“I haven’t got to that point yet and I doubt if I ever shall. I don’t intend to make burnt sacrifices on any altar.”
While he was arranging the flags the Reverend Dr. Normander called.
“You see, Doctor, I love Mother England and Sister France very well indeed, but I love America supremely.”
“Yes I see,” replied Dr. Normander, “and I know it is very easy to love our own country; but to love other countries equally well—in other words to love our neighbors as ourselves—there’s the rub, Mr. Cornwallis.”
“I recognize the beauty of equality, Doctor,” laughed Mr. Cornwallis, “and I think I might be able to love other countries as well as my own country after a great deal of practice and very possibly, my neighbor as well as myself, but I fear I could never love my neighbor’s boy as well as I love my own boy. I hope I am taking a step in the right direction when I pay equal honor to my country’s birthday and to his.”
Little Ruth caught her father’s spirit as by infection. Every Fourth of July she arose as soon as the cannon began to boom and running out into the dewy or rainy garden, whichever it happened to be, she picked two great bunches of red and white flowers and arranged them in two blue vases and put one at the end of the table where mamma sat and the other at the end where papa sat in honor of the two birthdays.
Mrs. Cornwallis made a new patriotic suit for her darling boy each year. This year it was a quaint George Washington suit in red, white and blue with a cute Can’t-tell-a-lie cap, all spangled with stars.
After breakfast was over, she spread the suit out on the bed in her room. She was going to give her boy a bath preparatory to putting it on.
The cannon on Schwarmer Hill began to boom again just as Laurens was stepping into his little bath tub. The boy shivered.
“What makes you shiver so, Laurens? Is the water too cold?” asked his mother.