Certainly he could not have
moved the lager caravan without the consent and aid of the Berlin war
office. For all I know to the contrary he may have been financed in
that competent quarter. That same morning I had seen a field weather
station, mounted on an automobile, standing in front of our lodging
place just off the square. It was going to the front to make and
compile meteorological reports. A general staff who provided weather
offices on wheels and printing offices on wheels--this last for the
setting up and striking off of small proclamations and orders--might
very well have bethought themselves that the soldier in the field would
be all the fitter for the job before him if stayed with the familiar
malts of the Vaterland. Believe me, I wouldn't put it past them.
Anyway, having safely reached Maubeuge, the far-seeing Rheinishman
effected a working understanding with a native publican, which was
probably a good thing for both, seeing that one had a stock of goods and
a ready-made trade but no place to set up business, and that the other
owned a shop, but had lost his trade and his stock-in-trade likewise.
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