In War 



ranks. " Are all the common men so 

 grand, and all the titled ones so mean ? " 



North or South, it was the same. 

 " Send forth the best ye breed " was the 

 call on both sides alike, and to this call 

 both sides alike responded. As it will 

 take " centuries of peace and prosperity 

 to make good the tall statures mowed 

 down in the Napoleonic wars," so like 

 centuries of wisdom and virtue are 

 needed to restore to our nation its lost 

 inheritance of patriotism, not the ca- 

 pacity for patriotic talk, for of that 

 there has been no abatement, but of 

 that faith and truth which " on war's 

 red touchstone rang true metal." With / 

 all this we can never know how great is / 

 our real misfortune, nor see how much 

 the men that are fall short of the men 

 that ought to have been. 



It will be said that all this is exagger- 

 ation, that war is but one influence 

 among many, and that each and all of 



77 



