"hard Bread" Barely Sent Back

"Now, if the baker sends us a loaf of stale bread, " said the old soldier, "we send it back. But, dear me, we didn't often do anything of that sort in the army. We didn't get very much soft bread anyway - that is, regular bread. What we had mostly was hard bread, sometimes oalled hard tack - a kind of cracker, like soda cracker in shape, and not unlike it in appearance, butthicker. And hard bread of good quality and not more than a month old wasn't bad. In fact, it was very good. It was only when we got some that was very old, and that had foreigii creatures boring in it, so that you had to knock it against something beforeeatingit, thatanybody growled, and even then we rarely sent it back. Sometimos if it was very bad the regimental quartennaster would send back the whole lot and draw new if he could. But oftener we kept it, and you could throw it away if you wanted to, but that was all. "Still, our outdoor life was conducive to good appetites, and af ter all one could have a poorer breakfast than moldy, hard bread and cofTee. Fcr instance. nothiug. '