There is more of death and less of days in my dream of Romance now.... I can see a man giving up his woman because she is dearer than his own life to him. I can see a man going to the scaffold for a country that is taking his life and hers. (Always I see him loving his country more dearly than the sober ones of regnancy and war.) ... I see him taking his woman in his hands--half laughing, half crying, their faces upturned--one creature in that moment of parting, as they had never been in street or church, or state.... Romance in that. I have a line here from the Valley Road Girl: ... Lastly, it came like a commandment to me--to give all to the Coming Generation--to acknowledge the New Race as one's God--remembering always that all Gods are jealous Gods." It's all in that, our dream of Romance--Democracy, the Planetary Hive. * * * * * I am using a short story as the next chapter, because it brings nearer to the centre of the picture certain ideals of romance, workmanship, martyrdom, love and death, than many essays could do. A tale may be a master-synthesis. Perhaps it is just the thing to show you what we mean, as a group,--what we mean about many things. This is not a marketable tale; in fact, it was done with the idea of making a place for itself just here in this book. * * * * * 26 THE COSMIC PEASANT A SHORT STORY When I was a lad I remember hearing some one say he had read a story of love and war. I thought of it just now, as I lay panting a bit in a queer nest for the night in the Galbraudin Foothills--in the midst of an army that had no country yet--a tragic document unfolding in my heart.... A story of love and war--yes, I had seen one. It was written upon the cells of my brain, the deeper parts engraved upon the heart--the old red war with a new dream hovering above it, and the old true love, white as ever, yet a touch of the rose and gold of the new race in its folds. It seems almost my story. Like Job's servant, only I am spared to tell it. Such a little while ago, I thought the tales of love and war all told. I saw Varsieff first at school, and went to him at once. Literally, I went to him. It was at recess, and I followed at his heels to his room instead of my own. He was not surprised. I was always at my best beside him. He accepted this gift from me. One who learns to give greatly as Varsieff did, learns also to accept the best things with grace. I only left his room long enough to get my bag. Gladly would I have slept at his door, but he asked me in. We were to be mates. Often he assured me that we were men, face to face; that I was not his Boswell, not his disciple, but a man-to-man friend. Yet I knew that my power was not the power of Varsieff, also that I was most powerful when I realised his splendid superiority.