s and 'put
it over' the other fellows. The Germans spit in their faces every day
and they say 'business is business' and take it. The Germans sink the
Lusitania and the President sends a note advising them to be more
careful in future and so it goes. Why, any decent man will strike back
when he is struck by a filthy swine; even a worm will turn."

"He couldn't," objected the Cap.

"Why couldn't he," returned the Colonel. "What's the matter with him?
Is he a jelly fish?"

"Because he is the chief engineer of the nation," explained the Cap.
"He is head of a nation that is a conglomerate; it isn't yet fused; it
contains fifteen to twenty millions of people of German origin. It is
like running an express train. As long as the track is straight and
the levers are left alone the engine will keep the tracks if he can
keep his hand on the throttle and observe the signals. There are some
bad signals up in the States. It is overrun with spies who know
everything; the navy is in bad shape; the Mexican affair is on; they
are nervous about Japan and they have no army. With a publicity bureau
such as the Germans have, controlling many newspapers and magazines,
the enemy can do a tremendous lot to alienate public sympathy from the
allied cause, and until America is touched in the quick there will be
no demand for a change of conditions."

"Then the President should lead public opinion," announced the
Colonel.

"Yes, and bring down the wrath of the enemy upon him; just give him
time; he hasn't got that jaw for nothing; he knows history; his
opportunity will come and he will rise to it. Don't you think so
Doc.?"

"I don't know," said the Doc. "I used to think he had tremendous
reserve power; now I'm not so sure. The President, in my opinion, made
his great mistake when he failed to make a dignified protest on behalf
of the violation of Belgium's neutrality. The U.S. stood for great
things in the world; she was the ideal of the smaller nations to whom
she was the personification of Liberty. She fell down and to-day even
France shakes her head or smiles behind her hand when the name of the
United States is mentioned. Yet, I feel that we cannot judge because
we don't know all the facts. The best men in the United States are
with us heart and soul; they feel disgraced and degraded individually
and as a nation because they are forced to eat dirt; they want to go
to war for they realize the European situation. Yet, we can't tell
what