So also the theatres--in the effort to forget one's self.

There are afternoon dances for young officers at home on leave: the curtains are drawn and the music is muffled.

More marriages take place--blind and maimed, as well as the young fellows just going to France--than were ever celebrated in any year within men's memory.

Verse-writing is rampant.

I have received enough odes and sonnets celebrating the Great Republic and the Great President to fill a folio volume.