ot
of the mountain, if you had stayed in Montreal. Then we have Toronto;
with deference to the Toronto men, I'll compare that to Cambridge. Still,
so far as I understand your English ideas, there's a difference--our boys
go to McGill or Toronto with the intention of learning something that
will open up a career. They certainly play football and one or two other
games pretty well, but that's a very secondary object; so's the acquiring
of a polished style. In fact, it's not altogether unusual on this side of
the Atlantic to find university men spending a vacation as waiters in the
summer hotels."

"But why do they do that?" Gertrude asked with a shocked expression.

"For money," Prescott answered dryly. "One gathers that the St. Andrew
boys did something of the same kind in Scotland in your grandfather's
time; and no logical objection could be made to it, anyway. Isn't it a
pretty good test of a man's determination? It's hard to see why he should
make a worse doctor, engineer, or preacher, because he has the grit to
earn his training by carrying plates, or chopping trees, which some of
our boys take to."

This was difficult to answer, and Gertrude did not attempt it; her
prejudices were stronger than her powers of reasoning. Looking southward,
she saw the turreted tops of the Sebastian elevators rising from the sea
of grass like cathedral towers. Their smallness emphasized the vastness
of the plain, which was beginning to have a stimulating effect on her
mind. She thought it might explain the broadness of her companion's
views, which, while erroneous, were becoming comprehensible. He lived in
the open, beyond the bounds of walls and fences, breathing this wonderful
invigorating air. Nevertheless, he was obviously a man of varied and
extensive information, which struck her as somewhat curious in face of
his severely practical abilities. He could mend harness, plow a straight
furrow, break horses, and strip a complicated machine. As a new type, he
deserved attention.

After a while they struck into a well-beaten track which had been graded
where it crossed a muskeg. The rude work, however, had suffered from
frost and rain: the ruts in the hard black soil were deep and there were
dangerous holes. To make matters worse, a big gasoline tractor, intended
to assist in some harvesting operations, had got into difficulties near
the middle of the graded track. It was making an alarming noise and
diffusing a pungent odor, while