If it
could just come back! But yesterdays never come back, little Jims--and
the todays are dark with clouds--and we dare not think about the
tomorrows."
11th December 1917
"Wonderful news came today. The British troops captured Jerusalem
yesterday. We ran up the flag and some of Gertrude's old sparkle came
back to her for a moment.
"'After all,' she said, 'it is worth while to live in the days which see
the object of the Crusades attained. The ghosts of all the Crusaders
must have crowded the walls of Jerusalem last night, with Coeur-de-lion
at their head.'
"Susan had cause for satisfaction also.
"'I am so thankful I can pronounce Jerusalem and Hebron,' she said.
'They give me a real comfortable feeling after Przemysl and
Brest-Litovsk! Well, we have got the Turks on the run, at least, and
Venice is safe and Lord Lansdowne is not to be taken seriously; and I
see no reason why we should be downhearted.'
"Jerusalem! The 'meteor flag of England!' floats over you--the Crescent
is gone. How Walter would have thrilled over that!"
18th December 1917
"Yesterday the election came off. In the evening mother and Susan and
Gertrude and I forgathered in the living-room and waited in breathless
suspense, father having gone down to the village. We had no way of
hearing the news, for Carter Flagg's store is not on our line, and when
we tried to get it Central always answered that the line 'was busy'--as
no doubt it was, for everybody for miles around was trying to get
Carter's store for the same reason we were.
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