He wished that he, too, had a wound, a red badge of courage. - Stephen Crane

The word is clear only to the kind who on peak or plain, from dark northern ice-fields to the hot wet jungles, through all wine and want, through lies and unfamiliar truth, dark or light, are governed by the unknown gods, and though each man knows the law, no man may give tongue to it.

But these matters did not annoy him. It is almost certain that if the boat capsized he would have tumbled comfortably out upon the ocean as if he felt sure that it was a great soft mattress.

This landscape gave him assurance. A fair field holding life. It was the religion of peace. It would die if its timid eyes were compelled to see blood. He conceived Nature to be a woman with a deep aversion to tragedy.