you remember, that one of his qualities is a
strange gentleness. He told me, in that manner of his, that he would take
only a minute of my time, and while I sat perfectly tongue-tied before
him, as if I were a schoolgirl, this is what he said, without any
passionate declaration, or any self-assertion.

"I came last night, Miss Wadsworth, to tell you that I loved you. You saw
it and stopped me. There seemed no answer to you then, but I have found
one now, and I think you ought to let me say it.

"You said that a man ought to be able to offer to a woman the best that
there is. I came to offer it. Our army women serve their country, not as
we men do, yet they do serve the flag, and unselfishly. There is really
nothing better that can be done by man or woman.

"There is only one other thing that seems to me worth while. It makes the
cottage the equal of the palace. I brought it--honest love. No true woman
can ask more."

Then he went away. I could not stop him; could not try to explain. How
could I say anything against those awful words? Besides, he spoke with
such a thrill as if he were showing me his religion. A dreadful
simplicity of belief! I know all his words by heart. All night long I
have been saying them over and over; and when this morning I heard the
drums, it was as if they said them too.

Do come quickly to your

VERA.

PRIVATE GODWIN'S FIRST HIKE LETTER

West Beekmantown, N. Y.
Monday the 25th, 3 P. M.

DEAR MOTHER:--

How glad I was, at the end of today's hike, to march into the big field
(where the cook tents already stood with smoking fires before them) to
have the two halves of the company line up facing each other, and to hear
the captain command, "Form for shelter tents!"

The file-closers scurried round and got into the vacant places. Every man
gave an anticipatory hitch at the pack that had gradually grown so heavy;
and the front rank men, if they thought the captain was not looking,
loosened their bayonets in their sheaths.

"Take interval, to the right and left!" We rear rank men stepped four
paces backward.

"Harch!" Both ranks faced away from the cook tents, and the lieutenant
began to count, "_One_--two--three--four--_One_--two--three--four!" and
at every _One_ a pair of men, front and rear rank bunkies, stepped