“Quite nicely!—like good little boys!” she answered. “And they are so cheerful and patient! Some of the very bad cases are the most enduring. Oh!—if you could only see one poor fellow—”
“I don’t want to see him!” growled her father. “And I don’t want to hear about him! I’m worried out of my life by stories of these ‘poor fellows’ who make the ‘supreme sacrifice’ for their country,—hang it all! the ‘supreme sacrifice’ has got to be made by all of us some day anyhow—and the men who make it before their naturally allotted span would no doubt have wasted their lives in idleness and drink!”
Her eyes filled with a gentle reproach.
“Oh, dear Dad!—you talk like the Philosopher! Don’t get as callous as he is!”
“He’s not callous,” snapped out the old gentleman. “And you’re a silly little flibbertigibbet! Callous indeed! Why he’s full of feeling! He’s not sentimental—and a good job too!—but he’s reasonable and—and kind.”
“If he’s kind to you, that’s enough!” she said, smiling. “But I don’t think he pays much attention to the war, and he never realises the awful sufferings of the men who are fighting for us—”
“Why should he? God bless my soul! Why should a learned and brilliant scholar bother to ‘realise’ what these fighting fools are about? He’s got something else to do—”
“The Dictionary!” she hinted, smiling.
“Well, that’s one thing certainly. And I tell you what—ah!—you may look surprised!—but if my ideas were carried out, and language—language, I say!—preserved in refined forms, and no newspaper slang allowed, there would be no wars!—there couldn’t be!”
The smile was still on her lips.