But the time came when all this tragical mirth was to end. We found that we did not dislike the new owner, and he liked us well enough, but he was eager to try his hand at our work, and some time early in August we quitted the familiar place. If there was any form of adieu with our gentle chief I do not remember it, and in fact my mind holds no detail of our parting except the last hour of it, when we found ourselves together at midnight in the long, gloomy barn then known as the Little Miami Depot, where we were to take our separate ways in the dark which hid us from each other forever. We walked up and down a long time, talking, talking, talking, laughing, promising each other to be faithful in letters, and wearing our souls out in the nothings which people say at such times with the vain endeavor to hold themselves together against the fate which is to sunder them in the voluntary death of parting. We heard the whistle of an approaching train, we shook hands, we said good-by, and then in a long wait repeated the nothings again and again. But my train on the Central Ohio was already there; and as Price obeyed the call to board his train for Cleveland, I mounted mine for Washington, and we never saw each other again. It is long since he died, and I who still survive him after fifty years offer his memory this vow of abiding affection. If we somewhere should somewhen meet, perhaps it will be with a fond smile for the time we were young and so glad together, with so little reason. THE END * * * * * Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber: iridiscent and beautiful=> iridescent and beautiful {pg 4} people cometimes put up=> people sometimes put up {pg 25} suffer to become irreverant=> suffer to become irreverent {pg 89} except for its gramaphones=> except for its gramophones {pg 102} If was what it had been aforetime=> It was what it had been aforetime {pg 226} sufficently muddled overture=> sufficiently muddled overture {pg 222} End of Project Gutenberg's Years of My Youth, by William Dean Howells