Chapter 6

THE AWAKENING

Exoriare aliquis de nostris ex ossibus ultor.--VIRGIL.

I

THE FIRST DAYS

The river glideth at his own sweet will. Dear God! the very houses seem asleep; And all that mighty heart is lying still!

. . . . .

Without Thee, what is all the morning's wealth? Come, blessed barrier between day and day, Dear Mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health!

WORDSWORTH.

It is safe to say that England's exhausted sleep on the night of Black Saturday marked the end of an era in British history. It was followed by a curious, quiescent half-consciousness during Sunday. For the greater part of that day I should suppose that more than half London's populace continued its sleep.

One of the first things I realized after Monday morning's awakening in my Bloomsbury lodging was that I must find wages and work speedily, since I possessed no more than a very few pounds. As a fact, upon that and several subsequent days I found plenty of work, if nothing noticeable in the way of wages. I was second in command of one of the food and labour bureaux which Constance Grey helped to organize, and all the workers in these bureaux were volunteers.

Another of my first impressions after the crisis was a sense of my actual remoteness, in normal circumstances, from Constance. Her father had left Constance a quite sufficient income. Mrs. Van Homrey was in her own right comfortably well-to-do. But, despite the exiguous nature of my own resources, it was not the money question which impressed me most in this connection, but rather the fact that, while my only acquaintances in London were of a more or less discreditable sort, Constance seemed to have friends everywhere, and these in almost every case people of standing and importance. Her army friends were apt to be generals, her political friends ex-Ministers, her journalistic friends editors, and so forth. And I---- But you have seen my record up to this point.

Nobody could possibly want Constance so much as I did, I thought. But an astonishing number of persons of infinitely more consequence than myself seemed to delight to honour her, to obtain her cooeperation. And I loved her. There was no possibility of my mistaking the fact. I had been used to debate with myself regarding Sylvia Wheeler. There was no room for debate where my feeling for Constance was concerned. The hour of her breakdown in Fleet Street on Black Saturday had taught me so much.

In the face of my circumstances just then, the idea of making any definite disclosure of my feelings to Constance seemed impracticable. Yet there was one intimate passage between us during that week, the nature of which I cannot precisely define. I know I conveyed some hint to Constance of my feeling toward her, and I was made vaguely conscious that anything like a declaration of love would have seemed shocking to her at that time. She held that, at such a juncture, no merely personal interests ought to be allowed to weigh greatly with any one. The country's call upon its subjects was all-absorbing in the eyes of this "one little bit of a girl from South Africa," as Crondall had called her. It made me feel ashamed to realize how far short I fell (even after the shared experiences culminating in Black Saturday) of her personal standard of patriotism. Even now, my standing in her eyes, my immediate personal needs, loomed nearer, larger in my mind than England's fate. I admitted as much with some shamefacedness, and Constance said:

"Ah, well, Dick, I suspect that is a natural part of life lived entirely in England, the England of the past. There was so little to arouse the other part in one. All the surrounding influences were against it. My life has been different. Once one has lived, in one's own home, through a native rising, for instance, purely personal interests never again seem quite so absorbing. The elemental things had been so long shut out of English life. Why, do you know----?" And she began to tell me of one of the schemes in which she was interested; in connection with which I learned of a cable message she had received that day telling that John Crondall was then on his way to England.

The least forgiving critics of "The Destroyers" have admitted that they did their best and worked well during those strange weeks which came immediately after the invasion. One reason of this was that party feeling in politics had been scotched. The House of Commons met as one party. There was no longer any real Opposition, unless one counted a small section of rabid anti-Britishers, who were incapable of learning a lesson; and even they carped but feebly, while the rest of the House devoted its united energies to the conduct of the country's shattered business with the single aim of restoring normal conditions. Throughout the country two things were tacitly admitted. That the Government in power must presently answer for its doings to the public before ceasing to be a Government; and that the present was no time for such business as that of a general election.

And so we had the spectacle of a Government which had entirely lost the confidence of the electors, a Government anathematized from the Orkneys to Land's End, carrying on its work with a unison and a complete freedom from opposition such as had not been known before, even by the biggest majority or the most popular Administration which had ever sat at Westminster. For the first time, and by no effort of our own, we obtained the rule of an Imperial Parliament devoted to no other end than the nation's welfare. The House of Commons witnessed many novel spectacles at that time--such as consultations between the leading members of the Government and the Opposition. Most of its members learned many valuable lessons in those first weeks of the new regime. It is to be supposed that the Surrender Riot had taught them something.

It must also be admitted that General, or, as he now was, General Baron von Fuechter, accomplished some fine work during this same period. It has been said that he was but consulting the safety of his Imperial master's armed forces; but credit may safely be given the General for the discretion and despatch he used in distributing the huge body of troops at his command, without hitch or friction, to the various centres which it was his plan to occupy. His was a hand of iron, but he used it to good purpose; and the few errors of his own men were punished with an even more crushing severity than he showed where British offences were concerned.

The task of garrisoning those English ports with German soldiers was no light or easy one; no task for a light or gentle hand. In carrying out this undertaking a very little weakness, a very small display of indecision, might easily have meant an appalling amount of bloodshed. As it was, the whole business was completed in a wonderfully short while, and with remarkable smoothness. The judicial and municipal administration of these centres was to remain English; but supreme authority was vested in the officer commanding the German forces in each place, and the heads of such departments as the postal and the police, were German. No kind of public gathering or demonstration was permissible in these towns, unless under the auspices of the German officer in command, who in each case was given the rank of Governor of the town.

We had learned by this time that the Channel Fleet had not been entirely swept away. But a portion of it was destroyed, and the remaining ships had been entrapped. It was strategy which had kept British ships from our coasts during the fatal week of the invasion. "The Destroyers" were responsible for our weak-kneed concessions to Berlin some years earlier, in the matter of wireless telegraphy. In the face of urgent recommendations to the contrary from experts, the Government had yielded to German pressure in the matter of making our own system interchangeable, and had even boasted of their diplomacy in thus ingratiating themselves with Germany. As a consequence, the enemy had been able to convey messages purporting to come from the British Admiralty and ordering British commanders to keep out of home waters.

That these messages should have been conveyed in secret code form was a mystery which subsequent investigations failed to solve. Some one had played traitor. But the history of the invasion has shown us that we had very many traitors among us in those days; and there came a time when the British public showed clearly that it was weary of Commissions of Inquiry. Where so many, if not indeed all of us, were at fault, where the penalty was so crushing, it was felt that there were other and more appropriate openings for official energy and public interest than the mere apportioning of blame and punishment, however well deserved.

The issue of what was called the "Invasion Budget" was Parliament's first important act, after the dispersal of the German forces in England, and the termination of the Government distribution of food supplies. The alterations of customs tariff were not particularly notable. The House had agreed that revenue was the objective to be considered, and fiscal adjustments with reference to commerce were postponed for the time. The great change was in the income-tax. The minimum income to be taxed was L100 instead of, as formerly, L160. The scale ran like this: sixpence in the pound upon incomes of between L100 and L150, ninepence from that to L200, one shilling from that to L250, one and threepence from that to L500, one and sixpence from that to L1,000, two shillings upon all incomes of between L1,000 and L5,000, and four shillings in the pound upon all incomes of over L5,000.

It was on the day following that of the Invasion Budget issue that I received a letter from my sister Lucy, in Davenham Minster, telling me of my mother's serious illness, and asking me to come to her at once. And so, after a hurried visit to the South Kensington flat to explain my absence to Constance, I turned my back upon London, for the first time in a year, and journeyed down into Dorset.

II

ANCIENT LIGHTS

Then the progeny that springs From the forests of our land, Armed with thunder, clad with wings, Shall a wider world command.

Regions Caesar never knew Thy posterity shall sway.

. . . . .

COWPER.

In the afternoon of a glorious summer's day, exactly three weeks after leaving London, I stood beside the newly filled grave of my mother in the moss-grown old churchyard of Davenham Minster.

My dear mother was not one of those whose end was hastened by the shock of England's disaster. Doctor Wardle gave us little hope of her recovery from the first. The immediate cause of death was pneumonia; but I gathered that my mother had come to the end of her store of vitality, and, it may be, of desire for life. I have sometimes thought that her complete freedom from those domestic cares of housekeeping, which had seemed to be the very source and fountainhead of continuous worry for her, may actually have robbed my mother of much of her hold upon life. In these last days I had been almost continuously beside her, and I know that she relinquished her life without one sigh that spelt regret.

Standing there at the edge of her grave in the hoary churchyard of the Minster, I was conscious of the loss of the last tie that bound me to the shelter of youth: the cared-for, irresponsible division of a man's life. The England of my youth was no more. Now, in the death of my mother, it seemed as if I had stepped out of one generation into another. I had entered a new generation, and was alone in it.

I was to sleep at my sister's house that night, but I had no wish to go there now. Doctor Wardle's forced gravity, his cheerful condolences, rather worried me. So it happened that I set out to walk from the churchyard, and presently found myself upon the winding upland road that led out of the rich Davenham valley, over the Ridgeway, and into the hilly Tarn Regis country, where I was born.

I drank a mug of cider in the quaint little beerhouse kept by Gammer Joy in Tarn Regis, and read again the doggerel her grandfather had painted on its sign-board, in which the traveller was advised of the various uses of liquor, taken in moderation, and the evil effects of its abuse. Taken wisely, I remember, it was suggested that liquor proved the best of lubricants for the wheels of life. Mrs. Joy looked just as old and just as active and rosy as she had always looked for so long as I could remember; and she hospitably insisted upon my eating a large slab of her dough cake with my cider--a very excellent comestible it was.

