ay will vanish. I shall have to go and mobilise too. I shall have
to fight. I have my papers."

"I never thought of you as a soldier before," said Teddy.

"I have deferred my service until I have done my thesis," said Herr
Heinrich. "Now all that will be--Piff! And my thesis three-quarters
finished."

"That is serious," said Teddy.

"_Verdammte Dummheit!_" said Herr Heinrich. "Why do they do such
things?"

On Thursday, the 30th of July, Caillaux, Carson, strikes, and all the
common topics of life had been swept out of the front page of the paper
altogether; the stock exchanges were in a state of wild perturbation,
and food prices were leaping fantastically. Austria was bombarding
Belgrade, contrary to the rules of war hitherto accepted; Russia was
mobilising; Mr. Asquith was, he declared, not relaxing his efforts "to
do everything possible to circumscribe the area of possible conflict,"
and the Vienna Conference of Peace Societies was postponed. "I do not
see why a conflict between Russia and Austria should involve Western
Europe," said Mr. Britling. "Our concern is only for Belgium and
France."

But Herr Heinrich knew better. "No," he said. "It is the war. It has
come. I have heard it talked about in Germany many times. But I have
never believed that it was obliged to come. Ach! It considers no one. So
long as Esperanto is disregarded, all these things must be."

Friday brought photographs of the mobilisation in Vienna, and the news
that Belgrade was burning. Young men in straw hats very like English or
French or Belgian young men in straw hats were shown parading the
streets of Vienna, carrying flags and banners portentously, blowing
trumpets or waving hats and shouting. Saturday saw all Europe
mobilising, and Herr Heinrich upon Teddy's bicycle in wild pursuit of
evening papers at the junction. Mobilisation and the emotions of Herr
Heinrich now became the central facts of the Dower House situation. The
two younger Britlings mobilised with great vigour upon the playroom
floor. The elder had one hundred and ninety toy soldiers with a
considerable equipment of guns and wagons; the younger had a force of a
hundred and twenty-three, not counting three railway porters (with
trucks complete), a policeman, five civilians and two ladies. Also they
made a number of British and German flags out of paper. But as neither
would allow his troops to be any existing foreign army, they agreed to
be Redland and Blueland, accord