"I never thought of anybody else at home but myself. I was selfish.
Sis and mother did everything for me. Everything at home centred in
me, and everything was arranged for my comfort. With this leg gone I
might have some right now, according to the way they think, to that
attention, but I don't want it any longer. I can't bear the thoughts
of having people do for me. I want to spend the rest of my life doing
things for other folks.

"Back of Noyon I saw a friend sail into a crowd of six Germans with
nothing but his bayonet and rifle. They had surrounded his captain,
and were rushing him back as a prisoner. They evidently had orders to
take the officers alive as prisoners. That big top-sergeant sailed
into them, and after killing two of them, knocking two more down, and
giving his captain a chance to escape, the last German shot him through
the head. He gave his life for the captain. That has changed me. I
shall never be the same again after seeing that happen. There's
something come into my heart. I'm going back home a Christian man."

Yes, America must learn to see beyond the darkness, beyond the
disfigured face, to the soul of the boy. And America will do it.
America is like that. And so back of these shaking bodies and these
stuttering tongues of the shell-shocked boys I saw their wonderful
souls. And after spending that two hours with them I can never be the
same man again.

I could, as Donald Hankey says, "get down on my knees and shine their
boots for them any day," and thank God for the privilege. I think that
this is the spirit of any non-combatant in France who has any immediate
contact with our men on the battle-front or in the hospitals. They are
so brave and so true.