Page:War; or, What happens when one loves one's enemy, John Luther Long, 1913.djvu/369

AS GRASS OF THE FIELD same old thing, Home, Sweet Home. And all formed in ranks and followed. The girls were still dressed in white, and had green garlands on their heads and pink and blue sashes around their waists. But I think each dear young eye in those hundreds had a tear for my boys—and maybe, for me. The rusty old preacher recited the services for the dead.

"Lord," he said, "thou sayest, truly, that we know not what a day may bring forth. But an hour ago these young brothers were lusty with life. Now one is dead by the other's hand. And that one maimed. Truly man is like the beast which perisheth. Man is like to vanity. He cometh forth as a flower and is cut down; he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not."

And so we came home.