He was a quickener of the public
conscience. That people are beginning to think tolerantly of
preparedness, that a nation which at one time looked yellow as
a dandelion is beginning to turn Red, White, and Blue is owing
in some measure to him.
R. H. D. thought that war was unspeakably terrible. He
thought that peace at the price which our country has been
forced to pay for it was infinitely worse. And he was one of
those who have gradually taught this country to see the matter
in the same way.
I must come to a close now, and I have hardly scratched the
surface of my subject. And that is a failure which I feel
keenly but which was inevitable. As R. H. D. himself used to
say of those deplorable "personal interviews" which appear in
the newspapers, and in which the important person interviewed
is made by the cub reporter to say things which he never said,
or thought, or dreamed of--"You can't expect a fifteen-dollar-
a-week brain to describe a thousand-dollar-a-week brain."
There is, however, one question which I should attempt to
answer. No two men are alike. In what one salient thing did
R. H. D. differ from other men--differ in his personal
character and in the character of his work? And that question
I can answer off-hand, without taking thought, and be sure
that I am right.
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