The old dame's mood was cheerfully pessimistic--that is to say, she was garrulous, and spoke cheerily of generally downward tendencies. Thus, the new rector, by her way of it, was of a decadent modern type, full of newfangled "Papish" notions as to church vestments and early services, and neglectful of traditional responsibilities connected with soup and coal and medical comforts. Cider was no longer what it used to be, I gathered, since the big brewers took it in hand, and spoiled the trade of those who had hand-presses. As for farming, Gammer Joy held that it was not near so good a trade for master or man with land at fifteen shillings the acre, as much of it was thereabouts, as it had been with rents up to two or three pounds, and food twice as dear as now.

"But there, Master Dick," said the old lady; "I suppose we be all Germans now--so they do tell me, however; an' if we be no better nor furriners here in Darset, why I doan't know as't matters gertly wha' cwomes to us at all. But I will say things wor different in your feyther's time, Master Dick--that they was. Ah doan't believe he'd ha' put up wi' this German business for a minute, that ah doan't."

I gathered that the new rector was an earnest young man and a hard worker; but, evidently, those of Gammer Joy's generation preferred my father's aloofness in conjunction with his regular material dispensations, and his habit of leaving folk severely to themselves, so far as their thoughts and feelings were concerned.

The cottagers with whom I talked that summer's evening cherished a monumental ignorance regarding the real significance of the events which had shaken England to its very roots since I had last seen Tarn Regis. Gammer Joy's view seemed to be fairly typical. We had become German; England belonged to Germany; the Radicals had sold us to the Kaiser--and so forth. But no German soldiers had been seen in Dorset. The whole thing was shadowy, academic, a political business; suitable enough for the discussion of Londoners, no doubt, but, after all, of small bearing upon questions of real and intimate interest, such as the harvest, the weather, and the rate of wages.

"Sims queer, too, that us should be born again like, and become Germans," said one man to me; "but ah doan't know as it meakes much odds to the loike o' we; though ah hev heerd as how Farmer Jupp be thinkin' o' gettin' shut o' his shartharn bull that won the prize to Davenham, an' doin' wi' fower men an' a b'y, in place o' sevin. Well, o' course, us has to keep movin' wi' the times, as sayin' is; an' 'tis trew them uplan' pastures o' Farmer Jupp's they do be mos' onusual poor an' leery, as you med say."

Twilight already held the land in its grave embrace when I made my way along Abbott's Lane (my father had devoted months to the task of tracing the origin of that name) and began the ascent of Barebarrow, by crossing which diagonally one reaches the Davenham turnpike from Tarn Regis, a shorter route by nearly a mile than that of the road past the mill and over the bridge. And so, presently, my feet were treading turf which had probably been turf before the Christian era. Smooth and vast against the sky-line, Barebarrow lay above me, like a mammoth at rest.

On its far side was our Tarn Regis giant, a famous figure cut in the turf, and clearly visible from the tower of Davenham Minster. Long ago, in my earliest childhood, village worthies had given me the story of this figure--how once upon a time a giant came and slew all the Tarn Regis flocks for his breakfast. Then he lay down to sleep behind Barebarrow, and while he slept the enraged shepherds and work-folk bound him with a thousand cart-ropes, and slew him with a thousand scythes and forks and other homely implements. And then, that posterity might know his fearsome bulk, they cut out the turf all round his form, and eke the outline of the club beside him, and left the figure there to commemorate their valour and the loss of their flocks. Some three hundred feet long it was, I think, with a club the length of a tall pine-tree. In any case, the Tarn Regis lad who would excel in feats of strength had but to spend the night of Midsummer's Eve in the crook of the giant's arm (as some one or two did every year), and other youths of the countryside could never stand a chance with him.

I paused on the ledge below the barrow beside a ruined shepherd's hut, and recalled the fact that here my father had unearthed sundry fragments of stone and pieces of implements which the Dorchester Museum curator had welcomed as very early British relics. They went back, I remembered, to long before the Roman period; to days possibly more remote than those of ancient Barebarrow himself. If you refer to a good map you will find this spot surrounded by such indications of immemorial antiquity as "Tumuli," "British Village," and the like. The Roman encampment on the other side of Davenham Minster was modernity itself, I thought, compared with this ancient haunt of the neolithic forerunners of the early Briton; this resting-place of men whose doings were a half-forgotten story many centuries before the birth of Julius Caesar.

I sat down on the grassy ledge and looked out across the lichen-covered roofs and squat, rugged church tower of Tarn Regis; and pictures rose in my mind, pictures to some extent inspired, perhaps, by scraps I had read of learned essays written by my father. He had loved this ancient ground; he had been used to finger the earth hereabouts as a man might finger his mistress's hair. I do not know what period my twilit fancy happened upon, but it was assuredly a later one than that of Barebarrow, for I saw shaggy warriors with huge pointless swords, their hilts decorated with the teeth of wild beasts--a Bronze Age vision, no doubt. I saw rude chariots of war, with murderous scythe-blades on their wheels--and, in a flash then, the figure of Boadicea: that valiant mother of our race, erect and fearless in her chariot--

Regions Caesar never knew, Thy posterity shall sway!

"Thy posterity shall sway!" If you repeat the lines to yourself you may see the outline of my vision. There at the foot of Barebarrow I saw that Queen of ancient Britons at the head of her wild, shaggy legions. "The Roman Army can never withstand the shouts and clamour of so many thousands, far less their shock and fury," said the Queen. I saw her lead her valiant horde upon Colchester, and for me the ancient rudeness of it all was shot through and through with glimpses of the scientific sacking of Colchester, as I had read of it but a few weeks ago. I saw the advance of the Roman Governor; the awful slaughter of the British; the end of the brave Queen who could not brook defeat: the most heart-stirring episode in English history.

"Thy posterity shall sway!" I recalled the solemn splendour of another great Queen's passing--that which I had seen with my own eyes while still a lad at Rugby: the stately gathering of the great ships at Spithead; the end of Victoria the Good. No more than a step it seemed from my vision of the unconquerable Boadicea. But to that other onslaught upon Colchester--to General von Fuechter's slaughter of women and children and unarmed men in streets of houses whose ashes must be warm yet--O Lord, how far! I thought. Could it really be that a thousand years of inviolability had been broken, ended, in those few wild days; ended for ever?

Lights twinkled now among the nestling houses of the little place where I was born. They made me think of torches, the clash of arms, the spacious mediaeval days when Davenham Minster supported a great monastery, whose lordly abbot owned the land Tarn Regis stood upon.

And then the little lights grew misty and dim in my eyes as glimpses came of my own early days; of play on that very ridge-side where I sat now, where I had then romantically sworn friendship with George Stairs on the eve of my departure for Elstree School, and his leaving with his father for Canada. How had I kept my vow? Where was George Stairs now? There was not a foot of that countryside we had not roamed together. My eyes pricked as I looked and listened. Exactly so, I thought, the sheep-bells had sounded below Barebarrow when I had lain listening to them in that low-pitched back bedroom of the Rectory which I had been proud to hear called "Dick's Room," after my first experience of sleeping alone.

Then for a space my mind was blank as the dark valley beyond the village--until thoughts and pictures of recent happenings began to oust the gentler memories, and I lived over again the mad, wild, tragic week which culminated in the massacre of the North London trenches. But in the light of my previous musings I saw these happenings differently, more personally, than in the actual experience of them. It seemed now that not my country only, but myself, had been struck down and humbled to the dust by the soldiers of the Kaiser. I saw the broad fair faces of the German cavalry as they had sat their horse in Whitehall on the evening of Black Saturday. I heard again the clank of their arms, the barking of guttural orders. Could it be that they had mastered England? that for nine long years we were to be encircled by their garrisons? Nine years of helotry!

A sudden coolness in the air reminded me of the lateness of the hour, and I rose and began to cross Barebarrow.

But this ancient land was British in every blade of its grass, I thought--root and crop, hill and dale, above and beneath, no single sod of it but was British. Surely nothing could alter that. Nine years of helotry! I heard again the confused din of the Westminster Riot; the frantic crowd's insistent demand for surrender, for unconditional surrender. And now the nation's word was pledged. Our heads were bowed for nine years long.

Suddenly, then, as I descended upon the turnpike, a quite new thought came to me. The invasion had overridden all law, all custom, all understandings. The invasion was an act of sheer lawless brutality. No surrender could bind a people to submission in the face of such an outrage as that. The Germans must be driven out; the British people must rise and cast them out, and overthrow for ever their insolent dominion. But too many of the English people were--like myself! Well, they must learn; we must all learn; every able-bodied man must learn; for a blow had to be struck that should free England for ever. The country must be awakened to realization of that need. We owed so much to the brave ones who gave us England; so much could be demanded of us by those that came after. The thing had got to be.

I walked fast, I remember, and singing through my head as I entered Davenham Minster, long after my sister's supper hour, were the lines to which I had never till then paid any sort of heed:

Regions Caesar never knew, Thy posterity shall sway!

III

THE RETURN TO LONDON

Oh! 'tis easy To beget great deeds; but in the rearing of them-- The threading in cold blood each mean detail, And furze brake of half-pertinent circumstance-- There lies the self-denial.

CHARLES KINGSLEY.

I spent but one other day in Dorset after my walk out to Tarn Regis, and then took train in the morning for London.

I believe I have said before that Doctor Wardle, my sister's husband, was prosperous and popular. The fact made it natural for me to accept my mother's disposition of her tiny property, which, in a couple of sentences, she had bequeathed solely to me. My sister had no need of the hundred and fifty pounds a year that was derived from my mother's little capital, which had been invested in Canadian securities and was unaffected by England's losses. Thus I was now possessed of means sufficient to provide me with the actual necessities of life; and, though I had not thought of it before, realization of this came to me while I attended to the winding up of my mother's small affairs, bringing with it a certain sense of comfort and security.

It was with a strongly hopeful feeling, a sense almost of elation, that I stepped from the train at Waterloo. My quiet days and nights in Dorset had taught me something; and, particularly, I had gained much, in conviction and in hope, from the evening spent by Barebarrow. I cannot say that I had any definite plans, but I was awake to a genuine sense of duty to my native land, and that was as strange a thing for me as for a great majority of my fellow countrymen. I was convinced that a great task awaited us all, and I determined upon the performance of my part in it. I suppose I trusted that London would show me the particular form that my effort should take. Meanwhile, as a convert, the missionary feeling was strong in me.

