It was half an hour before the doors were to be opened.
Curiously enough, there were no eighth-grade pupils present.
These were assembled in Room 1, on the floor below, seated behind the desks that had been theirs during the school year.
"Young ladies and gentlemen," began Old Dut, rapping on his desk and rising.

As he looked about there was a curious expression on his face, and some water in his twinkling eyes.
"I am going to take occasion to say the last few words that I shall have a chance to say to you confidentially and in private," continued the principal.

"I am conscious that I am taking one of my last looks at you all as my pupils.

I might call this the dying class, if it were not for the fact that, for most of you, to-day will be the real birth.

You will go forth into the world to-day, the larger portion of you.