Montreal he wrote to his sister Geills:

"Out on the awful old trail again! And with very mixed feelings, but
some determination. I am off to Val-cartier to-night. I was really
afraid to go home, for I feared it would only be harrowing for Mater,
and I think she agrees. We can hope for happier times. Everyone most
kind and helpful: my going does not seem to surprise anyone. I know you
will understand it is hard to go home, and perhaps easier for us all
that I do not. I am in good hope of coming back soon and safely: that, I
am glad to say, is in other and better hands than ours."

V. South Africa

In the Autumn of 1914, after John McCrae had gone over-seas, I was in a
warehouse in Montreal, in which one might find an old piece of mahogany
wood. His boxes were there in storage, with his name plainly printed
upon them. The storeman, observing my interest, remarked: "This Doctor
McCrae cannot be doing much business; he is always going to the wars."
The remark was profoundly significant of the state of mind upon the
subject of war which prevailed at the time in Canada in more intelligent
persons. To this storeman war merely meant that the less usefully
employed members of the community sent their boxes to him for
safe-keeping until their return. War was a great holiday from work; and
he had a vague remembrance that some fifteen years before this customer
had required of him a similar service when the South African war broke
out.

Either 'in esse' or 'in posse' John McCrae had "always been going to the
wars." At fourteen years of age he joined the Guelph Highland Cadets,
and rose to the rank of 1st Lieutenant. As his size and strength
increased he reverted to the ranks and transferred to the Artillery. In
due time he rose from gunner to major. The formal date of his "Gazette"
is 17-3-02 as they write it in the army; but he earned his rank in South
Africa.

War was the burden of his thought; war and death the theme of his verse.
At the age of thirteen we find him at a gallery in Nottingham, writing
this note: "I saw the picture of the artillery going over the trenches
at Tel-el-Kebir. It is a good picture; but there are four teams on the
guns. Perhaps an extra one had to be put on." If his nomenclature was
not correct, the observation of the young artillerist was exact. Such
excesses were not permitted in his father's battery in Guelph, Ontario.
During this same visit his curiosity led him into the House of Lords