I might have made shift to afford better quarters, perhaps, but it was to my original lodging in Bloomsbury that I drove from Waterloo. Some few belongings of mine were there, and I entertained a friendly sort of feeling for my good-hearted but slatternly landlady, and for poor, overworked Bessie, with her broad, generally smutty face, and lingering remains of a Dorset accent. The part of London with which I was familiar had resumed its normal aspect now, and people were going about their ordinary avocations very much as though England never had been invaded.

But in the north and east of the capital were streets of burned and blackened houses, and the Epping and Romford districts were one wilderness of ruins, and of graves; while across East Anglia, from the coast to the Thames, the trail of the invaders was as the track of a locust plague, but more terrible by reason of its blood-soaked trenches, its innumerable shallow graves, and its charred remains of once prosperous towns. Hundreds of ruined farmers and small landholders were working as navvies at bridge and road and railway repairs.

A great many people had been ruined during those few nightmare days of the invasion, and every man in England was burdened now with a scale of taxation never before known in the country. But business had resumed its sway, and London looked very much as ever. The need there was for a general making good, from London to the Wash, provided a great deal of employment, and the Government had taken such steps as it could to make credit easy. But Consols were still as low as sixty-eight; prices had not yet fallen to the normal level, and money was everywhere scarce.

In the middle afternoon I set out for South Kensington to see Constance Grey, to whom I had written only once during my absence, and then only to tell her of my mother's death. She had replied by telegraph, a message of warm and friendly sympathy. I knew well that she was always busy, and, like most moderns who have written professionally, I suppose we were both bad correspondents. Now there was much of which I wanted to talk with Constance, and it was with a feeling of sharp disappointment that I learned from the servant at the flat that she was not at home. Mrs. Van Homrey was in, however, and in a few moments I was with her in the little drawing-room where I had passed the night of London's exhausted sleep on Black Saturday.

"Yes, you have just missed my niece," said Mrs. Van Homrey, after a kindly reference to the strip of crepe on my arm. "She has gone in to Victoria Street to a 'conference of the powers' of John Crondall's convening. Oh, didn't you know he was here again? Yes, he arrived last week, and, as usual, is up to his neck in affairs already, and Constance with him. I verily believe that child has discovered the secret of perpetual motion."

At first mention of John Crondall's name my heart had warmed to its recollection of the man, and a pleasurable thought of meeting him again. And immediately then the warm feeling had been penetrated by a vague sense of disquiet, when Mrs. Van Homrey spoke of his affairs--"and Constance with him." But I was not then conscious of the meaning of my momentary discomfort, though, both then and afterwards, I read emphasis and meaning into Mrs. Van Homrey's coupling of the two names. I asked what the "conference" was about, but gathered that Mrs. Van Homrey was not very fully informed.

"I know they are to meet these young Canadian preachers who are so tremendously praised by the _Standard_---- What are their names, again? Tcha! How treacherous my memory grows! You know the men I mean. John Crondall met them the day after their arrival last week, and is enthusiastic about them."

I felt very much out of the movement. During the few days immediately preceding my mother's death, and since then, I had not even seen a newspaper, and, being unusually preoccupied, not only over the events of my stay at Davenham Minster, but by developments in my own thoughts, I seemed to have lost touch with current affairs.

"And what does John Crondall think of the outlook?" I asked.

"Well, I think his fear is that people in the country--outside East Anglia, of course--may fail to realize all that the invasion has meant and will mean; and that Londoners and townsfolk generally may slip back into absorption in business and in pleasure as soon as they can afford that again, and forget the fact that England is practically under Germany's heel still."

"The taxes will hardly allow them to do that, surely," I said.

"Well, I don't know. The English are a wonderful people. The invasion was so swift and sudden; the opposition to it was so comparatively trifling; surrender and peace came so soon, that really I don't know but what John is right. He generally is. You must remember that millions of the people have not seen a German soldier. They have had no discipline yet. Even here in London, as soon as the people spoke decidedly, peace followed. They did not have to strike a blow. They did not feel a blow. They were not with you and Conny, remember, at those awful trenches. Anyhow, John thinks the danger is lest they forget again, and regard the whole tragic business as a new proof of England's ability to 'muddle through' anything, without any assistance from them. Of course, England's wealth is still great, and her recuperative powers are wonderful; but John Crondall holds that, in spite of that, submission to nine years of German occupation and German tribute-paying will mean the end of the British Empire."

"And he feels that the people must be stirred into seeing that and acting on it?" I said, recalling my own thoughts during the night walk from Barebarrow.

"Yes, I suppose that is his view. But, now I come to think of it, why should you waste your time in talking to an old woman who can only give you echoes? It is only half an hour since Conny started. Why not hurry on to John Crondall's place, and join them there? He has often spoken of you, Conny tells me."

This seemed to me too good a suggestion to neglect, and ten minutes later I was on my way to St. James's Park by underground railway. I bought an evening paper on my way, and read an announcement to the effect that General Baron von Fuechter, after returning to Portsmouth from his visit to Berlin, had definitely decided that Portsmouth and Devonport could no longer remain British naval bases, and that no British sailors or soldiers in uniform could in future be admitted into any of the towns in England now occupied by Germany.

IV

THE CONFERENCE

Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side; Some great cause, God's new Messiah offering each the bloom or blight, Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right; And the choice goes by for ever 'twixt that darkness and that light.

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.

A few seconds after his servant had shown me into the dining-room of John Crondall's flat, the man himself entered to me with a rush, as his manner was, both hands outstretched to welcome me.

"Good man!" he said. "I've had fine news of you from Constance Grey, and now you're here to confirm it. Splendid!"

And then, with sudden gravity, and a glance at my coat sleeve: "I heard of your loss. I know what it means. I lost my mother when I was in Port Arthur, and I know London looked different because of it when I got back. It's a big wrench; one we've all got to face."

"Yes. I think my mother died without regret; she was very tired."

There was a pause, and then I said:

"But I may have chosen my time badly, to-day. Mrs. Van Homrey said you had a conference. If you----"

"Tut, tut, man! Don't talk nonsense. I was just going to say how well you'd timed things. I don't know about a conference, but Constance is here, and Varley, and Sir Herbert Tate--he took on the secretaryship of the Army League, you know, after Gilbert chucked it--and Winchester. You know Winchester, the Australian rough-rider, who did such fine work with his bushman corps in the South African war--and--let me see! And Forbes Thompson, the great rifle clubman, you know; _and_ the Canadian preachers--splendid fellows, by Jove! Simply splendid they are, I can tell you. I look for great things from those two. Stairs is English, of course, but he's been nearly all his life in British Columbia and the Northwest, and he's got all the eternal youth, the fire and grit and enthusiasm of the Canadian, with--somehow, something else as well--good. His chum, Reynolds, is an out-and-out Canadian, born in Toronto of Canadian parents. Gad, there's solid timber in that chap, I can tell you. But, look here! Come right in, and take a hand. I'm awfully glad you came. I heard all about _The Mass_ and that; but, bless me, I can see in your eye that that's all past and done with for ever. By the way, I heard last night that your Mr. Clement Blaine had got a job after his own heart, in the pay of the Germans at Chatham--interpreter in the passport office, or some such a thing. What a man! Well, come along in, my dear chap, and give us the benefit of your wisdom."

We were leaving the room now.

"I knew you'd like Constance," he said. "She's the real thing, isn't she?"

I despised myself for the hint of chill his words brought me. What right had I to suspect or resent? And in any case John Crondall spoke in his customary frank way, with never a hint of afterthought.

"Yes," I said; "she's splendid."

"And such a head-piece, my boy. By Jove, she has a better head for business than---- Here we are, then."

Constance Grey was naturally the first to greet me in the big room where John Crondall did his work and met his friends. There was welcome in her beautiful eyes, but, obviously, Constance was very much preoccupied. Then I was presented to Sir Morell Strachey, Sir Herbert Tate, and Forbes Thompson, and then to the Canadian parson, the Rev. George Stairs. I had paid no attention to the name when Crondall had mentioned it in the other room. Now, as he named the parson again, I looked into the man's face, and----

"Mordan? Why, not Dick Mordan, of Tarn Regis?" said the parson.

"By gad! George Stairs! I was thinking of you on the side of Barebarrow the night before last."

"And I was thinking of you, Dicky Mordan, yesterday afternoon, when I met the present rector of Tarn Regis at a friend's house."

It was a long strong handshake that we exchanged. Sixteen years on the young side of thirty is a considerable stretch of time, and all that had passed since I had last seen my old Tarn Regis playmate.

Stairs introduced me to his friend, Reynolds, and I learned the curious fact that this comrade and chum of my old friend's was also a parson, but not of Stairs's church. Reynolds had qualified at a theological training college in Ontario, and had been Congregational minister in the parish of which Stairs had been vicar for the last three years.

There was a big table in the middle of the room, littered over with papers and writing materials. About this table we presently all found seats.

"Now look here, my friends," said John Crondall, "this is no time for ceremoniousness, apologies, and the rest of it, and I'm not going to indulge in any. No doubt we've all of us got special interests of our own, but there's one we all share; and it comes first with all of us, I think. We all want the same thing for England and the Empire, and we all want to do what we can to help. It's because of that I dismiss the ceremonies, and don't say anything about the fear of boring you, and all that. I don't even make exceptions of you, Stairs, or you, Reynolds. I tell you quite frankly I want to poke and pry into your plans. I want to know all about 'em. I've sense enough to see that you wield a big influence. I am certain I have your sympathy in my aims. And I want to find out how far I can make your aims help my aims. All I know is that you have addressed three meetings, each bigger than the last; and that your preaching is the real right thing. Now I want you to tell us as much as you will about your plans. You know we are all friends here."

