She told us the story of the breaking of their moorings as they lay in the river in a great storm of wind and of how that breaking had saved them from colliding with another ship. "I asked," she said, "what had happened." Someone said "Our moorings broke." I said, "No, a hand cut them!" Then, after a moment's silence, with an expression in face and voice which it is utterly impossible to convey, she added, "That same Hand is cutting my moorings now, and I am going forth!" The picture rose before you of an unfettered ship going out to the wide sea and of the great untrammelled, unhindered soul moving majestically onwards. [Illustration: MISS EDITH CAVELL] [Illustration: DR. ELSIE INGLIS] There was no fear, no death! How could there be. She never thought of her own work--she knew unity. "You did magnificently," was said to her within an hour of her going. With all her wonted assurance and with a touch of pride she answered, "My Unit did magnificently." Her loss is irreparable to us, but there is no room for sorrow. She leaves us triumph, victory, and peace. Edith Cavell's name is another that shines upon our roll of honour--the same serene great spirit--no thought of self, but only a great love and desire to serve--and a great fearlessness. Her message, before she went out alone at dawn to her death, which added another stain to the enemy's pages dark with blood, was the message of one who saw the eternal verities, the things worth living and dying for. Our men's Roll of Honor is a heavy Roll. We have lost in killed and permanently out of the army, a million men and over 75 per cent of our casualties are our own Island losses. Our women in every village and in every city street have lost husbands, fathers, brothers, lovers and friends. From every rank of life our men have died, the agricultural labourer, the city clerk, the railway man, the miner, the engineer, the business man, the poet, the journalist, the author, the artist, the scientist, the heirs of great names, many of the most brilliant of our young men. We comb out our mines and shipyards, and factories, ceaselessly for more men. Our boys at eighteen go into the army. From eighteen to forty-one every man is liable for service. Our Universities have only a handful of men in them and these are the disabled, the unfit, and men from other countries. Oxford and Cambridge Colleges are full of Officers' Training Corps men. The Examination Schools and the Town Hall at Oxford are Hospitals, and Oxford and Cambridge streets are full of the blue-clad wounded, as are so many of our cities. We are a nation at war, and at war for over three years and everywhere and in everything we are changed.