don't know
how to darn socks. When the heels wear through, come blisters. Bad
blisters disable a man. Of the million of surplus women (see above) the
government has not had the intelligence to get any to darn our socks.
So a certain percentage of us go lame. And so on. And so on.

"You will think all this is awful grousing, but the point I want to
make--I hereby to ease my feelings make it now in a fair round hand--is
that all this business could be done far better and far cheaper if it
wasn't left to these absolutely inexperienced and extremely exclusive
military gentlemen. They think they are leading England and showing us
all how; instead of which they are just keeping us back. Why in thunder
are they doing everything? Not one of them, when he is at home, is
allowed to order the dinner or poke his nose into his own kitchen or
check the household books.... The ordinary British colonel is a helpless
old gentleman; he ought to have a nurse.... This is not merely the
trivial grievance of my insulted stomach, it is a serious matter for the
country. Sooner or later the country may want the food that is being
wasted in all these capers. In the aggregate it must amount to a daily
destruction of tons of stuff of all sorts. Tons.... Suppose the war
lasts longer than we reckon!"

From this point Hugh's letter jumped to a general discussion of the
military mind.

"Our officers are beastly good chaps, nearly all of them. That's where
the perplexity of the whole thing comes in. If only they weren't such
good chaps! If only they were like the Prussian officers to their men,
then we'd just take on a revolution as well as the war, and make
everything tidy at once. But they are decent, they are charming.... Only
they do not think hard, and they do not understand that doing a job
properly means doing it as directly and thought-outly as you possibly
can. They won't worry about things. If their tempers were worse perhaps
their work might be better. They won't use maps or timetables or books
of reference. When we move to a new place they pick up what they can
about it by hearsay; not one of our lot has the gumption to possess a
contoured map or a Michelin guide. They have hearsay minds. They are
fussy and petty and wasteful--and, in the way of getting things done,
pretentious. By their code they're paragons of honour. Courage--they're
all right about that; no end of it; honesty, truthfulness, and so
on--high. They have a kind of horse