Stairs looked at Reynolds, and Reynolds nodded at Stairs.

"Well," said the latter, smiling, first at Crondall, and then at me, "our plans are simplicity itself. In Canada we have not risen yet to the cultivation of much diplomacy. We don't understand anything of your high politics, and we don't believe in roundabout methods. For instance, I suppose here in England you don't find parsons of one denomination working in partnership much with parsons of another denomination. Well, now, when I took over from my predecessor at Kootenay, I found my friend Reynolds doing a fine work there, among the farmers and miners, as Congregational minister. He was doing precisely the work I wanted to do; but there was only one of him. Was I to fight shy of him, or set to work, as it were, in opposition to him? Well, anyhow, that didn't seem to me the way. We had our own places of worship; but, for the rest, both desiring the one thing--the Christian living of the folk in our district--we worked absolutely shoulder to shoulder. There were a few worthy folk who objected; but when Reynolds and I came to talk it over, we decided that these had as much religion as was good for them already, and that we could afford rather to ignore them, if by joint working we could rope in the folk who had next to none at all---- You must forgive my slang, Miss Grey."

Constance smiled across at the parson.

"You forget, Mr. Stairs, I grew up on the veld," she said.

"Ah, to be sure; I suppose one is as close to the earth and the realities there as in Canada."

"Quite," said Crondall. "And, anyhow, we are not doing any apologies to-day; so please go ahead."

"Well," continued George Stairs, "we often talked over Old Country affairs, Reynolds and I. Reynolds had only spent three months over here in his life, but I fancy I learned more from him than he from me."

"That's a mistake, of course," said Reynolds. "He had the facts and the knowledge. I merely supplied a fresh point of view--home-grown Canadian."

"Ah, well, we found ourselves very much in agreement, anyhow, about Home affairs and about the position of the Anglican Church in Canada; the need there is for less exclusiveness and more direct methods. The idea of coming Home and preaching through England, a kind of pilgrimage--that was entirely Reynolds's own. I would have come with him gladly, when we had our district in good going order out there. But, you see, I had no money. My friend had a little. Then my father died. He had been ailing for a long time, and I verily think the news of the invasion broke his heart. He died in the same week that it reached him, and left his two farms, with some small house property, to me.

"My father's death meant for me a considerable break. The news from England shocked me inexpressibly. It was such a terrible realization of the very fears that Reynolds and myself had so often discussed--the climax and penalty of England's mad disregard of duty; of every other consideration except pleasure, easy living, comfort, and money-making."

"This is the pivot of the whole business, that duty question," interposed Crondall. "It was your handling of that on Tuesday that burdened you with my acquaintance. I listened to that, and I said, 'Mr. George Stairs and you have got to meet, John Crondall!' But I didn't mean to interrupt."

"Well, as I say, I found myself rather at a parting of the ways, and then came my good friend here, and he said, 'What about these farms and houses of yours, Stairs? They represent an income. What are you going to do about it?' And--well, you see, that settled it. We just packed our bags and came over."

"And now that you are here?" said John Crondall.

"Well, you heard what we had to say the other afternoon?"

"I did--every word of it."

"Well, that's what we are here for. Our aim is to take that message to every man and woman in this country; and we believe God will give us zest and strength enough to bring it home to them--to make them _feel_ the truth of it. Your aim, naturally, is political and patriotic. I don't think you can have any warmer sympathizers than Reynolds and myself. But our part, as you see, is another one, and outside politics. We believe the folk at Home have lost their bearings; their compasses want adjusting. I say here what I should not venture to admit to a less sympathetic and indulgent audience: Reynolds and myself aim at arousing, by God's will, the sleeping sense of duty in our kinsmen here at Home. We have no elaborate system, no finesse, no complicated issues to consider. Our message is simply: 'You have forgotten Duty; and the Christian life is not possible while Duty remains forgotten or ignored.' Our purpose is just to give the message; to prove it; make it real; make it felt."

Crondall had been looking straight at the speaker while he listened, his face resting between his two hands, his elbows planted squarely on the table. Now he seemed to pounce down upon Stairs's last words.

"And yet you say your part is another one than ours. But why not the same? Why not the very essence and soul of our part, Stairs?"

"Gad--he's right!" said Sir Herbert Tate, in an undertone. Reynolds leaned forward in his chair, his lean, keen face alight.

"Why not the very soul of our part, Stairs--the essential first step toward our end? Our part is to urge a certain specific duty on them--a duty we reckon urgent and vital to the nation. But we can't do that unless we, or you, can first do your part--rousing them to the sense of duty--Duty itself. Man, but your part is the foundation of our part--foundation, walls, roof, corner-stone, complete! We only give the structure a name. Why, I give you my word, Stairs, that that address of yours on Tuesday was the finest piece of patriotic exhortation I ever listened to."

"But--it's very kind of you to say so; but I never mentioned King or country."

"Exactly! You gave them the root of the whole matter. You cleared a way into their hearts and heads which is open now for news of King and country. It's as though I had to collect some money for an orphanage from a people who'd never heard of charity. Before I see the people you teach 'em the meaning and beauty of charity--wake the charitable sense in them. You needn't bother mentioning orphanages; but if I come along in your rear, my chances of collecting the money are a deal rosier than if you hadn't been there first--what?"

"I see--I see," said Stairs, slowly.

"Mr. Crondall, you ought to have been a Canadian," said Reynolds, in his dry way. His use of the "Mr.," even to a man who had no hesitation in calling him plain "Reynolds," was just one of the tiny points of distinction between himself and Stairs.

"Oh, Canada has taught me something; and so have South Africa and India; and so have you and Stairs, with your mission, or pilgrimage, or whatever it is--your Message."

"Well," said Stairs, "it seems to me your view of our pilgrimage is a very kindly, and perhaps flattering one; and as I have said, your aims as a citizen of the Empire and a lover of the Old Country could not have warmer sympathizers than Reynolds and myself; but----"

"Mind, I'm not trying to turn your religious teaching to any ignoble purpose," said Crondall, quickly. "I am not asking you to introduce a single new word or thought into it for my sake."

"That's so," said Reynolds, his eye upon Stairs.

"Quite so, quite so," said Stairs. "And, of course, I am with you in all you hope for; but you know, Crondall, religion is perhaps a rather different matter to a parson from what it is to you. Forgive me if I put it clumsily, but----"

And now, greatly daring, I ventured upon an interruption, speaking upon impulse, without consideration, and hearing my voice as though it were something outside myself.

"George Stairs," I said--and I fancy the thoughts of both of us went back sixteen years--"what was it you thought about the Congregational minister when you took over your post at Kootenay? How did you decide to treat him? Did you ever regret the partnership?"

"Now if that isn't straight out Western fashion!" murmured Reynolds. Constance beamed at me from her place beside John Crondall.

"I leave it at that," said our host.

"A palpable bull's-eye," said Forbes Thompson.

I hardly needed George Stairs's friendly clap on the shoulder, nor the assurance of his:

"You are right, Dick. You have shown me my way in three words."

"Good," said Reynolds. "Well, now I don't mind saying what I wouldn't have said before, that among the notes we drew up nearly three years ago----"

"You drew up, my friend," said Stairs.

"Among the notes we drew up, I say, on this question of neglected duty, were details as to the citizen's obligations regarding the defence of his home and native land, with special reference to the callous neglect of Lord Roberts's campaign of warning and exhortation. Now, Stairs, you know as well as I do, you wrote with your own hand the passage about the Englishman's sphere of duty being as much wider than his country as Greater Britain was wider than Great Britain. You know you did."

"Oh, you can count me in, all right, Reynolds; you know I'm not one for half-measures."

"Well, now, my friends, I believe I see daylight. By joining hands I really believe we are going to accomplish something for England." Crondall looked round the table at the faces of his friends. "We are all agreed, I know, that the present danger is the danger Kipling tried to warn us about years and years ago."

"'Lest we forget!'" quoted Sir Herbert quietly.

"Exactly. There are so many in England who have neither seen nor felt anything of the blow we have had."

And here I told them something of what I had seen and heard in Dorset; how remote and unreal the whole thing was to folk there.

"That's it, exactly," continued Crondall. "That's one difficulty which has just got to be overcome. Another is the danger that, among those who did see and feel something of it, here in London, and even in East Anglia, the habit of apathy in national matters, and the calls of business and pleasure may mean forgetting, indifference--the old fatal neglect. You see, we must remember that, crushing as the blow was, it did not actually reach so very many people. It did not force them to get up and fight for their lives. It was all over so soon. Directly they cried out, 'The Destroyers' answered with surrender, and so helped to strengthen the fatal delusion they had cherished so long, that everything is a matter of pounds, shillings, and pence."

"'They'll never go for England, because England's got the dibs,'" quoted Forbes Thompson, with a nod of assent.

"Yes, yes. 'Make alliances, and leave me to my business!' One knows it all so well. But, mind you, even to the blindest of them, the invasion has meant something."

"And the income-tax will mean something to 'em, too," said Sir Morell Strachey.

"Yes. But the English purse is deep, and the Englishman has long years of money-spinning freedom from discipline behind him. Still, here is this brutal fact of the invasion. Here we are actually condemned to nine years of life inside a circle of German encampments on English soil, with a hundred millions a year of tribute to pay for the right to live in our own England. Now my notion is that the lesson must not be lost. The teaching of the thing must be forced home. It must be burnt into these happy-go-lucky countrymen of ours--if Stairs and Reynolds are to achieve their end, or we ours."

"Our aim is to awake the sense of duty which seems to us to have become atrophied, even among the professedly religious," said Stairs.

"And ours," said Crondall, sharp as steel, "is to ram home your teaching, and to show them that the nearest duty to their hand is their duty to the State, to the Race, to their children--the duty of freeing England and throwing over German dominion."

"To render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's," said Reynolds. And Stairs nodded agreement.

