John Steinbeck knew he was dying when he drove Rocinante across America and wrote Travels with Charley.

Steinbeck’s final book, America and Americans, is a fading man’s farewell look at his native land.

In the chapter “Genus Americanus,” Steinbeck ponders our veterans’ organizations, lodges and fraternal orders — “Elks, Masons, Knights Templar, Woodmen of the World, Redmen, Eagles, Eastern Star, Foresters, Concatenated Order of Whowho, International” — and at the parades which showcase them. “It is strange,” he concludes, “how Americans love to march if they don’t have to.”