God bless and keep you always!
There is no more important day in a mans life
than the day he formally takes up a sword for the first time.
At that fateful and long anticipated moment
when a youth extends his hand for the first time,
Witnessed by both his elders and his peers, to grip
the hilt of a sword that will be his own
his life and his world are changed forever.
In the eyes of men he has become a man.
From The Camulod Chonicles
By Jack Whyte
Happy Birthday to our Marines!