Plantsfield looked at him with withering contempt. That his word—the word of the chief "rumourist" of the unit—should be doubted was almost too much for human endurance. "I’ll stuff you, ye young cub, if ye dare to doubt a man old enough to be yer grandfather," he returned scathingly; and then turning to the others he continued: "I seen the Mechanical Transport near Boulogne and was talkin’ to them." "Oh, I’ll bet you wos talkin’, all right," Wilson came back vindictively, "if ye got within fifty yards uv ’em." Plantsfield’s garrulity was proverbial. He had been known to buttonhole generals and draw them to one side to whisper a choice bit of scandal in their unwilling ears—his age excusing him from reprimand. He looked wrathfully at Wilson, but that wily youth kept his rosy cheeks carefully out of arm-shot. Turning back to his more respectful auditors, and for the nonce ignoring the disrespectful one, he pursued: "The Supply Column on their way to the front saw a German aeroplane over them, forgot discipline in their excitement, jumped down off their waggons and blazed away at it with their rifles." "Without orders, I’ll bet?" exclaimed Jogman, slapping his knee. "Of course," grinned Plantsfield. Honk had been standing with his mouth open, listening intently and taking in every word orally. He opened it a shade wider as Jogman finished speaking, and was about to make an observation, when Huxford, who was somewhat of a mimic, took the words out of his mouth: "Just like them blawsted Canydians—’avin’ their poke at th’ bleedin’ Hun. W’y cawn’t they wyte fer h’orders like h’everybody h’else—wyte until ’e gits aw’y?" Honk’s indignant protest was drowned in the general clamour which followed this sally, but his eyes—individually—said wonders. At the outset discipline was a sore point with the Canadians. Like the peoples of all free-born countries, it took a long time to suppress the desire for individual initiative and an innate independence resented authority. But as the war progressed, Tommy and his seniors came to realise the absolute necessity for discipline, and bowed with what grace they might before its yoke. Perhaps what reconciled them most was the acquired knowledge that it pervaded all ranks from the generals down. They soon saw that the chain of responsibility must have no missing link. In the early days of the war, however, on Salisbury Plains in the rain and mud, discipline was almost an impossibility, and officers seeking to inculcate this quality in their men had many strange experiences. A Tommy was doing "sentry go" one evening in front of his battalion lines when an officer approached to speak to him. Tommy kept his rifle firmly on his shoulder, at the "slope," and made no attempt to come to attention or salute. The officer, wishing to see if he understood his duty, demanded: "What are you doing here?"