umfarthing, there is no doubt the greater part of the changed
situation was due to Dr. Dumfarthing himself.

Everything he did was calculated to please. He preached sermons to the
rich and told them they were mere cobwebs, and they liked it; he
preached a special sermon to the poor and warned them to be mighty
careful; he gave a series of weekly talks to workingmen, and knocked
them sideways; and in the Sunday School he gave the children so fierce
a talk on charity and the need of giving freely and quickly, that such
a stream of pennies and nickels poured into Catherine Dumfarthing's
Sunday School Fund as hadn't been seen in the church in fifty years.

Nor was Mr. Dumfarthing different in his private walk of life. He was
heard to speak openly of the Overend brothers as "men of wrath," and
they were so pleased that they repeated it to half the town. It was the
best business advertisement they had had for years.

Dr. Boomer was captivated with the man. "True scholarship," he
murmured, as Dr. Dumfarthing poured undiluted Greek and Hebrew from the
pulpit, scorning to translate a word of it. Under Dr. Boomer's charge
the minister was taken over the length and breadth of Plutoria
University, and reviled it from the foundations up.

"Our library," said the president, "two hundred thousand volumes!"

"Aye," said the minister, "a powerful heap of rubbish, I'll be bound!"

"The photograph of our last year's graduating class," said the
president.

"A poor lot, to judge by the faces of them," said the minister.

"This, Dr. Dumfarthing, is our new radiographic laboratory; Mr. Spiff,
our demonstrator, is preparing slides which, I believe, actually show
the movements of the atom itself, do they not, Mr. Spiff?"

"Ah," said the minister, piercing Mr. Spiff from beneath his dark
brows, "it will not avail you, young man."

Dr. Boomer was delighted. "Poor McTeague," he said--"and by the way,
Boyster, I hear that McTeague is trying to walk again; a great error,
it shouldn't be allowed!--poor McTeague knew nothing of science."

The students themselves shared in the enthusiasm, especially after Dr.
Dumfarthing had given them a Sunday afternoon talk in which he showed
that their studies were absolutely futile. As soon as they knew this
they went to work with a vigour that put new life into the college.

* * * * *

Meantime the handsome face of the Reverend Edward Fareforth Furlong
began to wear a sad and wear