"I didn't expect to spend this evening lying on a ship's deck," murmured Tom. He was thinking of what the Promenade Concert usually means to people who have been taught something by co-education. That good-bye, said in the Quadrangle when the music and the thoughtless people have gone and the lanterns blaze up and drop, one after another, and lie smoldering on the moonlit asphalt; those last words with people from whom you have concealed yourself these four years and to whom you can now afford to lay open your heart, as can the happy dead, because your ways after to-night may lie apart,--Tom knew that this good-bye does mean something, in spite of the superior announcement of Sophomore Smith. Only it meant more to a fellow lying thinking about it among the ropes of a transport's deck, with the Spaniards in prospect. Cap's cigarette shone like a glowworm in the shadow of the stack. "Our good-bye supper will be sloppy weather, all right;" said he. "Six going out." "No," answered Tom, "it won't be a drunk to-night, Cap. You haven't been in long enough. I'll bet they don't get through the first case; I'll bet it's a cry. You didn't see '95 go out." "Well, perhaps," assented the Sophomore. "The fellows are pretty well worked up." Tom went back to his Freshman days. "I remember our '95 feed in the Hall. Stanton cried that night, and Gray. I never saw them do it before." Then, more slowly, "It must be tough on a girl." After which he was not talkative. There was little enough, this last morning, to suggest Commencement, as he leaned on the damp rail of the ship and dreamed over the last few days. A voice at his elbow said: "Captain wants you, Sergeant." Tom started out of his reverie, and the military tilt came into his back. He was not a student bidding the College farewell; he was a sergeant at eighteen a month and lucky to get so much. The city had awakened when he came to the rail again. There was a tense feeling abroad, a gathering excitement that grew through the morning. All manner of water-craft fussed and fumed and dodged around the transports,--tugs, rowboats, launches and clumsy river steamers strung with flags and black with civilians. One tug that hung close by shone with more color than the others by reason of the women crowding it; Tom could discern the face of his mother looking, looking with yearning eyes that would have called him back. He drew a quick breath of surprise and his hands tightened on the black rigging. There on the tug, standing beside his mother instead of among those who were saying good-bye to the Campus, he saw the Other One. * * * * * Soon after three, the screw throbbed, moved, the craft wheeled into lines flanking the huge vessel; the noises of the city awoke: "For the large birds of prey They'll carry you away, And you'll never see your soldiers any more."