sits at a
window and sees the troops go by with dancing banners and glittering
bayonets, and the people cheering and shouting. And the refrain went
something like this:

"Never again call 'Comrade'
To the men who were comrades for years;
Never again call 'Brother'
To the men we think of with tears."

I happened to look around while the boy was speaking, and there sat the
old Doctor with the tears rolling unheeded down his ruddy face; he was
thinking, no doubt, of _his_ war time and the comrades _he_ knew.

On the other hand, how he despised fustian and bombast. His "Bah!"
delivered explosively, was often like a breath of fresh air in a stuffy
room. Several years ago, before I came here--and it is one of the
historic stories of the county--there was a semi-political Fourth of
July celebration with a number of ambitious orators. One of them, a
young fellow of small worth who wanted to be elected to the legislature,
made an impassioned address on "Patriotism." The Doctor was present, for
he liked gatherings: he liked people. But he did not like the young
orator, and did not want him to be elected. In the midst of the speech,
while the audience was being carried through the clouds of oratory, the
Doctor was seen to be growing more and more uneasy. Finally he burst
out:

"Bah!"

The orator caught himself, and then swept on again.

"Bah!" said the Doctor.

By this time the audience was really interested. The orator stopped. He
knew the Doctor, and he should have known better than to say what he
did. But he was very young and he knew the Doctor was opposing him.

"Perhaps," he remarked sarcastically, "the Doctor can make a better
speech than I can."

The Doctor rose instantly, to his full height--and he was an
impressive-looking man.

"Perhaps," he said, "I can, and what is more, I will." He stood up on a
chair and gave them a talk on Patriotism--real patriotism--the
patriotism of duty done in the small concerns of life. That speech,
which ended the political career of the orator, is not forgotten to-day.

One thing I heard to-day about the old Doctor impressed me deeply. I
have been thinking about it ever since: it illuminates his character
more than anything I have heard. It is singular, too, that I should not
have known the story before. I don't believe it was because it all
happened so long ago; it rather remained untold out of deference to a
sort of neighbourhood delicacy.

I had, indeed, wondered w