han that--we are Americans!" I
hear my countrymen say. Perhaps we should. I hope so; I believe so.
The British public thought that they were going to do better; military
men were surprised that they did as well.

Along with laws and language we have inherited our military ideas
from England. In many qualities we are different--a distinct type; but in
nothing are we more like the British than in our attitude toward the
soldier and toward war. The character of any army reflects the
character of its people. An army is the fist; but the muscle, the
strength, of the physical organism behind the blow in the long run
belong to the people. What they have prepared for in peace they
receive in war, which decides whether they have been living in the
paradise of a fool or of a wise man.

As a boy I was brought up to believe, as an inheritance of the
American Revolution, that one American could whip two Englishmen
and five or six of any other nationality, which made the feathers of the
eagle perched on the national escutcheon look glossy. It was a
satisfying sort of faith. Americans had never tried five or six of any
first-class fighting race; but that was not a thought which occurred to
me. As we had won victories over the English and the English had
whipped the French at Waterloo, the conclusion seemed obvious.
English boys, I understand, also had been brought up to believe that
one Englishman could whip five or six men of any other nationality,
but, I take it for granted, only two Americans. This clothed the British
lion with majesty, while the lower ratio of superiority over Americans
returned the compliment in kind from the sons of the lion to the sons
of the eagle.

After I began to read history for myself and to think as I read, I found
that when British and Americans had met, the generals on either side
were solicitous about having superior forces, and in case of odds of
two to one they made a "strategic retreat." When either side was
beaten, the other always explained that he was overcome by superior
numbers, though perhaps the adversary had not more than ten or
fifteen per cent, advantage. Then I learned that the British had not
whipped five or six times their number on the continent of Europe.
The British Expeditionary Force made as fine an effort to do so at
Mons as was ever attempted in history, but they did not succeed.

It was a regular army that fought at Mons. The only two first-class
nations which depend upon