obnoxious term, though originally it was not so, I
fawncy. I should hardly care to apply that expression as indicative of
Mr. Wilder's present occupation."

"And you think if I try hard I may at last become a book agent too?"

"You have mistaken my implication," said the professor scowling slightly
as he spoke. "I was striving solely to provide an incentive for you. You
may recall what Homer, or at least he whom in our current phraseology we
are accustomed to call Homer--I shall not now enter into the merits of
that question of the Homeridae. As I was about to remark, however, you
doubtless may recollect what Homer in the fifth book of his Iliad, line
forty-ninth, I think it is, has to say."

"I'm afraid I don't recall it. You see, professor, I had only three
books of the Iliad before I came to Winthrop."

"Surely! Surely! Strange that I should have forgotten that. It is a
pleasure you have in store then, Mr. Phelps."

"Can you give me any suggestions how to do better work, professor?"
inquired Will mildly.

"My advice to you is to secure Mr. Franklin of the present junior class
to tutor you for a time."

"Thank you. I'll try to see him to-night," said Will rising and
preparing to depart.

"That might be wise. I trust you will call upon me again, Mr. Phelps. I
have enjoyed this call exceedingly. You will not misunderstand me if I
say I had slight knowledge of your classic tastes before, and I am sure
that I congratulate you heartily, Mr. Phelps. I do indeed."

"Thank you," replied Will respectfully, and he then departed from the
house. He was divided between a feeling of keen disappointment and a
desire to laugh as he walked up the street toward his dormitory. And
this was the man who was to stimulate his intellectual processes! In his
thoughts he contrasted him with his professor in Latin, and the man as
well as the language sank lower and lower in his estimation. And yet he
must meet it. The problem might be solved but could not be evaded. He
would see Franklin at once, he decided.

CHAPTER XV

A REVERSED DECISION

In the days that immediately followed, Will Phelps found himself so busy
that there was but little time afforded for the pleasures of comradeship
or for the lighter side of college life. Acting upon the one good point
in the advice of his professor of Greek he secured a tutor, and though
he found but little pleasure in the study, still he gave himself to it
so unreservedly that when