The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-02-06
LICKING RAJV RECRUITS.
Ordeal Which Green British Soldiers Are
 Compelled to Pass Through.

(Ruiyard Klpl1ng in the Century.)
 The regular working of the empire shifted his world to India, where he tasted utter loneliness in subaltern's quarters, one room and one bullock trunk, and, With his mess, learned the new life from the beginning. But there were horses in the land-ponies at reasonable price; there was polo for such as could afford it; there were the disreputable remnants of a pack of hounds, and there were cricket and musketry instruction, and Cottar wor- ried his way along without too much despair. It dawned on him that a reg iment in India. was nearer the chance of active service than he had conceived, and that man might as well study his profession.
 A major of the new school backed this idea with enthusiasm Che was black little man, full of notions, and he and Cottar accumulated a good li- brary of military works, and read and argued and disputed far into the
 
 thing: "Get to know your men, young un, and they'll follow you anywhere. That's all you want-know your men. " Cottar thought he knew them fairly well at cricket and the regimental sports, but he never realized the true inwardness of them till he was sent off with a detachment of twenty to sit down in a mud fort near a rushing river which was spanned by a bridge of boats. When the floods came, they went out and hunted stray pontoons down the banks. Otherwise there was nothing. to do, and the men got drunk, gambled and quarreled. They were a sickly crew, for a junior subaltern is by custom saddled with the worst men. Cottar endured their rioting as long as he could, and then sent down country for a dozen pairs of boxing gloves. Nothing in the regulation forbids an of ficer taking part in healthy sports.
 T wouldn't blame you for fightin', 7 said he, eff you only knew how to use your hands, but you don't. Take these things and I'll show you.' It was great sport, for he could pay back an insubor- dinate young thief and teach him some thing at the same time; and then the men appreciated his, efforts. Now, in- stead of blaspheming and swearing at conlrade and threatening to shoot him, they could take him apart and soothe themselves to. exhaustion. As one man explained, whom Cottar found with a, shut eye and diamond-shaped mouth splitting teeth through an embra- sure: "We tried it with the gloves, sir, for twenty minutes, and that done us no good. sir. Then we took off the gloves and tried it that way for anoth- CT twenty minutes, same as you showed us, sir an that done us a world O good. 'Twasn't tightin', sir; there was a bet on."
 Cottar dared not laugh, but he invi- ted his men to other sports, such as racing across country in shirt and trousers after a trail of torn paper, and to single-stick in the evening, till the native population, who had a lust for sports in every form, wished to know whether the white men understood wrestling. They sent in an ambassa- dor, who took the soldiers by the neck and threw them in the dust, and the en- tire command were all for this new game. They spent money on learning new falls and holds, which was better than buying beer and other doubtful commodities, and the big-limbed peas antry grinned five deep round the tour nanrents.
 That detachment, who had gone up in bullock carts, returned to headquarters, at an average rate of thirty miles a day, fair heel and toe; no sick, no pris- oners, and no court-martials pending. They scattered themselves among their friends, singing the praises of their lieutenant and looking for causes of of fense.