PROBLEM

There is a tear for all who die,
A mourner o'er the humblest grave;
But nations swell the funeral cry,
And triumph weeps above the brave.
For them is Sorrow's purest sigh,
O'er Ocean's heaving bosom sent
In vain their bones unburied lie,
All earth becomes their monument.

Born to the War of 1854 on October 21, 1854,
a Daughter, called Red Cross.

The next night Vedder went away. His purposes were necessarily rather
vague, but it was certain he would go to the front if he thought he
could do any good there. He talked earnestly and long with Ragnor but
when it came to parting, both men were strangely silent. They clasped
hands and looked long and steadily into each other's eyes. No words
could interpret that look. It was a conversation for eternity.

In the meantime, the whole town was eager to do something but what
could they do that would give the immediate relief that was needed?
There were no sewing machines then, women's fingers and needles could
not cope with the difficulty, even regarding the Orkney men who were
suffering. To gather from every one the very necessary old linen
seemed to be the very extent of their usefulness.

In these first days of the trouble, Rahal and Thora were serious and
quiet. A dull, inexplicable melancholy shrouded the girl like a
garment. The pretty home preparing for Ian and herself lost its
interest. She refused to look forward and lived only in the unhappy
present. The few words Ian has said about some wrong or trouble in the
past years of his life overshadowed her. She was naturally very
prescient and her higher self dwelt much in

... that finer atmosphere,
Where footfalls of appointed things,
Reverberent of days to be,
Are heard in forecast echoings,
Like wave beats from a viewless sea.

However, if trouble lasts through the night, joy, or at least hope and
expectation, comes in the morning; and certainly the first shock of
grief settled down into patient hoping and waiting. Vedder and Ian
were both good correspondents and the silence and loneliness were
constantly broken by their interesting letters. And joyful or
sorrowful, Time goes by.

Sunna wrote occasionally but she said she found Edinburgh dull, and
that she would gladly return to Kirkwall if it was not for the
Pentland Firth and its winter tempers and tantrums.

The war [she added] has stopped all balls and even house parties.
There is no dancing a