"_We shall watch you here in our peaceful cloister_, _Faring onward, some to renown, to fortune_, _Some to failure--none if your hearts are loyal--_ _None to dishonour._" To Gordon every word brought back with it a flood of memories. He could see himself, the small boy, reading those verses for the first time before he went to Fernhurst, ignorant of what lay before him. How soon he had changed his fresh innocency! How soon his bright gold had grown dim! Then he saw himself this time last year, listening to those words with an unbounded confidence, certain that he at least would never achieve failure. Visions in the twilight! And what was the dawn to bring? The Latin _Carmen_ began. The school stood on their seats and howled it out. Then came _Auld Lang Syne_. They clasped hands, swaying in chorus. The echoes of _God Save the King_ shook the timbered ceiling, someone was shouting "Three cheers for the visitors!"; the school surged towards the door; Gordon found his feet on the small stone stairway. He looked back once at the warm lights; the honour-boards that would never bear his name; the choir still in their places; the visitors putting on their coats and wraps. Then the stream moved on; the picture faded out; and from the courts came the noise of motors crunching on the gravel. As Gordon walked into the cool air he ran into Ferrers. "Good-bye, sir." "You are off, are you? Well, good luck. Write to me in the hols; I'll look you up if I'm in town. If not, cheer-o!" He was gone in a second. "_'So some time token the last of all our evenings_ _Crowneth memorially the last of all our days ...'_" Gordon murmured to himself as he walked slowly down to the dining hall.... The next morning there was the inevitable bustle, the tipping of the servants, the good-byes, the promises to write at least twice during the holidays, the promises which were never kept. "Here, Bamford, I say," shouted Gordon, "take my bag down to the station." Bamford looked almost surly at being told to do anything on that last day. "Authority forgets a dying king," thought Gordon. His power could not have been so great if it began to wane almost before he had gone. The eight-forty came into the station, snorting and puffing. Gordon secured a corner seat, and leant out of the window, shaking hands with everyone he could see. "You'll be down next term, won't you?" yelled Morgan, bursting as ever with good will. "I expect so," said Gordon. But in his heart of hearts he knew that he would never come back. He would be afraid lest he should find the glamour with which he had surrounded the grey studies and green walks of Fernhurst merely a mist of sentiment that would fade away. So many things that he had believed in he had found untrue. But he wanted to keep fresh in his mind the memory of Fernhurst as he had last seen it, beautiful and golden in the morning sun.