A little later in the day quite a number of the fathers and mothers of the children arrived in their rickety vehicles.
They had come to take leave of the young teacher.

There were almost as many as were present at the school celebration.

Keith was quite overcome, and when the hour arrived for closing the school, instead of, as he had expected, tying up the half-dozen books he kept in his desk, shaking hands with the dozen children eager to be turned loose in the delightful pasturage of summer holiday, turning the key in the lock, and plodding alone down the dusty road to Squire Rawson's, he now found the school-room full, not of school-children only, but of grown people as well.

He had learned that they expected him to say something, and there was nothing for him to do but to make the effort.

For an hour, as he sat during the last lessons,--which were in the nature of a review,--the pages before him had been mere blurred spaces of white, and he had been cogitating what he should say.