I cannot too emphatically contradict every reason advanced to sustain a gloomy attitude of mind. There is every reason for the greatest enthusiasm and confidence. In fact, we over here on the firing line have a spontaneous kind of enthusiasm that comes only to the victorious. This war is a long and ferocious process in which each battle must be considered as a single shot fired only as a part of the _ensemble_. On land and sea things look better than they have in a long time. Every American effort is pure velvet for the Allied side. I trust our nation will now begin to see that America is a big and powerful fellow among the nations of the world and that, with just a little bit of careful attention, this European situation can be hammered into shape. The women of the country are, after all, pretty much the whole thing, for they can inculcate the spirit of fight and of happy confidence that nothing else can put into their boys. If the mother will adopt the old Spartan admonition of “Come home either with your shield or on it,” the boys will keep surging into this war with an ardor that no enemy can stop. ... My experiences thus far have brought me more laughs than it has been my pleasure to have in any other period of time. I must confess, however, that many of the laughs come when I view some of the situations in retrospect. At times, especially in the middle of a ruction, when literally tons of high explosives are being launched, we are too busily engaged to laugh. On such occasions we have to think rapidly and work fast. One incident may be worthy of note. A flock of troop-ships was under escort through the torpedo zone. The eagle eye of a trained observer caught the tell-tale symptoms of a submarine trying to manœuvre into striking position. Activities began at once, if not sooner. Those of us whose job it was to look after the sub, did it. Those of us whose job it was to screen the troop-ships, did that. On one of the transports were many negroes who knew more about shore duties than seafaring. On the ship they were passengers _pro tem_. The process of dealing with a submarine certainly must send thrills through a spectator who has never attended any rehearsals. The negroes in question were all novices and their chief emotion was primitive terror. The simultaneous explosion of forty or fifty barrels of dynamite made the whole ocean heave and rumble. Even those of us who were used to dropping ’em over and who were braced for the shock, felt considerably jolted. The darky soldiers thought the end of creation had sure busted loose in epidemic form. One of them excitedly dug down into his pack and fished out a Bible. Opening it on deck, he knelt upon it, wrung his hands to Heaven and cried in accents that could be heard above the racket of the explosions, “O Lawd, O Lawd, I’se never gwine roll dem bones no mo’. Ah promise it. Ah promise it absotively.”