s name is read at commencement.

"Thunder!" said Amzi. "I just wanted to take the gas out of Alec's
speech. What are those fools doing now?"

Phil, Fred, and Amzi, with several of the students who had acted as the
banker's bodyguard, gathered at the front window. Amzi's announcement
that the Sycamore interest would be paid had brought Kirkwood into the
minds of many who knew of his efforts to save the company. His name
shouted here and there in the street directed attention to his office
windows. As a former member of the faculty of Madison, Kirkwood appeared
usually on the platform at commencement, and now that he was mentioned
the students improvised a cheer for him that Kirkwood's building flung
back at Montgomery's Bank. The demonstration continued with increased
volume, until finally Kirkwood opened a window and looked down. A shout
rose as he appeared. The tears sprang to Phil's eyes as she saw her
father's tall figure, his stoop accentuated as he bent under the window.
He had really achieved at last! She only vaguely grasped the import of
what Amzi had told her in a few abrupt sentences after his return to the
bank, but her heart beat fast at the thought that her father shared in
the day's honors. He had been of real service to his fellow-townsmen and
they were now demanding a speech. He bowed and vanished; but when the
cheering was renewed and long continued, he came back, and when silence
fell upon the crowd (Phil wondered if they, too, felt the pathos in him
that had always touched her, and which just then brought the tears to
her eyes!) he spoke slowly and clearly.

"My friends, this is the best town and its people are the best and
kindest people in the world. If I have done anything to win your praise
I am glad. This community is bound to prosper, for it is founded, not
upon industry and thrift alone, but upon faith and honor and
helpfulness; and these, my good friends, are the things that endure
forever."

"I couldn't hear that," said Amzi to Phil, as her father disappeared
into his office amid the loudest cheers of the day, "but I reckon Tom
said about the right thing."

"I'm sure he did," replied Phil, drying her eyes, "and it's all true,
too!"

CHAPTER XXIV

THE FORSAKEN GARDEN

It's pleasant, on the whole, to do something worth doing; to make grass
grow where it has never grown before; to put the last touch to a
canoe-paddle of exactly the right weight and balance; to bring to
somethi