"Now, by my way of it, Stairs and Reynolds must succeed before we can succeed," said Crondall. "That is my view, and because that is so, you can both look to me, up till the last breath in me, for any kind of support I can give you--for any kind of support at all. But that's not all. Where you sow, I mean to reap. We both want substantially the same harvest--mine is part of yours. I know I can count on you all. You, Stairs, and you, Reynolds, are going to carry your Message through England. I propose to follow in your wake with mine. You rouse them to the sense of duty; I show them their duty. You make them ready to do their duty; I show it them. I'll have a lecturer. I'll get pictures. They shall _feel_ the invasion, and know what the German occupation means. You shall convert them, and I'll enlist them."

"Enlist them! By Jove! that's an idea," said Forbes Thompson. "A patriotic league, a league of defenders, a nation in arms."

"The Liberators!"

"Ah! Yes, the Liberators."

"Or the Patriots, simply?"

"I would enrol them just as citizens," said Crondall. "By that time they should have learned the meaning of the word."

"Yes, by Jove! it is good enough--just 'The Citizens,'" said Sir Morell Strachey.

And then a servant came in with a message for Forbes Thompson, and we realized that dinner-time had come and almost gone. But we were in no mood for separating just then, and so every one welcomed John Crondall's invitation to dine with him at a neighbouring hotel.

V

MY OWN PART

Free men freely work; Whoever fears God, fears to sit at ease.

E. B. BROWNING.

Constance Grey and myself were the last of John Crondall's guests to leave him on that evening of the conference. As soon as we three were alone, Constance turned to Crondall, and said:

"You must expect to have me among your camp followers if I find Aunt Mary can stand the travelling. I dare say there will be little things I can do."

"Things you can do! By George, I should think so!" said Crondall. "I shall look to you to capture the women; and if we get the women, it will surprise me if we don't get the men as well. Besides, don't you fancy I have forgotten your prowess as a speaker in Cape Town and Pretoria. You remember that meeting of your father's, when you saved him from the wrath of Vrow Bischoff? Why, of course, I reckon on you. We'll have special women's meetings."

"And where do I come in?" I asked, with an assumed lightness of tone which was far from expressing my feeling.

"Yes," said Crondall, eying me thoughtfully; "I've been thinking of that."

As he said that, I had a swift vision of myself and my record, as both must have appeared to a man like Crondall, whose whole life had been spent in patriotic effort. The vision was a good corrective for the unworthy shafts of jealousy--for that no doubt they were--which had come to me with John Crondall's references to Constance. I was admitted cordially into the confidences of these people from whom, on my record, I scarcely deserved common courtesy. It was with a distinctly chastened mind that I gave them both some outline of the thoughts and resolutions which had come to me during my evening beside Barebarrow, overlooking sleepy little Tarn Regis.

"It's a kind of national telepathy," said Crondall. "God send it's at work in other counties besides Dorset."

"It had need be," I told them; "for all those that I spoke to in Dorset accepted the German occupation like a thing as absolutely outside their purview as the movements of the planets."

"Yes, they want a lot of stirring, I know; but I believe we shall stir 'em all right. But about your part in the campaign. Of course, I recognize that every one has to earn his living, just as much now as before. But yet I know you'd like to be in this thing, Dick Mordan, and I believe you can help it a lot. What I thought of was this: I shall want a secretary, and want him very badly. He will be the man who will do half my work. On the other hand, I can't pay him much, for every cent of my income will be wanted in the campaign, and a good deal more besides. The thing is, would you tackle it, for the sake of the cause, for a couple of hundred a year? Of course, I should stand all running expenses. What do you think? It's not much of an offer, but it would keep us all together?"

Constance looked expectantly at me, and I realized with a sudden thrill the uses of even such small means as I now possessed.

"Well, no," I said; "I couldn't agree to that." The pupils of John Crondall's eyes contracted sharply, and a pained, wondering look crept into the face I loved, the vivid, expressive face of Constance Grey. "But what I would put my whole heart and soul into, would be working as your secretary for the sake of the cause, as long as you could stand the running expense, and--and longer."

I think the next minute was the happiest I had ever known. I dare say it seems a small enough matter, but it was the only thing of the kind I had ever been able to do. These friends of mine had always given so much to our country's cause. I had felt myself so far beneath them in this. Now, as John Crondall's strong hand came down on my shoulder, and Constance's bright eyes shone upon me in affectionate approval, my heart swelled within me, with something of the glad pride which should be the possession of every man, as it indubitably is of every true citizen and patriot.

"You see," I explained deprecatingly, as Crondall swayed my shoulder affectionately to and fro in his firm grip; "I have become a sort of a minor capitalist. I have about a hundred and fifty a year coming in, and so I'm as free as I am glad to work with you, and--there'll be two hundred more for the campaign, you see."

"God bless you, old chap! You and Constance and I, we'll move mountains--even the great mountain of apathy--between us. Sir Herbert offers a thousand pounds toward expenses, and Forbes Thompson and Varley are ready to speak for us anywhere we like, and Winchester has a pal who he says will work wonders as a kind of advance agent. I'm pretty sure of Government help, too--or Opposition help; they'll be governing before Christmas, you'll find. Now, we all meet here again the day after to-morrow. We three will see each other to-morrow, I expect. I must write a stack of letters before the midnight post."

"Well, can I lend a hand?" I asked.

"No, not to-night, Mr. Secretary Dick, thank you! But it's late. Will you take Constance home? I'll get my fellow to whistle up a cab."

Ten minutes earlier I should have been chilled by his implied guardianship of Constance; but now I had that within which warmed me through and through: the most effectual kind of protection against chill. So all was settled, and we left John Crondall to his letters. And, driving out to South Kensington, we talked over our hopes, Constance and I, as partners in one cause.

"This is the beginning of everything for me, Constance," I said, when we parted in the hall below her flat.

"It is going to be the beginning of very much for a good many," she said, as she gave me her hand.

"I wonder if you know how much--for me!"

"I think so. I am tremendously glad about it all."

But she did not know, could not know, just how much it meant to me.

"Good night, my patriotic Muse!" I said.

"Good night, Mr. Secretary Dick!"

And so we parted on the night of my return to London.

VI

PREPARATIONS

We were dreamers, dreaming greatly, in the man-stifled town; We yearned beyond the sky-line where the strange roads go down. Came the Whisper, came the Vision, came the Power, with the Need, Till the Soul that is not man's soul was lent us to lead.

. . . . .

Follow after--follow after--for the harvest is sown: By the bones about the wayside ye shall come to your own!

RUDYARD KIPLING.

Never before had I known days so full, so compact of effort and achievement, as were those of the week following the conference in John Crondall's rooms. I could well appreciate Winchester's statement when he said that: "John Crondall is known through three Continents as a glutton for work."

Our little circle represented Canada, South Africa, Australia, and the Mother Country; and, while I admit that my old friend, George Stairs, and his Canadian-born partner, Reynolds, could give points to most people in the matter of unwearying energy, yet I am proud to report that the member of our circle who, so to say, worked us all to a standstill was John Crondall, an Englishman born and bred. I said as much in the presence of them all, and when my verdict was generally endorsed, John Crondall qualified it with the remark:

"Well, I can only say that pretty nearly all I know about work I learned in the Colonies."

And I learned later on to realize the justice of this qualification. Colonial life does teach directness and concentration. Action of any sort in England was at that time hedged about by innumerable complications and cross issues and formalities, many of which we have won clear from since then. Perhaps it was the strength of our Colonial support which set the pace of our procedure. Whatever the cause, I know I never worked harder, or accomplished more; and I had never been so happy.

I think John Crondall must have interviewed from two to three hundred prominent politicians and members of the official world during that week. I have heard it said by men who should know, that the money Crondall spent in cable messages to the Colonies that week was the price of the first Imperial Parliament ever assembled in Westminster Hall. I use these words in their true sense, their modern sense, of course. Nominally, the House of Commons had long been the "Imperial" Parliament.

I know that week's work established _The Citizens_ as an already powerful organization, with a long list of names famous in history among its members, with a substantial banking account, and with volunteer agents in every great centre in the kingdom. The motto and watchword of _The Citizens_, as engraved upon a little bronze medal of membership, was: "For God; our Race; and Duty." The oath of enrolment said:

"I ---- do hereby undertake and promise to do my duty to God, to our Race, and to the British Empire to the utmost limit of my ability, without fear and without compromise, so help me God!"

John Crondall interviewed the editors of most of the leading London newspapers during that week, and thereby earned a discreet measure of journalistic support for his campaign. There was a great need of discretion here, for our papers were carefully studied in Berlin, as well as by the German Generals commanding the various English towns now occupied by the Kaiser's troops. It was, of course, most important that no friction should be caused at this stage.

But it was with regard to the preaching pilgrimage of the two Canadian parsons that Crondall's friends of the Press rendered us the greatest possible service. Here no particular reticence was called for, and the Press could be, and was, unreservedly helpful and generous. In estimating the marvellous achievements of the two preachers, I do not think enough weight has been attached to the great services rendered to their mission by such journals as the great London daily which published each morning a column headed, "The New Evangel," and, indeed, by all the newspapers both in London and the provinces.

We were not directly aiming, during that first week, at enrolling members. No recruiting had been done. Yet when, at the end of the week, a meeting of the executive committee was held at the Westminster Palace Hotel, the founder, John Crondall, was able to submit a list of close upon six hundred sworn members of _The Citizens_; and, of these, I suppose fully five hundred were men of high standing in the world of politics, the Services, commerce, and the professions. Among them were three dukes, twenty-three peers, a Field Marshal, six newspaper proprietors, eleven editors, seven of the wealthiest men in England, and ninety-eight prominent Members of Parliament. And, as I say, no systematic recruiting had been done.

