One day I made so bold as to address this personage. I went up shyly to him, one day, and said, “Could I make something of myself if I went to college?” He leaned on his mop, his light brows lifted, his cheeks puffed out like as if a frog were blowing itself up, then he said in a thick, dawdling voice, “You could either come out a thick head or a genius. It depends!” Then I made my great confession, “I’d like to go to college--if I only had the brains--and the money,” I confided. Then he seemed to be trying to swallow his tongue, while he thought of something germane to the conversation in hand. Then he replied, “It does take brains to get through college!” and then turned to his work. I was not to be put off. I touched his overall brace, and asked, “Do you think that I might beg my way into college some day? Of course I wouldn’t be able to graduate with a title, like a regular student, but do you think they’d let me study there and try to make something of myself, sir?” The deference in my address must have brought him to attention with a little beyond his habitual speed, for he turned to me suddenly, and said, “Of course they will, you crazy kid!” I left him then, left him with a new outlook into the future, for had I not been told by a REAL college graduate that I could get to college! Every former dream hitherto chained down broke loose at that, and I felt myself with a set of made-over ambitions. The seal, the signature, had been placed on officially. I could do it if I tried. I could get out of the mill; away from it. I could get an education that would give me a place outside it! After that I began to fit myself for college! It was a fitting, though, of a poor sort. I did not know how to go about it. There seemed to be none in my circle overeager to tell me how to go about the matter. It was blind leading all the way. I thought, first of all, that if I could get hold of some books of my own, my very own, that would be the first step toward an intellectual career. I had read the lives of several scholars, and their libraries were always mentioned. I thereupon resolved that I would own some books of my own. The next stage in an intellectual career, was the reading of _DRY_ books. I resolved that the books I purchased should be dry, likewise. So after that I found real diversion in visiting the Salvation Army salvage rooms, where they had old books for which they asked five and ten cents apiece. The rooms were so laden with old clothes and all sorts of salvage that I had to root long and deep often to bring the books to light. I also went among the many second-hand shops and made the same sort of eager search. After a few months of adventuring I had my own library of dry books. Their dryness will be evident from the check-list which follows.