I was asked the other day to send to a new magazine a statement as to the
event of the war which had made the deepest impression on me. Without
hesitation I selected the remarkable Christmas demonstrations in Flanders.
Here were men who for weeks and months past had been engaged in the task of
stalking each other and killing each other, and suddenly under the
influence of a common memory, they repudiate the whole gospel of war and
declare the gospel of brotherhood. Next day they began killing each other
again as the obedient instruments of governments they do not control and of
motives they do not understand. But the fact remains. It is a beam of light
in the darkness, rich in meaning and hope.

But if I were asked to name the instance of individual action which had
most impressed me I should find the task more difficult. Should I select
something that shows how war depraves, or something that shows how it
ennobles? If the latter I think I would choose that beautiful incident of
the sailor on the _Formidable_.

He had won by ballot a place in one of the boats. The ship was going down,
but he was to be saved. One pictures the scene: The boat is waiting to take
him to the shore and safety. He looks at the old comrades who have lost in
the ballot and who stand there doomed to death. He feels the passion for
life surging within him. He sees the cold, dark sea waiting to engulf its
victims. And in that great moment--the greatest moment that can come to any
man--he makes the triumphant choice. He turns to one of his comrades.
"You've got parents," he says. "I haven't." And with that word--so heroic
in its simplicity--he makes the other take his place in the boat and signs
his own death warrant.