the most salient thing, and described various phases of their life as
pervaded by it. The fighting spirit was bred in their bones. They were
a nation of warriors almost as much as the Spartans, and stood ready
on the instant to obey the tap of the drum calling to arms. Such
constant suggestions of war were painful. The spiked helmet is never
an amiable head-dress; "but," said the representative Prussian,
"there is no help for it. We have been a weak people wedged in between
powerful unscrupulous neighbours, and have had a life-and-death
struggle to wage almost constantly with one or the other of these, or
all at once. And in what way is our situation different now? Is Russia
less ambitious? How many swords has France beaten into ploughshares?
What pruning-hooks have been made from the spears of Austria? Let
us know on what conditions we can live other than wearing our spiked
helmets, and we will embrace them." It was not an easy matter to argue
down your resolute Prussian when he turned to you warmly, after you
had been crying peace to him.

As I pondered, I thought perhaps it is a necessity, since the world is
what it is, that Europe should still be a place of discord. America,
however, is practically one, not a jarring company of nations
repeating the protracted agony of the Old World. We have no question
of the "balance of power" coming up in every generation, settled only
to be unsettled amid devastation and slaughter. We can grow forward
unhindered, with hardly more than a feather's weight of energy taken
for fighting from the employments of peace. America stands indeed a
nation blessed of God; and there is nothing better worth her while to
pray for than that a happier time may come to her giant brother over
the sea; that the strength of such an arm may not always waste itself
wielding the sword; that the sensibilities of such a heart may not be
crushed or brutalised in carnage that forever repeats itself; that