ng to
distinguish between upper classmen and entering men, even though the
freshman cap would not appear until the following Monday. Those who were
too obviously, too nervously at home were freshmen, for as each train
brought a new contingent it was immediately absorbed into the hatless,
white-shod, book-laden throng, whose function seemed to be to drift
endlessly up and down the street, emitting great clouds of smoke
from brand-new pipes. By afternoon Amory realized that now the
newest arrivals were taking him for an upper classman, and he tried
conscientiously to look both pleasantly blase and casually critical,
which was as near as he could analyze the prevalent facial expression.

At five o'clock he felt the need of hearing his own voice, so he
retreated to his house to see if any one else had arrived. Having
climbed the rickety stairs he scrutinized his room resignedly,
concluding that it was hopeless to attempt any more inspired decoration
than class banners and tiger pictures. There was a tap at the door.

"Come in!"

A slim face with gray eyes and a humorous smile appeared in the doorway.

"Got a hammer?"

"No--sorry. Maybe Mrs. Twelve, or whatever she goes by, has one."

The stranger advanced into the room.

"You an inmate of this asylum?"

Amory nodded.

"Awful barn for the rent we pay."

Amory had to agree that it was.

"I thought of the campus," he said, "but they say there's so few
freshmen that they're lost. Have to sit around and study for something
to do."

The gray-eyed man decided to introduce himself.

"My name's Holiday."

"Blaine's my name."

They shook hands with the fashionable low swoop. Amory grinned.

"Where'd you prep?"

"Andover--where did you?"

"St. Regis's."

"Oh, did you? I had a cousin there."

They discussed the cousin thoroughly, and then Holiday announced that he
was to meet his brother for dinner at six.

"Come along and have a bite with us."

"All right."

At the Kenilworth Amory met Burne Holiday--he of the gray eyes was
Kerry--and during a limpid meal of thin soup and anaemic vegetables they
stared at the other freshmen, who sat either in small groups looking
very ill at ease, or in large groups seeming very much at home.

"I hear Commons is pretty bad," said Amory.

"That's the rumor. But you've got to eat there--or pay anyways."

"Crime!"

"Imposition!"

"Oh, at Princeton you've got to swallow everything the first year. It's
like a damned