Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 68.djvu/422

418 are all famous for it. It is often allied with moral cowardice. Hotspur is an ideal physical-courage hero when he exclaims—

 By heaven, methinks it were an easy leap, To pluck bright honor from the pale-faced moon, Or dive into the bottom of the deep, Where fathom-line could never touch the ground, And pluck up drowned honor by the locks; So that he that doth redeem her thence might wear Without corrival all her dignities.

Vain peacock, unless he could reap the glory and strut bespangled with glittering decorations, he cared not to achieve. All for himself, nothing for the cause, nothing for his country.

Achilles, sulking in his tent, incensed upon the question of loot and praying the gods to defeat his own countrymen, is another example of a physically courageous military hero. Fortunately our modern military men are generally of a different type. It is not the individual who conforms to the standard of his age, but the bad standard of the age that is to be condemned. Men are to be judged only by the standard of their time, and though our standard of to-day may be low indeed, the men conforming to it are not to be decried.

If you would be lifted up and inspired by worshipping at the shrine of the much nobler and rarer virtue, moral courage, stand before the Martyrs' Monument yonder. The martyrs cared nothing for earthly glory and honor or reward; their duty was to stand for a noble cause, and for that, not for their own selfish exaltation, they marched through fire and fagot to death unflinchingly, chanting as they marched.

There is one very encouraging indication of progress within our race, as showing, it is to be hoped, the influence of education upon the masses in evolving clearer ideas of responsibility for their actions. The attention of parliament was recently called to the difficulty of obtaining recruits for the army. The shortage of officers in the auxiliary forces (volunteers and militia) is no less than twenty-five per cent.—one-fourth of the whole. The militia has 32,000 men less than before. The regular army lacks 242 officers, and the British army for India is short 12,000 British recruits. The government pronounces this 'the most serious problem which confronts the military authorities.' Some of the highest military authorities see the final remedy only in conscription. I rejoice to inform you that your kin beyond sea in America have on hand the very same problem for their navy. Their army, being so small, is not yet affected. All their war-ships can not be manned—3,500 men are lacking. From this shortage of recruits we are justified in concluding that there is no longer a general desire in our race to enter the services. This is specially significant, as we are informed that increase of pay would not greatly increase recruiting, as