At that meeting of the executive a great deal of important business was transacted. John Crondall was able to announce a credit balance of ten thousand pounds, with powers to overdraw under guarantee at the Bank of England. A simple code of membership rules and objects was drawn up for publication, and a short code of secret rules was formed, by which every sworn member was to be bound. These rules stipulated for implicit obedience to the decision and orders of the executive, and by these every member was bound to take a certain course of rifle drill, and to respond immediately to any call that should be made for military service within the British Isles during a period of twelve months from the date of enrolment. John Crondall announced that there was every hope of _The Citizens_ obtaining from the Government a grant of one service rifle and one hundred rounds of ammunition for every member who could pass a simple medical examination.

"We may not actually secure this grant until after the general election," Crondall explained; "but it can be regarded as a certain asset."

It was decided that, officially, there should be no connection between the Canadian preachers, as every one called them, and the propaganda of _The Citizens_. But it was also privately agreed that steps should be taken to follow the Canadians throughout their pilgrimage with lectures and addresses, and meetings at which members could be enrolled upon the roster of _The Citizens_, including volunteer instructors in rifle drill. My friend Stairs attended this meeting with Reynolds, and, after discussion, it was agreed that, for the present, they should not visit the towns occupied by the Germans.

"The people there have their lesson before them every day and all day long," said John Crondall. "The folk we want to reach are those who have not yet learned their lesson. My advice is to attack London first. Enlist London on your side, and on that go to the provinces."

There was a good deal of discussion over this, and finally an offer John Crondall made was accepted by Stairs and Reynolds, and our meeting was brought to a close. What Crondall said was this:

"To-day is Monday. There is still a great deal of detail to be attended to. Officially, there must be no connection between Stairs and Reynolds and _The Citizens_. Actually, we know the connection is vital. Give me the rest of this week for arrangements, and I promise that we shall all gain by it. I will not appear in the matter, and I will see you each evening for consultation. Your pilgrimage shall begin on Sunday, and ours within a day or so of that."

Then followed another week of tense effort. Stairs and Reynolds both addressed minor gatherings during the week, and met John Crondall every evening for consultation. On Wednesday the principal Imperialistic newspaper in London appeared with a long leading article and three columns of descriptive exposition of "The New Evangel." On the same day the papers published despatches telling of the departure from their various homes of the Premiers, and two specially elected representatives of all the British Colonies, who were coming to England for an Imperial Conference at Westminster. The Government's resignation was expected within the month, and writs for the election were to be issued immediately afterwards.

On Wednesday evening and Thursday morning the newspapers of London alone published one hundred and thirteen columns of matter regarding the message and the pilgrimage of the Rev. George Stairs and the Rev. Arthur J. Reynolds. During the latter part of the week all London was agog over the Canadian preachers. As yet, very little had appeared in print regarding _The Citizens_.

On Sunday morning at three o'clock John Crondall went into his bedroom to sleep, and I slept in the room he had set aside for me in his flat--too tired out to undress. Even Crondall's iron frame was weary that night, and he admitted to me before retiring from a table at which we had kept three typewriters busy till long after midnight, that he had reached his limit and must rest.

"I couldn't stand another hour of it--unless it were necessary, you know," was his way of putting it.

By my persuasion he kept his bed during a good slice of Sunday morning, and lunched with me at Constance Grey's flat. He always said that Mrs. Van Homrey was the most restful tonic London could supply to any man. I went to the morning service at Westminster Abbey that day with Constance, and listened to a magnificent sermon from the Bishop of London, whose text was drawn from the sixth chapter of Exodus: "And I will take you to me for a people, and I will be to you a God."

The Bishop struck a strong note of hopefulness, but there was also warning and exhortation in his discourse. He spoke of sons of our race who had gone into far countries, and, carrying our Faith and traditions with them, had preserved these and wrought them into a finer fabric than the original from which they were drawn. And now, when a great affliction had come upon the people of England, their sons of the Greater Britain oversea were holding out kindly hands of friendship and support. But it was not alone in the material sense that we should do well to avail ourselves of the support offered us from the outside places. These wandering children of the Old Land had cherished among them a strong and simple godliness, a devout habit of Christian morality, from which we might well draw spiritual sustenance.

"You have all heard of the Canadian preachers, and I hope you will all learn a good deal more of their Message this very afternoon at the Albert Hall, where I am to have the honour of presiding over a meeting which will be addressed by these Christian workers from across the sea."

We found John Crondall a giant refreshed after his long sleep.

"I definitely promise you a seat this afternoon, Mrs. Van Homrey," he said, as we all sat down to lunch in the South Kensington flat, "but that's as much as I can promise. You and I will have to keep our feet, Dick, and you will have to share Lady Tate's seat, Constance. If every ticket-holder turns up this afternoon, there won't be a single vacant seat in the whole of that great hall."

"You earned your Sunday morning in, John," said Mrs. Van Homrey. "Is the Prime Minister coming?"

"No, he has failed me at the last, but half the members of the last Government will be there, and I have promises from prominent representatives of every religious denomination in England. There will be sixty military officers above captain's rank, in uniform, and forty-eight naval officers in uniform. There will be many scores of bluejackets and private soldiers, a hundred training-ship lads, fifty of the Legion of Frontiersmen, and a number of volunteers all in full uniform. There will be a tremendous number of society people, but the mass will be leavened, and I should say one-half the people will be middle-class folk. For to-night, no tickets have been issued. The attendance will depend to some extent on the success of this afternoon, but, to judge from the newspapers and the talk one hears, I should say it would be enormous."

Just before we left the flat Crondall told us a secret.

"You know they have a volunteer choir of fifty voices?" he said. "It was Stairs's idea, and he has carried it out alone. The choir consists entirely of bluejackets, soldiers, volunteers, Red Cross nurses, and boys from the Army bands."

VII

THE SWORD OF THE LORD

Stern Daughter of the Voice of God! O Duty! if that name thou love Who art a light to guide, a rod To check the erring, and reprove; Thou who art victory and law When empty terrors overawe; From vain temptations dost set free, And calm'st the weary strife of frail humanity!

WORDSWORTH'S _Ode to Duty_.

I have always been glad that I was able to attend that first great service of the Canadian preachers; and so, I think, has every one else who was there. Other services of theirs may have been more notable in certain respects--indeed, I know they were; but this one was the beginning, the first wave in a great tide. And I am glad that I was there to see that first grand wave rise upon the rock of British apathy.

I have said something of the audience, but a book might well be devoted to its description, and, again, a sentence may serve. It was a representative English gathering, in that it embraced a member of the Royal Family, a little group of old men and women from an asylum for the indigent, and members of every grade of society that comes between. Also, it was a very large gathering--even for the Albert Hall.

It should be remembered that not many weeks prior to this Sunday afternoon, the people of London, maddened by hunger, fear, and bewildered panic, had stormed Westminster to enforce their demand for surrender, and had seen Von Fuechter with his bloodstained legions take possession of the capital of the British Empire. Fifty Londoners had been cut down, almost in as many seconds, within two miles of the Mansion House. In one terrible week London had passed through an age of terror and humiliation, the end of which had been purchased in panic and disorder by means of a greater humiliation than any. Now England had to pay the bill. Some, in the pursuit of business and pleasure, were already forgetting; but the majority among the great concourse of Londoners who sat waiting in the Albert Hall that afternoon, clothed in their Sunday best, were still shrewdly conscious of the terrible severity of the blow which had fallen upon England.

Having found Constance her half-seat with Lady Tate, I stood beside one of the gangways below the platform, which lead to the dressing-rooms and other offices. Beside me was a table for Press representatives. There, with their pencils, I noted Campbell, of the _Daily Gazette_, and other men I knew, including Carew, for the _Standard_, who had an assistant with him. He told me that somewhere in the hall his paper had a special descriptive writer as well.

Looking up and down that vast building, from dome to amphitheatre, I experienced, as it were vicariously, something of the nervousness of stage fright. Londoners were not simple prairie folk, I thought. How should my friend George Stairs hold that multitude? Two plain men from Western Canada, accustomed to minister to farmers and miners, what could they say to engage and hold these serried thousands of Londoners, the most blase people in England? I had never heard either of the preachers speak in public, but--I looked out over that assemblage, and I was horribly afraid for my friends. A Church of England clergyman and a Nonconformist minister from Canada, and I told myself they had never had so much as an elocution lesson between them!

And then the Bishop of London appeared on the crowded platform, followed by George Stairs and Arthur Reynolds; and a dead silence descended upon the hall. In the forefront of the platform was a plain table with a chair at either end of it, and a larger one in the middle. Here the Bishop and the two preachers placed themselves. Then the Bishop rose with right hand uplifted, and said solemnly:

"May God bless to us all the Message which His two servants have brought us from oversea; for Christ's sake, Amen."

George Stairs remained kneeling at his end of the table. But as the Bishop resumed his seat Arthur Reynolds stepped forward, and, pitching his voice well, said:

"My friends, let us sing the British Anthem."

And at that the great organ spoke, and the choir of sailors, soldiers, and nurses led the singing of the National Anthem. The first bar was sung by the choir alone, but by the time the third bar was reached thousands among the standing congregation were singing with them, and the volume of sound was most impressive. I think that a good many people besides myself found this solemn singing of the Anthem, from its first line to its last, something of a revelation. It made "God Save the King" a real prayer instead of a musical intimation that hats might be felt for and carriages ordered. It struck a note which the Canadian preachers desired to strike. They began with a National Hymn which was a prayer for King and Country. The people were at first startled, and then pleased, and then stirred by a departure from all customs known to them. And that this should be so was, I apprehend, the deliberate intention of the Canadian preachers.

Still George Stairs knelt at his end of the bare table.

As the last note of the organ accompaniment died away, Arthur Reynolds stepped to the front.

"Will you all pray, please?" he said. He closed his eyes and extended one hand.

