Prejudice against the military man hasn’t ordinarily gone to that length, but many citizens are at least disinterested. Not long ago I was called upon to speak to a rather cultured group on the soldier’s work. A few days later, an acquaintance, an intelligent, elderly woman, met me on the street. “I liked the way you talked,” she said, “but I’m not in sympathy with anything you spoke about. I don’t want to hear about the soldier or anything military.” I thanked her for her frankness, and dropped the matter, knowing it was useless to try to give her the facts which are presented here, and which she probably wouldn’t have believed anyway. Here are some of the questions which have been asked me by educated people: “What do you fellows in the army do when there’s no war? Do you just go out and drill the boys and then loaf around? What’s the need of an army in a depression? Where’s the army now? How big is it? What’s the use of an army when we have an air corps?” Whether or not such questions sound foolish, they do show ignorance of what the soldier and the War Department are really doing. But the citizen is not to blame for this lack of knowledge. A combination of circumstances has deprived him of knowing what has happened and what is happening with the military man. Certainly no true American wishes to be unfair. First of all our school and college histories, our literature, our entertainment have a habit of either misrepresenting or omitting the actual deeds and purpose of the soldier. Second, anyone associated with weapons usually has a bad name nowadays. Third, the soldier, away off in our island possessions or in an army post, has too little intimacy with the general run of people. Fourth, the name War Department has a misleading sound. It makes us think of a great mail-fisted demon, breathing fire and smiting with a red-hot sword. Before we get through with the stories and facts given later, we’ll see that it could much more faithfully be called the Peace Department. Fifth, there’s the term “preparation for war,” which is about as far from the truth about what the soldier is trying to do, as saying that firemen are preparing to cause fires.