“Here’s to the wives we loved in the days before War came upon us. Here’s to the promises they made us—to be ours until death came between us. Here’s to the suffering they have borne for our thoughtlessness; the hours when they have looked into the future and wondered if the love that we promised was worth the price they were paying. Here’s to the hopes and the fears, the joys and the sorrows that have come to them—that are coming to them now—that are coming to them in the years on ahead with ever greater portion. Here’s to their courage and noble endeavor, given so pathetically to us chaps who sometimes—forget. May we die as faithfully in the cause to which we have pledged ourselves as they will live in the memory of what-might-have-been in the lean years when there are forms sitting in fantasy beside them in the firelight and our voices are heard in the homes we made with them—no more. “And here’s to the girls we are leaving behind! Here’s to the kisses they have given us under the stars of many summers—the memory of their hands and their lips and their eyes! Here’s to the weight in their souls and the pain that will hallow the memories that will haunt them through the years. Here’s to the sighs and the shadows, the heart-hopes and the longing! God grant in His goodness their fidelity is rewarded! “These are the things to which we drink—the men of yesterday—and the memory of their heroism which has been—and the women of to-day and whose heroism is to be. With the great incentive of these two in our hearts, boys—let us drink and go away to fight like men—to honor the first—to sanctify the second.” He clinked his glass against that of speechless Uncle Joe Fodder’s—and they drank—Uncle Joe drinking his wine with a hand which trembled so that the liquid stained his withered claw like a scarlet wound. The hall was strangely silent. Sam turned to his wife. “That boy never composed that beautiful speech alone, Mary,” he said—“not impromptu like that!” Down the hall an old lady whispered to her daughter: “Alice! Alice!—His grandaddy made just such a speech—almost word for word—the night John Farrington’s company bade us women-folks good-by.” As the hall was being cleared for the big farewell dance, Sam came to the boy. “Laddie,” he demanded, “where did you learn that speech?” “What speech?” asked the boy. “You know _what_ speech—the toast!” “I don’t know, Mr. Hod. I just looked at the faces—and the wine—and—and—Betty!—and it just came out.” “Is that the truth?” “Sure, it’s the truth. What was it I said that was so awful wonderful?” “Don’t you remember what you said?” The boy laughed ashamedly. “—I couldn’t repeat it if it cost me my life,” he replied. “It—just—came—out!” Late that night the old editor lay in his bed thinking of many things. “The things in life are far stranger than the things in story books,” he said. Then in the velvet dark he whispered: “Strange! Strange!” ――――