The farmer seemed to waver, and I turned to the son, asking him to intercede for me, telling him a little, very little, about myself. He smiled. "Pop ain't goin' to take you back, don't worry," he consoled me, and it seemed as if a great stone had been lifted off my back. Very few times in my life have I experienced the same peace and thankfulness that were mine after the son had spoken. Soon he brought me some old boots, a coat and a different cap, for which I gladly exchanged that of the school. When my pockets had been filled with sandwiches and doughnuts, and the farmer had at last finished cautioning me about being careful, I bade these good people good-bye. If they should ever see these lines, I want them once again to receive my heartfelt thanks for their hospitality, and to know that their kindness was not altogether misplaced. All during that Sunday I remained hidden in some woods, resuming my journey toward the West Virginia state line at night. After five days' travel I crossed the imaginary boundary--it was a living thing to me--and was at last out of the jurisdiction of the superintendent and his officers. Then began that long eight months' tramp trip, during which I finally came to my senses and said _Adios_ to _Die Ferne_ forever--_Adios_ in the sense that never again was she able to entangle me in a mesh of difficulties nor to entice me away from the task set before me. She thought many and many a time afterward, when the call of the Road was strong and tempting, that she again had me in her toils. But respectable vacation trips or _bona fide_ investigations in the tramp world sufficed to satisfy my _Wanderlust_. Without doubt these excursions and investigations were a compromise with the Road in a certain sense; the wanderer's temperament lingered with me for years. But _Die Ferne_ was beaten for all time. To the school life and the ensuing eight months' sojourn In Hoboland credit is also due for the disappearance of my pilfering inclination. When, how, why, or where it went, are questions I can answer but imperfectly to-day. It slipped out of my life as silently and secretly as it had squirmed into it, and all that I can definitely remember now in the shape of a "good-bye" to it, on my part, is a sudden awakening, one morning on the Road, and then and there resolving to leave other people's property alone. There was no long consideration of the matter, I merely quit on the spot; and when I knew that I had quit, that I was determined to live on what was mine or on nothing, the rest of the Road experience was a comparatively easy task.