THE SUBALTERNS' PARADISE.
I met Bilsden and congratulated him on being in "civvies."
"What are you going to do now?" I asked. "Back to the old firm?"
"No," said Bilsden gravely; "when a man has acquired the power of leading men he's thrown away in an accountant's office, especially as the junior member of the staff. I see no prospect in England. I have offered to take charge of large departments of English firms, and be responsible for entire supervision, but they fail to recognise what the capacity for leadership gained in the army will do. I'm off to Ceylon—tea-planting. Just to control big gangs of coolies and see that they work. It will be child's play for me. Lovely climate; elephants. An absolutely ideal job."
It seemed to me on that foggy frosty day, that to lie in a hammock in the shade, with the temperature about ninety, watching coolies work, would be the perfect form of labour.
I congratulated Bilsden on having found his métier.
Half-an-hour later I met Parkinson, another second-loot who had just shed his pip.
"Well, what are you going to do now?" I asked.
"I'm a bit dubious," he said.
"Try tea-planting in Ceylon," I suggested. "Elephants, spicy breezes, swing in a hammock all day watching coolies. My dear boy, were I twenty years younger I should be inquiring about a berth on the next steamer."