rest, and lights his pipe, maybe, and
looks about the old room which holds so many memories for him. And
supper will be ready, you may be sure. They will not have much to
say, these folk of Jock's, but if you look at his face as dish after
dish is set before him, you will understand that this is a feast that
has been prepared for him. They may have been going without all sorts
of good things themselves, but they have contrived, in some fashion,
to have them all for Jock. All Scotland has tightened its belt, and
done its part, in that fashion, as in every other, toward the winning
of the war. But for the soldiers the best is none too good. And
Jock's folk would rather make him welcome so, by proof that takes no
words, than by demonstrations of delight and of affection.

As he eats, they gather round him at the board, and they tell him all
the gossip of the neighborhood. He does not talk about the war, and,
if they are curious--probably they are not!--they do not ask him
questions. They think that he wants to forget about the war and the
trenches and the mud, and they are right. And so, after he has eaten
his fill, he lights his pipe again, and sits about. And maybe, as it
grows dark, he takes a bit walk into town. He walks slowly, as if he
is glad that for once he need not be in a hurry, and he stops to look
into shop windows as if he had never seen their stocks before, though
you may be sure that, in a Scottish village, he has seen everything
they have to offer hundreds of times.

He will meet friends, maybe, and they will stop and nod to him. And
perhaps one of six will stop longer.

"How are you getting on, Jock?" will be the question.

"All right!" Jock will say. And he will think the question rather
fatuous, maybe. If he were not all right, how should he be there? But
if Jock had lost both legs, or an arm, or if he had been blinded,
that would still be his answer. Those words have become a sort of
slogan for the British army, that typify its spirit.

Jock's walk is soon over, and he goes home, by an old path that is
known to him, every foot of it, and goes to bed in his own old bed.
He has not broken into the routine of the household, and he sees no
reason why he should. And the next day it is much the same for him.
He gets up as early as he ever did, and he is likely to do a few odd
bits of work that his father has not had time to come to. He talks
with his mother and the girls of all sorts of little, commonpl