* * * * *

There were three dormitory groups on the “hill.”  The “villas” were the most aristocratic.  There the “gentlemen” among the students, and the teachers’ favourites, dwelt—­with the teachers.  Then there was Crosston Hall, and Oberly.  Crosston was the least desirable of the halls.  It was there that I lived.

We were hardly settled in our rooms when the usual fall revival began....

One of the founders of the school, a well-known New England manufacturer, came on his yearly pilgrimage ... a fanatic disciple of the great Moreton, he considered it his duty to see to the immediate conversion, by every form of persuasion and subtle compulsion, of every newly arrived student.

Rask was a tall, lean, ashen-faced man.  He had yellow, prominent teeth and an irregular, ascetic face.  In his eyes shone an undying lightning and fire of sincere fanaticism and spiritual ruthlessness that, in mediaeval times, would not have stopped short of the stake and fagot to convince sinners of the error of their ways.

The evangelist’s two sons also hove on the scene from across the river ... both of them were men of pleasing appearance.  There was the youthful, elegant, dark, intellectual-browed John Moreton, who had doctorates of divinity from half a dozen big theological seminaries at home and abroad; and there was the business man of the two—­Stephen, middle-aged before his time, staid and formal ... to the latter, the twin schools:  the seminary for girls and the preparatory school for boys—­and the revivalistic religion that Went with them, meant a, sort of exalted business functioning ... this I say not at all invidiously ... the practical business ideal was to him the highest way of men’s getting together ... the quid pro quo basis that even God accepted.

* * * * *

The first night of the opening of the term, when the boys had scarcely been herded together in their respective dormitories, the beginning of the revival was announced from the little organ that stood in the middle of the dining-room ... a compulsory meeting, of course.  In newly acquainted groups, singing, whistling, talking, and laughing, as schoolboys will, the students tramped along the winding path that led to the chapel on the crest of the hill.

On the platform sat the teachers.  In the most prominent chair, with its plush seat and its old-fashioned peaked back, sat the evangelist-manufacturer, Rask,—­the shine of hungry fanaticism in his face like a beacon, his legs crossed, a dazzling shine on his shoes, his hands clutching a hymn book like a warrior’s weapon.

Little Principal Stanton stood nearby, his eyes gleaming spectrally through his glasses, his teeth shining like those of a miniature Roosevelt.

“We will begin,” he snapped decisively, “with John Moreton’s favourite hymn, when he was with us in this world.”