An interesting point, meself. It is Kipling of course that puts the words in the narrators mouth but is he voicing his own words or mimicking what he hears the ordinary soldier say? And to what extent is he recording those ordinary soldiers words impartially? I am not, alas, a Kipling scholar. I am sure many could tell us the answers. Possibly many different answers to the same question in diametrically opposed ways at times :-D

DtG