justified the years of death. The last and longest chapter was about education. “In education the author argued for a more complete education, in which every part of the boy will be educated, i.e., body, mind, and character. He placed the home pre-eminent as the builder of character. ….The home is to be planned to keep our young Australians possessed of these three characteristics - freshness, decision, enthusiasm. Our schools can do their work by adding an all-important quality to their character - public spirit. Bean wanted to see a system of education that would give to every child an equal (positive active encouragement) to develop every ounce of brain power, physical strength, and manly or womanly character that is in them ‘The teachers must be chosen not so much for what they know, as for what they are.’ “ Bean concluded the book with: ‘Sixty thousand young Australians, who left Australia in high hopes to fight for her, sixty thousand who will never return to her dear shores, have preserved that power to us. We can make her what we will. It is in your hands, Australians.’ Considered as an Australian version of the world-wide hope that the survivors of war would perform peaceful deeds which justified the years of death, In Your Hands, Australians was republished in 1919. The significance to Bean of In Your Hands, Australians can be ascertained from the timing and circumstances of its writing and the urgency he applied to its publication. Bean decided to use his leave in October 1918 to write the book on reconstruction and to see that it was published, a month later, before the departure of the troops for Australia. In Bean’s words: "Late in 1918, when news came that the Germans were asking President Woodrow Wilson to arrange an armistice the author (Charles Bean) seized the respite for a fortnight’s leave in the south of France where he spent his holiday in writing for Australian soldiers and the youth of Australia 'a little book about the problems of Australia’s future' which he wanted to publish before the troops left for Australia." "This book was written during the only real 'holiday' leave that I had during the war (except for a couple of days at Oxford in 1916). … I got away for a fortnight to a quiet hotel at Cannes, where I had time to put down many