The recruiting officer sadly shook his head. Stanley watched him in an agony of suspense. Here was his way out--his way of escape from this body of death that had hung over him ever since he could remember. He drew nearer to the recruiting officer,--"For God's sake, sir, take me!" he cried. Then the recruiting officer pulled himself together and grew firm and commanding. "I won't take you," he said, "and that's all there is about it. This is a job for grown-up men and men with all their wits about them. You would faint at the sight of blood and cry when you saw the first dead man." In a few weeks another recruiting meeting was held, and again Stanley presented himself when the first invitation was given. The recruiting officer remembered him, and rather impatiently told him to sit down. Near the front of the hall sat the German-American storekeeper of the neighboring town, who had come to the meeting to see what was going on, and had been interrupting the speaker with many rude remarks; and when Stanley, in his immaculate suit of gray check, his gray spats, and his eyeglass, passed by where he was sitting, it seemed as if all his slumbering hatred for England burst at once into flame! "My word!" he mimicked, "'ere's a rum 'un--somebody should warn the Kaiser! It's not fair to take the poor man unawares--here is some of the real old English fighting-stock." Stanley turned in surprise and looked his tormentor in the face. His look of insipid good-nature lured the German on. "That is what is wrong with the British Empire," he jeered; "there are too many of these underbred aristocrats, all pedigree and no brains, like the long-nosed collies. God help them when they meet the Germans--that is all I have to say!" He was quite right in his last sentence--that was all he had to say. It was his last word for the evening, and it looked as if it might be his last word for an indefinite time, for the unexpected happened. Psychologists can perhaps explain it. We cannot. Stanley, who like charity had borne all things, endured all things, believed all things, suddenly became a new creature, a creature of rage, blind, consuming, terrible! You have heard of the worm turning? This was a case of a worm turning into a tank! People who were there said that Stanley seemed to grow taller, his eyes glowed, his chin grew firm, his shoulders ceased to be apologetic. He whirled upon the German and landed a blow on his jaw that sounded like a blow-out! Before any one could speak, it was followed by another and the German lay on the floor! Then Stanley turned to the astonished audience and delivered the most successful recruiting speech that had ever been given in the Pembina Valley.