summation of a five years' programme, and five years is long for youth to hold a purpose.
With swelling satisfaction the railroad man saw the president of the university now addressing his daughter. It was the same Latin formula that had been repeated scores of times already this morning; but now Mitchell made his first effort to grasp it, to reason out its meaning, all the while greatly admiring his daughter's unfaltering courage under the fire of these unintelligible phrases.
The somewhat irrepressible Miss Bessie was, indeed, doing very well. For a moment the dimples had actually composed themselves, and there was a light of high dignity in the eye, as the candidate extended her hand for the diploma and stood meekly while the silken collar was placed about her neck.
"That is a very able man, that Doctor Winton," remarked Mitchell to his wife. "He has got the same way as the rest of them when he talks; but what he says is sense."
Since Mitchell did not know at all what the university president had said, this remark showed that he had fallen back upon his intuitive judgment of men and had swiftly perceived in the university president something of the same practical qualities that go to the making of a business executive in any other walk.
But an excited whisper was just now coming from behind the white-gloved hand of Mrs. Mitchell. "Oh! look!" that lady exclaimed, "she's got her box lid on crooked!"
It was true that Miss Bessie by some restless twitch of her head or some rebellious outburst of a knot of that crinkly hair, had got her mortar board rakishly atilt. Of course, there were other mortar boards askew, but Bessie's was individualistically and pronouncedly listed far to port. And she didn't care. Bessie was so brimming and beam-
