“On the train the other day a private sat with his tunic unbuttoned, for the temperature was high. A sergeant strode up to him and said:
“‘Button up that tunic! Did you never hear of by-law 217, subsection D? I’m Sergeant Jabez Winterbottom!’
“A gentleman in the seat behind tapped the sergeant sternly on the shoulder.
“‘How dare you issue orders with a pipe in your mouth?’ he asked. ‘Go home and read paragraph 174, section M, part IX. I am Major Eustace Carroll.’
“Here a gentleman with a drooping white mustache interposed from the other side of the aisle:
“‘If Major Carroll,’ he said coldly, ‘will consult by-law 31 of section K, he will learn that to reprimand a sergeant in the presence of a private is an offense not lightly to be overlooked.’”
THEN HE GRABBED THE PAIL
A woman, one of the 30,000 British working for the Y. M. C. A., was assigned to scrub the Eagle hut floor in London. She had done little manual labor in her life, but accepted the job without protest and went down on her knees with a pail of hot water, a cloth, and a cake of soap. Soon the water in the pail was black. A man in uniform passed. The woman looked up and asked if he would mind emptying the pail and refilling it with clean water.
There was a pause, then his reply:
“Dammit, madam, I’m an officer!”