The soldier knows that, and he just carries around what he can use, and the kit bag is where he keeps them. It is a very fine thing to be able to carry useful things around with us.
A useless girl or boy is usually in the road.
What is the good of a lot of clothes if you can't wear them?
I saw a man on the vessel on which I once sailed to Australia who had seventeen suits of clothes, and their chief use was in keeping busy his cabin boy, who brushed them.
And what's the use of a lot of information in your mind if you can't use it?
I do not know which is the worse, having too many things or having nothing useful.
I have read of a beehive in California, away out on the face of a cliff. It is stored full, but all day long hundreds of bees swarm around the cave; and while men have put on leather suits, very little has ever been secured from that nest of useless sweetness.
But second: The kit bag has in it not merely things the soldier has to daily use—socks to keep his feet warm and dry; brushes to keep the snarl out of his hair; razors to keep his face smooth; soap to keep him clean—but he also stores away in it precious things, and they are useful too: Letters from home—what would he do without their messages of love?
They say the saddest sight in a camp was the disappointed face of a boy when the mail came and there was nothing for him.
If you are a young person, away from home and forget the old folks, that's the way your mother looks when you neglect to write.