I particularly remember the latter three, because the plumber’s assistant came to the school to inveigle some of the other boys to play cards with him in one of the rear seats, and to amuse himself by throwing tobacco quids and beans while I, with my back turned to the class, would be engaged in explaining things on the blackboard. I was nineteen years of age, husky, weighing 180 pounds, and unafraid even of a plumber’s boy. As my weekly stipend of $15 was my sole support and its retention depended upon my being able to maintain discipline and keep up the attendance, I was not going to permit this loafer’s antics to defeat me--and one evening when I caught him playing cards, I forcibly ejected him from the classroom. Thenceforth my tenure of office was assured and continued to the closing day exercises, at which I had the pleasure of rewarding the coachman, Morgan O’Toole, with a prize for the greatest advancement made by any pupil. This man was very anxious to learn fractions. During the first three weeks of the session, every Friday evening I had succeeded in teaching them to him. Every following Monday evening his mind was an absolute blank as to fractions, and the fourth week I asked him to come to my house both Saturday and Sunday, and gave him private lessons. His joy on the next Monday when he found he had retained his knowledge is still a vivid memory in my mind. The blacksmith, a man named Whitney, had been a fellow pupil of mine in Fifty-first Street School, and had been one of the best penmen. I was surprised to see him come to reacquire that ability, which he had lost through wielding the hammer and pulling the bellows. One of the carpenters wanted to learn duodecimals. As I knew nothing about them, I told him that I wanted him to brush up on ordinary fractions for two days. In the meantime, I learned duodecimals and then taught him. It was really a great experience to divide impartially two hours every evening so as to satisfy the twenty-five earnest seekers after knowledge. I deeply sympathized with these men who, wearied from their day’s labour, preferred to forego needed rest or amusement and devote their evenings to extricate themselves from the ignorance in which they had been compelled, probably through poverty and the early need of self-support, to live the better part of their existence. It spurred me to still greater efforts to increase my own knowledge and I was no longer content merely to perform my allotted tasks at the Law School, but spent several hours a day at the Astor Library and drew deep drafts from that fine well. During that period I devoted all the daylight hours to study, principally at the Law School, sitting in the midst of these hundreds of men who had come from all parts of this country and Japan, to imbibe from the lips of this great teacher, Professor Theodore W. Dwight, the basis of the law of the land.