But the one that put years on all the many hundreds of candidates who must have regarded it with uninspired misery was of an angelic little boy sitting staring soulfully at a violin. There are men all over the world today who will remember that picture when Rembrandt’s Night Watch is forgotten. As art it was probably execrable, and as a mental stimulant it was the original lead balloon. Just the sight of that smug, curly-headed little Bubbles filled you with a sense of gloom. One Indian candidate was so affected by it that he began to weep; Hayhurst, after much mental anguish, produced the idea that it was one of Fagin’s apprentices gloating over his first haul; my own thought was that the picture represented the infant Stradivarius coming to the conclusion that given a well-organised sweat-shop there was probably money in it.
Only Martin-Duggan dealt with the thing at length; the picture stirred something in his poetic Irish soul. The little boy, he recorded for the benefit of the examiners, was undoubtedly the son of a famous concert violinist. His daddy had been called up to the forces during the war, and the little boy was left at home, gazing sadly at the violin which his father would have no opportunity of playing until the war was over. The little boy was terribly upset about this, the thought of his father’s wonderful music being silenced; he felt sure his daddy would pine away through being deprived of his violin-playing. Let the little boy take heart, said Martin-Duggan; he needn’t worry, because if his daddy played his cards right he would get himself promoted to the post of quarter-master, and then he would be able to fiddle as much as he liked.
Martin-Duggan was terribly pleased with this effort; the poor sap didn’t seem to understand that in military circles a joke is only as funny as the rank of its author is exalted, and Martin-Duggan’s rank couldn’t have been lower.
Of course, by the time the written tests were over, the three of us were quite certain that we were done for. Our showing had probably been about as bad as it could be, we thought, and our approach to the final ordeal of the Selection Board, on the third afternoon, was casual, not to say resigned. This was a trip over the assault course—a military obstacle race in which you tear across country, climb walls, swing on ropes, crawl through tunnels, and jump off ramps. The climax is usually something pretty horrid, and in this case it consisted of a monsoon ditch four feet deep in water, at the end of which was a huge bamboo fence up which you had to climb in three-man teams, helping each other and showing initiative, intelligence, cheerfulness, and other officer-like qualities, if possible.
We were the last three over, and as we waded up the ditch, encouraging each other with military cries, the rain was lashing down something awful. There was a covered shelter overlooking the ditch, and it was crammed with examiners—all writing away as they observed the floundering candidates - as well as the top brass of the board. All the other candidates had successfully scaled the fence, and were standing dripping with mud and water, waiting to see how we came on.
Our performance, viewed from the bank, must have been something to see. I stood up to my waist in water against the fence, and Martin-Duggan climbed on my shoulders, and Hayhurst climbed on his, and I collapsed, and we all went under. We did this about five or six times, and the gallery hooted with mirth. Martin-Duggan, who was a proud sensitive soul, got mad, and swore at me and kicked me, and Hayhurst made a tremendous effort and got on to the top of the fence. He pulled Martin-Duggan up, and the pair of them tried to pull me up, too, but I wasn’t having any. I was rooted up to my middle in the sludge, and there I was going to stay, although I made it look as though I was trying like hell to get up.
They tugged and strained and swore, and eventually Martin-Duggan slipped and came down with a monumental splash, and Hayhurst climbed down as well. The spectators by this time were in hysterics, and when we had made three or four more futile efforts—during which I never emerged from the water once—the officer commanding the board leaned forward and said:
“Don’t you chaps think you’d better call it a day?”
I don’t know what Martin-Duggan, a mud-soaked spectre, was going to reply, but I beat him to it. Some heaven-sent inspiration struck me, because I said, in the most soapy, sycophantic, Eric-or-Little-by-Little voice I have ever used in my life:
“Thank you, sir, we’d prefer to finish the course.”
It must have sounded impressive, for the C.O. stood back, almost humbly, and motioned us to continue. So we did, floundering on with tremendous zeal and getting nowhere, until we were almost too weary to stand and so mud-spattered that we were hardly recognisable as human beings. And the C.O., bless him, leaned forward again, and I’ll swear there was a catch in his voice as he said:
“Right, that’s enough. Well tried. And even if you didn’t finish it, there’s one thing I’d like to say. I admire guts.” And all the examiners, writing for dear life, made muted murmurs of assent.
What they and the C.O. didn’t know was that my trousers had come off while we were still wading up the ditch, and that was why I had never budged out of the water and why we had never got up the fence. A good deal I had endured, but I was not going to appear soaked and in my shirt-tail before all the board and candidates, not for anything. And as we waded back down the ditch and out of sight round the bend, I told Martin-Duggan and Hayhurst so.
And we passed, I suppose because we showed grit, determination, endurance, and all the rest of it. Although with Selection Boards you never could tell. Only the three of us know that what got us through was the loss of my pants, and military history has been made out of stranger things than that.
The life of the very young officer is full of surprises, and perhaps the most shaking is the moment when he comes face to face with his men for the first time. His new sergeant stamps to a halt in front of him, salutes, and barks: “Platoon-presnready-frinspeckshun-sah!”, and as he clears his throat and regards the thirty still figures, each looking to its front with frozen intensity, the young subaltern realises that this is it, at last; this is what he is drawing his meagre pay for.
In later years he may command armies or govern great territories, but he will never feel again the same power-drunk humility of the moment when he takes over his platoon. It is elating and terrifying—mostly terrifying. These thirty men are his responsibility, to look after, to supervise, to lead (whatever that means). Of course, they will do what he tells them—or he hopes they will, anyway. Suppose they don’t? Suppose that ugly one in the front rank suddenly says “No, I will not slope arms for you, or shave in the morning, or die for king and country”? The subaltern feels panic stealing over him, until he remembers that at his elbow there is a sergeant, who is wise in dealing with these matters, and he feels better.
There are young officers, of course, who seem to regard themselves as born to the job, and who cruise through their first platoon inspection with nonchalant interest, conversing airily with the sergeant as they go; possibly Hannibal and Napoleon were like that. But I doubt it. A man would have to be curiously insensitive not to realise that for the first time in his life thirty total strangers are regarding him with interest and suspicion and anxiety, wondering if he is a soft mark or a complete pig, or worse still, some kind of nut. When he realises this he feels like telling them that he is, really, all right and on their side, but of course he can’t. If he did, they would know for certain he was some kind of nut. They will just have to find out about each other gradually, and it can be a trying process.
I have only a hazy impression of inspecting my platoon for the first time. They were drawn