the men who are handling the nation, wear a unanimous sudden
growth of rolling gray beard. Class after class they come,
till over a thousand men have marched out to the music of bands,
down Yale Field and past the great circle of the seats, and
have settled in brilliant masses of color on the "bleachers."
Then from across the field rise men's voices singing. They
sing the college songs which their fathers sang, which their
sons and great-grandsons will sing. The rhythm rolls forward
steadily in all those deep voices:

"Nor time nor change can aught avail," the words come,

"To break the friendships formed at Yale."

There is many a breath caught in the crowded multitude to hear
the men sing that.

Then the game--and Yale wins. The classes pour on the field in
a stormy sea of color, and dance quadrilles, and form long lines
hand in hand which sway and cross and play fantastically in a
dizzying, tremendous jubilation which fills all of Yale Field.
The people standing up to go cannot go, but stay and watch them,
these thousand children of many ages, this marvellous show of
light-heartedness and loyalty. Till at last the costumes drift
together in platoons and disappear slowly; and the crowd thins
and the last and most stirring act of the commencement-day drama
is at hand.

It has come to be an institution that after the game the old
graduates should go, class by class, to the house of the president