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And I always considered vegetables, if we except green corn, green peas, and asparagus, as a sort of necessary evil to be endured in moderation for the good of the system. Of course there is as great a variety from day to day as the out-in-the-world markets will furnish. If you have followed me thus far, I am going to tell you, in all honesty, that a dinner of vegetables is good, mighty good.

From four-thirty till seven is fly-fishing time. Usually our canoe and two boats are all in use in different parts of the lake or drifting along within calling distance, and at supper time there is animated conversation about the "big one" that rose alongside the canoe, and the "old sockdolager" that was just hooked lightly through the lip and got away before he could be brought to net.

After supper there is reading aloud from some of the books brought into camp until the boys' bedtime at eight-thirty-before this year I have thought reading aloud or being read to was an unmitigated nuisance-then an

other half-hour or more reading quietly to one's self, and at nine-thirty lights out, finishing a busy day.

Providing amusement for yourself from within yourself is much more satisfying than amusement sold to you on the basis of two dollars for an orchestra chair.

So the days go on. In another month the enforced vacation will be over.

The heavy walking-stick, a very necessary aid up to ten weeks ago, has been thrown aside, and now I can follow any pace the boys want to set through the woods, and can jump the bad holes in the "corduroy" or clear mud-holes at a jump as well as they.

The great outdoors; hard work mixed with real fun; one, sometimes two, dips in the lake a day-each has done its work. It was a wise doctor who prescribed it, and would prescribe nothing else.

Don't be foolish, as I was, and wait till you are forced to take a vacation. It is apt to be a long one. Make a regular vacation a part of your year's business.

THE NATIONS AT WAR

THE END OF A DAY AT YPRES
BY ALICE THAYER1

CLOUD hung over the earth. A fierce onslaught had been repulsed. We were all dazed, and worked as people in a trance trying to get together the men and nurses of our unit, so as to send as many of the wounded as we could to shelter; and the dead-they lay where they had fallen.

I bent over the body of a little Scotchman, a brave, sturdy young fellow. His curly hair was stained with blood, the deep-blue eyes were fiery. He was talking fast, though the failing strength made his voice very low, and I had difficulty in hearing what he said. His exhausted mind could find no rest. Each incident of the battle was being lived over. "Boys, it looks like business." He got excited. "D-n them! This place is like a plowed field; there is hardly a place to stand. My ears! why are they buzzing so? Oh, yes, I know; the big shells. They are

1 The author of this sketch of actual life and death is a young American volunteer who has been working for the wounded and dying in a French military hospital.

I

going at it hard, nurse. On with your masks,
boys-the clouds-look, they are going to
give us the gas.
Well, let them try!"
Suddenly he flung his arms around my neck
and whispered, "Mother, water, please."
gave him a little, and he smiled and quieted.
Nurse, you don't mind, do you? You
see"-he grew wistful-"I like to think
I am
at home-and mother-you'll tell
her?"

64

"Cheer up, my laddie," I said. "You'll be well before long. To-night you are going to the ambulance, and in a week or so you'll be home."

He scarcely listened. The faint flicker of a smile passed over his face.

What's that light over there?" he cried. "It's a French fuze éclairante; and that light there it gets bigger and bigger and bigger."

I could not see it.

"It's lonely, you know, nurse; and the music and the flowers and the birds."

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CRIMINAL LAW: A Suggested CHANGE I have read with great interest the article on page 942 of The Outlook of August 23 on the subject "Abolish Modern Torture."

It is certainly scandalous that the police should be allowed to interrogate in private a person whom they suspect of crime, and the sooner it is done away with the better for the innocent and the guilty and for society at large.

There is, however, one other improvement which ought to go hand in hand with this reform, and that is the abolishment of the absurd rule which allows a prisoner on his trial to refuse to go on the stand to testify, and prevents the prosecuting attorney from using that refusal in summing up the case to the jury. When a man is implicated by circumstantial evidence, it is his duty to go on the stand and explain those circumstances, and, from an ordinary, common-sense point of view, if he refuses to explain incriminating circumstances, everybody understands that it is because he cannot explain them and it is a sign of guilt. That is the rule on which every one goes in ordinary life, and it is the rule which prevails in the courts in the trial of civil cases. As it is now, a man accused of crime can remain silent in the face of the most incriminating circumstances, and unless there is direct evidence of his guilt, the jury can very properly acquit him. ALBERT H. ATTERBURY, Attorney at Law.

New York City.

THE ORIGIN OF "JOHN BROWN'S BODY" The following is a copy of part of a letter from Miss Mary W. Greenleaf, of 36 Oak Street, Belmont, Massachusetts, dated August 4, 1913, to Miss Alice A. Gray, of Languoit, New York. Miss Greenleaf is a daughter of James E. Greenleaf, who was a son of the Rev. Patrick Henry Greenleaf, an Episcopalian clergyman of Charlestown, Massachusetts:

"You are right in supposing that the James Greenleaf mentioned in the newspaper article was my father, and I will give you a faithful

account of the use and origin of the song, 'John Brown's Body Lies Mouldering in the Grave.' The John Brown named in the song was not the John Brown of Harper's Ferry fame, but a John Brown in a regiment of Boston Light Infantry, stationed at Fort Warren (South Boston, Massachusetts), at the beginning of the Civil War. James E. Greenleaf (my father) was captain of one of the companies, and John Brown was a member of it.

