Told in a French Garden | Page 6

NOT," snapped the Doctor, "but I don't dislike them any more

than I do--well," catching himself up with a laugh, "lots of other
people."
"And you mean to tell me," said the gentle voice of the Divorcée at his
elbow, "that you calmly face the idea of the hundreds of thousands of
men,--well and strong to-day--dead to-morrow,--the thought of the
mothers who have borne their sons in pain, and bred them in love, only
to fling them before the cannon?"
"For what, after all, are we born?" said the Doctor. "Where we die, or
when is a trifle, since die we must. But why we die and how is vital. It
is not only vital to the man that goes--it is vital to the race. It is the
struggle, it is the fight, which, no matter what form it takes, makes life
worth living. Men struggle for money. Financiers strangle one another
at the Bourse. People look on and applaud, in spite of themselves. That
is exciting. It is not uplifting. But for men just like you and me to
march out to face death for an idea, for honor, for duty, that very fact
ennobles the race."
"Ah," said the Lawyer, "I see. The Doctor enjoys the drama of life, but
he does not enjoy the purely domestic drama."
"And out of all this," said the Trained Nurse, in her level voice, "you
are leaving the Almighty. He gave us a world full of beauty, full of
work, full of interest, and he gave us capacities to enjoy it, and
endowed us with emotions which make it worth while to live and to die.
He gave us simple laws--they are clear enough--they mark sharply the
line between good and evil. He left us absolutely free to choose. And
behold what man has made of it!"
"I deny the statement," said the Doctor.
"That's easy," laughed the Journalist.
"I believe," said the Doctor, impatiently, "that no good comes but
through evil. Read your Bible."
"I don't want to read it with your eyes," replied the Journalist, and

marched testily down the path toward the house.
"Well," snapped the Doctor, "if I read it with yours, I should call on the
Almighty to smite this planet with his fires and send us spinning, a
flaming brand through space, to annihilation--the great scheme would
seem to me a failure--but I don't believe it is." And off he marched in
the other direction.
The Lawyer shrugged his shoulders, and suppressed, as well as he
could, a smile. The Youngster, leaning his elbows on his knees, recited
under his breath:
"And as he sat, all suddenly there rolled, From where the woman wept
upon the sod, Satan's deep voice, 'Oh Thou unhappy God.'"
"Exactly," said the Lawyer.
"What's that?" asked the Violinist.
"Only the last three lines of a great little poem by a little great Irishman
named Stephens--entitled 'What Satan Said.'"
"After all," said the Lawyer, "the Doctor is probably right. It all
depends on one's point of view."
"And one's temperament," said the Violinist.
"And one's education," said the Critic.
Just here the Doctor came back,--and he came back his smiling self. He
made a dash down the path to where the Journalist was evidently
sulking, went up behind him, threw an arm over his shoulder, and led
him back into the circle.
"See here," he said, "you are all my guests. I am unreasonably fond of
you, even if we can't see Life from the same point of view. Man as an
individual, and Man as a part of the Scheme are two different things. I
asked you down here to enjoy yourselves, not to argue. I apologize--all
my fault--unpardonable of me. Come now--we have decided to stay as

long as we can--we are all interested. It is not every generation that has
the honor to sit by, and watch two systems meet at the crossroads and
dispute the passage to the Future. We'll agree not to discuss the ethics
of the matter again. If the men marching out there to the frontier can
agree to face the cannon--and there are as many opinions there as
here--surely we can look on in silence."
And on that agreement we all went to bed.
But on the following day, as we sat in the garden after dinner, our
attempts to "keep off the grass" were miserably visible. They cast a
constraint on the party. Every topic seemed to lead to the forbidden
enclosure. It was at a very critical moment that the Sculptor, sitting
cross-legged on a bench, in a real Alma Tadema attitude, filled the
dangerous pause with:
"It was in the days of our Lord 1348 that there happened in Florence,
the finest city in Italy--"
And the Violinist, who was leaning against a