that they were to be the leading feature in a London
procession, many of them even lacked uniforms. With true American
democracy of spirit, the officers stripped their rank-badges from
their spare tunics and lent them to the privates, who otherwise could
not have marched.

"I'm satisfied," my friend said, "that there were Londoners so doggone
hoarse that night that they couldn't so much as whisper."

What impressed the men most of all was the King's friendly greeting of
them at Buckingham Palace. There were few of them who had ever seen
a king before. "Friendly--that's the word! From the King downwards
they were all so friendly. It was more like a family party than a
procession; and on the return journey, when we marched at ease, old
ladies broke up our formations to kiss us. Nice and grandmotherly of
them we thought."

This, as I say, I learnt later in France; at the time I only knew
that the advance-guard of millions was marching. As I watched them
my eyes grew misty. Troops who have already fought no longer stir
me; they have exchanged their dreams of glory for the reality of
sacrifice--they know to what they may look forward. But untried troops
have yet to be disillusioned; dreams of the pomp of war are still in
their eyes. They have not yet owned that they are merely going out to
die obscurely.

That day made history. It was then that England first vividly realised
that America was actually standing shoulder to shoulder at her side.
In making history it obliterated almost a century and a half of
misunderstanding. I believe I am correct in saying that the last
foreign troops to march through London were the Hessians, who fought
against America in the Revolution, and that never before had foreign
volunteers marched through England save as conquerors.

On my recovery I was sent home on sick leave and spent a month in New
York. No one who has not been there since America joined the Allies
can at all realise the change that has taken place. It is a change
of soul, which no statistics of armaments can photograph. America
has come into the war not only with her factories, her billions
and her man-power, but with her heart shining in her eyes. All her
spread-eagleism is gone. All her aggressive industrial ruthlessness
has vanished. With these has been lost her youthful contempt for older
civilisations, whom she was apt to regard as decaying because they
sent her emigrants. She has exchanged her prejudices for admirat