I cannot tell you what simple magic the man used. I know those were his words. But the compelling appeal in them was most remarkable. There was something childlike about his simple request. I do not think any one could have scoffed at the man. After a minute's silence, he prayed aloud, and this is what he said:

"Father in Heaven, give us strength to understand our duty and to do it. Thou knowest that two of the least among Thy servants have crossed the sea to give a Message to their kinsmen in England. Our kinsmen are a great and proud people, and we, as Thou knowest, are but very simple men. But our Message is from Thee, and with Thee all things are possible. Father, have pity upon our weakness to-day. Open to us the hearts of even the proudest and the greatest of our kinsmen. Do not let them scorn us. And, O Father of all men, gentle and simple, breathe Thou upon us that we may have a strength not of ourselves; a power worthy of the Message we bring, which shall make its truth to shine so that none may mistake it. For Christ's sake. Amen."

Arthur Reynolds resumed his seat, and a great Australian singer, a _prima donna_ of world-wide repute, stepped forward very simply and sang as a solo the hymn beginning:

Church of the Living God, Pillar and ground of truth, Keep the old paths the fathers trod In thy illumined youth.

The prayer had softened all hearts by its simplicity, its humility. The exquisitely rendered hymn attuned all minds to thoughts of ancient, simple piety, and the traditions which guided and inspired our race in the past. When it was ended, and not till then, George Stairs rose from his knees, and stepped forward to where a little temporary extension jutted out beyond the rest of the platform. He stood there with both hands by his side, and a Bible held in one of them. His head inclined a little forward. It was an attitude suggestive rather of submission to that great assembly, or to some Power above it, than of exhortation. Watching him as he stood there, I realized what a fine figure of a man George was, how well and surely Canadian life had developed him. His head was massive, his hair thick and very fair; his form lithe, tall, full of muscular elasticity.

He stood so, silent, for a full minute, till I began to catch my breath from nervousness. Then he opened the Bible, and:

"May I just read you a few verses from the Bible?" he said.

There was the same directness, the same simple, almost childlike appeal that had touched the people in Reynolds's prayer. He read some verses from the First Book of Samuel. I remember:

"'And did I choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to be my priest, to offer upon mine altar, to burn incense, to wear an ephod before me? And did I give unto the house of thy father all the offerings made by fire of the children of Israel? Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and at mine offering, which I have commanded in my habitation; and honouredst thy sons above me to make yourselves fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Israel, my people? Wherefore the Lord God of Israel saith, I said indeed that thy house and the house of thy father should walk before me for ever; but now the Lord saith, be it far from me; for them that honour me I will honour, and them that despise me shall be lightly esteemed. Behold the day is come, that I will cut off thine arm, and the arm of thy father's house, and there shall not be an old man in my house. And thou shalt see an enemy in my habitation, in all the wealth which God shall give Israel.... And I will raise me up a faithful priest, that shall do according to that which is in mine heart and in my mind....'"

There was a pause, and then the preacher read a passage from Judges, ending with the famous war-cry: "The Sword of the Lord and of Gideon." He looked up then, and, without reference to the Bible in his hand, repeated several verses:

"'And by thy sword thou shalt live, and shalt serve thy brother: and it shall come to pass when thou shalt have the dominion, that thou shalt break his yoke from off thy neck.'

"'He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one.'

"'For he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.'

"'And take the helmet of salvation, and the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.'

"'Think not that I am come to send peace on earth; I came not to send peace but a sword.' Not the peace of indolence and dishonour; not the fatted peace of mercenary well-being; but a Sword; the Sword of the Lord, the Sword of Duty, which creates, establishes, and safeguards the only true peace--the peace of honourable peoples."

I remember his slow turning of leaves in his Bible, and I remember:

"'Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man--' the whole duty---- Yes, 'but isn't Duty rather an early Victorian sort of business, and a bit out of date, anyhow?' That was what a young countryman of mine--from Dorset, he came--said to me in Calgary, last year. I told him that, according to my reading of history, it had come down a little farther than early Victorian days. I remember I mentioned Rorke's Drift; and he rather liked that. But, of course, I knew what he meant."

It was in this very simple strain, without a gesture, without a trace of dramatic appeal, that George Stairs began to address that great gathering. Much has been said and written of the quality of revelation which was instinct in that first address; of its compelling force, its inspired strength, the convincing directness of it all. And I should be the last to deny to my old friend's address any of the praises lavished upon it by high and low. But what I would say of it is that, even now, sufficient emphasis and import are never attached to the most compelling quality of all in George Stairs's words: their absolutely unaffected simplicity. I think a ten-year-old child could have followed his every word with perfect understanding.

Nowadays we take a fair measure of simplicity for granted. Anything less would condemn a man as a fool or a mountebank. But be it remembered that the key-note and most striking feature of all recent progress has been the advance toward simplicity in all things. At the period of George Stairs's first exposition of the new evangel in the Albert Hall, we were not greatly given to simplicity. It was scarcely noticeable at that time even among tillers of the earth. Not to put too fine a point upon it, we were a tinselled lot of mimes, greatly given to apishness, and shunning naked truth as though it were the plague. Past masters in compromise and self-delusion, we had stripped ourselves of simplicity in every detail of life, and, from the cradle to the grave, seemed willingly to be hedged about with every kind of complexity. We so maltreated our physical palates that they responded only to flavours which would have alarmed a plain-living man; and, metaphorically, the same thing held good in every concern of our lives, until simplicity became non-existent among us, and was forgotten. There were men and women in that Sunday afternoon gathering at the Albert Hall whose very pleasures were a complicated and laborious art, whose pastimes were a strain upon the nervous system, whose leisure was quite an arduous business.

This it was which gave such striking freshness, such compelling strength, to the simple, forthright directness, the unaffected earnestness and modesty of the Message brought us by the Canadian preachers. The most bumptious and self-satisfied Cockney who ever heard the ringing of Bow Bells, would have found resentment impossible after George Stairs's little account of his leaving Dorset as a boy of twelve, and picking up such education as he had, while learning how to milk cows, bed down horses, split fire-wood, and perform "chores" generally, on a Canadian farm. Even during his theological course, vacations had found him in the harvest field.

"You may guess my diffidence, then," he said, "in lifting up my voice before such a gathering as this, here in the storied heart of the Empire, the city I have reverenced my life long as the centre of the world's intelligence. But there is not a man or woman here to-day who would chide a lad who came home from school with tidings of something he had learned there. That is my case, precisely. I have been to one of our outside schools, from my home here in this beloved island. Home and school alike, they are all part of our family heritage--yours and mine. I only bring you your own word from another part of our own place. That is my sole claim to stand before you to-day. Yet, when I think of it, it satisfies me; it safeguards me from the effect of misunderstanding or offence, so long as my hearers are of my kin--British."

His description of Canada and the life he had lived there occupied us for no more than ten minutes, at the outside. It has appeared in so many books that I will not attempt to quote that little masterpiece of illumination. But by no means every reproduction of this passage adds the simple little statement which divided it from its successor.

"That has been my life. No brilliant qualities are demanded of a man in such a life. The one thing demanded is that he shall do his duty. You remember that passage in Ecclesiastes--'The conclusion of the whole matter'?"

And then came the story of Edward Hare. That moved the people deeply.

"My first curacy was in Southern Manitoba. When I was walking from the church to the farmhouse where I lodged, after morning service, one perfect day in June, I passed a man called Edward Hare, sitting at the edge of a little bluff, on a rising piece of ground. I had felt drawn toward this man. He was a Londoner, and, in his first two years, had had a tough fight. But he had won through, and now had just succeeded in adding a hundred and sixty acres to his little farm, which was one of the most prosperous in the district.

"'I didn't see you at church this morning, Hare,' I said, after we had chatted a minute or two.

"'No,' said he; 'I wasn't at church. I've been here by this bluff since breakfast, and--Parson!' he said, with sudden emphasis, 'I shall give up the farm. I'm going back Home.'

"Well, of course, I was surprised, and pressed him for reasons. 'Well,' he said, 'I don't know as I can make much of a show of reasons; but I'm going. Did you notice anything special about the weather, or--or that, this morning, Parson?' I told him I had only noticed that it was a very sweet, clear, happy sort of a morning. 'That's just it, Parson,' he said; 'sweet and clear and clean it is; and I don't believe there's any sweeter, cleaner thing than this morning on my farm--no, not in heaven, Parson,' he said. 'And that's why I'm going back Home to London; to Battersea; that's where I lived before I came here.'

"I waited for him to tell me more, and presently he said: 'You know, Parson, I was never what you might call a drunkard, not even at Home, where drinking's the regular thing. But I used to get through a tidy lot of liquor, one way and another, and most generally two or three pints too many of a Saturday night. Then, of a Sunday morning, the job was waiting for the pubs to open. Nobody in our street ever did much else of a Sunday. I suppose you don't happen to have ever been down the Falcon Road of a Sunday morning, Parson? No? Well, you see, the street's a kind of market all Saturday night, up till long after midnight--costers' barrows with flare-lights, gin-shops full to the door, and all the fun of the fair--all the fun of the fair. Mothers and fathers, lads and sweethearts, babies in prams, and toddlers in blue plush and white wool; you see them all crowding the bars up till midnight, and they see--well, they see Battersea through a kind of a bright gaze. Then comes Sunday, and a dry throat, and waiting for the pubs to open. The streets are all a litter of dirty newspaper and cabbage-stumps, and worse; and the air's kind of sick and stale.'

"At that Hare stopped talking, and looked out over the prairie on that June morning. Presently he went on again: 'Well, Parson, when I came out here this morning--I haven't tasted beer for over three years--I sat down and looked around; and, somehow, I thought I'd never seen anything so fine in all my life; so sweet and clean; the air so bright, like dew; and green--well, look at it, far as your eye can carry! And all this round, away to the bluff there, and the creek this way; it's mine, every foot of it. Well, after a bit, I was looking over there to the church, and what d'ye think I saw, all through the pretty sunlight? I saw the Falcon Road, a pub I know there, and a streak of sunshine running over the wire blinds into the bar, all frowsy and shut in, with the liquor stains over everything. And outside, I saw the pasty-faced crowd waiting to get in, and all the Sunday litter in the road. Parson, I got the smell of it, the sick, stale smell of it, right here--in Paradise; I got the frowsy smell of it, and heard the waily children squabbling, and--I can't tell you any more of what I saw. If you'd ever seen it, you'd know.'

