democratic liberty
would cause a silence to fall upon a group of them as though some
obscenity beyond the limits allowed in an officers' mess-room had
been uttered by a man without manners.

Their attitude to French officers was, in the beginning of the war,
calculated to put a little strain upon the Entente Cordiale. It was an
attitude of polite but haughty condescension. A number of young
Frenchmen of the best families had been appointed as interpreters to
the British Expedition. There were aristocrats among them whose
names run like golden threads through the pages of French history. It
was therefore disconcerting when the young Viscomte de Chose and
a certain Marquis de Machin found that their knowledge of English
was used for the purpose of buying a packet of cigarettes for a
lieutenant who knew no French, and of running errands for British
officers who accepted such services as a matter of course. The rank-
and-file of the British army which first came into France was also a
little careless of French susceptibilities. After the first rapture of that
welcome which was extended to anyone in khaki, French citizens
began to look a little askance at the regiments from the Highlands
and Lowlands, some of whose men demanded free gifts in the shops,
and, when a little drunk, were rather crude in their amorous advances
to girls of decent up-bringing. These things were inevitable. In our
regular army there were the sweepings of many slums, as well as the
best blood of our peasantry and our good old families. Tough and
hardened fellows called to the Colours again from Glasgow and
Liverpool, Cardiff and Limehouse, had none of the refinements of the
younger generation of soldiers who prefer lemonade to whisky, and
sweetmeats to shag. It was these who in the first Expeditionary Force
gave most trouble to the military police and found themselves under
the iron heel of a discipline which is very hard and very necessary in
time of war.

4

These men were heroic soldiers, yet our hero-worship need not blind
us to the truth of things. There is nothing more utterly false than to
imagine that war purges human nature of all its frailties and vices,
and that under the shadow of death a great body of men gathered
like this from many classes and cities, become suddenly white
knights, sans-peur et sans reproche, inspired by the highest ideals of
faith and chivalry. If only some new Shakespeare would come out of
the ranks after th