Benjamin Franklin once said, "Be sober and temperate and you will be healthy." This is in the main true and is excellent advice for the soldier. But there are ills that are liable to affect the fighting man in spite of his temperance and sobriety and of these we must speak.

The health of men in the army is, on the average, much better than that of individuals outside of it. This is due to many causes chief of which is the fact that only healthy men are admitted to the army. Then the out-of-door life, regular and wholesome food, sufficient exercise and "early to bed and early to rise" tend to keep him well. If he enters the army fit, he must make it his business to remain fit and it will be well to remember that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." To preserve good health is his Duty for only thus can he become an efficient soldier. If the bodily resistance is weakened, man becomes prey to the millions of germs that are to be found in the air and even within his own system. When he is healthy the body is able to keep them in subjection, but once let him permit his system to run down and these armies of microbes will attack him with all their forces.

Now let us begin first of all with Bodily Cleanliness. No soldier can come on parade unless his face and hands be clean. Shaving, though sometimes a bore, is an excellent method of keeping the face clean and fresh. It tends to smarten a man, and officers are not slow to pick out the careful from the slovenly soldier. We used to reserve the unpleasant tasks of the camp—latrine duties amongst others—for men who would not keep their hands and faces clean. But there are other parts of the body to which it is just as necessary to apply cleansing methods regularly even though no military punishment follows the violation of the rule. First of these that I would mention is the

Teeth. Soldiers, I find, are very careless in this matter till the first thing you know is that someone is absent from parade because of the toothache. On one occasion in the trenches, when we were very short handed, an officer had to leave us for a week to go to the hospital with a badly abscessed tooth due entirely to neglect. Cleaning the teeth night and morning freshens the mouth and makes food taste better. An excellent custom is to rinse the mouth after every meal, and while this may often be inconvenient it can be done if a soldier remembers to wash his mouth out with the first sip of water every time he takes a drink. If the teeth are allowed to get very bad a man's digestion suffers and he falls ill. This robs the army of part of its fighting strength, a result which every soldier has an interest in avoiding.

Hair. No better advice can be given to the soldier on this subject than "cut it short." The shorter the better, for when it is short it is easy to keep clean both from body dirt and vermin. In this war soldiers have almost invariably had the clippers run completely over their heads. Soap and water are as good for the head as for any other part of the body.

Trunk. It is not always possible for soldiers to get a shower or plunge every day, but a small sponge carried as part of the equipment will help a good deal. In France, where the water was scarce, we had to make it go a long way. When the enemy permitted, I used to get my regular morning bath with the aid of the sponge and about a saucerful of water. I felt like a canary during the process and wanted to chirp and flap my wings. Soldiers should be encouraged to go in swimming whenever circumstances permit. To go in swimming was not a military order in my regiment, but we used to take the men to the sea and then ask who wanted to go in. About eighty per cent of the men would volunteer. Then we would tell off the remaining twenty per cent for vigorous physical exercises and after ten minutes give them the choice of continuing or taking a plunge in the sea. They all went in! Men's objections to water usually come from habit and they soon learn to appreciate its refreshing power.

Feet. "An army marches on its stomach"—metaphorically, but it marches on its feet, literally, as every poor infantryman knows. And it has to do a good deal of marching in war and in preparation for war. "Route Marches" and "Hikes" are very popular with the training staff as the soldier will find, and they are usually planned by the men who ride horses! So important did we consider the care of the feet that we used to have "Toe Parades" twice a week with the Doctor in attendance. Men with neglected feet were considered as candidates for cookhouse garbage duty, and were promptly assigned to this task. In the first place feet must be comparatively clean—soap and water recommended! Then they should be free from corns. This is not so easy to accomplish. Paring with a knife helps, but if they get too bad the doctor or the chiropodist should be consulted. Another frequent source of trouble is neglected toe nails. The best way is to cut them straight across, not too far down, but so as to keep them from tearing the sock or cramping the foot in the boot. Blisters sometimes arise on the feet. They should be treated at once, mainly by removing the cause—which may be in the boot itself or the sock—and then by bathing them in a solution of boric acid. If the socks are kept oiled, or even if small pieces of soap are put into the boots, this condition will, in large measure, be avoided. I have seen many a pitiful case of men trailing along the road well in rear of their company, limping and hobbling as best they could, all due to the fact that they had not paid the attention to their feet that they must if the feet are to do the work for which the army calls.

A few minutes attention per day given to these points will, I am confident, help to procure and maintain health for the soldier. But all his care will be wasted unless that which he takes inside his body is wholesome—food and drink. In camps the soldier usually has all his food cooked for him, and it is the duty of his officers to see that it is good in quality, sufficient in quantity, and reasonably well cooked. As the soldier does the serving himself, that is entirely his own lookout. In the trenches it is not possible to have things arranged as one has in camp. The regimental cookers were usually stationed about three miles from the firing line—for their safety—and all the food was cooked there and sent up to the lines in boxes or sandbags, and apportioned to the various platoons according to the number of men on the strength. Three times a week the cooks were given fresh meat to prepare for us—when the Government says it is fresh it is fresh even in Summer time and when the flies have been busy—and for the other days we subsisted on canned meats or "bully beef" as it was called. The meat was either baked or boiled, though sometimes we got a stew—in camp we got too many stews! Potatoes were boiled, usually in their jackets. This food we could heat in the trenches in our individual cooking apparatus, which also served to cook our ration of bacon for breakfast, while in the upper part of the tin we made tea.

