inge
of ill-nature, although in places, especially in later years, there is
bitter indignation against those Canadian patriots who were patriots
merely for their bellies' sake.

Taken together his letters and diaries are a revelation of the heroic
struggle by which a man gains a footing in a strange place in that most
particular of all professions, a struggle comprehended by those alone
who have made the trial of it. And yet the method is simple. It is all
disclosed in his words, "I have never refused any work that was given me
to do." These records are merely a chronicle of work. Outdoor clinics,
laboratory tasks, post-mortems, demonstrating, teaching, lecturing,
attendance upon the sick in wards and homes, meetings, conventions,
papers, addresses, editing, reviewing,--the very remembrance of such a
career is enough to appall the stoutest heart.

But John McCrae was never appalled. He went about his work gaily, never
busy, never idle. Each minute was pressed into the service, and every
hour was made to count. In the first eight months of practice he
claims to have made ninety dollars. It is many years before we hear him
complain of the drudgery of sending out accounts, and sighing for the
services of a bookkeeper. This is the only complaint that appears in his
letters.

There were at the time in Montreal two rival schools, and are yet two
rival hospitals. But John McCrae was of no party. He was the friend of
all men, and the confidant of many. He sought nothing for himself and by
seeking not he found what he most desired. His mind was single and his
intention pure; his acts unsullied by selfish thought; his aim was true
because it was steady and high. His aid was never sought for any cause
that was unworthy, and those humorous eyes could see through the bones
to the marrow of a scheme. In spite of his singular innocence, or rather
by reason of it, he was the last man in the world to be imposed upon.

In all this devastating labour he never neglected the assembling of
himself together with those who write and those who paint. Indeed, he
had himself some small skill in line and colour. His hands were the
hands of an artist--too fine and small for a body that weighted 180
pounds, and measured more than five feet eleven inches in height. There
was in Montreal an institution known as "The Pen and Pencil Club". No
one now living remembers a time when it did not exist. It was a peculiar
club. It contained no member who sh