"We couldn't let the 'old grey mother of the northern sea' fight it out alone, could we?
But you can't go--the typhoid has done you out of that.

Sort of a shame, eh ?" Walter did not say whether it was a shame or not.

He looked silently over the Glen to the dimpling blue harbour beyond.
"We're the cubs--we've got to pitch in tooth and claw if it comes to a family row," Jem went on cheerfully, rumpling up his red curls with a strong, lean, sensitive brown hand--the hand of the born surgeon, his father often thought.

"What an adventure it would be! But I suppose Grey or some of those wary old chaps will patch matters up at the eleventh hour.

It'll be a rotten shame if they leave France in the lurch, though.