Food remains a source of naval grievance to-day almost as much as in the days of the Great Mutiny. That it does so is mostly an inherited tradition of the past; for both quality and quantity are now excellent. An impression prevails, however, that were messing provided by the Admiralty on non-profit lines instead of by contract, “extras” would either be cheaper, or that what are now “canteen profits” on them would be more available than they are at present. There is little reason to believe that this is so. Like the purser of a hundred years ago, the modern contractor probably does not make a tenth of the profit that he is legendarily supposed to make, nor is there any clear proof that things could be materially bettered, except in details which have little or nothing to do with the main point. When all is said and done, the bluejacket of the Twentieth Century has always been fed as well or better than his brother in civilian life, and his growls upon the subject of messing do not demand any very serious attention. Just as the Great Mutiny of 1797 brought about an attention to details of uniform, regulations and things of that sort which have ever since endured, so it perpetuated a corresponding impression that an official eye must ever be directed to keeping messing more or less up to the mark. And that eye has never slumbered. In Chapter VIII, Vol. I, a page is devoted to surgery in the Great War Era. Here, as in some other matters, progress may be more real than imaginary. Now, as then, the Navy offers little in the way of lucrative inducements to a good surgeon. In one sense it offers less than it did; for, though exceptions can be found, the general naval conception of the doctor is still the old-fashioned notion of someone to cure the sick man rather than the more modern idea of preventing the man from becoming sick. The problem, it must, however, be admitted, is a difficult one in many ways. In peace conditions the medical staff is rather too large than too small; for all that, for modern war conditions it is probably hopelessly inadequate. It is more or less accepted that in modern battle the wounded must lie where they fall. Theoretically, at any rate, this is mitigated by certain instructions in First Aid, and the furnishing of hypodermic syringes to one member of each gun’s crew for use on the badly wounded. The days when lint was forbidden as a useless extravagance, and sponges were restricted for the sake of economy, have indeed gone, just as surely as has the old-time surgeon who, unable to afford his own instruments, had to borrow from the carpenter an ordinary saw to amputate a limb! But--relatively to shore-practice of equal date--the naval medical service is not much less hampered than it was a hundred odd years ago; and a really big naval action is likely enough to see as much superfluous agony (relatively speaking) as in the old days!