great nation. Self-control and conunon sense are. The most patriotic thing we can do in times of international bad temper is to keep cool and quiet.
IT is fortunate at this time that Mr. Root is secretary of state — continued the Observer. I think it is fortunate for us at all times that he is secretary of state, but now especially we need just this man of cool fearlessness. A good many men have written about the late John Hay as a great secretary of state, but it is no injustice to his memory to say that he did not have the material in him to make as efficient a pub- lic servant as Mr. Root. Besides, his use- fulness as secretary of state was impaired by his long service in the diplomatic corps. The marks of the first secretary clung to him. The jargon of diplomacy, its forms and customs, seemed more important to him at times than the essence of the question on hand. He did not really lack American- ism: he was a true American. But he had been much affected by his long residence in England. It was said of him once that he was not our secretary of state but the real British ambassador. No such taunt can be leveled at Mr. Root. He is the most American of Americans. He has come up as one of the leaders of a generation that has ceased to look sulkily to England for all our guide-posts, literary, legal, spiritual and political. He knows the strength of this country as well as any man. He would be as quick as any man to use it if the need arose. But his habit of mind is against violence. He is secretary of state now, not secretary of war. He would be, I think, about the last person to advise the begin- ning or the ending of a war.
I BELIEVE it— said the Philosopher— and he would be the first to silence the jingo. I have just been reading a little book of his, "The Citizen's Part in Government," and his tart disposition of the man who considers blustering and grumbling the chief duties of citizenship are beautiful reading. He tells a story in the course of his remarks which bears on our talk. " Murat Haktead once told me," Mr. Root writes, " how being a young newspaper correspondent dining the Civil War, he had felt moved to write a long letter to Secretary Stanton, giving his views about the matters in which the Secretary was engaged, and how many years afterward the letter was found in the files of the War Department endorsed in Stanton's handwriting — M. Halstead Tells How the War Ought to Be Carried On.*' I can imagine Mr. Root dis- posing of us all these days in the same laconic way. ••
AFTER ALL — said the Editor — we don't want war, or the Japs either.
HABIT
BY MARGARET STEELE ANDERSON
So, then! Wilt use me as a garment ? Well, Lo, at thy marriage feast, upon one hand Tis man's high impudence to think he may; Face of thy bride, and on the other — ^mine! But I — ^who am as old as Heav'n and Hell — Lo, at thy couch of sickness close I stand, I am not lightly to be cast away. And taint the cup, or make it more benign I Wilt run a race? Then I will run with Yea — hark! The very son thou hast begot thee. One day doth give thee certain sign and cry; And stay thy steps or speed thee to the goal; Hold thou thy peace — frighted or frighted Wilt dare a fight? Then, of a certainty, not — I'll aid thy foeman, or sustain thy soul. That look, that sign, that presence — it is I !
