“As soon as my rawness wore off and I began to get the hang of it, the martial spirit asserted itself. I began to be obsessed by the desire to show that I was the right stuff, that the heroism of my American ancestors, the spirit of ’76, was in me. Through all my intensive training I was feverishly eager to know every detail of company and battalion drill, musketry and target-practice, and all the daily grind of the other sundry factors in military discipline. “When I began to ‘matey’ my comrades, I soon understood why a Tommy Atkins is not like an American, who is born with a fine sense of personal independence, and who feels that he is as good as any Lord or Duke; or like a volatile Frenchman, with his easy grace of manner and buoyant spirit. I realized that although there may be a ‘Sentimental Tommy’ here and there, the average Tommy Atkins is a stolid chap, humdrum and prosaic, but with as kind a heart as any rookie in the world. “As spring came along, after months of soldiering in many different quarters, which meant roughing it in leaky tents where cold, rain, and mud played a large part, and poor equipment a larger, we were no longer raw rookies, parading or drilling before an unadmiring public,—a target for pretty girls’ laughter, or the ire of a berating sergeant,—for our battalion had acquired a high degree of efficiency. “Our arms were one with us, we had done with squad, platoon formation, and company drills, had shown our metal at the rifle-range at Aldershot, taken part in field maneuvers, bayonet charges, and mimic battles. We had become experts at trench-digging, bomb-throwing, and sniping, while the machine-gunners were quite up to the mark in that important weapon; in fact, we had become familiar with all branches of the army service. “Then when every man was ‘in the pink’ the marching orders came, and we assembled on the barrack-square at Aldershot. Not only were we physically fit, fine specimens of the trained soldier, but we were completely equipped, even to the identification tag, which registered your name, regimental number, regiment, and religion; besides, we carried the first-aid field dressing,—an antiseptic gauze pad and bandage, and a small bottle of iodine. Also, each soldier carried a copy of Lord Kitchener’s letter, as to what was expected of every British soldier. The words ‘Do your duty bravely. Fear God. Honor your King,’ meant much to me, although I was an American.