And at the cry right triumphed over wrong in the old professor's throbbing heart. Getting unsteadily upon his feet he raised his hand. "Silence!" he called, and then, in the hush, he added, his voice trembling, "I move that this meeting adjourn at once to Court House Square!" A cheer was raised, and in the wake of the procession that was formed upon the instant the old professor marched--his head bowed, his eyes wet--to the open place where the speeches, now ablaze, with patriotic fervor, were resumed. There were those who knew and somewhat understood what it had meant to the old professor to move that adjournment and when they spoke of him among themselves for many days thereafter it was with a little tremor of the voice and a certain mistiness of the eyes. And for three years he lived among them uncomplaining though stricken to the soul. II But the weeks became months and the months gathered into years, and after many years even the old professor himself forgot the incident save at such times as the appearance of a man in uniform recalled it to him. At such times he was wont to close his book--his long slim finger marking the place--and let it fall upon his knee, whilst his mind galloped back across the desert of the years to hover an instant about the past's neglected grave. Perhaps some ray of humor would creep in and part the clouds and the old professor's smile would reflect the glint of sunshine deeper in his heart. Then he would shake his head and sigh and open the book again, following the lines as he read, with that long, slim forefinger. "A dream--a dream," he would murmur and forget. And for a long time the memories of the dead days would sleep in his quiet mind. He dwelt in peace in the midst of an active warring world; the peace that is the man's who feels that he has done his part, his little share, in making his world better. He knew his work was ended, that his time for rest had come, and knowing this he was satisfied to creep noiselessly and unnoticed into a dingy, unfrequented corner and there, with a book or two, a ream of pure white paper and a pen, to spend the time allowed him in the sweet society of his books. Unhappy, you ask, this frail old man into whose thick hair the years had sprinkled many snowflakes? All about him there was none happier. Had you asked _him_, he would have said, no doubt, with that pale little smile of his: "I have my books. I live well. I have my room. I have my bed. I have my meals--and some of them I prepare myself. And I have a friend. Could a man ask more? As I grow older I find myself agreeing more and more with David Thoreau, who, you will remember, once said, as he passed a tool box standing beside a railway, that he could not understand why a man should want a better home than such a box would make." And he would laugh with himself at the philosophic quip.