en some fellow has to go home because a lovely lady has left him
with bitter, bitter memories. I'm with Henley. If we're the cream of the
earth--well, thank the Lord, we're not."

"Who is," Lawrence asked earnestly.

"God knows."

CHAPTER XXV

English 53 had only a dozen men in it; so Henley conducted the course in
a very informal fashion. The men felt free to bring up for discussion
any topic that interested them.

Nobody was surprised, therefore, when George Winsor asked Henley to
express his opinion of the value of a college education. He reminded
Henley of what he had said two years before, and rapidly gave a resume
of the discussion that resulted in the question he was asking. "We'd
like to know, too," he concluded, grinning wickedly, "just whom you
consider the cream of the earth. You remember you said that if we were
you felt sorry for the skimmed milk."

Henley leaned back in his chair and laughed. "Yes," he said, "I remember
saying that. I didn't think, though, that you would remember it for two
years. You seem to remember most of what I said. I am truly astonished."
He grinned back at Winsor. "The swine seem to have eaten the pearls."

The class laughed, but Winsor was not one to refuse the gambit. "They
were very indigestible," he said quickly.

"Good!" Henley exclaimed. "I wanted them to give you a belly-ache, and I
am delighted that you still suffer."

"We do," Pudge Jamieson admitted, "but we'd like to have a little mercy
shown to us now. We've spent four years here, and while we've enjoyed
them, we've just about made up our minds that they have been all in all
wasted years."

"No." Henley was decisive. His playful manner entirely disappeared. "No,
not wasted. You have enjoyed them, you say. Splendid justification. You
will continue to enjoy them as the years grow between you and your
college days. All men are sentimental about college, and in that
sentimentality there is continuous pleasure."

"Your doubt delights me. Your feeling that you haven't learned anything
delights me, too. It proves that you have learned a great deal. It is
only the ignoramus who thinks he is wise; the wise man knows that he is
an ignoramus. That's a platitude, but it is none the less true. I have
cold comfort for you: the more you learn, the less confident you will be
of your own learning, the more utterly ignorant you will feel. I have
never known so much as, the day I graduated from high school. I held my