s. They knew
that the gigantic power of America could crush half a dozen Germanys--
in time. But what we were all fearing, we who knew how grave the
situation was, how tremendous the Hun's last effort would be, was that
the line in France would be broken. The French had fought almost to
the last gasp. Their young men were gone. And if the Hun broke through
and swept his way to Paris, it was hard to believe that we could have
gathered our forces and begun all over again, as we would have had to
do.

In Kansas City there was a great chance for me, I was told. The people
wanted to hear me talk. They wanted to hear me--not just at the
theatre, but in the great hall where the conventions met. There was
only the one time when I could speak, and I said so--that was at noon.
It was the worst time of all the day to gather an audience of great
size. I knew that, and I was sorry. But I had been booked for two
performances a day while I was in Kansas City, and there was no
choice.

Well, I agreed to appear. Some of my friends were afraid it would be
what they called a frost. But when the time came for me to make my way
to the platform the hall was filled. Aye--that mighty hall! I dinna
ken how many thousand were there, but there were more than any theatre
in the world could hold--more than any two theatres, I'm thinking. And
they didna come to hear me sing or crack a joke. They came to hear me
talk--to hear me preach, if you'll be using that same word that my
wife is sae fond of teasing me with.

I'm thinking I did preach to them, maybe. I told them things aboot the
war they'd no heard before, nor thought of, maybe, as seriously as
they micht. I made them see the part they, each one of them, man, and
woman, and child, had to play. I talked of their president, and of the
way he needed them to be upholding him, as their fathers and mothers
had upheld President Lincoln.

And they rose to me--aye, they cheered me until the tears stood in my
een, and my voice was so choked that I could no go on for a space. So
that's what I'm meaning when I say it's no all my fault if I preach,
sometimes, on the stage, or when I'm writing in a book. It's true,
too, I'm thinking, that I'm no a real author. For when I sit me doon
to write a book I just feel that I maun talk wi' some who canna be wi'
me to hear my voice, and I write as I talk. They'll be telling me,
perhaps, that that's no the way to write a book, but it's the only way
I ken.

Oh,