no longer the one
grief-burdened figure sitting dejectedly on the mort-safe--I saw the
unnumbered host of mothers throughout the world who have given their
sons over to carnage, and who are as Rachel weeping for her children,
refusing to be comforted because they are not. Millions of men locked
in the death grapple means millions of mothers given tears to drink in
great measure, bound in affliction and iron.

The song of the river went on ceaselessly, the russet-leaves fell
softly, and the sun shone on a world wrapped in peace--all nature
utterly regardless of the millions of Rachels that weep. (Ten million
hearts may break, but nature silences not one note of its joyousness.)
And as she sat there, behind her, under the campanile, showed the
church door, locked and barred. Nature was heedless of her; the church
shut its door upon her. She seemed to me the Mater Dolorosa.

***

As I went up the brae there came the memory of a school lesson long
ago. Out of the subconscious it leaped as a diver might come up from
the depths of the sea with a gleaming coin in his hand. Among the
temples of ancient Rome there was one temple always kept open in time
of war. There the Roman General clashed the shield and the spear,
invoking the god ere he went to the battle-line, and its door was shut
not day or night. And I have no doubt but that the Eternal Ruler heard
that clashing of spear on shield, and marked that open door. But over
wide districts of Great Britain we have left these pagan habits far
behind us. We shut the doors of our temples alike in war and in
peace--excepting two hours on one day of the week, or in many cases one
hour in the week. Nor do I doubt but that the same Ruler marks these
doors now shut on the mothers of sorrow, and these sanctuaries locked
and silent.

The glory was now gone from the day. I could not forget how the iron
mort-safe gave the rest that the Church refused. The shadow lay heavy
over the valley, and the mind tried to give the shadow a name. But it
could not. So up the long flight of stone steps I climbed, and turned
along a tree-shaded road. There, where three roads meet, stands a
little chapel within whose walls a small section of our parishioners
worship. I have passed it times out of mind without so much as
glancing at it. But to-day its open door arrested my eye, and I stood
in the roadway and gazed. And there came to me there a sudden sense of
thankfulness for that t