e that nothing except--"

"Death?" said Aladdin.

"--that nothing, nothing except death--shall keep you from coming back."

"If I live," said Aladdin, "I will come back."

Everybody of education knows that Lucy Locket lost her pocket and that
Betty Pringle found it without a penny "in it" (to rhyme with "found
it"), but everybody does not know that the aforementioned Lucy Locket
had a tune composed for her benefit that has thrilled the hearts of more
sons of the young republic when stepping to battle than any other tune,
past, present, or to come. There is a martial vigor and a tear in "The
Girl I Left Behind Me"; some feet cannot help falling into rhythm when
they hear the "British Grenadiers"; North and South alike are possessed
with a do-or-die madness when the wild notes of "Dixie" rush from the
brass; and "John Brown's Body" will cause the dumb to sing. But it is
the farcical little quickstep known by the ridiculous name of "Yankee
Doodle" which the nations would do well to consider when straining the
patience of the peace-loving and United States.

And so they marched down the street to the station, and the tall men
walked on the right and the little men on the left, and the small boys
trotted alongside, and the brand-new flags flung out, and bouquets were
thrown, and there were cheers from the heart up all along the line. But
ever the saucy fifes sang, and the drums gaily beat

Yankee Doodle came to town
Riding on a pony,
Stuck a feather in his Hat,
And called it macaroni.

At the station the emotions attendant on departure found but one voice.
The mother said to the son what the sweetheart said to the lover, and
the sister to the brother. Nor was this in any manner different from
what the brother, lover, and son said to the sister, sweetheart, and
mother. It was the last sentence which bleeding hearts supply to lips at
moments of farewell:

"Write to me."

And the supercilious little quickstep went on:

Yankee Doodle came to town
Riding on a pony,
Stuck a feather in his Hat,
And called it macaroni.

XXIII

A tongue of land with Richmond (built, like another capital beginning
with R, on many hills) for its major root, and a fortification vulgarly
supposed to be of the gentler sex for its tip, is formed by the yellow
flow of the James and York rivers. To land an army upon the tip of this
tongue, march the