@@@@@for what reason? Hearn didn't knowAnd he
@@@@@for what reason? Hearn didn't knowAnd he couldn't escape the peculiar magnetism of the General, a magnetism derived from all the connotations of the General's powerHe had known men who thought like the General; he had even known one or two who were far more profoundBut the difference was that they did nothing or the results of their actions were lost to them, and they functioned in the busy complex mangle, the choked vacuum of American lifeThe General might even have been silly if it were not for the fact that here on this island he controlled everythingIt gave a base to whatever he saidAnd as long as Hearn remained with him, he could see the whole process from the inception of the thought to the tangible and immediate results the next day, the next monthThat kind of knowledge was the hardest to obtain, the most concealed in everything Hearn had done in the past, and it intrigued him, it fascinated him
"You can look at it, Robert, that we're in the middle ages of a new era, waiting for the renaissance of real powerRight now, I'm serving a rather sequestered function, I really am no more than the chief monk, the lord of my little abbey, so to speak
His voice continued on and on, its ironic sustained mockery spinning its own unique web, while all the time the tensions inside him flexed and expanded, sought their inexorable satisfactions in whatever lay between Hearn and himself, between himself and the five thousand troops against him, the terrain, and the circuits of chance he would mold
What a monster, Hearn told himself


Chorus:
THE CHOW LINE

(The mess tent is on a low bluff overlooking the beachIn front of it is a low serving bench on which are placed four or five pots containing foodThe troops file by in an irregular line, their mess gear opened and extendedRed, Gallagher, Brown and Wilson shuffle past to receive their rationsAs they go by they sniff at the main course which has been dumped into a big square panIt is canned Meat and Vegetable Stew heated slightlyThe second cook, a fat red-faced man with a bald spot and a perpetual scowl, slaps a large spoonful in each of their mess plates

RED: What the fug is that swill?
COOK: It's owl shitWha'd you think it was?
RED: Okay, I just thought it was somethin' I couldn't eat(Laughter)
COOK: (good naturedly) Move on, move on, before I knock-the-crap-out-of-you
RED: Take a bite on this
GALLAGHER: That goddam stew again
COOK: (shouting to the other cooks and KPs on the serving line) Private Gallagher is bitching,