Your mother's pride, your comrades' praise—
All that romance that seemed so fair
Grows dim, and you are left to bear
The prose of duty's sombre ways
And labour of the long unlovely days.
Yet here's the test to prove you kin
With those to whom we trust our fate,
Sober and steadfast, clean and straight,
In that stern school of discipline
Hardened to war against the foe within.