"Lucky he doesn't start talking about the factory hands who've
served their apprenticeship in the war, and all those who've stayed
at home under the excuse of National Defense, that was put on its
feet in five secs!" murmured Tirette; "he'd keep us going with them
till Doomsday."
"You say there are a hundred thousand of them, flea-bite," chaffed
Barque. "Well, in 1914--do you hear me?--Millerand, the War
Minister, said to the M.P.'s, 'There are no shirkers.'"
"Millerand!" growled Volpatte. "I tell you, I don't know the man;
but if he said that, he's a dirty sloven, sure enough!"
* * * * * *
"One is always," said Bertrand, "a shirker to some one else."
"That's true; no matter what you call yourself, you'll
always--always--find worse blackguards and better blackguards than
yourself."
"All those that never go up to the trenches, or those who never go
into the first line, and even those who only go there now and then,
they're shirkers, if you like to call 'em so, and you'd see how many
there are if they only gave stripes to the real fighters."
"There are two hundred and fifty to each regiment of two
battalions," said Cocon.
"There are the orderlies, and a bit since there were even the
servants of the adjutants."--"The cooks and the under-cooks."--"The
sergeant-majors, and the quartermaster-sergeants, as often as
not."--"The mess corporals and the mess fatigues."--"Some
office-props and the guard of the colors.
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