[Illustration: General Ian Hamilton in South Africa.] Until it comes to the critical test, however, the British army gets along just as well as though the officers worried themselves about the fine principles of the art of war. It is astonishing how dependent the officers are upon their men. One morning, while with General French’s staff during the operations in South Africa, I was waiting for a man to put the saddle on my horse; being rather impatient, as an action was expected, I remarked to one of the staff officers standing by that I would not wait, and so picked up my saddle, swung it on the horse, and began to cinch it up. The officer watched me in an interested, half-amused way for a moment, and then said, “My word! but you’re clever!” I asked what he meant. “Why,” he answered, “you can saddle your own horse.” “Most certainly,” I replied; “can’t you?” “Well,” said he, “I suppose I could, although I have never tried, for my man always does that.” And that man was a cavalry officer. A signal difference between the English and American officer is that the former cannot forget his Piccadilly manner when he is in the field; while the latter, no matter whether he is a regular or a volunteer, once in the field he is a soldier through and through. There are some of this type in the British service, but they are few and far between. One of the most typical soldiers I have ever seen in any service was Colonel Beech, now a captain of the Reserve, who was for about ten years commanding an Egyptian regiment of cavalry. He is still a young man, but he has had more experience in war than usually comes to any ten men. He has seven clasps to his Egyptian medal, having been in every campaign waged about the Nile by the British in conquering the country. He is a man of enormous force, and perfect knowledge of all branches of military work, and is to-day a better soldier than the majority of generals who are commanding. He is much the same type of man that Kitchener is, and naturally, as he was trained in the same school.