“Hardly, my boy, hardly,” I reassured him. “I’ve gone through war, or what war is; I’ve licked a couple of would-be Kaisers myself and I’m going after a few more of them before I have done with life. I am, forsooth, a bit battle scarred but my skin is as thick as that of a rhinocerous. Any little thing that you might say about me I’d be delighted to jot it down.” “Let’s see,” reflected Jack, “when we left off yesterday I had just been discharged from the hospital and was back with my folks in Montclair. When I was able to get around I wanted to see Broadway and came over one morning with dad. I was feeling bully as I was strolling down the trail when suddenly I spied a man I once knew although I hadn’t seen him in years, no, not since I was a kid operator learning wireless. “He was a tall, spare man like yourself, whose legs, as honest Abe once said, were long enough to reach to the ground. He might have been anywhere up to a hundred and five, by which I mean his age and not his weight; at any rate he had surely seen fifty summers and heaven only knows how many hard falls. “He was slightly stoop-shouldered, which I suspect was due to his sticking to his desk too closely, or, perchance, because he couldn’t shake the weight of his own tragedies from them. His face was pale, quiet and cadaverous, but whatever troubles he may have had and however many, they seemed not to have attacked his hair for it was all there, nearly,--though I didn’t count ’em--with not a gray one to mar their beautiful mouse-like color. In truth, he dressed like you, looked like you and, by gravy, he _was_ you, Mr. Collins.” Jack laughed heartily at this photo-impression of his old friend and I was glad to know that after all he had gone through with here, there and everywhere and the pain he had suffered and was suffering even then, he was still able to see the humor in so grisly a subject. I laughed, too, just to show him that I had not yet given up the ship and, hence, there was still hope for us both. “Turn about is fair play and now that you have given a word picture of me I’ll give one of you. As I remember our meeting it was like this: I was hurrying up Broadway one morning when suddenly a young soldier stepped abruptly in front of me thereby barring any farther progress on my part. I observed he had a trim fighting figure and wore the uniform we love so well. He wore puttees and limped somewhat but from the medals he wore on his breast I judged that he had met the enemy and that they were his--and ours. “His was a fine, heroic face and the very way his overseas cap set on the side of his head, his smiling eyes, his hearty laugh and the firm, smooth grasp of his hand was enough to show me that he was one of the brave boys from over there who had caught ‘the torch from failing hands and held it high in Flanders fields.’