“Do you think you will go on doing it?” he asked, with a laugh. Mrs. Phillips was running a Convalescent Home in Folkestone, he told her; and had even made a speech. Hilda was doing relief work among the ruined villages of France.!

“You will find yourself expensive to dress,” she told her, “cheap things won’t go well on you; and it would be madness, even from a business point of view, for you not to make the best of yourself.” “No, dear,” answered Mary. “It’s only one or two who have nowhere else to go.”

“It’s a noble ideal,” he said. “La Patrie! The great Mother. Right or wrong, who shall dare to harm her? Yes, if it was she who rose up in her majesty and called to us.” He laughed. “What does it mean in reality: Germania, Italia, La France, Britannia? Half a score of pompous old muddlers with their fat wives egging them on: sons of the fools before them; talkers who have wormed themselves into power by making frothy speeches and fine promises. My Country!” he laughed again. “Look at them. Can’t you see their swelling paunches and their flabby faces? Half a score of ambitious politicians, gouty old financiers, bald-headed old toffs, with their waxed moustaches and false teeth. That’s what we mean when we talk about ‘My Country’: a pack of selfish, soulless, muddle-headed old men. And whether they’re right or whether they’re wrong, our duty is to fight at their bidding—to bleed for them, to die for them, that they may grow more sleek and prosperous.” He sank back on his pillow with another laugh. “Yes,” said Joan. “We are founding the League of Youth. You’ve got to be in it. We are going to establish branches all round the world.” “You see, dear, I began when I was young,” she explained; “and he has always seen me the same. I don’t think I could live like this.”