Читать книгу Set Down in Malice: A Book of Reminiscences онлайн

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He told me what my own experience in France and Salonica in 1915–1917 confirmed later on, that it is frequently the neurotic, the artistic, the excitable man who most quickly adapts himself to, and is least disturbed by, ssss1 the incredible cruelties of warfare, whilst the phlegmatic type of man is more liable to be broken by those cruelties. Sir Victor Horsley suggested that this was, in some measure, due to the fact that the neurotic man has, in imagination, tasted the terror of war before he has actually experienced it; that he has, as it were, prepared his mind for the shock it is to receive. The unimaginative man cannot do this, so that when his turn comes to go to the trenches and witness stark horrors, his nervous system reacts most violently.

Sir Victor spoke a good deal to me about the evil influence of drink, and continually regretted that rum was served out to our soldiers. On this subject, of course, though I disagreed with him profoundly, I did not attempt to argue, though I pointed out that Napoleon had won many of his campaigns by almost drugging his men with spirits. To this he made no reply, though he shook his head gravely and seemed to ponder a little.