do now against the men who have made war a science
instead of sport!

"I should like to know what the good people who have made such a fuss
about the 'tyranny of Conscription' will say now, when they find that we
haven't trained men enough to defend our homes. Just as if military
service was not the first duty a man owes to his country and to his
home. A man has no right to a country nor a home if he isn't able to
defend them. Kipling was perfectly right when he said:

'What is your boasting worth
If you grudge a year of service to the lordliest life on earth?'"

This little lecture was delivered with trembling lips, flushed cheeks
and flashing eyes by Lady Margaret Holker, Lord Westerham's sister, who
had joined the party that morning to help her brother in his recruiting.

She was an almost perfect type of the modern highly-bred Englishwoman,
who knows how to be entirely modern without being vulgarly "up-to-date."
She was a strong contrast to her brother, in that she was a bright
brunette--not beautiful, perhaps not even pretty, but for all that
distinctly good-looking. Her hair and eyebrows were black, her eyes a
deep pansy-blue. A clear complexion, usually pale but decidedly flushed
now, and, for the rest, somewhat irregular features which might have
been almost plain, but for that indefinable expression of combined
gentleness and strength which only the careful selection of long descent
can give.

As for her figure, it was as perfect as absolute health and abundant
exercise could make it. She could ride, shoot, throw a fly and steer a
yacht better than most women and many men of her class; but for all that
she could grill steaks and boil potatoes with as much distinction as she
could play the piano and violin, and sing in three or four languages.

She also had a grip, not on politics, for which she had a wholesome
contempt, but on the affairs of the nations--the things which really
mattered. And yet withal she was just an entirely healthy young
Englishwoman, who was quite as much at home in the midst of a good
swinging waltz as she was in an argument on high affairs of State.

"My dear Madge," said her brother, who had been reading the reports in
the second morning edition of the _Times_ aloud, "I am afraid that,
after all, you are right. But then, you must not forget that a new enemy
has come into the field. I hardly like to say so in Miss Castellan's
presence, but it is perfectly clea