Would not this be better? Say for all who are killed by a regiment let each soldier wear a blood-red stripe for each man slain. If very successful in their bloody warfare the stripes would be increased until their whole garments would be of one uniform, ruddy hue, and they would be “heap big Injuns” for all the world to look at. Their praises would be read and known instantly by all observers. Then, instead of worshiping one whom they style a God of Love, and one whom they call the “Prince of Peace,” why not be consistent and adopt a god of war, such as is Kali, the goddess of the murderers of India, and offer unto him the blood of their victims, as these people do to their goddess? Does it speak well for civilization, after thousands of years, and after nineteen hundred years of Christianity, that twenty millions of armed soldiers, belonging to the most enlightened and so-called Christian nations of the earth, should be waiting and expecting every morning an order to attack and destroy each other? And all anxious to flesh their weapons in the bodies of their fellowmen? If, after all these centuries, Christianity has culminated in such a condition of murderous intention, how long will it be before their “Prince of Peace” will come to reign? Having such feelings about war and soldiering in my later years, I must have had something of them when I left school, and they prevented me from thinking seriously of a soldier’s life. I concluded that I would rather be a hermit in a forest all my life, living on herbs and wild fruits, and die thus, and go to my Maker without a spot of the blood of my fellowmen on my soul, than to be the greatest warrior that ever lived, though he could boast of having slain his thousands. What of the responsibility of those who instigate war? The great poet says, “The king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make when all these legs and arms and heads chopped off in battle shall join together in the latter day and cry, all, “_We died at such a place_;” some swearing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I am afraid that there are few that die well, that die in battle, for how can they charitably dispose of anything when blood is their argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it will be a black matter for the king that led them to it.” Well might the king say, in his remorse, “The lights burn blue, it is now dead midnight, cold, fearful drops stand trembling on my flesh. Methought the souls of all that I had caused to be murdered came.” Another thing influenced me. A surgeon of the army remarked to me that the best soldier was one with a vigorous, healthy body, and only sense enough to obey an order and fire a musket.