thinking of the carts on the hills of
Hampstead and the boys who drove them. "What is lacking to them," he
mused, "is the power of seeing this problem steadily and seeing it whole.
Let me endeavour to impart this habit to all who have any connection with
transport."

He had just completed this reflection when, turning a corner, he came on
a large van standing stockstill at the top of an incline. The driver was
leaning idly against the hind wheel filling a pipe. Mr. Lavender glanced
at the near horse, and seeing that he was not distressed, he thus
addressed the man:

"Do you not know, my friend, that every minute is of importance in this
national crisis? If I could get you to see the question of transport
steadily, and to see it whole, I feel convinced that you would not be
standing there lighting your pipe when perhaps this half-hour's delay in
the delivery of your goods may mean the death of one of your comrades at
the front."

The man, who was wizened, weathered, and old, with but few teeth, looked
up at him from above the curved hands with which he was coaxing the flame
of a match into the bowl of his pipe. His brow was wrinkled, and
moisture stood at the comers of his eyes.

"I assure you," went on Mr. Lavender, "that we have none of us the right
in these days to delay for a single minute the delivery of anything--not
even of speeches. When I am tempted to do so, I think of our sons and
brothers in the trenches, and how every shell and every word saves their
lives, and I deliver----"

The old man, who had finished lighting his pipe, took a long pull at it,
and said hoarsely:

"Go on!"

"I will," said Mr. Lavender, "for I perceive that I can effect a
revolution in your outlook, so that instead of wasting the country's time
by leaning against that wheel you will drive on zealously and help to win
the war."

The old man looked at him, and one side of his face became drawn up in a
smile, which seemed to Mr. Lavender so horrible that he said: "Why do you
look at me like that?"

"Cawn't 'elp it," said the man.

"What makes you," continued Mr. Lavender, "pause here with your job half
finished? It is not the hill which keeps you back, for you are at the
top, and your horses seem rested."

"Yes," said the old man, with another contortion of his face, "they're
rested--leastways, one of 'em."

"Then what delays you--if not that British sluggishness which we in
public life find such a terrible handicap to our e