Roger again, and others like him, hoping more from liberty than he feared from revolution, and believing the contest would be fiery, but brief and decisive, plunged gallantly into the flood, with Liberty blazoned on their banners; liberty to do right and to speak the truth. His chosen captain was Mr. Cromwell, in whose troop he served from the first. God only knew the bitter pang it cost him (I knew it not till years afterwards) to take his post on the field which must, he knew, make so great a gulf between him and the Davenants. It was seldom Roger spoke of what he felt; scarce ever of what he suffered. Dr. Antony wrote, meanwhile, from London:-- "Chirurgeons, like women, have indeed their place on the battle-field, and not out of reach of the danger. But their work is with the wounded, and their weapons are turned against the enemy of all; the 'last enemy,' scarce to be destroyed in this war! I hope to succour on the battle-field those I sought to comfort in the prisons. God grant I find the air of the field as wholesome to the spirits of my patients as that of the dungeon." Job Forster never hesitated for a moment as to which was the right side. To him England was in one sense Canaan to be conquered, in another the Chosen Land to be kept sacred. The king was Saul; or, in other aspects, Sihon king of the Amorites, or Og king of Bashan. The Parliament, at first, and then the Lord Protector and the army, were the chosen people, Moses, Joshua, David. His only hesitation was whether he himself ought to fight on the field, or to work at the forge and protect Rachel and the village at home. "The Almighty," he said, "has not given me this big body of mine for nought. God forbid it should be said of Job Forster, Why abodest thou amidst the sheep-folds to hear the bleatings of the flocks?--that is, the ring of the hammer and anvil, which is as the bleating of my flocks to me. Yet there is Rachel! And the old law was merciful; and if it forbid a man to leave his new-married wife, how should I answer for leaving her who has more need of me, and has none but me? and she so ailing, and I, to whom the Lord has said as plain as words can speak, 'Be thou better to her than ten sons." It was perhaps the first perplexity he had never confided to her, and sorely was Job exercised, until one morning in August he came to my Father with a lightened countenance, and said,-- "Mr. Drayton, she has given the word, as plain as ever Deborah spoke to Barak. I've got my commission, and I'm ready to go this night."