He launched out into eager talk about his hopes for Blaines College. In all his wide circle of friends, he knew no one who made so sympathetic and intelligent a listener as she. He talked freely, lengthily, even egotistically it might have seemed, had they not been such good friends and he so sure of her interest. Difficulties, it seemed, had already cropped out. He was not sure of the temper of his trustees, whom he had called together for an informal meeting that morning. Starting to advertise the great improvements that had taken place in the college, he had collided with the simple fact that no improvements had taken place. Even if he privately regarded his own accession in that light, he humorously pointed out, he could hardly advertise it, with old Dr. Gilfillan, the retired president, living around the corner and reading the papers. Again, taking his pencil to make a list of the special advantages Blaines had to offer, he was rather forcibly struck with the fact that it had no special advantages. But upon these and other difficulties, he touched optimistically, as though confident that under the right treatment, namely his treatment, all would soon yield. Sharlee, fired by his gay confidence, mused enthusiastically. "It's inspiring to think what can be done! Really, it is no empty dream that the number of students might be doubled--quadrupled--in five years." "Do you know," said he, turning his glowing face upon her, "I'm not so eager for mere numbers now. That is one point on which my views have shifted during my studies this summer. My ideal is no longer a very large college--at least not necessarily large--but a college of the very highest standards. A distinguished faculty of recognized authorities in their several lines; an earnest student body, large if you can get them, but always made of picked men admitted on the strictest terms; degrees recognized all over the country as an unvarying badge of the highest scholarship--these are what I shall strive for. My ultimate ambition," said Charles Gardiner West, dreamily, "is to make of Blaines College an institution like the University of Paris." He sprang up presently with great contrition, part real, part mock, over having absorbed so much of the honest tax-payer's property, the Departmental time. No, he could not be induced to appropriate a moment more; he was going to run on up the street and call on Colonel Cowles. "How is the old gentleman, anyway?" "His spirits," said Sharlee, "were never better, and he is working like a horse. But I'm afraid the dear is beginning to feel his years a little." "He's nearly seventy, you know. By the bye, what ever became of that young helper you and I unloaded on him last year--the queer little man with the queer little name?"