e was waiting for me to say something, when
in fact I don't believe she thinks of me at all, except as her
protector and friend."

Warren sat nibbling at the stem of a corn-cob pipe. He stretched forth
his legs and chewed upon the stem till it cracked between his teeth.

"This disposition to under-estimate yourself is where the whole
trouble lies," said Warren. "It is the only weakness I have ever been
able to find in your character. Don't you think it must be on account
of some sort of work you have done? Haven't you at some time been in a
position where everybody could come along and boss you?"

"I waited in a dining-room to pay my way through college. And you have
struck it. Yes, sir, you've struck it on the top of the head. If a man
has once stood as a servant, he is, if at all sensitive, ever
afterward afflicted with a sort of self-repression. It is a sense of
independence that makes the cow-boy aggressive; it is the wear of
discipline that makes the regular soldier, long after quitting the
army, appear humble. To wear a white apron and to carry a bowl of soup
across a dining-room, one must not have had a high spirit or must have
stabbed it. I stabbed mine."

"And yet you are as proud as the devil," said Warren.

"Yes, and I am not afraid of a pistol, but I fancy that anyone could
drive me with a teaspoon. If I am ever the father of a boy I will
teach him to work, to cut down trees, to dig ditches, to do anything
rather than to wait on another man."

"But you don't regret having made the sacrifice to get the education,
do you?"

"You over-rate my learning. I don't know anything thoroughly. I sailed
through with the class and put myself in a position to learn, that's
about all. But I have acquired one great piece of knowledge, which,
had I not received a regular training, might have seemed to me as the
arrogance of ignorance, and that is the fact that profound knowledge
hurts the imagination. Of course I had read this--but ascribed it to
prejudice. I know now, however, that it is true; and I would take care
not to over-educate the boy with an instinct for art. His technique
would destroy his creation. And take it in the matter of writing. I
believe in correctness, but it is a fact that when a writer becomes a
purist he conforms but does not create. After all, I believe that
what's within a man will come out regardless of his training. There
may be mute, inglorious Miltons, but Art struggles for expression. T