"On the night the song originated the men were trying to pass a cheerful evening before the company was to start next day for active service in the South. One of their number, as they were joking John Brown, said, 'John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave,' then other men added more lines, and at last some one said, 'Greenleaf, you give us a tune to sing it by.' Father said he thought of the old Methodist tune which seemed to fit the words, so they all sang it, marching around their tents.

“P. T. Gilmore, the famous bandmaster, was at Fort Warren that night and heard it. He was jubilant over the swing of it all, father said; and he came to him and said, 'Captain Greenleaf, I must have that to play going up State Street (Boston) to-morrow morning; can you give it to me?' And then, though it was after eleven o'clock, he sat down on an old box and by the light of a candle wrote entirely from memory the score for the band, and gave it to Mr. Gilmore by midnight.

"As they marched up State Street that next morning the air was first publicly played as a war song, and that old Methodist tune has stirred men's souls to 'marching on' ever since. My father never claimed authorship of the tune, and was always much annoyed at the articles appearing from time to time in connection . with the famous song, and almost always incorrectly reported. Several times he tried to give the press the correct story, but the idea that the great John Brown was the John Brown of the song was so firmly fixed in the public mind that it was hard to contradict it."

"(Signed) MARY W. GREENLEAF."

An advertisement of an aviation school says, "A short course will fit you to fly any type of machine. Pupil flies the first lesson." The aeroplane, at this rate, may yet overtake the automobile in popularity as a pleasure vehicle. Another indication of the future of the flyingmachine is seen in the erection of a huge building in Brooklyn, New York, for the manufacture of gyroscopes and other adjuncts to the aeroplane; it is said that it will employ two thousand workers.

"Our present idea of beautiful hands in women differs from that of the M ddle Ages," says a writer in "Good Health." The old idea was that portrayed in sacred pictures of the old masters-long, slim hands with delicate tapering fingers that suggest sainthood." The firm, muscular hand that is the ideal at present, according to this writer, has been developed through the use of golf clubs, tennis racquets, canoe paddles, etc.

Notwithstanding Great Britain's absorption in the war, she is building more merchant ships than a year ago. Among the 432 steam vessels on the ways at present in British shipyards there are some large liners. Two vessels of between 30,000 and 40,000 tons burden are under construction, and more than a score of over 10,000 tons. The Mauretania, it will be remembered, is of 32,000 tonnage, while the New York, of the American Line, has a tonnage of about 10,000.

As an example of made-to-order "funny" stuff, with a certain edge of wit, this extract from the "Chaparral " has its appeal: "Downan Out.-Jo Cose: 'Is Mr. Downan in?' Ima Stenog: 'No, he went out to lunch.' Jo Cose: 'Will he be in after lunch?' Ima Stenog: 'No, that's what he went out after.'"

Sometimes there are profits in the insurance business, even when run by a Government. Since the United States Bureau of War Risk Insurance was started, two years ago, it has received $2,950,377 in premiums and suffered net losses of only $712,518, leaving a balance of $2,237,859 on the right side of the ledger.

"Waste Land Boy Contest." The heading invites further reading: "The idea of the contest is for a farmer to look over his land, pick out the bad spots, turn over one acre of it to his son and let him improve it. Money prizes of $100 are offered in each of six sections of the United States. For entry blanks and further information about the contest write to E. I.. Du Pont de Nemours & Company, Wilmington, Delaware."

A vegetarian magazine starts an article on "The High Price of Meat" with the disconcerting remark, "It is encouraging to see the price of meat continually going higher." Thou

sands of people, it says, are finding out that meat is not essential as an article of diet, and that one may maintain health, strength, and vigor without meat far better than with it. The majority, however, it may be observed, are not invalids, and are not troubled about maintaining health, strength, and vigor-they have these; but they are vitally interested in having "a good table"-and vegetarianism certainly does not help in this respect.

An article called "Putting Punch in Salesmanship" in the "Automobile Trade Journal ” discriminates carefully between "noise" and "punch." "Don't get the idea that noise has anything to do with punch," it says. "We all have met salesmen who seemed to think that, the louder they talked, the deeper the impression they would make. Noise may represent a certain kind of force, but it is not the kind that will get by with a buyer."

"Signs were put up in hotel rooms notifying guests that no one could sleep more than eight hours without being charged another dollar for his couch." This three-shift rule for sleepers is said to have been adopted in Nederland, Colorado, during the recent boom in the tungsten industry. Tungsten is found in but few places in this country, and Nederland is one of them. The boom has quieted down now, but for a time the memories of '49 were revived in the experiences of this district.

The Los Angeles "Examiner "has a home that is probably unique architecturally. It is built on the lines of the Spanish architecture of the early days of southern California, but the material is steel and reinforced concrete. Excepting a central tower, the building is only two stories high, thus presenting a radical departure from the "sky-scraper" style of newspaper building.

Who owns Spitzbergen? Nobody, according to "Shipping Illustrated." "The conditions at Spitzbergen are unique," it says, "in that this is probably the only inhabited and promising part of the world that is under the sovereignty of no country, has no government of any kind, and no police force, courts, laws, or regulations." There are valuable coal deposits on the principal island, all above sea-level, and after the war is over no doubt a government will be organized to care for the four hundred persons who are engaged in developing these mines.

The future historian of New York City may find space for this side-light on the infant paralysis epidemic of 1916. It is in the form of an advertisement in a daily paper:

WANTED-In order to save lives and limbs of children, a small amount of blood from any child or adult who has had infant paralysis. It can be taken by a needle puncture. Expenses of volunteers will be paid and those in need will be recompensed. Apply any day... to the New York State Board of Health at, etc., etc.

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