of half a dozen insolent men. In discussing these things in our little parliament we were not altogether unprejudiced, it must be confessed. For, to say nothing of interests of Mr. Morgan and my own, which seemed in some danger of disappearing for the “public good,” Mrs. Fletcher's little fortune was nearly all invested in that sound “rock-bed” railway in the Southwest that Mr. Jerry Hollowell had recently taken under his paternal care. She was assured, indeed, that dividends were only reserved pending some sort of reorganization, which would ultimately be of great benefit to all the parties concerned; but this was much like telling a hungry man that if he would possess his appetite in patience, he would very likely have a splendid dinner next year. Women are not constituted to understand this sort of reasoning. It is needless to say that in our general talks on the situation these personalities were not referred to, for although Margaret was silent, it was plain to see that she was uneasy. Morgan liked to raise questions of casuistry, such as that whether money dishonestly come by could be accepted for good purposes. “I had this question referred to me the other day,” he said. “A gambler--not a petty cheater in cards, but a man who has a splendid establishment in which he has amassed a fortune, a man known for his liberality and good-fellowship and his interest in politics--offered the president of a leading college a hundred thousand dollars to endow a professorship. Ought the president to take the money, knowing how it was made?” “Wouldn't the money do good--as much good as any other hundred thousand dollars?” asked Margaret. “Perhaps. But the professorship was to bear his name, and what would be the moral effect of that?” “Did you recommend the president to take the money, if he could get it without using the gambler's name?” “I am not saying yet what I advised. I am trying to get your views on a general principle.” “But wouldn't it be a sneaking thing to take a man's money, and refuse him the credit of his generosity?” “But was it generosity? Was not his object, probably, to get a reputation which his whole life belied, and to get it by obliterating the distinction between right and wrong?” “But isn't it a compromising distinction,” my wife asked, “to take his money without his name? The president knows that it is money fraudulently got, that really belongs to somebody else; and the gambler would feel that if the president takes it, he cannot think very disapprovingly of the manner in which it was acquired. I think it would be more honest and straightforward to take his name with the money.” “The public effect of connecting the gambler's name with the college would be debasing,” said Morgan; “but, on the contrary, is every charity or educational institution bound to scrutinize the source of every benefaction? Isn't it better that money, however acquired, should be used for a good purpose than a bad one?”