Captain Jinks, Hero, Ernest Howard Crosby [free e books to read TXT] 📗

“We ought not to be too quick in judging foreigners,” said Sam. “Their methods may seem strange to us, but we are not competent to criticize them. Let each army judge for itself.”

“As a matter of fact,” said Cleary, “every army is down on the others. If you believe what they say about each other they’re a pretty bad lot. They all say that the Mosconians are barbarians, and they call the Tutonians thugs. The rest of them call the Franks woman-hunters, and they all call us and the Anglians auctioneers and looters and shopkeepers, and drunkards, and we’re known as temple-burners and vandals too.”

“What an outrage!” ejaculated Sam.

“The Anglians are more like us, but they’ve got a few old generals and then a lot of small boys, and nothing much between. I should think the generals would feel like schoolmasters. I told one of their officers that, and he said it was better than having second lieutenants seventy-five years old as we do. We’re loving each other a lot just now, the Anglians and us, but one of our naval officers let on to me that they were dying to have a war with them. You see, since South Africa nobody’s afraid of them except the Porsslanese, and they don’t read the papers. And how the Anglians despise the Franks! Why, we were discussing lying in war at a lunch-party, and one of their generals was there, a rather dense sort of a machine of a man. They had been saying that lying was an essential part of war, and that an officer must be a good liar and able to deceive the enemy well, as well as a good fighter, and the conversation drifted off into the question of lying in general. Somebody asked the general if he would say he was a Tutonian to save his life. ‘Of course,’ he answered. ‘But would you say you were a Frank under the same circumstances?’ asked someone else. ‘Certainly not,’ he said. Everybody roared, but he didn’t see any joke, and looked as grave as an owl all the rest of the afternoon. Then the commanders are all so jealous of each other. They are spying on each other and putting sticks in each other’s wheels. Officers are queer people. There’s only one profession that can compete with them for feline amenities, and that is the actress profession.”

“Cleary,” said Sam, “I let you talk this way for old acquaintance’s sake, but I wouldn’t take it from anyone else.”

“Fiddlesticks! You know I’m right. The Anglian officers like to hint at the frauds in our quartermaster’s department at Havilla, but I shut them up by asking how much their officers made off the horses they bought for South Africa in Hungary. Then they shut up like a clasp-knife. Officers talk a lot about their ‘brother officers,’ and you’d think they loved each other a lot, but I find they’re all glad so many were killed in South Africa because it gives them a lot of promotion. I tell you the officers of all the armies like to have a good list of dead officers after each battle, if they are only their superiors in rank. I’ve been picking up all I can among the different soldiers, and learning a lot. I was just talking to a lot of Anglian soldiers now. They were sharpening sabers and bayonets on grindstones. One of the older ones was telling me how they used to flog in the army. They had a regular parade, and the drummers used to lay on the lash, while a doctor watched so that they shouldn’t go too far. Sometimes the young subalterns who were in command would faint away at the sight.

“ ‘But it was so manly, sir,’ the fellow said to me. ‘The army isn’t what it was. But the other armies keep it up still, and we still birch youngsters in the navy so we needn’t despair of the world.’ ”

“When will the campaign be over?” asked Sam.

“There’s no telling. All the armies are afraid to leave, for fear the ones that are left will get some advantage from the Porsslanese Government. They’re a high old lot of allies. It’s a queer business. But the missionaries are as queer as any of them. You ought to have heard old Amen last Sunday. How he whooped things up! He took his text from the Gospel of St. Loot, I think! He was trying to stir up Taffy to be more severe. Amen ought to be a soldier. Our minister plenipotentiary isn’t a backward chap either. I went through the Imperial palace with him and his party the other day, and they pretty nearly cleaned it out, just for souvenirs, you know. He didn’t take anything himself, as far as I could see; but his women, bless my soul, they filled their pockets with jade and ivory and whatnot. There were some foreign looters in there at the same time, great swells too, and they just smashed the plate-glass over the cabinets and filled their pockets and their arms too. One old Porsslanese official was standing there, a high mandarin of some sort, and he had an emerald necklace around his neck. Some diplomat or other walked up to him and quietly took it off, and the old man didn’t stir, but the tears were rolling down his cheeks.”

“He had no right to complain,” said Sam. “We clearly have the right to the contents of a conquered city by the rules of war.”

“Perhaps. But there are some curious war rules. Some of the armies shoot all natives in soldiers’ uniforms because they are soldiers, and then they shoot all natives who resist them in civil dress, because they are not soldiers and have no right to fight. I suppose they ought to go about naked. They used to kill their prisoners with the butt-end of their rifles, but that breaks the rifles, and now they generally