"Forty Years On" is a song written by Edward Ernest Bowen and John Farmer in 1872.
in each chorus is sung unaccompanied by the School XII, which is made up of the best singers in the top year.
Forty years on, when afar and asunder Parted are those who are singing today, When you look back, and forgetfully wonder What you were like in your work and your play, Then, it may be, there will often come o’er you, Glimpses of notes like the catch of a song – Visions of boyhood shall float them before you, Echoes of dreamland shall bear them along,
Routs and discomfitures, rushes and rallies, Bases attempted, and rescued, and won, Strife without anger and art without malice, – How will it seem to you, forty years on?
Then, you will say, not a feverish minute Strained the weak heart and the wavering knee, Never the battle raged hottest, but in it.
God give us bases to guard or beleaguer, Games to play out, whether earnest or fun; Fights for the fearless, and goals for the eager, Twenty, and thirty, and forty years on!
For each generation You kindled courage to stand and to stay; You led our fathers to fight for the nation, Called "Follow up" and yourself showed the way.
We who were born in the calm after thunder Cherish our freedom to think and to do; If in our turn we forgetfully wonder, Yet we'll remember we owe it to you.
The original Churchill verse, sung to him on 12 November 1954, was as follows: Sixty years on—though in time growing older, Younger at heart you return to the Hill: You, who in days of defeat ever bolder, Led us to Victory, serve Britain still.
Still there are bases to guard or beleaguer, Still must the battle for Freedom be won: Long may you fight, Sir, who fearless and eager Look back to-day more than sixty years on Adapted from the Harrow School version, written in 1872: Forty years on, when afar and asunder, Parted are those who are singing today, When we look back and forgetfully wonder What we were like in our work and our play: Brotherhood strong and our teachers devoted, Assembly, Chapel, the House where we grew, Posho, Githeri, the Founders' Day dinner, Talks in Baraza, the friendship we knew.
O the great days in the distance enchanted, Hours in the classroom and hours in the field, In games and athletics we struggled and panted, Learning to strive hard and never to yield, Scouting, exploring, those long expeditions, Fighting of fires, swimming and First Aid, Playing of music, debating and drama, Voluntary service – our first steps we made.
God gives us duty for us to discharge it, Problems to face, struggle with and overcome, Service to render and glory to covet, Twenty and thirty and forty years on!
Rather than the "tramp of the twenty-two men", Haileybury College, Carey, Camberwell Grammar School, Scotch College and Melbourne High School all replace the line with the "tramp of the thirty-six men" in reference to Australian rules football being the dominant football code in Victoria.
In the United States: sung at the Cranbrook Kingswood School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan (excluding the Winston Churchill verse) at the commencement ceremony.
In Thailand, at Vajiravudh College considered to be the country's best boarding school built by King Rama VI (King Vajiravudh) in 1910, the "tramp of twenty-two men" became "The Might of Thirty Best Men" in reference to the school's supremacy in Rugby.
In Hong Kong, the melody is used by Queen's College as its school song, with its lyrics written by Headmaster Mr. William Kay (1920).
In Canada, the girls at Havergal College in Toronto also sing this at their candlelight ceremony - a "passing of the torch" between the incoming and outgoing graduating classes.