"Do you know, Clay, I think this is a darned critical time. The press,
hasn't got it yet, but both the British and the French are hard up
against it. They'll fight until there is no one left to fight, but
these damned Germans seem to have no breaking-point. They haven't any
temperament, I daresay, or maybe it is soul they lack. But they'll fight
to the last man also, and the plain truth is that there are too many of
them.

"It looks mighty bad, unless we come in. And I don't mind saying that
there are a good many eyes over here straining across the old Atlantic.
Are we doing anything, I wonder? Getting ready? The officers here say we
can't expand an army to get enough men without a draft law. Can you see
the administration endangering the next election with a draft law? Not
on your life.

"I'm on the wagon, Clay. Honestly, it's funny. I don't mind telling you
I'm darned miserable sometimes. But then I get busy, and I'm so blooming
glad in a rush to get water that doesn't smell to heaven that I don't
want anything else.

"I suppose they'll give us a good hate on Christmas. Well, think of me
sometimes when you sit down to dinner, and you might drink to our coming
in. If we have a principle to divide among us we shall have to."