Being so desperately busy all my life I failed to see as much as I should like either of him or of the other boys, but there was always an instinctive sympathy between us; and it is a relief to me to be unable to remember any, even a single, occasion on which I have been vexed with him. In all serious matters he was, as far as I could judge, one of the best youths I have ever known; and we all looked forward to a happy life for him and a brilliant career. His elder brothers highly valued his services in their Works. He got on admirably with the men; his mode of dealing with overbearing foremen at the Works, where he was for some years an apprentice, was testified to as masterly, and was much appreciated by his "mates"; and honestly I cannot bethink myself of any trait in his character which I would have had different--unless it be that he might have had a more thorough liking and aptitude for, and greater industry in, my own subject of physics. When the war broke out his mother and I were in Australia, and it was some time before we heard that he had considered it his duty to volunteer. He did so in September 1914, getting a commission in the Regular Army which was ante-dated to August; and he threw himself into military duties with the same ability and thoroughness as he had applied to more naturally congenial occupations. He went through a course of training at Great Crosby, near Liverpool, with the Regiment in which he was a Second Lieutenant, namely the 3rd South Lancashires, being attached to the 2nd when he went to the Front; his Company spent the winter in more active service on the south coast of the Firth of Forth and Edinburgh; and he gained his desired opportunity to go out to Flanders on 15 March 1915. Here he applied his engineering faculty to trench and shelter construction, in addition to ordinary military duties; and presently he became a machine-gun officer. How desperately welcome to the family his safe return would have been, at the end of the war, I need not say. He had a hard and strenuous time at the Front, and we all keenly desired to make it up to him by a course of home "spoiling." But it was too much to hope for--though I confess I did hope for it. He has entered another region of service now; and this we realise. For though in the first shock of bereavement the outlook of life felt irretrievably darkened, a perception of his continued usefulness has mercifully dawned upon us, and we know that his activity is not over. His bright ingenuity will lead to developments beyond what we could have anticipated; and we have clear hopes for the future. O. J. L. MARIEMONT, _September 30, 1915_. * * * * * A MOTHER'S LAMENT _Written on a scrap of paper, September 26, 1915_, "_To ease the pain and to try to get in touch_"