"And there he stopped again, until I moved. Then he said: 'Parson, if you saw a fellow starving on a bit of land over there that wouldn't feed a prairie-chick, and you knew of a free homestead across the creek, where he could raise five and twenty bushels to the acre and live like a man, would you leave him to rot on his bare patch? Not you. That's why I'm going Home--to Battersea.'

"If Hare had been a married man I might have advised him otherwise. But he was married only to the farm he had wrought so well, and it did not seem to me part of my business to come between a man and his duty--as he saw it. That man came Home, and took the cheapest lodging he could get in Battersea. He had sold his farm well. Now he took to street preaching, and what he preached was, not religion, but the prairie. 'Lord sake, young folk!' he used to say to the lads and girls when they turned toward the public-houses. 'Hold on! Wait a minute! I want to tell you something!' And he would tell them what four years' clean work had given him in Canada.

"He got into touch with various emigration agencies. The money he had lasted him, living as he did, for five years. In that time he was the means of sending nine hundred and twenty men and five hundred and forty women and girls to a free and independent life in Canada. Just before his money was exhausted, England's affliction, England's chastisement, came upon her like God's anger in a thunderbolt. Hare had meant to return to Canada to make another start, and earn money enough to return to his work here. Instead of that, my friends, instead of what he called Paradise in Manitoba, God took him straight into Heaven. He left his body beside the North London entrenchments, where, so one of his comrades told me, he fought like ten men for England, knowing well that, if captured, he would be shot out of hand as a civilian bearing arms. One may say of Edward Hare, I think, that he saw his duty very clearly--and did it.

* * * * *

"But what of us? What of you, and I, my friends? How do we stand regarding Duty?"

I never heard such questions in my life. He had been speaking smoothly, evenly, calmly, and without gesticulation. With the questions, his body was bent as though for a leap; his hands flung forward. These questions left him like bullets. It was as though that great hall had been in blackest darkness, and with a sudden movement the speaker had switched on ten thousand electric lights. I saw men rise to a half-erect posture. I heard women catch their breath. The air of the place seemed all aquiver.

"My friends, will you please pray with me?"

He leaned forward, an appeal in every line of his figure, addressed confidentially to each soul present. Then his right hand rose:

"Please God, help me to give my Message! Please God, open London's heart to hear my Message! Please God, give me strength to tell it--now! For Christ's sake. Amen!"

One heard a low, emphatic, and far-carrying "Amen!" from the lips of London's Bishop; and I think that, too, meant something to the great congregation of Londoners assembled there.

Immediately then, it was, while the electric thrill of his questions and the simple prayer still held all his audience at high tension, that George Stairs plunged into the famous declaration of the new evangel of Duty and Simplicity. If any man in the world has learned for himself that prayer is efficacious, that man is the Rev. George Stairs. For it is now universally admitted that such winged words as those of his first great exposition of the doctrine of Duty and simple living, the doctrine which has placed the English-speaking peoples in the forefront of Christendom, had never before thrilled an English audience.

His own words were a perfect example of the invincible virtue of simplicity; his presence there was a glowing evidence of the force of Duty. It is quite certain that the knowledge shown in his flashing summary of nineteenth-century English history was not knowledge based upon experience. But neither the poets, nor the most learned historians, nor the most erudite of naval experts, has ever given a picture so instantly convincing as the famous passage of his oration which showed us, first, the British Fleet on the morning of Trafalgar; then, Nelson going into action; then, the great sailor's dying apotheosis of Duty; and, finally, England's reception of her dead hero's body. The delivery of this much-quoted passage was a matter of moments only, but from where I stood I saw streaming eyes in women's faces, and that stiff, unwinking stare on men's faces which indicates tense effort to restrain emotion.

And so, with a fine directness and simplicity of progress, he carried us down through the century to its stormy close, with vivid words of tribute for the sturdy pioneers of Victorian reform who fought for and built the freest democracy in the world, and gave us the triumphant enlightenment which illumined Victoria's first Jubilee.

"'But isn't Duty a rather early Victorian sort of business, and out of date, anyhow?' said my young countryman in Calgary. To the first half of his question there can be no answer but 'Yes.' To deny it were to slander our fathers most cruelly. But what of the question's second half? Our fathers have no concern with the answering of that. Is Duty 'out of date,' my friends? If so, let us burn our churches. If so, let the bishops resign their bishoprics. If so, let us lower for ever the flag which our fathers made sacred from pole to pole. If so, let Britain admit--as well first as last--that she has retired for ever from her proud place among the nations, and is no more to be accounted a Power in Christendom; for that is no place for a people with whom Duty is out of date.

"'And did I choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to be my priest, to offer upon mine altar?... But now the Lord saith, Be it far from me, for them that honour me I will honour, and them that despise me shall be lightly esteemed. _Behold the days come that I will cut off thine arm!_'"

It was almost unbearable. No one had guessed the man had such a voice. He had recited that passage quietly. Then came the rolling thunder of the: "Behold the days come that I will cut off thine arm!" A woman in the centre of the hall cried aloud, upon a high note. The roar of German artillery in North London never stirred Londoners as this particular sentence of God's Word stirred them in the Albert Hall.

And then, in a voice keyed down again to calm and tender wisdom, the words of the Scriptural poet stole out over the heads of the perturbed people, stilling their minds once more into the right receptive vein: "'Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.'"

Like balm, the stately words fell upon the people, as a light to lighten their darkness, as an end and a solution to a situation found intolerable. But, though calm resolve was in George Stairs's gift that day, he suffered no complaisance; and, by this time, he held that great assembly in the hollow of his hand. It was then he dealt with the character of our own century, as distinguished from that of the Victorian era. It was then his words taught me, personally, more than all he had said besides.

I will not quote from a passage which has been incorporated in hundreds of school-books. It is generally admitted that the end and purpose underlying the civil and national code of our age has never since been more admirably stated than on the day of its first enunciation in the Albert Hall by George Stairs. His words were glowing when he showed us how the key-note of our fathers' age had been the claiming and establishing of rights and privileges. His words stung like whip-thongs when he depicted our greedy, self-satisfied enjoyment of those rights and privileges, with never a thought, either of the various obligations pertaining to them, or of our plain duty in the conservation for our children of all that had been won for us. Finally, his words were living fire of incentive, red wine of stimulation, when he urged upon us the twentieth-century watchword of Duty, and the loyal discharge of obligations.

"Theirs, an age crowned by well-won triumph, was the century of claimant demand; ours is the century of grateful obedience. Theirs was the age of claims; ours the age of Duty. Theirs the century of rights; ours the century of Duty. Theirs the period of brave, insistent constructive effort; ours the period of Duty--Duty--Duty!

"In fighting to obtain all that they won for us, our fathers pledged themselves--and us--to be fit recipients, true freemen. For a moment, misled by the glare of wealth and pleasure, we have played the caitiff's part; grasped freemen's privileges, without thanks, and with repudiation of the balancing duties and obligations without which no rights can survive. And--'Behold, the days come that I will cut off thine arm!'

"The God of our fathers trusted them, in our behalf; and we played traitor. So God smote England, through the arrogant war-lords of another people. That blow, self-administered, is Heaven's last warning to England. In truth, the blow was ours, yours and mine; we ourselves it was who played the traitor and struck a cruel blow at Britain's heart. Unworthy sons of valiant sires, we snatched our wages and shirked our work; seized the reward and refused the duty. God in His mercy gave us many warnings; but we hid our faces and pursued our selfish ends. 'Behold, the days come----'

"But God stayed His hand. England lies bloody but unbroken. There can be no more warnings. The time for warnings has gone by. There can be no more paltering. Now is the day of final choice. Will ye be men--or helots and outcasts? Will you choose Duty, and the favour of God's appointed way for us, of progress and of leadership; or will you choose--pleasure, swift decay, annihilation? Upon your heads be it! Our fathers nobly did their part. Upon your choice hangs the future of our race, the fate of your children, the destiny of God's chosen people, who have paltered with strange gods, blasphemed the true faith, and stepped aside from the white path--the Only Way: Duty!"

He turned, raising one hand, and the notes of the great organ rose and swelled mightily, filling the hall with the strains of the British National Anthem. Every soul in the building stood erect, and following the choir's lead, that great gathering sang the British hymn as it was never sung before. As the last note throbbed into silence in the hall's dome, George Stairs, who had knelt through the singing of the anthem, advanced, with hand uplifted.

"God helping us, as, if we choose aright, He surely will help us, do we choose Duty, or pleasure? Choose, my kinsmen! Is it Duty, or is it pleasure?"

It was a severe test to put to such an assembly, to a congregation of all classes of London society. There was a moment of silence in which I saw George Stairs's face, white and writhen, through a mist which seemed to cloud my vision. And then the answer came, like a long, rolling clap of thunder:

"Duty!"

And I saw George Stairs fall upon his knees in prayer, as the Bishop dismissed the people with a benediction, delivered somewhat brokenly, in a hoarse voice.

VIII

THE PREACHERS

There are who ask not if thine eye Be on them; who in love and truth Where no misgiving is, rely Upon the genial sense of youth: Glad hearts! without reproach or blot, Who do thy work, and know it not: O! if through confidence misplaced They fail, thy saving arms, dread Power! around them cast.

_Ode to Duty._

It was with something of a shock that I learned, while endeavouring to make my way through a dense crowd to the Canadian preacher's dressing-room, that my friend, George Stairs, was lying unconscious in a fainting fit. But my anxiety was not long-lived. Several doctors had volunteered their services, and from one of them I learned that the fainting fit was no more than the momentary result of an exceptional strain of excitement.

Within half an hour, Stairs and Reynolds were both resting comfortably in a private sitting-room at a neighbouring hotel, and there I visited them, with Constance Grey and Mrs. Van Homrey, and John Crondall. Stairs a