The Next of Kin

䙺Next of Kin, The

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Title: The Next of Kin Those who Wait and Wonder
Author: Nellie L. McClung
Release Date: August 19, 2005 [EBook #16552]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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The Next of Kin
Those who Wait and Wonder By
Nellie L. McClung
Author of "Sowing Seeds in Denny," "The Second Chance," "The Black Creek Stopping House," and "In Times like These"
TORONTO THOMAS ALLEN BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 1917

1917, BY NELLIE L. McCLUNG
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
_Published November 1917_
HOPE
Down through the ages, a picture has come of the woman who weepeth: Tears are her birthright, and sorrow and sadness her portion: Weeping endures for a night, and prolongeth its season Far in the day, with the will of God For a reason!
Such has the world long accepted, as fitting and real; Plentiful have been the causes of grief, without stinting; Patient and sad have the women accepted the ruling, Learning life's lessons, with hardly a word of complaint At the schooling.
But there's a limit to tears, even tears, and a new note is sounding: Hitherto they have wept without hope, never seeing an ending; Now hope has dawned in their poor lonely hearts, And a message they're sending Over the world to their sisters in weeping, a message is flashing, Flashing the brighter, for the skies are so dark And war thunders crashing! And this is the message the war-stricken women send out In their sorrow: "Yesterday and to-day have gone wrong, But we still have to-morrow!"

Contents
FOREWORD 1
I. BEACH DAYS 22
II. WORKING IN! 35
III. LET'S PRETEND 46
IV. PICTURES 53
V. SAVING OUR SOULS 58
VI. SURPRISES 70
VII. CONSERVATION 92
VIII. "PERMISSION" 112
IX. THE SLACKER--IN UNIFORM 142
X. NATIONAL SERVICE--ONE WAY 154
XI. THE ORPHAN 171
XII. THE WAR-MOTHER 193
XIII. THE BELIEVING CHURCH 210
XIV. THE LAST RESERVES 227
XV. LIFE'S TRAGEDY 241
XVI. WAITING! 247

The Next of Kin
FOREWORD
It was a bleak day in November, with a thick, gray sky, and a great, noisy, blustering wind that had a knack of facing you, no matter which way you were going; a wind that would be in ill-favor anywhere, but in northern Alberta, where the wind is not due to blow at all, it was what the really polite people call "impossible." Those who were not so polite called it something quite different, but the meaning is the same.
There are districts, not so very far from us, where the wind blows so constantly that the people grow accustomed to it; they depend on it; some say they like it; and when by a rare chance it goes down for a few hours, they become nervous, panicky, and apprehensive, always listening, expecting something to happen. But we of the windless North, with our sunlit spaces, our quiet days and nights, grow peevish, petulant, and full of grouch when the wind blows. We will stand anything but that. We resent wind; it is not in the bond; we will have none of it!
"You won't have many at the meeting to-day," said the station agent cheerfully, when I went into the small waiting-room to wait for the President of the Red Cross Society, who wanted to see me before the meeting. "No, you won't have many a day like this, although there are some who will come out, wind or no wind, to hear a woman speak--it's just idle curiosity, that's all it is."
"Oh, come," I said, "be generous; maybe they really think that she may have something to say!"
"Well, you see," said this amateur philosopher, as he dusted the gray-painted sill of the wicket with a large red-and-white handkerchief, "it is great to hear a woman speak in public, anyway, even if she does not do it very well. It's sorto' like seeing a pony walking on its hind legs; it's clever even if it's not natural. You will have some all right--I'm going over myself. There would have been a big crowd in if it hadn't been for the wind. You see, you've never been here before and that all helps."
Then the President of the Red Cross Society came and conducted me to the house quite near the station where I was to be entertained. My hostess, who came to the door herself in answer to our ring, was a sweet-faced, little Southern woman transplanted here in northern Canada, who with true Southern hospitality and thoughtfulness asked me if I would not like to step right upstairs and "handsome