banners waving, above me my flag making a sky of stars and stripes, and behind me block upon block of my co-workers; I felt uplifted and at the same time humbled.
"Here we come," I felt like saying. "Here we come a thousand strong—all alike, no one higher than another. Here we come in quest. We come in quest of a broader vision and a bigger life. We come, shoe-strings dragging, skirts impeding, wind disheveling, holding on to inappropriate head-gear, feathers awry, victims of old-time convictions, unadapted to modern conditions, amateur marchers, poorly uniformed—but here we come—just count us—here we come! You'll forget the shoe-strings after you've watched a mile of us. You'll forget the conspicuous fanatics among us (every movement has its lunatic fringe, somebody has said), you'll forget the funny remarks, the jokes of newsboys, and the humorous man you stood beside, after your legs begin to feel stiff and weary, and still we keep on coming, squad upon squad, band upon band, banner upon banner."
As I rode that day with all my sisters I felt for the first time in my life the inspiration of coöperation. It flashed across me that the picture of the wheel with the wings was as untrue as it was impossible. I had made a mistake. I was not that sort of wheel. I wasn't superfluous. I was a tiny little wheel with cogs. I was set in a big and tremendous machine—Life, and beside me were other wheels, which in their turn fitted into other cogs of more and larger wheels.
