ng tobacco
with unspeakable valor; tremendous bodies of fierce soldiery who were
sweeping along like the Huns. Others spoke of tattered and eternally
hungry men who fired despondent powders. "They'll charge through
hell's fire an' brimstone t' git a holt on a haversack, an' sech
stomachs ain't a-lastin' long," he was told. From the stories, the
youth imagined the red, live bones sticking out through slits in the
faded uniforms.

Still, he could not put a whole faith in veterans' tales, for recruits
were their prey. They talked much of smoke, fire, and blood, but he
could not tell how much might be lies. They persistently yelled "Fresh
fish!" at him, and were in no wise to be trusted.

However, he perceived now that it did not greatly matter what kind of
soldiers he was going to fight, so long as they fought, which fact no
one disputed. There was a more serious problem. He lay in his bunk
pondering upon it. He tried to mathematically prove to himself that he
would not run from a battle.

Previously he had never felt obliged to wrestle too seriously with this
question. In his life he had taken certain things for granted, never
challenging his belief in ultimate success, and bothering little about
means and roads. But here he was confronted with a thing of moment. It
had suddenly appeared to him that perhaps in a battle he might run. He
was forced to admit that as far as war was concerned he knew nothing of
himself.

A sufficient time before he would have allowed the problem to kick its
heels at the outer portals of his mind, but now he felt compelled to
give serious attention to it.

A little panic-fear grew in his mind. As his imagination went forward
to a fight, he saw hideous possibilities. He contemplated the lurking
menaces of the future, and failed in an effort to see himself standing
stoutly in the midst of them. He recalled his visions of broken-bladed
glory, but in the shadow of the impending tumult he suspected them to
be impossible pictures.

He sprang from the bunk and began to pace nervously to and fro. "Good
Lord, what's th' matter with me?" he said aloud.

He felt that in this crisis his laws of life were useless. Whatever he
had learned of himself was here of no avail. He was an unknown
quantity. He saw that he would again be obliged to experiment as he had
in early youth. He must accumulate information of himself, and
meanwhile he resolved to remain close upon his guard lest those