he idea of Home Rule. He was too
light-hearted to be in full sympathy with fanatical Puritans like
Crossan and McNeice. He certainly had no hatred of the British Empire
or the English army. He was, up to the last moment, on friendly terms
with those of the army officers whom he happened to know. He chatted
with them and with detached inspectors of police in the same friendly
way as he did with Henderson at the railway station.

I can only suppose that he regarded the whole business--to begin with
at all events--as a large adventure of a novel and delightful kind. He
went into it very much as many volunteers went into the Boer War,
without any very strong convictions about the righteousness of the
cause in which he fought, certainly without any realization of the
horror of actual bloodshed.

There are men of this temperament, fortunately a good many of them. If
they did not exist in large numbers the world's fighting would be very
badly done. The mere mercenary--uninspired by the passion for
adventure--will at the best do as little fighting as possible, and do
it with the smallest amount of ardour. Fanatics cannot be had to
order. Some kind of idea--in most cases a religious idea--is necessary
to turn the ordinary church-going business man or farmer into an
efficient fighting unit. The kind of patriotism which is prepared to
make sacrifices, to endure bodily pain and risk death, is very rare.
It is on the men who enjoy risk, who love struggle, who face death
with a laugh, the men of Bob Power's reckless temperament, that the
world must rely when it wants fighting done. Hitherto men of this kind
have been plentiful. Whether our advancing civilization is going to
destroy the breed is a question which, I am pleased to say, need not
be answered by my generation. There are enough Bob Powers alive to
last my time.

CHAPTER XVIII

I fully intended to go to church on Sunday morning. I was, in fact,
waiting for Marion at the door of the hotel, when Sir Samuel
Clithering came to see me.

"I shall be so much obliged," he said, "if you will spare me a few
minutes."

I did not want to spare any minutes to Sir Samuel Clithering. In the
first place I had promised to take Marion to the cathedral. "A Parade
Service"--I quote the official title of the function--was to be held
for the benefit of the volunteers and Marion naturally wanted to see
Bob Power at the head of his men. I wanted to hear the men singing
that hymn ag