We were, of course, happy to offer these officers hospitality, and we were glad to be able to show, even in a tiny way, British sympathy with the Serbian nation. But now our little stock of stores was coming to an end, and there was no prospect of renewal, and on this evening we shared our last pot of jam with these Serbian friends. Could they, we asked, have a more practical proof of sympathy than that?
Some of the oxen were lame, and I found that it was because the men had carelessly omitted to reshoe them. Next morning, therefore, early, I summoned all the drivers, and told each man to bring his oxen before me, that I might examine their feet. Oxen parade. I then reminded them that the time might come, any day, when we in our turn should be in pursuit of the enemy, and how would they feel if they had to stay behind because their oxen were lame? I was told it was not possible to shoe them now, and this, that, and the other plausible excuse was offered. But this was no time for excuses; fierce eye and deep voice were summoned, and then at once the sergeant acquiesced. "Ja! Ja! Dobro! Dobro!" ("Yes! Yes! All right! All right!") Then I heard him murmur to Vooitch, as he shrugged his shoulders, "It's no use. If she says it's got to be done, we've got to do it." And it was done. (I knew there were shoes and a smith in another column near us.) That little affair was scarcely finished, when I heard that one of the kitchen boys was playing cards, when he had been told by the cooks to fill the lamps. Fierce-eye business again. I don't believe in corporal punishment, but I couldn't begin teaching the Serbian soldiers abstract reasons for the necessity of obedience, and obedience was essential. So, hoping to teach the sergeant a little elementary discipline, I called him, put my whip in his hand, and took him with me to the bivouac tent in which the delinquent was playing truant, and told him he was to use the whip if I gave the word. We arrived in front of the kitchen sleeping tent, and there, sure enough, was the naughty Nicola, playing cards with three other soldiers. Very fierce eye, and very fierce voice this time. They could play cards, I told them, in leisure hours, not in work time; I took away the cards, tore them in pieces, and told the sergeant to use the whip. He thought it would be a pity to discriminate between Nicola and the others, and he belaboured all four, and we had no illegitimate card-playing after that.
