then and there, while the remembrance of his terrible hardships was
still fresh in his mind, to impart them to a phonograph, so that
the archives of the town might not lack direct evidence of the
experiences, if he might so express it, of her bravest citizen, and
future generations might know something of the noble thoughts that
surged in so gallant a breast in times of danger, and the fine and
honourable words with which those thoughts had been uttered.

The Mayor's peroration annoyed Thompson; the cheers that followed it
annoyed him still more, and the subsequent shower of congratulations
and vigorous slaps on the back threatened to move him to reply in a
speech which might have been unintelligible to the ladies present.

Fortunately the danger was averted. Before he could come into action
a select committee of two, specially appointed for the purpose, had
seized him by the arms and was conducting him up the steps of the Town
Hall. The rapidity and the unexpected nature of the movement threw him
out of gear, and he was forced to adopt an attitude of sullen silence
during the progress of the little party across the Council Chamber and
through a doorway leading into a small room.

This room was furnished only with a table and a chair. On the former
stood a phonograph; into the latter the Committee deposited ex-Private
Thompson and explained to him that he was desired to sit there and
in his own words to recount into the trumpet of the machine his
experiences at the Front. That becoming modesty, they added, which
hitherto had sealed his lips should now be laid aside. Posterity must
not be denied the edification of listening to a hero's story of his
share in the Great War. The phonograph was then turned on and the disc
began to revolve with a slight grating sound that set Thompson's teeth