Early morning breakfast, as it is served in the British Army, is unknown in French units. On turning out in the morning, coffee is brought round to the barrack rooms, but the first real meal of the day is "soup" at ten o'clock. The food is properly served in dishes, and a corporal or a man told off for the duty is at the head of each table to help each man to his allowance, for which an enamelled plate is provided. Crockery is unsafe in a barrack room, and the fact is wisely recognised.
The canteen of the British Army, so far as drinks are concerned, provides beer only for its men, but beer is scarcely ever seen in a French canteen. Various brands of wine are at the disposal of the conscript, and it is possible to get a bottle of drinkable stuff for fivepence, though in order to obtain a really good brand one must pay at least a franc, for which the wine obtained is equal to that for which many a London restaurant will charge half a crown. Wine is the staple drink of the Army, though brandy finds favour among the hardened drinkers. The man who goes to the canteen for a bottle of wine to share with a comrade must not be regarded as a tippler, for the clarets which the canteen provides are not very alcoholic beverages, containing as they do but little more alcohol to the pint than supposedly "teetotal" ginger beer of some brands.
To each company of infantry, as to each squadron of cavalry and battery of artillery, is allotted a barber, whose business is to shave every conscript of his company at least twice a week free of cost, the barber being remunerated by the authorities. Since most men need to shave every day in order to fulfil the requirements of parade appearance, it is obvious that the efforts of the barber in this direction must be supplemented by the men themselves, and on the whole the barber gets an easy time as a rule, for the man who shaves himself three times a week will usually get the business done without troubling the barber at any time.
Complaints used to be made, especially in infantry stations, about the sanitation and lack of washing accommodation in French barracks, but modern custom has remedied all this. Chief cause of reformation was the Russo-Japanese War, which showed that an army is twice as effective if matters of sanitation are properly attended to--it does not pay to have men falling sick from the presence of nursery beds for infectious diseases. The French Army, ever first in experiment for the efficiency of its men and in search of ways to increase the fighting value of the forces available, has taken the lessons of modern sanitation to heart. In practically all barracks, now, the soldier can enjoy a hot bath or a cold one when he wishes; all that is still to be desired is a greater regard for necessary sanitary measures, and a greater regard for personal cleanliness among the men themselves. The peasant lad, who has lived a comparatively lonely life in absolutely healthy surroundings, does not understand at first that barrack life exposes him to fresh dangers, and he has to be taught what, to a town dweller, are elementary facts as regards infection. For this reason, tubercular and allied complaints still rank rather high in the medical statistics of the French Army, though every year sees an improvement in this respect.