the longing was immediately answered. 'I am doing the will of the Lord
of Hosts,' he said. 'I was needed here.' Then I felt his kiss on my
cheek, and I lifted my head and looked at the clock. It had struck
three just as I was conscious of the presence of Boris. It was only
two minutes past three, but I seemed to have lived hours in that two
minutes."

"Do you think, Bishop, that God loves a soldier? He may employ them
and yet not love them?"

Then the Bishop straightened himself and lifted his head, and his face
glowed and his eyes shone as he answered, "I will give you one
example, it could be multiplied indefinitely. Paul of Tarsus, a pale,
beardless young man, dressed as a Roman soldier, is bringing prisoners
to Damascus. Christ meets him on the road and Paul knows instantly
that he has met the Captain of his soul. Hence forward, he is beloved
and honoured and employed for Christ, and at the end of life he is
joyful because he has fought a good fight and knows that his reward is
waiting for him.

"God has given us the names of many soldiers beloved of Him--Abraham,
Moses, Joshua, Gideon, David, etc. What care he took of them! What a
friend in all extremities he was to them! All men who fight for their
Faith, Home and Country, for Freedom, Justice and Liberty, are God's
armed servants. They do His will on the battlefield, as priests do it
at the altar. So then,

"In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of life,
Be not like dumb driven cattle,
Be a hero in the strife!"

"We were speaking of the bards going to the battlefield with the
soldiers, and as I was quoting that verse of Longfellow's a few lines
from the old bard we call Ossian came into my mind."

"Tell us, then," said Thora, "wilt thou not say the words to us, our
dear Bishop?"

"I will do that gladly:

"Father of Heroes, high dweller of eddying winds,
Where the dark, red thunder marks the troubled cloud,
Open Thou thy stormy hall!
Let the bards of old be near.
Father of heroes! the people bend before thee.
Thou turnest the battle in the field of the brave,
Thy terrors pour the blasts of death,
Thy tempests are before thy face,
But thy dwelling is calm above the clouds,
The fields of thy rest are pleasant."

"When I was a young man," he continued, "I used to read Ossian a good
deal. I liked its vast, shadowy images, its visionary incompleteness,
just because we have not yet invented the precise wor