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Barbusse, Henri, 1873-1935

"Under Fire: the story of a squad"

Q.--Headquarters; the
Service de l'lntendance, [note 3] and the supply column. There's
also the drove of cattle, the Remount Depot, the Motor
Department--talk about the swarm of soft jobs I could tell you about
in an hour if I wanted to!--the Paymaster that controls the
pay-offices and the Post, the Council of War, the Telegraphists, and
all the electrical lot. All those have chiefs, commandants, sections
and sub-sections, and they're rotten with clerks and orderlies of
sorts, and all the bally box of tricks. You can see from here the
sort of job the C.O. of a Corp's got!"
At this moment we were surrounded by a party of soldiers carrying
boxes in addition to their equipment, and parcels tied up in paper
that they bore reluctantly and anon placed on the ground, puffing.
"Those are the Staff secretaries. They are a part of the
H.Q.--Headquarters--that is to say, a sort of General's suite. When
they're flitting, they lug about their chests of records, their
tables, their registers, and all the dirty oddments they need for
their writing. Tiens! see that, there; it's a typewriter those two
are carrying, the old papa and the little sausage, with a rifle
threaded through the parcel. They're in three offices, and there's
also the dispatch-riders' section, the Chancellerie, the
A.C.T.S.--Army Corps Topographical Section--that distributes maps to
the Divisions, and makes maps and plans from the aviators and the
observers and the prisoners.


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