of his company. First thing I did was to take him to the stores and fit him out with a suitable equipment. You will see in a minute.”
We go out to the parade-ground. The company has fallen in. Mittelstaedt stands them at ease and inspects.
Then I see Kantorek and am scarcely able to stifle my laughter. He is wearing a faded blue tunic. On the back and in the sleeves there are big dark patches. The overcoat must have belonged to a giant. The black, worn breeches are just as much too short; they reach barely halfway down his calf. The boots, tough old clod-hoppers, with turned-up toes and laces at the side, are much too big for him. But as a compensation the cap is too small, a terribly dirty, mean little pill-box. The whole rig-out is just pitiful.
Mittelstaedt stops in front of him: “Territorial Kantorek, do you call those buttons polished? You seem as if you can never learn. Inadequate, Kantorek, quite inadequate———”
It makes me bubble with glee. In school Kantorek used to chasten Mittelstaedt with exactly the same expression—“Inadequate, Mittelstaedt, quite inadequate.”
Mittelstaedt continues to upbraid him: “Look at
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