Prejudices, third seriesMencken, H. L. (Henry Louis)
History
Prejudices, third series
Mencken, H. L. (Henry Louis)
American essays -- 20th century; American literature -- History and criticism; Literature -- History and criticism
But even so the civil arm is robbed of its just dues in the department
of gauds and radioactivity, no doubt by the direct operation of
military vanity and jealousy. Despite a million proofs (and perhaps a
billion eloquent arguments) to the contrary, it is still the theory at
the official ribbon counter that the only man who serves in a war is
the man who serves in uniform. This is soft for the Bevo officer, who
at least has his service stripes and the spurs that gnawed into his
desk, but it is hard upon his brother Irving, the dollar-a-year man,
who worked twenty hours a day for fourteen months buying soap-powder,
canned asparagus and raincoats for the army of God. Irving not only
labored with inconceivable diligence; he also faced hazards of no mean
order, for on the one hand was his natural prejudice in favor of a
very liberal rewarding of commercial enterprise, and on the other hand
were his patriotism and his fear of Atlanta Penitentiary. I daresay
that many and many a time, after working his twenty hours, he found it
difficult to sleep the remaining four hours. I know, in fact, survivors
of that obscure service who are far worse wrecks to-day than Pershing
is. Their reward is—what? Winks, sniffs, innuendos. If they would
indulge themselves in the now almost universal American yearning to
go adorned, they must join the Knights of Pythias. Even the American
Legion fails them, for though it certainly does not bar non-combatants,
it insists that they shall have done their non-combatting in uniform.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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