The heat became so intolerable, that they dropped over the edges of the rafts into the water up to their necks, and repeatedly ducked their heads. A great sheet of flame stretched out across the water and over their heads, and set the forest on fire about a half mile beyond them. The flames leaped nearly one and one-half miles, a distance unheard of in forest fires, and theretofore believed an impossible distance for a fire to leap.

So many of us said wisely to ourselves, when President Wilson made his famous trip into the west, telling us that the world was on fire, that if we staid on our side of the broad Atlantic, that great green ocean would be the natural and invincible "safeguard" beyond which the flames of Europe would not reach. This was our mistake, for we had not reckoned with the ambition of the insane monarch, and the war mad brutal bestiality of the Prussian. Germany and the German people were

but pawns in the game. They had been taught for generations things concerning the power, the intelligence and the destiny of the race.

Germany's threat to make the United States pay indemnity, for the losses her war lords claimed were due to munition and food supplies for the Allies and none for the Central Empire, was a factor in inducing the United States to enter into the conflict.

Before the formal entry of this country into the fray, many theretofore Americans, crossed the Canadian line and became citizens of the Dominion, and enlisted under the English flag. Thousands of Italians and French people returned to their native lands to fight for the country that gave them birth.