Читать книгу Stalky's Reminiscences - Lionel Charles Dunsterville - Страница 3

Table of Contents

In the following pages I have attempted to give some account of my life experiences—episodes strung rather sketchily together, accompanied by occasional reflections and comments.

I am sorry that I have so little to say regarding the many famous or interesting people I have met, in fact there is little in this book about anyone but myself. Where others do come into the story, I have tried, as far as possible, to avoid giving names. I do not want to run the risk of a libel action, and one can libel people so much more freely by saying ‘I would not for one moment divulge his name. He is a tall, dark man, with a squint, well known to you all, but it would be unfair to disclose his identity.’

I have endeavoured to confine myself to the lighter side of life, avoiding serious accounts of military episodes, and accentuating, as far as possible, the more cheerful events of a soldier’s life in peace-time.

It may well be that the trivialities I record have no interest for the general reader, but to me the minor incidents of life are vastly more interesting than heroic achievements—if this is a personal failing, I cannot escape from it.

It is possible also that I have dwelt too much on the subject of manœuvres—but that portion of my book was written chiefly with a view of interesting soldiers in India to whom these memoirs were originally addressed—men who surely must be growing weary, after twelve years of novels, autobiographies and films, of the subject of the Great War.

In the accounts of my travels I have offered a few comments on the racial characteristics and conditions of life in various countries, but I do not forget the danger of such superficial generalities. It is also obvious that most of my experience was gained long before the Great War, which is assumed to have altered everything.