Chapter 21 Collapse 
Y uncle’s visit in June had been so 
successful he did not need any urging 
to repeat it, and in Odtober he came 
again, bath-chair and all. But the 
four months had made a difference. It would 
not have been, in any case, so deleétable to sit 
out of doors in the garden as it had been in the 
summer afternoons; the dark came sooner and 
allowed no evening outings; and worst of all, 
the beginning of the war against Germany had 
brought upon everybody a gloom such as John 
Smith’s health was by no means strong enough to 
endure. Had he not lived too long? He said 
little: sat silent and mournful for long stretches. 
It was a mark of his depression, of his own 
weariness, when he observed, speaking of his dead 
sister Ann, “ I’m thankful poor old Auntie didn’t 
live to see all this wickedness. *Iwould have 
distressed her so.” 
The time was indeed melancholy. On the 
second, or perhaps the third, day of his visit the 
morning papers were full of the “ frightfulness ” 
of the attack upon Antwerp; and as the day 
wore on a helpless indignation settled down on us 
all, the news growing blacker hour by hour. 
“ Frightfulness ” itself was a failure: it did not 
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