Page:War's dark frame (IA warsdarkframe00camp).pdf/156

126 ing our own appetites. Splendid rashers of bacon had been brought from the storehouse for tomorrow's breakfast, and legs of lamb beyond counting for tomorrow's dinner. And I've learned since that there was nothing exceptional here. Tommy fights on such food unless his sup- plies are cut off by an unexpected bombardment, or, in an attack, he is caught for the night ahead of his transport.

The colonel grinned.

"Now and then they complain if they don't get just the type of cheese or jam they're accustomed to. But that sort of thing's looked after."

We followed him breathlessly to a hollow of the grounds where a hut stood reminiscent of the Y. M. C. A. shacks I had seen in Panama during the construction of the canal. The colonel verified that hazard. There is, he told me, a chain of these behind the front, furnished according to the familiar pattern with a store at one end, a billiard table at the other, and often a miniature stage for concerts and amateur theatricals.

"So," he said, "if a boy gets hungry or doesn't like what we give him up there he drops in and buys some chocolate or a cup of tea or coffee and maybe a handful of biscuits."

Somebody ventured the opinion that over-eat-