Colonel Cold strode up the Line
(tabs of rime and spurs of ice);
stiffened all that met his glare:
horses, men and lice.
The first line reads like a child’s rhyme, with the hard,  alliterative  “C"s in "Colonel Cold”. The idea of the unstoppable,  personified  figure, like a schoolmaster striding aggressively alongside a line of children, is daunting. Those who read this when it was first published will have been familiar with this frightening figure. Teachers in the early twentieth century were strict and punitive. 
 
 Note the capitalised “Line”. This line of troops represents all soldiers who were ordered to risk death through hypothermia.
Winter Warfare