ttle homes--eyes
bright with unshed tears, love and laughter and courage, patriotism as
fine as in any great house in America, determination that in giving to
America what was dearest it should be given with high spirit--that the
boys should have smiling faces to remember, over there. And then
again--love and tender words. He was missing all that. He, too, might go
back to his father's house an enlisted man, and meet his father's eyes
of pride and see his sisters gaze at him with a new respect, feel their
new honor of him in the touch of arms about his neck. All these things
were for him too, if he would but take them. With that there was the
sound of singing, shrill, fresh voices singing down the street. He
wheeled about. A company of little girls were marching towards him and
he smiled, looking at them, thinking the sight as pretty as a garden of
flowers. They were from eight to ten or eleven years old and in the
bravery of fresh white dresses; each had a big butterfly of pink or blue
or yellow or white ribbon perched on each little fair or dark head, and
each carried over her shoulder a flag. Quite evidently they were coming
from the celebration at the church, where in some capacity they had
figured. Not millionaires children these; the little sisters likely of
the boys who were going to be soldiers; just dear things that bloom all
over America, the flowering of the land, common to rich and poor. As
they sprang along two by two, in unmartial ranks, they sang with all
their might "The Long, Long Trail."

"There's a long, long trail that's leading
To No Man's Land in France
Where the shrapnel shells are bursting
And we must advance."

* * * * *

And then:

We're going to show old Kaiser Bill
What our Yankee boys can do.

Jim Barlow, his hands in his pockets, backed up against a house and
listened to the clear, high, little voices. "No Man's Land in France--We
must advance--What our Yankee boys can do."

As if his throat were gripped by a quick hand, a storm of emotion swept
him. The little girls--little girls who were the joy, each one, of some
home! Such little things as the Germans--in Belgium--"Oh, my God!" The
words burst aloud from his lips. These were trusting--innocent,
ignorant--to "What our Yankee boys can do." Without that, without the
Yankee boys, such as these would be in the power of wild beasts. It was
his affair. Suddenly he felt that stab through h