vision--Jem, I really saw him for a moment that evening long ago.
Suppose England does fight?"

"Why, we'll all have to turn in and help her," cried Jem gaily. "We
couldn't let the 'old grey mother of the northern sea' fight it out
alone, could we? But you can't go--the typhoid has done you out of
that. Sort of a shame, eh?"

Walter did not say whether it was a shame or not. He looked silently
over the Glen to the dimpling blue harbour beyond.

"We're the cubs--we've got to pitch in tooth and claw if it comes to a
family row," Jem went on cheerfully, rumpling up his red curls with a
strong, lean, sensitive brown hand--the hand of the born surgeon, his
father often thought. "What an adventure it would be! But I suppose Grey
or some of those wary old chaps will patch matters up at the eleventh
hour. It'll be a rotten shame if they leave France in the lurch, though.
If they don't, we'll see some fun. Well, I suppose it's time to get
ready for the spree at the light."

Jem departed whistling "Wi' a hundred pipers and a' and a'," and Walter
stood for a long time where he was. There was a little frown on his
forehead. This had all come up with the blackness and suddenness of a
thundercloud. A few days ago nobody had even thought of such a thing. It
was absurd to think of it now. Some way out would be found. War was a
hellish, horrible, hideous thing--too horrible and hideous to happen in
the twentieth century between civilized nations. The mere thought of it
was hideous, and made Walter unhappy in its threat to the beauty of
life. He would not think of it--he would resolutely put it out of his
mind. How beautiful the old Glen was, in its August ripeness, with its