“Even they mightn't have thought of it if it hadn't been for the first one. Vengeance is the most terrible thought; once you put it into people's minds that they ought to have it, it runs away with them.” “Well, it isn't mostly vengeance we're after, at all. There's a lot more to it than just getting even with--” She did not heed him. “You're all blind! You don't see what you're doing; you don't even see what you've done to this peaceful place here. You've filled it full of thoughts of fury and killing and massacre--” “Why, no,” said Ramsey. “It was those Dutch did that to us; and, besides, there's more to it than you--” “No, there isn't,” she interrupted. “It's just the old brutal spirit that nations inherit from the time they were only tribes; it's the tribe spirit, and an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. It's those things and the love of fighting--men have always loved to fight. Civilization hasn't taken it out of them; men still have the brute in them that loves to fight!” “I don't think so,” said Ramsey. “Americans don't love to fight; I don't know about other countries, but we don't. Of course, here and there, there's some fellow that likes to hunt around for scrapes, but I never saw more than three or four in my life that acted that way. Of course a football team often has a scrapper or two on it, but that's different.” “No,” she said. “I think you all really love to fight.” Ramsey was roused to become argumentative. “I don't see where you get the idea. Colburn isn't that way, and back at school there wasn't a single boy that was anything like that.” “What!” She stopped, and turned suddenly to face him. “What's the matter?” he said, stopping, too. Something he said had startled her, evidently. “How can you say such a thing?” she cried. “_You_ love to fight!” “Me?” “You do! You love fighting. You always have loved fighting.” He was dumbfounded. “Why, I never had a fight in my life!” She cried out in protest of such prevarication. “Well, I never did,” he insisted, mildly. “Why, you had a fight about _me_!” “No, I didn't.” “With Wesley Bender!” Ramsey chuckled. “_That_ wasn't a fight!” “It wasn't?” “Nothing like one. We were just guyin' him about--about gettin' slicked up, kind of, because he sat in front of you; and he hit me with his book strap and I chased him off. Gracious, no; _that_ wasn't a fight!” “But you fought Linski only last fall.” Ramsey chuckled again. “That wasn't even as much like a fight as the one with Wesley. I just told this Linski I was goin' to give him a punch in the sn-- I just told him to look out because I was goin' to hit him, and then I did it, and waited to see if he wanted to do anything about it, and he didn't. That's all there was to it, and it wasn't any more like fighting than--than feeding chickens is.” She laughed dolefully. “It seems to me rather more like it than that!” “Well, it wasn't.”