desire now, and that was
to return to his unit. His batman brought him also an order from
the Assistant Director of Chaplain Service bidding him report at the
earliest moment.

At Headquarters he learned that the A. D. C. S. had been in Boulogne,
but had gone to Etaples, some thirty or forty miles distant, to visit
the large hospitals there. He determined that to-morrow he would go to
Etaples and report, after which he would proceed to his battalion.

That evening, he visited the men in the hospital, coming upon many
Canadians whose joy in seeing a chaplain from their own country touched
Barry to the heart. He took their messages which he promised to transmit
to their folks at home, and left with them something of the serene and
exultant peace that filled his own soul.

From Ewen Innes and others of the Wapiti draft, he learned something
of his father's work and place in their battalion. Soldiers are not
eloquent in speech, but mostly in silence. Their words halted when they
came to speak of their sergeant major's soldierly qualities,--for his
father had become the sergeant major of the battalion--his patience, his
skill, his courage.

"He knew his job, sir," said one of them. "He was always onto it."

"It was his care of his men that we thought most of," said Ewen, who
continued to relate incidents that had come under his own observation of
this characteristic, tears the while flowing down his cheeks.

"He never thought of himself, sir. It was our comfort first. He was far
more than our sergeant major. He watched us like a father; that's what
he did."

As Barry listened to the soldiers telling of his father in broken words,
and with flowing tears, he almost wondered at them for their tears and
wondered at himself that he had none. Tears seemed to be so much out of
place in telling such a tale as that.

The train for Etaples leaving at an unearthly hour in the morning, Barry
went to take farewell of the V. A. D. the night before.

"That is an awfully early hour," she said, "and, oh, such a wretched
train." There was in her voice an almost maternal solicitude for his
comfort.

"That's nothing," said Barry. "When I see you here at your unending
work, it makes me feel more and more like a slacker."

"Wait for me here a moment," she said, and hurried away to return
shortly in such a glow of excitement as even her wonted calm and
self-restraint could not quite hide.

"I'm going to drive you to Etaples to-morro