During Those Awful Days Spent In The Halls Of Suffering
And Death Near Verdun There Were Found Many Golden Chains Of
Friendship, And We Thought -
"Better than grandeur, better than gold,
Than rank or title a hundred-fold,
Is a healthy body and a mind
At ease,
And simple pleasures that always please,
A heart that can feel for a neighbor's woe,
And share in his joy with a friendly glow,
With sympathies large enough to infold
All men as brothers, is better than gold."
Gold has no power to purchase true friendship and only eternal
things are given away. So, what matters it whether we travel
east or west as long as our souls retain the freshness and
fragrance of the early morning's hours? We can be our own
alchemists, and through the gray vapors of our poor lives
transmute them into golden flowers of character that shall gleam
and sparkle as the evening of our closing days draw near, like
coruscating stars in the violet dusk of our twilight sky.
Nature seemed to have adorned herself richly for our departure;
no sky could have been more blue, no grass more green and no
trees more full of glistening leaves and singing birds. There
was an indescribable freshness and glory on the sunny hills and
shining sky. The breeze sifted through the trees and over the
rim of the circling slopes, causing the maple leaves to show
silver and wafting fragrance from a thousand fountains of
sweetness. At brief intervals the loud, rich notes of the
Maryland Yellow Throat and the high pitched song of the indigo
bunting resounded from the bushes near Glen-Miller park of
Richmond, Ind.
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