When he was fifteen years old, I was commanded to appear before King Edward, who was a guest at Rufford Abbey, the seat of Lord and Lady Sayville, situated in a district called the Dukeries, and I took John as my accompanist.

I gave my usual performance, and while I was making my changes, John played the piano.  At the close, King Edward sent for me, and thanked me.  It was a proud moment for me, but a prouder moment came when the King spoke of John’s playing, and thanked him for his part in the entertainment.

There were curious contradictions, it often seemed to me, in John.  His uncle, Tom Vallance, was in his day, one of the very greatest football players in Scotland.  But John never greatly liked the game.  He thought it was too rough.  He thought any game was a poor game in which players were likely to be hurt.  And yet—­he had been eager for the rough game of war!  The roughest game of all!

Ah, but that was not a game to him!  He was not one of those who went to war with a light heart, as they might have entered upon a football match.  All honor to those who went into the war so—­they played a great part and a noble part!  But there were more who went to war as my boy did—­taking it upon themselves as a duty and a solemn obligation.  They had no illusions.  They did not love war.  No!  John hated war, and the black ugly horrors of it.  But there were things he hated more than he hated war.  And one was a peace won through submission to injustice.

Have I told you how my boy looked?  He was slender, but he was strong and wiry.  He was about five feet five inches tall; he topped his Dad by a handspan.  And he was the neatest boy you might ever have hoped to see.  Aye—­but he did not inherit that from me!  Indeed, he used to reproach me, oftentimes, for being careless about my clothes.  My collar would be loose, perhaps, or my waistcoat would not fit just so.  He’d not like that, and he would tell me so!

When he did that I would tell him of times when he was a wee boy, and would come in from play with a dirty face; how his mother would order him to wash, and how he would painstakingly mop off just enough of his features to leave a dark ring abaft his cheeks, and above his eyes, and below his chin.

“You wash your face, but never let on to your neck,” I would tell him when he was a wee laddie.

He had a habit then of parting and brushing about an inch of his hair, leaving the rest all topsy-turvy.  My recollection of that boyhood habit served me as a defense in later years when he would call my attention to my own disordered hair.

I linger long, and I linger lovingly over these small details, because they are part of my daily thoughts.  Every day some little incident comes up to remind me of my boy.  A battered old hamper, in which I carry my different character make-ups, stands in my dressing room.  It was John’s favorite seat.  Every time I look at it I have a vision of a tiny wide-eyed boy perched on the lid, watching me make ready for the stage.  A lump rises, unbidden, in my throat.