Events continued to move with astounding rapidity in that autumn of 1918. My heart, like the heart of many another mother, was wrung by the news of the terrible fighting in the Argonne Forest, and again wrung by alternate hopes and fears as the October days drew to a close. On the 27th day of October my brother celebrated his sixtieth birthday under the quiet portal of his beloved home. As usual, I had sent to him my yearly message, in which I always told him what that day meant to me--the day when into this world, this confused, strange world that we human beings find so difficult to understand, there came his clarifying spirit, his magnetic personality, his great heart, ready always to help the weak and lift the unfortunate who were trying to lift themselves. I used to tell him that as long as he lived, no matter what my own personal sorrows were, life would retain not only happiness but also glamour for me. In answer to my birthday letter, an answer written on his very birthday in his own handwriting, he sends me the following message. Intimate as it is, I give it in full, for in these few short lines there seems to breathe the whole spirit of my brother--the unswerving affection, the immediate response to my affection, and the wish to encourage me to face sorrows that were hard to bear by reminding me of the rare joys which I had also tasted. The manner in which he joined his own sorrows and joys to mine, the sweet compliment of the words which infer that for him I still had youthfulness, and at the end the type of humor which brought always a savor into his own life and into the lives of those whom he closely touched, all were part of that spirit. Sagamore Hill, October 27, 1918. DARLING PUSSIE:-- It was dear of you to remember my birthday. Darling, after all, you and I have known long years of happiness, and you are as young as I am old. Ever yours, METHUSALEH’S UNDERSTUDY. XVIII “THE QUIET QUITTING”[C] For those who must journey Henceforward alone, Have need of stout convoy Now Great-Heart is gone. --Rudyard Kipling. On November 11, 1918, the armistice with Germany was signed by General Foch. The war was over! So many years had passed since that fateful August 1, 1914, that at first the mind of the world was not attuned to peace. It now seemed as incomprehensible that we should be at peace as it had seemed impossible that we should be at war. Just before the armistice was signed the United States had proved by the ballots cast on Election day that the request of President Wilson that a Democratic Congress should be returned was not in accord with the wishes of the American people. [C] Title of a poem written on the death of Theodore Roosevelt by J. Fries, an old veteran of the Civil War.