Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1918-05-16

his veins.
Then another collection is made. a
school formed. and they carry on with
the game.
The caller-out has many nicknames
for the numbers such as "Kelly's Eye
for one, Legs Eleven" for eleven,
"Cllckety-cllck" for sIxty-six, or TOP
OF the house" meaning ninety.
The game is honest and quite en-
joyable. Sometimes you have fourteen
numbers on your card covered and
you are waiting for the fifteenth to be
called. In an implorlng voice you call
out, "Come on Watkins. chum, I'm
sweating on 'Kelly's Eye"
Watkins generally replies, swell.
keep out of a draft, you'll catch cold
Another game is "Pontoon." played
with cards; II is the same as our
''Black Jack" or "Twenty-one."
A card game called "Brag" is also
popular. Using a casino deck, the
dealer deals each player three cards.
Ii is similar to our poker, except for
the fact that you only use three cards
and cannot draw. The deck Is never
shuffied until a man shows three or a
kind or "prIle" as II Is called. The
value of the hands are, high card, a
pair, a run, flush or three Of a kind
or "prlle.' The limit Is generally a
penny, so II Is hard to win fortune.
The next In popularity Is a card
game called NAP" II Is well named.
Every time played It went to sleep.
Whist and solo whist are played by
the hlghbrows of the company.
When the gamblers tire of all other
games they try Banker and Broker"
spent a week trying to teach some
Of the Tommles how to play poker, but
because | won thlrty-hve francs they
declared that they didn't "fawncy" the
game.
Tommy plays few card games; the
general run never heard of poker, eu-
chre, seven up. or plnochle. They have
game similar to pinochie called
"Royal Bezique," but few know how to
play It.
Generally there are two decks of
cards In a section. and In short time
they are so dog-eared and greasy, you
can hardly tell the ace Of spades from
the ace Of hearts. The owners of these
decks sometimes condescend to lend
them after much coaxing.
SO you see Mr.. Atkins has his fun
mixed In with his hardshlps and, con-
trary to popular belief, the rank and
file OF the British army In the trenches
is one big happy family. Now In Vir-
glnla, at school, was fed on old Nc
Guffys primary reader, which gave me
an opinion of an Engllshman about
equal to '76 Minute Mans backed up
by Sim Feiners. But l found Tom
my to be the best of mates and a gem
tleman through and through. He never
thinks of knocking his officers. If one
makes costly mistake and Tommy
pays with his blood, there is no gen.
eral condemnation of the officer. He.
Is just pitled. 1t Is exactly the same
as it was with the Light Brigade at
Balaclava, to say nothing of Gallipoli,
Neuve Chapelle and Loos. Personally
remember a little incident where
twenty Of us were sent on trench
raid, only two of us returning, but
will tell this story later on.
l said i was q big happy family, and
so It is, but as In all happy families,
there are servants, so In the British
army there are also servants, officers
servants, or 30. s." as they are termed
In the American army the common
name for them is dog robbers" From
Winston Churchill made the state
ment, as far as | can remember, that
the officers servants in the British
forces totaled nearly two hundred
thousand. He claimed that this re-
moved two hundred thousand excep-
tionally good and well-traned fighters
from the actual firing line, claiming
that the officers, when selecting man
for servants duty, generally picked the
man who had been out the longest and
knew the ropes.
But from my observation find that
a large percentage of the servants do
90 over the top, but behind the lines
they very seldom engage in digging
parties, fatigues, parades or drills.
This work is as necessary as actually
engaging In an attack, therefore think
1t would be safe to say that the all
round work of the two hundred thou
sand is about equal to fifty thousand
men who are on straight military du-
ties. In numerous instances, officers
servants hold the rank of lance-corpo-
rails and they assume the same duties
and authority of butler, the one
stripe giving him precedence over the
other servants.
There are lots of amusing stories
told of 80. s."
One day one of our majors went into
the servants billet and commenced
"blinding' at them, saying that his
horse had no straw and that he per-
knew that straw had been is
sued for this purpose. He called the
to account. The cor
moral answered "Rlima mo sir the