an oil lamp. It was done within twenty-four hours, and surely women who could accomplish that feat deserved the salute of at least one army. The Boy Scouts had decided, even before we entered the war, what they could do to help. They carry no guns, but it is not the man with the gun who does all the work of a great war. Not every one realizes that there are about 200,000 on the lists of the Boy Scouts, besides 350,000 young men who have had the valuable Boy Scout training, to say nothing of 50,000 men who have been connected with them as advisers and scout masters. More than half a million of boys and men who have been trained to see and hear exactly, to think quickly, and to know what to do in an emergency, is a valuable asset for any country, whether in war or out of it. In war a Scout can render first aid to the sick or injured. He can send messages by wire, wireless, or wigwagging, he can carry a message promptly and repeat it accurately, and he can get through places where a man cannot. He can work on a farm; he can act as guard of property and give alarm in case of danger. All these things he has often done, and when the United States entered the war, the Boy Scouts was one of the few organizations that were prepared to do their part from the first. Girl Scouts, too, and Camp-Fire Girls had promised to be loyal, and when war came, they translated their promise of loyalty into service. Their work was not limited to carrying pretty knittingbags by any means, for they offered themselves promptly to the Red Cross for orders, and the work assigned them was not always agreeable. From Eastport, Maine, to Portland, Oregon, they swept workroom floors and picked oakum. In New York they opened a Red Cross workroom of their own. In Philadelphia they raised by a bazaar $800 for buying knitting yarn. They have learned the best methods of canning, and some of them have been specially trained to teach these things to schools, clubs, and churches. In short, "wherever a girl's size war job has offered itself, these Girls have taken it on." Both they and the Boy Scouts have been excellent solicitors for the Liberty Loans, and both fully deserve to wear a badge on which is written "America first." The Government, of course, provides for the care of its animals in the war, but many emergencies arise in which a private society can act much more quickly. Therefore, the Secretary of War invited the American Humane Association to aid in this work, and the American Red Star was promptly organized. More than six hundred anti-cruelty societies were eager to help, and even the natives of Alaska are contributing generously and wearing Red Star buttons with the utmost pride and satisfaction. The Red Star, like the Red Cross, "specializes in emergencies," and at times of immediate need officers are free to call for whatever is needed. Their requests have ranged all the way from blankets and 'bandages to a veterinary hospital, and every one has been promptly filled. The American Library Association is doing a fine work in providing books for the men in camp and "over there." Not rubbish, of course, but books of value in all lines are in demand. In one camp there are seven hundred college boys. Some colleges give credit for study done in camp, and the boys want up-to-date college textbooks. Many foreigners want simple books for beginners in English. Good novels, interesting histories and biographies, especially on French subjects, are called for. The Association collects money for books, and every public library is a station to which books for the soldiers may be sent. So it is that every person in the land who has any genuine love for his country is trying to help her. Well-known artists are designing posters and doing rough camouflage work; actors and musicians are using their popularity to gain dollars for the soldiers, and using their talents to entertain them in the camps; men with heavy business cares are neglecting these and devoting their time and ability to the needs of the Government. "My country asks me to help her," may well be the proud slogan of those who help make munitions, or drive nails into ships, or save food from careless waste, or do their bit in any other way. Even little children are helping to win the war; and this is right, for the war is waged expressly for their sake. Every man in the trenches of the Allies is fighting for them. "You must always remember," one brave soldier wrote home to his boys and girls, "that your father came into this great war for the sake of all little children." The grown folk will not stay here many years longer, and it would not have been difficult for them to make some sort of peace that would endure for a time. They are not struggling for themselves, but to make the world safe for their children and the children of those children. "The glory of the Present is to make the Future free" — and this is why we are in the war. There is only one thing worse than war, and that is to stand one side when we ought to be fighting. We have not taken up arms for revenge, or to gain land or wealth or power. We have entered this war to make sure that right rather than might shall rule. It is a struggle between truth and falsehood, between mercy and cruelty, between freedom and slavery. It is a struggle that we have got to win. "For right is right, since God is God; And right the day must win; To falter would be sin." POSTSCRIPT-THE END OF THE WAR WHEN the last sentence was written, no one doubted that Germany would surrender some time; the only question was "When?" Her last frantic drive came to an end with her defeat in the second battle of the Marne. In the autumn of 1918 she requested an armistice, with a view, it was generally believed, to creating an opportunity to get her troops, ordnance, munitions, and supplies safely back into Germany. She could then rest and prepare for another drive in the spring of 1919. Nothing but unconditional surrender could be accepted, and the Allied lines pushed on. "Are you going to France?" some one asked an American soldier as he stood waiting on the wharf. "No, ma'am; to Berlin," he replied. People who were following on their maps the course of the war moved every day the flags of the Allies a little nearer the German boundaries. The German plan had been to make a drive, then rest and take plenty of time to prepare for another drive. General Foch's plan was to keep up a continuous battle, striking first at one point, then at another, then at two together, no German ever knowing where the next blow would fall. The result was that at the end of his nine weeks' campaign the line of the Germans on the Western Front was everywhere crumbling, while the Allies' line was as powerful as |