n the multimillionaire
untied the strings of his money-bags.

"Our founder, Stephen McGraw," Doctor Todd was fond of explaining,
"gave us the nucleus of a great educational institution. Our task is
to build on his foundation. It is true that in fifty years not a new
stone has been laid, but that must not discourage us. We shall go on
hoping and working."

Dear old Doctor Todd! He still works on and hopes. He has had bitter
disappointments, but they have never beaten him down. Had Stephen
McGraw left his money and not his name to the university, the doctor's
task would have been easier, for it is not the way of men to beautify
another's monument. Once, I remember, a Western capitalist was
persuaded to make a great gift to McGraw. He made it with conditions,
and for a while our hopes blazed high and with exceeding fury. The
collegiate Gothic quadrangles were within our reach, as near to us as
the grapes to Tantalus. A half-million dollars was promised us if we
raised a like sum within a year. Doctor Todd tried to effect a
compromise by accepting two hundred thousand dollars outright, but the
philanthropist did not believe in making beggars of institutions by
surfeiting them with charity. So we cheered him right heartily and
went to work to gather our share. I remember it all very well because
I sang in the glee-club concert which we gave in the opera house to
help the fund, and because our classroom work was very light, as the
president and half of the faculty were canvassing the State for aid.
We worked desperately--faculty, alumni, and students. Even Mr. Pound
gave ten dollars from his meagre salary, and the Reverend Sylvester
Bradley, three times moderator of the synod, a round hundred. With
only a month in which to make up a deficit of four hundred thousand
dollars, we did not abandon hope. Every morning in chapel the doctor
prayed earnestly for a rain of manna or a visitation of ravens, which
we knew to be his adroit way of covering a more mercenary petition.
But heaven never opened, and a check never fluttered to earth from the
only source from which it could be expected. The year ended and our
would-be benefactor gave his money outright to Harvard or Yale, I
forget which, for a swimming tank or a gymnasium.

Some day McGraw may get the coveted money. I know that were it in my
power the collegiate Gothic quadrangles would rise on the lines of
Doctor Todd's faded blue-print. I should build Todd