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I still think that probably the best story of World War Two was about two marines. It seems that they were aviators who were forced down on the ocean, and were floating around on a rubber raft when an en€my submarine surfaced close to them, and an officer ordered them to surrender and come aboard. One of them whispered to the other: "Act like we're surrendering, and when we get close to the sub LET'S RAM IT !" That's the way I think of our marines, "rt*"t. * * * t*.*

Which reminds me of the story about the night the Marines landed in the Solomons. That night a Marine Sergeant in a San Francisco cafe was praising his corps in loud tones when an Army captain interrupted him. "Don't forget," said the officer, "that when a Marine goes into battle there are ten soldiers on one side of him, and ten sailors on the other." The Marine drew himself up to his full six-feet-two, came to attention and answered : "Sir ! That's the proper proportion."

And perhaps your scrapbook, friend reader, could find a small spot for a remark of the great thinker, Oliver Wendell Holmes. Someone asked him why he always went to church on SundaS and Holmes said that he had discovered in himself a little plant called reverence, that needed to be watered about once a week. ***

The world hasn't changed much. I was reading an editorial I wrote forty years ago, and here is how I commented on folks in general: "Every town has a liar or two, a smart aleck, some pretty girls, more loafers than it needs, a woman who tattles, men who stand on street corners and make remarks about wom,en, the man who laughs like an idiot every time he says something, men who can tell you just how the war question ought to be settled, foretell the weather and how to ru,n every other fellow's business; all of whom made dismal failures of their own."

1.**

A friend of mine was asked one time to tell his opinion of a real retail lumberman, and his reply is worth remembering. He said: "Retail lumbering is a business that calls for many of the finer characteristics in men. The real lumberman has the patience of Job, the urbanity of a Chesterfield, the philosophy of a Marcus Aurelius, the mind of a poet; he does not believe he is capable of giving advice to Allah, or of running the universe; his mirth bubbles up like a fountain; he recognizes humanity in man, is tolerant of his foibles, forgives his sins, and is great in the little things of life. This is the real retail lumberman."

I know no lumberman who would object to that description, do you?

A friend of mine, *iai "* "jr..r, to make, wished to compliment a man of small stature and asked me if I could suggest any happy things he might say. I told him I was loaded on that subject, having written about it at different times. Some small men seem to rese,nt references to their size. Once I introduced a politician of that sort to make a speech, and I stated, facetiously, that he had once visited the tomb of Napoleon and, looking down at the remains of the man who revolutionized the science of warfare. he remarked: "Ffe was a small man, too." The gentleman, to my surprise, sort of resented the thing.

But here is what I tolJ ,fi. Ioun who wanted to compliment small men in a speech. No subject could furnish finer fuel for a hot speech, for the history of the world is packed with men who were great in mind, but small in body. Take soldiers. Napoleon was exactly 5 ieet, l/4" tall. Alexander the Great, who conquered the world and then sat down by the ever-moaning sea and wept into his red bandana because he knew of no more people to grind beneath his heel, was about the size of Napoleon. ,* * *

England's great naval hero, Lord Nelson, was a shorty. So was that noble Roman, Julius Caesar, who divorced his wife because she was heard to admire tall Roman soldiers. Ulysses S. Grant, American war hero, was much below average height. So was Admiral Farragut, the man who damned the torpedoes. General Phil Sheridan, of Civil War fame, was a short man. So was John Paul Jones. Pretty husky bunch of shorties! **{<

Now let's review the small men who set the world on fire with the magic of their thinking. Emmanuel Kant, topnotch among all topnotch philosophers, was just 5 feet tall. Spinoza, c6nsidered by many scholars to have been the greatest of all thinkers, was a little man. And the mighty thinker and writer of the 15th century, Erasmus, was small, though he wrote three hqndred books and has been quoted by scholars for centuries. And did you know that the immortal Athenian, Plato, was a small man? And that so was that king among thinkers and pupils of Plato, Aristotle? He was also the teacher of the small but mighty conqueror, Alexander. Saint Paul is deduced by Biblical scholars to have been a small man. Saint Francis Xavier was just 4 feet 6 inches tall, shortest in stature of all the great men of history. And John Calvin was a short man. And so was the great orator, Savonarola.

Now take artists. rrr.*inl*oltal musicians. Beethoven