What strange and complex annals I should possess had I kept such a list of my earliest school-friends, supplementing it as time went on by any news of them that I could continue to obtain, and keeping track, as best I might, of the principal changes in their lives!  As it is, of the two or three hundred lads that I knew there are but twenty or thirty whom I can recall, or with whose occupations and whereabouts I am acquainted—­ of the others I know absolutely nothing.  For a few years I kept them all vividly in mind; three hundred rosy faces smiled at me, three hundred schoolboy jackets testified more or less distinctly to the paternal standing, from the velvet coat of the mayor’s son to the floury roundabout of the baker’s offspring; I still heard all their different voices; I saw where each one sat in school; I recalled their words, their attitudes, their gestures.  Gradually all the faces melted into a rosy blur, the jackets into a uniform neutral tint; the gestures were blent in a vague ripple of movement, and at last a thick mist enveloped all and the vision disappeared.

It grieves me that it should be so, and many a time I long to burst through the mist and evoke the hidden vision.  But, alas! my comrades are all scattered; and were I to try to seek them out, one by one, how many devious twists and turns I should have to make, and to what strange places my search would lead me!  From a sacristy I should pass to barracks, from barracks to a laboratory, thence to a lawyer’s office; from the lawyer’s office to a prison, from the prison to a theatre, from the theatre, alas! to a cemetery, and thence, perhaps, to a merchant vessel lying in some American or Eastern port.  Who knows what adventures, what misfortunes, what domestic tragedies, what transformations in appearance, in habits, in life, would be found to have befallen that mere handful of humanity, within that short space of time!

And yet those are not the friends that I most long to see again.  Indeed, if we analyze that sense of mournful yearning which makes us turn back to childhood, we shall be surprised to find how faint is the longing for our old comrades, nay, we may even discover that no such sentiment exists in us.  And why should it, after all?  We were often together, we were merry, we sought each other out, we desired each other’s companionship; but there was no interchange between us of anything that draws together, that binds closer, that leaves its mark upon the soul.  Our friendships were unmade as lightly as they were made.  What we wanted was somebody to echo our laughter, to climb trees with us, and return the ball well; and as the pluckiest, liveliest, and most active boys were best fitted to meet these requirements, it was upon them that our choice usually fell.  But did we feel kindly towards the weaklings?  Did it ever occur to us, when a comrade looked sad, to ask:  What ails you? or, if he answered that somebody lay dead at home, did we have any tears for his sorrow?  Ah, we were not real friends!