"Quite so," he said, and gave me a long explanation of what my pay would be now that I had decided to join the Army. He began with the one and a penny of a private and was working up towards the stipend of a Field Marshal when I stopped him. "One moment----" "Exactly," he said. "You're married." "Y--yes," I said. "At least, no," I added, thinking of Madingley. "Surely you know?" he asked in surprise. I remembered suddenly the penalty for a false declaration. It would be no good explaining afterwards that I meant Madingley. "Yes," I said. "Married." He told me what my separation allowance would be.... As a married Field Marshal with three children it came to ----. I decided to be firm. "Er--I mustn't trouble you too much," I said. "I really only wanted to know if you take men with spectacles." "Depends how short-sighted you are. Do you always wear them?" "No, but I ought to really." I made a desperate effort to get Madingley back into the conversation. "I really only came to find out for a----" "Ah, well, the best thing you can do," said the sergeant, "is to pass the medical examination first. You can sign the papers afterwards. Come along." I followed him meekly downstairs. It was obviously not Madingley's afternoon. We plunged downstairs into what was no doubt the anti-Zeppelin cellar. Through the gloom I saw dimly two or three pink-and-white figures waiting their turn to be thumped. Down the throat of a man in the middle of the room a doctor was trying to climb. Mechanically I began to undo my tie. The sergeant spoke to one of the doctors and then came back to me. "It'll save time if we do your sight first," he said. "Stand over in this corner." I stood in the corner.... For a long time nothing happened. "Well?" said the sergeant impatiently. "Well?" I said. "Why don't you read?" "What? Have we begun?" I asked in surprise. I couldn't see anything. The medical officer came over to me and in a friendly way put his hand over my left eye. It didn't help much, but I spotted where he came from, and gathered that the card must be in that direction. Gradually it began to loom through the blackness. "Wait a moment," I said. I removed his hand and gazed keenly at the opposite wall. "That's a B," I announced proudly. "That top one." The doctor and the sergeant looked at each other. "It's no good," sighed the sergeant. "He can't even read the first two lines," groaned the doctor. "It's all very well for you two," I broke in indignantly; "one of you lives down here and is used to it, and the other knows the card by heart. I haven't come to enlist for night operations only. Surely your regiment does things in the daylight sometimes?" The doctor, only knowing about the daylight by hearsay, looked blank; the sergeant repeated sadly, "Not even the first two lines." "Look here," I said, "lend me the card to-night and I'll come again to-morrow. If it's only two lines you want, I think I can promise you them."