"Ladies and Gentlemen, Naybours all," he said,--"I don't suppose
these here proceedin's will conclude much afore ten o'clock: after
which it'll take me the best part of an hour to get home; an' what
with one thing and another I doubt it'll be far short o' midnight
afore my missus gets me to bed. Whereby, knowin' my habits, you'll
see that I reckon this to be summat more than an ord'nary occasion:
the reason bein', as you know, that pretty well the hull of Europe's
in a state o' War: which, when such a thing happens, it behoves us.
I'll say no more than that, as Britons, it behoves us. It was once
said by a competent observer that Britons never, never--if Miss
Rounsell will oblige?"

This was a rehearsed effect. Miss Rounsell, taking her cue, struck
the key-board, and as Miss Charity Oliver (in the front row)
testified next morning, "the effect was electric." All sprang to
their feet and sang the chorus of _Rule, Britannia!_ till the windows
shook.

"Thenk 'ee, friends," continued Farmer Best, as the tumult and the
singers subsided. "There's no more to say but that most of 'ee's
heard tell, in one way or another at some time of his life, of
Armygeddon. Well, this here's _of_ it; an' if you ask my opinion o'
that fellow they call the Kaiser, I say I wouldn' sleep in his bed
for a million o' money. And with these few remarks I will no longer
stand between 'ee and Mr Boult, who is a speaker all the way from
London, an' will no doubt give us a Treat an' persuade many of our
young friends in front to join up."

Mr Boult arose amid violent applause. He pulled the lappels of his
frock-coat together. He spoke, and from the first moment it was
clear that he held at command all the tricks of the hired orator.
He opened with an anecdote from the life of President Garfield, and a
sentimental application that made the Vicar wince. He went on to
point out, not unimpressively, that Armageddon ("as you, sir, have so
aptly and so strikingly termed it") had actually broken upon the
world. Farmer Best, flattered by this acknowledgment of copyright in
the word, smiled paternally.

"It has burst like a thunderstorm upon the fields of Belgium; but the
deluge it discharges is a deluge of blood intermingled with human
tears. And where, my friends, is Belgium? How far distant lie these
trodden and wasted fields, these smoking villages, these harvests
where men's bodies crush the corn and their blood pollutes the food
they pl