As Barry watched the drill sergeant on his job, it seemed to him that he had never seen a soldier work before. In figure, in pose, in action there was a perfection about him that awakened at once admiration and envy. Below the average height, yet not insignificant, erect, without exaggeration, precise in movement without angularity, swift in action without haste, he was indeed a joy to behold.

"Now, did you ever see anything like that?" enquired the major, after their eyes had followed the evolutions of the drill sergeant for a time.

"Never," said Barry, "nor do I hope to again. He is a--I was going to say dream, but he's no dream. He's much too wide awake for that. He's a poem; that's what he is."

Back and forth, about and around, stepped the little drill sergeant, a finished example of precise, graceful movement. He was explaining in clean cut, and evidently memorised speech the details of the movements he wished executed, but through his more formal and memorised vocabulary his native cockney would occasionally erupt, adding vastly to the pungency and picturesqueness of his speech.

"He knows we are here all right," said the major, "but he would not let on if it were King George himself. I'll bet you a month's pay, though, that we can't get one foot beyond what he considers the saluting point before he comes to attention, and as for his salute, there is nothing like it in the whole Canadian army. Talk about a poem, his salute has Shakespeare faded. Now he's going to move them off. Watch and listen!"

"Ye-a-ou-w!" came the long-drawn cry, fiercely threatening, representing in English speech the word "squad." Then followed an expletive, "Yun!"

which for explosive quality made a rifle crack seem a drawl, and which appeared to release in the men a hidden spring drawn to its utmost tension. The slack and sagging line leaped into a rigid unit, of breathless, motionless humanity.

"Aw-e-ou-aw!" a prolonged vocalisation, expressive of an infinite and gentle pity, and interpreted to the initiated ear to mean "As you were!"

released the rigid line to its former sagging state.

"N-a-w then," said the voice in a semi-undertone, slow and tense, "this ain't no arter dinner bloomin' siester. A little snap--ple--ease!" The last word in a sharply rising inflection, tightening up the spring again for the explosive "Ye-a-ou-w--yun!" (Squad attention.) "Aw-e-ou-r--yun!!! Aw-e-ou-r--yun!!!"

Without warning came the commands, repeating "As you were!" "Attention!"

He walked up and down before the rigid line, looking them over and remarking casually,

"Might be a little worse," adding as an afterthought, "per-haps!" After which, with a sharp right turn, and a quick march, he himself leading with a step of clean-cut, easy grace, he moved them to the bayonet-fighting ground.

"By Jove!" breathed Barry. "Did you ever imagine anything like that?"

"The result of ten years in the regular army," said the major.

"It's almost worth it," answered Barry.

Arriving at the bayonet-fighting ground, the little sergeant major put the squad through their manual as if they had been recruits, to a running comment of biting pleasantries. After bringing them to attention, he walked slowly down the line, then back again, and remarked after due deliberation:

"I have seen worse--not often--" Then, in a tone of resignation, he gave the order:

"Stan-a-yeh!!!"

The men "stood at ease," and then "stood easy."

"Now, then," said the major, "we'll steal in on him, if we can." They moved forward toward the little sergeant major, who remained studying the opposite horizon in calm abstraction until their toes had reached a certain line, when, like the crack of a whip, there came once more the long-drawn cry with its explosive termination:

"Ye-a-ou-w!--Yun!!!" with the result that the line was again thrown into instantaneous, breathless and motionless rigidity.

Toward the advancing officers the sergeant major threw himself into a salute with one smooth, unbroken movement of indescribable grace and finish.

"Good morning, sergeant major," said Major Bayne. "Captain Dunbar, this is Sergeant Major Hackett."

Again came the salute, with a barely perceptible diminution of snap, as befitted a less formal occasion.

"Sergeant major," said Barry, "I would give a great deal to be able to do that."

"Wot's that, sir?" enquired the sergeant major.

"That salute of yours."

"Quite easy wen you knaow 'ow!" permitting himself a slight smile.

"You are doing some bayonet-fighting, I see, sergeant major," said Major Bayne.

"Yes, sir, goin' to do a bit, sir," replied the sergeant major.

"Very well, carry on!"

And the sergeant major "carried on," putting into his work and into his every movement and utterance an unbelievable amount of concentrated and even vicious energy.

On the bayonet-fighting ground, the first line of the enemy was represented by sacks stuffed with straw, hung upon a frame, the second by stuffed sacks deposited on the parapet of a trench. In bayonet-fighting the three points demanding special emphasis are the "guarding" of the enemy's attack, a swift bayonet thrust and an equally swift recovery, each operation, whether in case of a living enemy or in the stuffed effigy, being attended with considerable difficulty. Barry was much interested in the psychological element introduced into the exercises by the drill master.

"You must halways keep in mind that the henemy is before you. It's important that you should visualise your foe. The henemy is hever before you. Anything be-ind a British soldier won't trouble anybody, and you are to remember that hit's either you or 'im."

In moments of rapid action the sergeant major evidently had difficulty with his aspirates.

"The suspended sacks before you represent the henemy. You are to treat 'em so."

Having got his line within striking distance of the swinging sacks, the exercise was directed by two commands, "On guard!" and "Point!" the first of which was supposed to knock off the enemy's thrust, and the second to drive the bayonet home into his vitals, after which, without command, there must be a swift recovery.

"Naw then, Hn-gah!--Pint!!!"

For some moments, in response to these orders, the squad practised "guarding" and "pointing," not, however, to the complete satisfaction of the sergeant.

"Naw, then, number five, stick it hinto 'im. Ye ain't 'andin' a lidy an unbreller!"

Another attempt by number five being still suggestive of the amenities proper to a social function, the sergeant major stepped up to the overgentle soldier.

"Naw, then," he said, "hobserve! There's my henemy. See 'is hugly mug.

Hn-gah! Pint!!!"

At the words of command, the sergeant major threw himself into his guard and attacked with such appalling ferocity as must have paralysed an ordinary foe, sending his bayonet clean through to his guard, and recovering it with a clean, swift movement.

Having secured a fairly satisfactory thrust, the sergeant major devoted his attention to the recovery of the bayonet.

"Fetch it hout!" he cried fiercely. "There's another man comin'. Fetch it hout! Ye may fetch 'is spinial column with it. No matter, 'e won't need it."

The final act in this gruesome drama was the attack upon the second line represented by the sacks lying upon the parapet of the trench beyond.

The completed action thus included the guard, thrust, recovery, the leap forward past the swinging line of sacks, and a second thrust at the figure prone upon the parapet, with a second recovery of the weapon, this second recovery being effected by stamping the foot upon the transfixed effigy, and jerking back the bayonet with a violent upward movement.

This last recovery appeared to cause number five again some difficulty.

"Now then, number five, put a little aight (hate) into it. Stamp your bleedin' 'obnyles (hobnails) on his fice, and fetch it hout! This wye!"

As he took the rifle from number five, the sergeant major's face seemed to be transformed into a living embodiment of envenomed hate, his attack, thrust, recovery, gathering in intensity until with unimaginable fury he leaped upon the prostrate figure, drove his bayonet through to the hilt, stamped his hobnails upon the transfixed enemy, jerked his weapon out, and stood quivering, ready for any foe that dared to approach. The savage ferocity of his face, the fierce energy in his every movement, culminating in that last vicious leap and stamp, altogether constituted such a dramatic and realistic representation of actual fighting that the whole line burst into a very unsoldierly but very hearty applause, which, however, the sergeant major immediately and sternly checked.

"What do you think of that?" enquired the major. "Isn't he a scream?"