lves with two tunics and no trousers, or
two hats and only one puttee. But no one cared. The person who had two
tunics flung one in the middle of the floor, and then went in search of
some spare trousers. Everyone was clothed somehow in the end. There was
always enough clothes to go round. There was bound to be at least ten
people who had got leave off. It was a convenient socialism.

But one day FitzMorris turned up on parade in a pair of footer shorts, a
straw hat, and a First Eleven blazer. He was a bit of a nut, and finding
his clothes gone, went on strangely garbed, merely out of curiosity to
see what would happen. A good deal did happen.

As soon as the corps was dismissed there was a clothes inspection. And
the garments of FitzMorris were found distributed on various bodies.
Clarke again addressed the House. Anyone in future discovered wearing
anyone else's clothes would be severely dealt with. But the House was
not to be outdone. Every single name was erased from every single piece
of clothing: identification was impossible. FitzMorris turned up at the
next parade with one puttee missing, and a tunic that could not meet
across his chest. There was another inspection, but this time it
revealed nothing. Everyone swore that he was wearing his own clothes;
there was nothing to prove that he was not. For the time Clarke was
discomfited.

FitzMorris set out on his Easter holidays contented with himself and the
world, in the firm belief that he had thoroughly squashed that blighter
Clarke. The head of the House returned to his lonely home on the moors,
very thoughtful--the next term would be his last.

On the first Sunday of the summer term the Chief preached a sermon the
effect of which Gordon never forgot. He was speaking on the subject of
memory and remorse. "It may be in a few months," he said, "it may be not
for three or four years; but at any rate before very long, you will each
one of you have to stand on the threshold of life, and looking back you
will have to decide whether you have made the best of your Fernhurst
days. For a few moments I ask you to imagine that it is your last day at
school. How will it feel if you have to look back and think only of
shattered hopes, of bright unfulfilled promises? Your last day is bound
to be one of infinite pathos. But to the pathos of human sorrow there is
no need to add the pathos of failure. Oh, I know you are many of you
saying to yourselves: 'There is heaps of time