"Stop it, Tommy. You've been listening again to that horrid old Mrs. Conover. Her husband was a perfect old Scrooge, and now that she's rid of him, poor dear, she feels that she's got to expand and make up for lost time----" Her voice, which had become more and more drowsy, as if bored with what it had to say, trailed off and died. Then, with renewed interest, she exclaimed, "I wonder what they are going to do about Poland?" Tom had learned that an answer to these startling questions and comments of Mrs. Norris was not required. There was no harm, however, in saying the first thing that came into one's head, as in a psychological test, and he accordingly now answered, "Paderewski." "Yes," said Mrs. Norris quietly. Then brightening up: "How is your work going, Tommy?" "Why, it's going pretty well." "They get rather difficult about this time of year, don't they?" "They do! Oh my, I've had an awful time with them lately. I've muffed Carlyle and Transcendentalism completely." "Oh, no! Why that's Emerson and all those Concord people. Still, I suppose Louisa Alcott is getting a little old-fashioned." "You should have seen the set of papers I got back today. There it was, all that I had given them, in great heavy undigested lumps--" "Like footballs," suggested Mrs. Norris. "Once I was funny with them," went on Tom, "and I may say that I was properly punished. They put it all down in their notebooks and then mixed it up with everything they shouldn't have mixed it up with--and I shall never be funny again." "I shall give you _at least_ two grains----" "Then there are the young men who get off all the stale old facts and expect an A. One of them came to me yesterday, when I had given him a C, and whined around my desk until I finally told him I did not consider his performance remarkable in a young man of eighteen, however much so it might be in a poll parrot of the same age." "Now that was wrong. Were there other boys around?" "Yes." "Well, you simply must not go do that kind of thing. They'll hate it." "I know it was wrong, but I am rather amused by it. As a matter of fact, I can stand anything but the ones who think they can fool me with a lot of embroidery and gas. They're insulting----" "Why, Tommy, you were doing the same thing yourself only three or four years ago. You mustn't get so snufty so soon." "Of course, at times when I've had a good recitation I wouldn't trade places with anyone. It's a kind of ecstasy. It's like all sorts of rushing, exciting things--like a high tide, or a close race, or a fire; really it is. Then you go to the other extreme and you ask yourself what on earth is the use of so futile a business, and what right has a young man with anything to him whatever to waste his time with it. Better go and make bird cages or hair nets or--or--hot water bags, and make some money. When I feel that way I sometimes go out along the ridge, just at dusk, you know, or into the woods--"