f I were to let myself go and state exactly what I
do think at the present moment, I might say some things I should
regret later. So it is better to wait and allow the experience to
settle in my mind; and as I get farther away from it, things will
assume their right proportions.

Reiterating my belief in the value of the experiment, I drew to a
conclusion.

The time has now come for me to say good-bye, and really I cannot
trust my feelings to say it as I should like to say it.

Believe me, I shall never forget you. In my sleep at night as well as
in my waking hours, I shall hear in imagination the tramp of your
feet in the yard, and see the lines of gray marching up and down.

And do not forget me. Think of me always as your true friend. I shall
ask the privilege of being enrolled as an honorary member of your
brotherhood.

I do not know that I could better close my remarks than by repeating
to you those noble lines which the poet Longfellow found inscribed on
a tablet in an old churchyard in the Austrian Tyrol:

"Look not mournfully into the Past; it comes not back again.

"Wisely improve the Present; it is thine.

"Go forth to meet the shadowy Future without fear and with a manly
heart."

Halting and inadequate as are the words of my speech, I feel certain that
my audience understands me. Had I stood up here and repeated the alphabet
or the dictionary, I think it would have been the same. The men are going
far behind the words; they are looking into my soul and I into theirs.

I have come among them, worn their uniform, marched in their lines, sat
with them at meals and gone to the cells with them at night; for a week I
have been literally one of them--even to fourteen hours in the dark
punishment cells; what need therefore of words? It makes little or no
difference what I say, or how far I fail to express my meaning. They
understand.

A feeling of renewed life, a sense of hope and exhilaration kindles within
me as I look in their faces and realize for the first time the full
measure of their gratitude and affection. I step down from the platform
and again take my seat with the basket-shop company; receiving warm grips
of the hand from Stuhlmiller, Bell, and the others as I crowd past them to
my seat in the center.

There ensues a long and dreary wait. In the mess-hall the first ones in
are the first ones out;