eauteous,'" the last King grinned. "Shoot!"

"It's an English thing, by Henry Newbolt,--about cricket, but that
doesn't matter. It's the thing itself. I may not have the words
exactly,--I read it over there, and copied it down in my diary, from
memory." He looked at the boys and the girl; Honor was waiting eagerly,
sure of anything he might bring her; Jimsy King, fresh from the sweating
realities of the gridiron, was good-humoredly tolerant; Carter Van Meter
was courteously attentive, with his oddly mature air of social poise. He
began to read, to recite, rather, his eyes on their faces:

There's a breathless hush in the Close to-night,
Ten to make and the match to win;
A bumping pitch and a blinding light,
An hour to play and the last man in,
And it's not for the sake of a ribboned coat
Or the selfish hope of a season's fame,
But his Captain's hand on his shoulder smote--
Play up! Play up! and--Play the Game!

Jimsy King, who was lolling on the couch, sat up, his eyes kindling.
"Gee...." he breathed. Honor's cheeks were scarlet and she was breathing
hard and fast. Only the new boy was unmoved, his pale face still pale,
his shadowed eyes calm. Stephen Lorimer kept that picture of them always
in his heart; it was, he came to think, symbol and prophecy. He swung
into the second verse, his voice warming:

The sand of the desert is sodden red;
Red with the wreck of a square that broke;
The gatling's jammed and the colonel dead,
And the regiment blind with dust and smoke:
The River of Death has brimmed his banks;
And England's far, and Honor a name,
But the voice of a school boy rallies the ranks--
Play up! Play up! and--Play the Game!

His own voice shook a little on the last line and he was a trifle amused
at his emotionalism. He tried to bring the moment sanely back to the
commonplace. "Corking for a song, Top Step. I'll hammer out some chords
... doesn't need much." He looked again through the strangely charged
atmosphere of the quiet room, at the three big children. Jimsy King was
on his feet, shaken out of the serene insolence of his young stoicism,
his hands opening and shutting, swallowing hard, and Honor, the
boy-girl, Jimsy's sturdy Skipper, was crying, frankly, unashamed,
unaware, the tears welling up out of her wide eyes, rolling down her
bright cheeks. Only Carter Van Meter sat as before, a little withdrawn,
a little