Of course in the trenches we had to eat whatever we could get, but our lot was relieved considerably by the arrival of delicacies from England by the parcel post. This sometimes subjected us to the temptation that we were under while in training, and that was to eat pastry and suchlike food, which, while very appetising, is not to be recommended as a diet for the soldier.

On the question of Drink my views have become very pronounced since my experience with the army. Undoubtedly the best universal drink for the soldier is tea—preferably weak. I should say water were it always possible to get water that is pure. But during a campaign pure water is a luxury. By making the water into tea you make sure that it gets boiled, and by the addition of tea you get a beverage that has not the insipid sickly flavour of boiled or sterilised water. Coffee is preferred by Americans, I know, but there are dangers to be recognised especially by those whose hearts are inclined to be weak.

With regard to alcohol I would most heartily recommend total abstinence. I need scarcely remind American readers that there is not a single front rank baseball manager that allows his men to indulge in alcohol. From my own experience I could tell of many men who were permanently rendered unfit as soldiers through foolish indulgence. Of the men who were brought before the Colonel for more or less serious crimes, 90 per cent of them owed their humiliation directly to alcohol, and 5 per cent of them to alcohol indirectly. I know that it is possible for some men to take alcohol in moderation. Not many continue to do so, and sooner or later there is almost certain to be an overindulgence. In the British army men were sentenced to the extreme penalty—death—for being intoxicated while on active service in France. I say without hesitation that the best men I had were the abstainers and the worst men I had were the drinkers. Alcohol weakens the tissues of the body, it lowers its vitality and makes it an easy victim to disease, and worse still, it rapidly obscures the mind. For a war of the kind that is being waged in Europe a man needs to have his head very clear, and this he cannot do if he is the victim of the alcohol habit.

Many total abstainers from alcohol are tempted to take "gassy" drinks, fizzes and so forth. These tend to shorten the wind and should therefore be avoided.

If plain water has to be drunk, care should be taken to see that it is reasonably pure, and all vessels such as water bottles should be thoroughly rinsed each time before using.

When these simple rules of eating and drinking are followed many of the dangers incidental to army life will be avoided, and physical fitness established.

A kindred subject is that of Smoking. This habit has become so universal in the British army that it is almost true to say that every one smokes. From my own experience I have seen very few ill effects from it except in cases of obvious overindulgence. But undoubtedly it is easy to overdo the cigarette business, and on this point I would utter a word of warning. Pipes are to be preferred, though I admit it is difficult to get men to smoke anything else than cigarettes in the trenches. In the monotony and strain of trench life, and from the need to do something to keep the stench of decaying bodies from the nostrils, men do smoke to excess. There is some excuse there, but during training at home every man must endeavour to be reasonable in his indulgence.

Clothing. I have found that men are very apt to load themselves up with all sorts of useless items of apparel. In their endeavour to keep warm they have often badly overdone it with the result that they have found themselves perspiring and exhausted in the midst of an important piece of physical labour. Of course the soldier will need to see to it that his underclothes are sufficiently warm to keep out the extreme cold, but it is better to add something to the clothing from time to time—such as a Cardigan waistcoat—than to be equipped permanently with the heaviest kind of underclothes. Above all, avoid those garments that are being offered extensively to unsuspecting men, and which, while they will undoubtedly keep you warm, will also prevent the proper perspiration of the body. The body must be allowed to perspire and the air must be allowed to carry off the perspiration. Woollens are the best for this purpose, and though the initial cost of them is rather great, they are worth it in the long run.

Boots. In the paragraph on feet I couldn't help mentioning the matter of boots, but it is so important that, at the risk of too great repetition, I want to mention it again. You must have boots that are right, otherwise you will soon be lamed and thus be out of action. And every man out of action "counts two on a division." We found it advisable in France to get boots that were large enough to accommodate the feet and two pairs of socks—one thin and one thick pair. Into the boots we poured a small quantity of oil, or between the socks we put small pieces of soap to keep the feet in good condition. You will find that the feet must be oiled if they are to stand the work of a campaign.

But sometimes injuries are caused to the feet by other parts of the clothing of a soldier. Men frequently laced their puttees or leggins too tight and found that they suffered pains in the feet—the circulation was being stopped. This rendered them very liable to frostbite, than which there is nothing more painful. If there are signs of freezing, remove the boots as soon as possible and restore the circulation. But if the feet are actually frozen the soldier is in for a long and tedious illness, and will be lucky if he does not need to have his feet amputated. I am told that, during the first campaign in the Carpathians, the Central Powers lost 25,000 men per day with frozen feet.

Before leaving this subject to deal with diseases and their avoidance, I would like to say a word or two on the congenial subject of Rest. A soldier should get as much of it as he can, consistent, of course, with doing his duty. Never stand when you could as well be lying down. Throw yourself on the ground whenever you can, to rest, and let the whole body relax. When you are given a rest on the roadside, stretch out on your back and breathe as deeply as you can. Give your mind and body alike a vacation and you will feel the benefit of it at the end of the day. Don't spend your hours of beauty sleep in talking—get that done during the day. Your body will call for rest after the tiring duties of the day and you should give it all the rest you can.