In the following chapters, showing as far as possible the inner life of the Army from the point of view of the soldier, an attempt has been made to show the average of life in each branch of the service. Exceptions occur: the quality of the commanding officer makes all the difference in the life of the unit which he commands; again, apart from the influence exercised by the personality of the commanding officer, that of the company or squadron officer is a very potent factor in the lives of the men under his command. The British Army, fine fighting machine though it is, is not perfect, and there are instances of bad commanding officers, bad squadron and company officers, just as there are instances of superlatively good ones. Between these is the influence exerted by the mass on the mass, from which an average picture may be drawn. That picture is the portrait of the British soldier, second to none. CHAPTER II THE WAY OF THE RECRUIT The way of the recruit, though still a hard one, is not so hard as it used to be, for, especially in the cavalry and artillery, various modifications have been introduced by which the youngster is broken in gradually to his work. This is not all to the good, for under the new way of working the training which precedes “dismissal” from recruit’s training to the standing of a trained soldier takes longer, and, submitting the recruit to a less strenuous form of life for the period through which it lasts, does not produce quite so handy and quick a man as the one who was kept at it from dawn till dark, with liberty at the end of his official day’s work to clean up equipment for the next day. Still, the annual training of the “dismissed” soldier is a more strenuous business now than in old time, so probably the final result is about the same. The recruit’s first requirements, after he has interviewed the recruiting sergeant on the subject of enlistment is to take the oath--a very quick and simple matter--and then to pass the doctor, which is not so simple. The recruit is stripped, sounded, tested for full physical efficiency, and made to pass tests in eyesight and breathing which, if he emerges satisfactorily, proclaim him as near physical perfection as humanity can get without a course of physical culture--and that course is administered during his first year of service. Kept under the wing of the recruiting sergeant for a matter of hours or days, as the case may be, the recruit is at last drafted off to his depot, or direct to his unit, where his real training begins in earnest. We may take the case of a recruit who had enlisted from mixed motives, arrived at a station whence he had to make his way to barracks in the evening, in order to begin his new life; here are his impressions of beginning life in the Army.