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DUCHESS Farewell to revelry, farewell the dance,
And the gay trappings of my second youth!
Farewell the music, and, sweet saxophone,
Thou art not music, yet I wish thee well,
With all late suppers and hot gala nights,
The colored streamer and the blue balloon,
Fans, rattles, dolls, and India-rubber dogs,
And wicked kippers eaten in the dawn,
And those fierce rhythmic and delicious tunes
Which light a fever in the veins and set
The feet, the soul, fermenting-fare you well!
Oh, it is selfish in the young to grudge us
The little joys of our declining days!

Have they not Love and Happiness their servants,
And must all Pleasure bow to them as well?
This were ungenerous. And I think in Heaven,
If there be saxophones as well as harps,

They are not only for the young. But here
I shall not see a gala night again.

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The snares and dangers of this wicked world,
And nursed you always with a daughter's love.
For you were too much guarded in your youth,
And knew not everything, as we know now,
Who by experience of all temptation
Against temptation are inoculated;

But you, poor innocent, were an easy prey.
The first shrill saxophone that squeaked in London
Was your undoing. And where'er you be,
Whether 't is harps or saxophones or timbrels
That now make mischief in your neighborhood,
You shall not face that music quite alone.

WITHERS Thou too, Lætitia, art thou dead?

(Dies of remorse. Chord)

PLUM

She is.

WITHERS Then there is no more virtue in the world!

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Come and be mourners at my funeral,
For I am in the vestibule of death.

This is the gate and portal of my ending,
I think there doth not any word remain,
But silence and still quiet touch my lips
With the mute harmony of things unspoken.
I never was of that loud company

Which seek their harvest in a waste of words;
'DO' was my dictionary. And my sword
Leaped from the sheath ere I could mention it.

As you may see in some great orchestra
A little lonely fellow at the end

Sits by the cymbals, and the instruments
Thunder around him their tempestuous din,-
Flutes, horns, and oboes, harp and clarinet,
And the wild fiddles like the forest swaying
On Swedish mountains when the storm is high, —
But he, that could with one most royal clash
Startle the city and make all that music
Like the small twittering of birds appear,
Sits with his brasses, but doth make no sound
Till the conductor shall command him so,
And leaves his cymbals and goes home at last,
Still with no sound, nor kindly thanks, nor notice,
For the conductor hath forgotten him
So sit I here, and die without a word.

(Stabs self)

(Stabs self)

(Stabs self and surveys scene)

Well, this will puzzle them at Scotland Yard.

(Dies. Chord)

[CURTAIN]

THE REVOLT OF A MIDDLE-AGED FATHER

BY I. M. RUBINOW

I HAVE a daughter in the sophomore class of X College. It is a small freshwater college, but with an excellent reputation; admission is fraught with many difficulties and confers some distinction. My choice was due partly to its location near the city in which I live, but partly also to its lack of ostentation.

We might have chosen the large university in my city, one of the largest in the country. But my son was a student there, and from him I learned of the disadvantages of large colleges the lack of personal contact with the professors; the impersonal, machinelike processes of degree-making; the absence of true college life. To some extent I had contact with the student body at that large university. The group was not impressive. It certainly was quite different from the small group of students I studied with at Columbia in the early nineties. So my daughter was going to have the best I could afford; perhaps ill afford, for I am a man of modest means salaried man, in fact, having two other children already in college. Her going meant considerable sacrifice of comforts, of opportunities for saving, and even of the savings previously made.

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As my daughter's college is less than an hour from the city, really in the suburbs, I could visit her off and on, going down direct from the office in time for the evening meal or for an occasional Saturday afternoon. Thus

VOL. 189- NO. 5

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I have obtained an intimate glimpse of present-day college life.

My first impression was decidedly favorable. There were the alluring old buildings, scattered over the large campus, a welcome relief from the congestion of a gestion of a large metropolis. There were the groups of young girls and boys (it is a coeducational institution). There was loud talking, laughing, joking; and some innocent spooning, to be sure; yet, as far as I could see and learn, there was very little of that extravagance of conduct which some observers seem to find about a campus. They were happy boys and girls. But, somehow, I never could feel the atmosphere of an educational institution.

A few visits were needed before I could answer the question which seemed to trouble me: 'What does this remind me of?' It came in a flash. A summer hotel in the mountains or at the seashore. The exuberant youth, the loud, sporty clothes,—perhaps not always expensive; I am a poor judge of that, the cars before the entrance, the meandering couples, the total absence of care, even the tone of the conversation, all smacked of vacation rather than vocation.

I confess that, when the comparison occurred to me, it worried me. And the more I observed the so-called college life, the more worried I became. I have no fear that modern youth or the coming generation will go to moral perdition. Each age and generation

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