The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749) and Two Rambler papers (1750)

whole career had been ruined in a twinkling. He knew. There could be no future for him in the school. What he had done was so awful that it could never be forgiven or forgotten. Why

orn, like the hero in that dreadful book, Two Years Before the Mast. He would run away that night, before the story spread o

, and the voice of But

House; you're safe. Open up. I'

ey White, whose tempestuous rage had long since spent itself in hilarious laughter, as, indeed, had been the

he said curtly. "You've

d Dink miserably,

t, had not the slightest suspicion of Stover's absolute, overwhelming

he said, failing to read the anguish in Sto

!" said Din

hy

a bu

rty? Not a

ed to b

Butsey, putting the part in the mid

the

u think they'd h

f that. After all, what co

n't th

and keep your elbows in. That's all you'd have got. Then it would have been over; now you've got to

vinced. Stover was too firmly persuaded of the eno

than to follow Butsey into the dining-room and face the d

g, his eyes on his plate, tasting nothing of

some reply, he never knew what, hearing only the dreadful snicker that ran

He looked at the now ridiculous souvenir toilet set and bitterly thought where the precious dollars had gone-that story, too, would be abroad by the morrow. The whole school would probably rise and jeer at him when he entered chapel the next morning. That night he crept into his bed to the stillness of the black room, to suffer a long hour that first overwhelming anguish that can only be suffered once, that no other suffering can compare to, that

side, the morning came in with warm embrace; green things stirred against the window-panes; the flash of a robin's wing cut a

ith his knees under his chin, was actually asleep. In great alarm he went o

he gong's rung, Mr

ising

s,

reakfast gong exp

esently reopened and

ashbasin-stick my

ifting over the tingling air. Joyfully he turned for a plunge in cold water and the unspeakable crockery set met his eye. Then he remember

re was a splash in the basin that spattered the water far and near, and Butsey, enveloped in a towel, rushed into his upper garments, flung back his hair with a masterful swooping stroke of the comb, and bolted out of the door, buckling his belt and

room and, after the more permanent preparati

ne incident; the Coffee-colored Angel, in passin

u to-day. I'

look, but somehow he remembered nothing else. The instinctive hostility he had felt at the first meeting of their eyes rose a

f the school was before him in the hundreds that, streaming across the campus in thin, dotted lines, swelled into a compact, mo

s place in the gallery, between Pebble Stone and Duke Straus, who sleepily asked his name and went off for a supplementary nap on the shoulder o

own at the body of the school marshaled below, at the enormous fifth-formers who seemed-and never was that illusion to fade-the most terrifically immense and awesome repres

at him. Stover felt the impact on his own forehead and dropped his eyes uneasily. When the hymn began he looked curiously among hi

e were friends, undiscovered friends, in the mass before him, to be won and held. An easier feeling c

ers; and I'm the o

e Shad, pleased; "but we did come it pretty st

ink. "I deserved it, but-b

ing look. "If you do us we'll take you into the fir

th the heroes, who stalked majestically in their voluminous bulk, with the coveted 'Varsity caps riding on the

e surging upward and others cr

the Tennessee Shad, p

a throng that waited hopefully, as other classes waited hopef

u want to stand in with. Study like the devil the first two weeks;

l," sa

"If you guess don't hesitate; jump at it. The only thing you can do is to wait fo

l," sa

t up from the senti

s! Here

pea

melan

l i

pe to scale, the slippery blackboards rose up and bound them in. On a raised stand was the master's pulpit where presently The Roman would come

copy of C?sar's Gallic Wars slid on to the floor. He bent down, laboriously collecting the scattered pages and straightened up. Then he g

lip, stopped half-way and dropped. Then his mouth opened, set, and

ing his eyes from the Ciceronian countenance and the

ising and falling infection, "who's here? Another del

said Dink

ddition, I hope. Ye

oh

l-we

Stover," said Din

r," said The Roman, with a twitch to his lip and a

ass, at a loss, turned from one t

etter able to take his little morning nap. A little embarrassed, Stover? Dear me! I shouldn't

his hair would catch on fire. The class, perceiving onl

little confidential joke. Now for a bee-ootiful recitation. Splendid spring weather-yesterday was a cut; of co

ons Stover sat, without a thought in his head, his hands locked, starin

t. "Dished! Spinked! He'll flunk me

g of the three years' daily conflict that was to come. For, of course, now there could be no question of The Roman's mortal and

ime, had Channing, the Coffee-colored Angel

, Channing-gerund or ger

und,

on a lower octave repeated: "Too bad! Thi

e Coffee-colored Angel

. Tenth line, last word-ger

the Coffee-colored

tick to his system. The law

said the Coffee-co

Really,

s,

sit

utely,

gerundive,

ored Angel abr

speculate any m

, s

ce-no luck to-day? Try

in water. The Roman, without malice, passed over the rows and

om the Jackson twins? Alas! How about the D's this morning? Davis, Dark, Denton, Deer, Dickson, nothing from the D's.

laughed alone. The Roman stopp

every day facts. Well, well, it has been a beautiful recitation in the review-not exceptional, not exceptional at all. Has any one the advance? Don'

d tripped along for brief spaces, and then sat down

ove

o astonished to rise. "W

a wicked smile. "I never thought

e decide

y, sir,"

d of you,

d his coat and took up the prosy records of C?sar. Pebble Stone showed

est, C?sar init

an Dink in a

t!" said

initiated the orators ..." Dink cont

ear on one leg of his chair, staring at the familiar text as thou

on he went, glib and eloquent, weaving out of the tangled text a picture that gradually, freeing itself from the early restraints, painted in vivid detail a spirited conference between C?s

rbs and conjunctions, avoiding whole phrases, undismayed by the rise of sudden, hostile n

is chair, murmuring all the while to himself. Finally he rose and, slow

op, sir?" s

en fo

hing account of the athletic exercises of the

st, wiped his eyes with h

trifle free, a trifle-but, on the whole, a very creditable performance. Very! I was sure, whatever you did, Stover,

, brought the scene back to Rome a

with The Roman and not retreated. He had his first moment of triumph, attested

ou're a

with a solemn warn

nking knowledge." He turned and raked the awed ranks with the sweep of a pivot gun, and then took up again in cutting, chilling, spaced syllables: "I have, in the course of my experience as a teacher, had to deal with imbeciles, had

est, little imagining that he whom he had ranked as a deadly, unforgiving foe sat a long

blew him, C?sar ini