We haven't had any hint of what is going to happen to us--whether Field
Artillery, the Heavies or trench mortars. There seems little doubt that
we are to be in England for a little while taking special courses.
I read father's letter yesterday. You are very brave--you never thought
that you would be the father of a soldier and sailors; and, as you say,
there's a kind of tradition about the way in which the fathers of
soldiers and sailors should act. Confess--aren't you more honestly happy
to be our father as we are now than as we were? I know quite well you
are, in spite of the loneliness and heartache. We've all been forced
into a heroism of which we did not think ourselves capable. We've been
carried up to the Calvary of the world where it is expedient that a few
men should suffer that all the generations to come may be better.
I understand in a dim way all that you suffer--the sudden divorce of all
that we had hoped for from the present--the ceaseless questionings as to
what lies ahead. Your end of the business is the worse. For me, I can go
forward steadily because of the greatness of the glory. I never thought
to have the chance to suffer in my body for other men. The insufficiency
of merely setting nobilities down on paper is finished. How unreal I
seem to myself! Can it be true that I am here and you are in the still
aloofness of the Rockies? I think the multitude of my changes has
blunted my perceptions. I trudge along like a traveller between high
hedgerows; my heart is blinkered so that I am scarcely aware of
landscapes. My thoughts are always with you--I make calculations for the
differences of time that I may follow more accurately your doings. I'd
love to come down to the study summer-house and watch the blueness of
the lake with you--I love those scenes and memories more than any in the
world.
Good-bye for the present. Be brave.
Yours,
Con.
V
SHORNCLIFF, August 19th, 1916.