Then the benediction closed the exercises, and in a burst of martial music from the orchestra, the crowd began to disperse.
But the boys of section D lingered still. They realized now that they could never be all together again, and Mr. Horton, as he clasped one after another by the hand, found it harder to say “Good-bye” to this than to any class he had ever before taught.
“I am afraid I shall dread to go back next year,” he said, holding Hamlin’s hand, while he laid his arm affectionately across Clark’s shoulders. “You boys are going into new scenes, and you will soon forget the old high school, but I shall be there with all new faces. Boys—you don’t know how I am going to miss you.”
They crowded about him then, realizing, as they had not done before, how real and true was his interest in them—his friendship for them—realizing, too, that the great days of our lives, though full of sunshine, have yet their shadows.
But they were boys, strong, healthy, happy boys, and life was all before them, with ever new heights to reach, new prizes to win, and no shadow could rest long on their young hearts on that glad day.
In the years that followed they made no mean record in college and in the world, and often Mr. Horton would read with a happy smile of what one and another of his boys—the boys of section D—had accomplished out in the great world.
Transcriber’s Notes:
Illustrations have been moved to paragraph breaks near where they are mentioned.
Punctuation has been made consistent.