merican flag in
the world. I never saw it but once, but it thrilled me then
unspeakably. I have loved it ever since. I can think of but one other
sight that would be more beautiful and thrilling."

"And what is that?"

"To see 'Old Glory' waving from the top of a flag-staff here on the
soil of France, signifying that our country has taken up the cause of
the Allies and thrown herself, with all her heart and might into this
war."

"Wait; you will see it, comrade, you will see it. It can't be delayed
for long now."

Then the order came to advance. In a storm of shrapnel, bullets and
flame, the British host swept down again upon the foe. The Germans
gave desperate and deadly resistance. They fought hand to hand, with
bayonets and clubbed muskets and grenades. It was a death grapple,
with decisive victory on neither side. In the wild onrush and terrific
clash, Pen lost touch with his comrade. Only once he saw him after the
charge was launched. Aleck waved to him and smiled and plunged into
the thick of the carnage. Two hours later, staggering with shock and
heat and superficial wounds, and choking with thirst and the smoke and
dust of conflict, Pen made his way with the survivors of his section
back over the ground that had been traversed, to find rest and
refreshment at the rear. They had been relieved by fresh troops sent
in to hold the narrow strip of territory that had been gained.
Stumbling along over the torn soil, through wreckage indescribable,
among dead bodies lying singly and in heaps, stopping now and then to
aid a dying man, or give such comfort as he could to a wounded and
helpless comrade, Pen struggled slowly and painfully toward a resting
spot.

At one place, through eyes half blinded by sweat and smoke and
trickling blood, he saw a man partially reclining against a post to
which a tangled and broken mass of barbed wire was still clinging. The
man was evidently making weak and ineffectual attempts to care for his
own wounds. Pen stopped to assist him if he could. Looking down into
his face he saw that it was Aleck. He was not shocked, nor did he
manifest any surprise. He had seen too much of the actuality of war to
be startled now by any sight or sound however terrible. He simply
said:

"Well, old man, I see they got you. Here, let me help."

He knelt down by the side of his wounded comrade, and, with shaking
hands, endeavored to staunch the flow of blood and to bind up two
dreadful wounds, a gap