"They never seem to get enough sleep, in the East, at any rate.

I have seen them dancing for hours after midnight, and heard of them pig-sticking or schooling hunters at five o'clock next morning." "So you assume I have been in the army ?" "I am quite sure of it." "May I ask why ?" "Your manner, your voice, your quiet air of authority, the very way you walk, all betray you." "Then," he said sadly, "I will not attempt to deny the fact.

I held a commission in the Indian Staff Corps for nine years.

It was a hobby of mine, Miss Deane, to make myself acquainted with the best means of victualing my men and keeping them in good health under all sorts of fanciful conditions and in every kind of climate, especially under circumstances when ordinary stores were not available.

With that object in view I read up every possible country in which my regiment might be engaged, learnt the local names of common articles of food, and ascertained particularly what provision nature made to sustain life.
The study interested me.