xact training in
either to give him a high stand, but an appreciation of the literatures
about which the old scholar was always enthusiastic. Philip regretted
all his life that he had not been severely drilled in the classics and
mathematics, for he never could become a specialist in anything. But
perhaps, even in this, fate was dealing with him according to his
capacities. And, indeed, he had a greater respect for the scholarship of
his wayside tutor than for the pedantic acquirements of many men he came
to know afterwards. It was from him that Philip learned about books
and how to look for what he wanted to know, and it was he who directed
Philip's taste to the best. When he went off to college the lad had not
a good preparation, but he knew a great deal that would not count in the
entrance examinations.

"You will need all the tools you can get the use of, my boy, in the
struggle," was the advice of his mentor, "and the things you will need
most may be those you have thought least of. I never go fishing without
both fly and bait."

Philip was always grateful that before he entered college he had a fine
reading knowledge of French, and that he knew enough German to read and
enjoy Heine's poems and prose, and that he had read, or read in, pretty
much all the English classics.

He used to recall the remark of a lad about his own age, who was on a
vacation visit to Rivervale, and had just been prepared for college
at one of the famous schools. The boys liked each other and were much
together in the summer, and talked about what interested them during
their rambles, carrying the rod or the fowling-piece. Philip naturally
had most to say about the world he knew, which was the world of
books--that is to say, the stored information that had accumulated in
the world. This more and more impressed the trained student, who one day
exclaimed:

"By George! I might have known something if I hadn't been kept at school
all my life."

Philip's career in college could not have been called notable. He was
not one of the dozen stars in the class-room, but he had a reputation
of another sort. His classmates had a habit of resorting to him if they
wanted to "know anything" outside the text-books, for the range of his
information seemed to them encyclopaedic. On the other hand, he escaped
the reputation of what is called "a good fellow." He was not so much
unpopular as he was unknown in the college generally, but those who did
know h