THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



499 



Photograph by Herbert Corey 



AN AMERICAN ROLLING KITCHEN ON ITS WAY TO THE FRONT ON A RAINY DAY 



Each company of 250 men has a mess sergeant and four cooks. Each cook has two 

 helpers and four "kitchen police. The "K. P.s" are seen standing at the rear wheels. It is 

 their duty to find the wood and water and do the rough work. Note the tin hat slung to the 

 collar of one of the mules. 



They still feel, against all reason, that 

 there is something shameful in their state. 

 They try to assume a joviality they do 

 not feel, and call the things "pants rab- 

 bits" and "seam squirrels" and speak of 

 "reading their shirts." 



"I'll meet you this afternoon," a non- 

 com once told me, "down at Cootie 

 Park." 



Cootie Park was the grassy bank of a 

 streamlet on which the sun shone warm. 

 In the meadow was a flock of sheep 

 guarded by two alert dogs, while the bent 

 old shepherd carried the weaker lambs in 

 his arms. Now and then he blew upon a 

 brass instrument — half whistle, half 

 squeak — and the flock and dogs obeyed 

 his summons. 



The disciplined sheep interested the 

 boys immensely, as they sat there bare to 

 the waist in the sunshine, going over their 

 seams. Two discussed the shepherd and 

 the sheep: 



"Sure," one said, "he can blow every 

 order we've got in the manual of arms. 

 Last night I was watching him, and when 

 it came time to start home he whistled 

 'Eyes right/ and they did." 



TRUE MORAL COURAGE NEEDED TO BEAR 

 THIS PLAGUE 



This is not a pleasant recital, if one 

 thinks in civilian terms of the louse as 

 loathsome and suspects that the men who 

 suffer from this plague are in some way 

 to blame. At the very best it cannot be 

 pleasant. But lately, since my own peo- 

 ple have come into the war, and because 

 I know them best and talk their language, 

 I have begun to realize the moral courage 

 that is needed to bear this plague without 

 whining. 



Many a man has told me that to be 

 under fire would be a trifle if he could 

 but be clean. Mud and thirst and hunger 

 and cold can be borne with equanimity, 

 but the louse carries the suggestion of 

 degradation. Yet that, too, is sustained 

 bravely. 



"I have only known one man who cried 

 because of the plague," a surgeon once 

 told me. "That man went into No Man's 

 Land on reconnaissance at night in as 

 commonplace fashion as though he were 

 taking the tram' for the office of a morn- 

 ing." 



