uarter."

"So'd mine," said Penrod.

CHAPTER XVIII MUSIC

Boyhood is the longest time in life for a boy. The last term of the
school-year is made of decades, not of weeks, and living through them is
like waiting for the millennium. But they do pass, somehow, and at last
there came a day when Penrod was one of a group that capered out
from the gravelled yard of "Ward School, Nomber Seventh," carolling a
leave-taking of the institution, of their instructress, and not even
forgetting Mr. Capps, the janitor.

"Good-bye, teacher! Good-bye, school! Good-bye, Cappsie, dern ole fool!"

Penrod sang the loudest. For every boy, there is an age when he "finds
his voice." Penrod's had not "changed," but he had found it. Inevitably
that thing had come upon his family and the neighbours; and his father,
a somewhat dyspeptic man, quoted frequently the expressive words of
the "Lady of Shalott," but there were others whose sufferings were as
poignant.

Vacation-time warmed the young of the world to pleasant languor; and
a morning came that was like a brightly coloured picture in a child's
fairy story. Miss Margaret Schofield, reclining in a hammock upon the
front porch, was beautiful in the eyes of a newly made senior, well
favoured and in fair raiment, beside her. A guitar rested lightly upon
his knee, and he was trying to play--a matter of some difficulty, as
the floor of the porch also seemed inclined to be musical. From directly
under his feet came a voice of song, shrill, loud, incredibly piercing
and incredibly flat, dwelling upon each syllable with incomprehensible
reluctance to leave it.

"I have lands and earthly pow-wur.
I'd give all for a now-wur,
Whi-ilst setting at MY-Y-Y dear old mother's knee-ee,
So-o-o rem-mem-bur whilst you're young----"

Miss Schofield stamped heartily upon the musical floor.

"It's Penrod," she explained. "The lattice at the end of the porch is
loose, and he crawls under and comes out all bugs. He's been having
a dreadful singing fit lately--running away to picture shows and
vaudeville, I suppose."

Mr. Robert Williams looked upon her yearningly. He touched a thrilling
chord on his guitar and leaned nearer. "But you said you have missed
me," he began. "I----"

The voice of Penrod drowned all other sounds.

"So-o-o rem-mem-bur, whi-i-ilst you're young,
That the day-a-ys to you will come,
When you're o-o-old and only in the way,
Do not scoff a