[Illustration: BREAKING THE ICE.

SCENE--_Public Drawing-room of Hotel in the Engadine._

_The Hon. Mrs. Snebbington_ (_to Fair Stranger_), "ENGLISH PEOPLE ARE
SO UNSOCIABLE, AND NEVER SPEAK TO EACH OTHER WITHOUT AN INTRODUCTION.
I ALWAYS MAKE A POINT OF BEING FRIENDLY WITH PEOPLE STAYING AT THE
SAME HOTEL. ONE NEED NEVER KNOW THEM AFTERWARDS!"]

* * * * *

ADVANCING YEARS.

(_HOW IT STRIKES A CONTEMPORARY._)

["Owing to advancing years, Mr. ---- has been compelled to
resign his position as ----" _Extract from any Daily Paper_."]

Advancing years! It cannot be.
What, JACK, the boy I've known--God bless me!
Why yes, it was in '43
That first we met, and--since you press me--
The time has sped without my knowledge,
That's close on fifty years ago;
Like some deep river's silent flow,
Since JACK and I first met at College.

'Twas on a cloudy Autumn day.
Fast fading into misty twilight;
The freshmen, as they trooped to pray,
Stepped bolder in the evening's shy light.
As yet we did not break the rules
In which the College deans immesh men,
We fledglings from a score of schools,
That far October's brood of freshmen.

Like one who starts upon a race,
The Chaplain through the service scurried.
From prayer to prayer he sped apace;
I marked him less the more he hurried.
My prayer-book fell--my neighbour smiled;
Reversing NEWTON with the apple,
I, by that neighbour's eye beguiled,
Quite lost my gravity in chapel.

And so we smiled. I see him still,
Blue eyes, where darting gleams of fun shine,
A smile like some translucent rill
That sparkles in the summer sunshine,
A manly mien, and unafraid,
Crisp hair, fair face, and square-set shoulders,
That made him on the King's Parade
The cynosure of all beholders.

And from this slight irreverence,
Too small, I hope, to waste your blame on,
We grew, in quite a Cambridge sense,
A sort of PYTHIAS and DAMON.
Together "kept," together broke
Laws framed by elderly Draconians,
And I was six, and JACK was stroke,
That famous night we bumped the Johnians.

How strong he was, how fleet of foot,
Ye bull-dogs witness, and ye Proctors;
How bright his jests, how aptly put
His scorn of duns, and Dons, and Doctors.
We laughed at care, read now and then--
Though vexed by EUCLID on the same bridge--