oldiers on the battle line don't win a war alone.
We who feed and clothe you achieve at least half. I regret again,
Captain Mason, that you can't join me later. Mine's a noble calling.
It's a great thing to be a merchant prince, and it's we, as much as any
other class of people, who spread civilization over the earth."

"I know it," said Dick earnestly. "I'm not blind to the great arts of
peace. Now, here come my closest friends, Captain Warner and Captain
Pennington, who have understanding. I want you to meet them."

Dick's hearty introduction was enough to recommend the contractor to his
comrades, but Warner already knew him well by reputation.

"I've heard of you often from some of our officers, Mr. Watson," he said.
"You deliver good goods and you're a New Englander, like myself. Ten
years from now you'll be an extremely rich man, a millionaire, twenty
years from now you'll be several times a millionaire. About that
time I'll become president of Harvard, and we'll need money--a great
university always needs money--and I'll come to you for a donation of one
hundred thousand dollars to Harvard, and you'll give it to me promptly."

John Watson looked at him fixedly, and slowly a look of great admiration
spread over his face.

"Of course you're a New Englander," he said. "It was not necessary for
you to say so. I could have told it by looking at you and hearing you
talk. But from what state do you come?"

"Vermont."

"I might have known that, too, and I'm glad and proud to meet you,
Captain Warner. I'm glad and proud to know a young man who looks ahead
twenty years. Nothing can keep you from being president of Harvard,
and that hundred thousand dollars is as good as given. Your hand again!"

The hands of the two New Englanders met a second time in the touch of
kinship and understanding. Theirs was the clan feeling, and they had
supreme confidence in each other. Neither doubted that the promise would
be fulfilled, and fulfilled it was and fourfold more.

"You New Englanders certainly stand together," said Dick.

"Not more than you Kentuckians," replied the contractor. "I was in
Kentucky several times before the war, and you seemed to be one big
family there."

"But in the war we've not been one big family," said Dick, somewhat
sadly. "I suppose that no state has been more terribly divided than
Kentucky. Nowhere has kin fought more fiercely against kin."

"But you'll come together again afte