They come back each spring. He loved them and cared
for them when he was alive. Even on his leave in 1915 he gloried in
them. And when they come back each spring they seem to come to give me
promise that I shall see him again."
Then I translated Oxenham's verses about the roses for her. The
translation was poor, but she caught the idea, and her face beamed with
a new light, and she said: "Ah, yes, it is as I believe, that the good
God who still makes the beautiful roses, he will not take him away from
me forever."
I never read Oxenham's verse now that I do not see that little cottage
in Brittany that has sheltered the same family for centuries; twined
about with great red and white roses; and the old mother and the young
mother and the little lonely girl.
"Yet our hope in Him reposes
Who in war-time still makes roses."
Another time, down on the Toul front lines, I had this thought forced
home by a strange scene. It was in mid-March and for three days a
heavy blizzard had been blowing. I, who had lived in California for
several years, wondered at this blizzard and revelled in it, although I
had had to drive amid its fury, sometimes creeping along at a snail's
pace, without lights, down near the front lines. It was cruelly cold
and hard for those of us who were in the "truck gang.
Pages:
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91