It would be by no means surprising if such nicety of execution as that to which we have alluded tended to draw his attention from rhetorical themes.  Yet, spite of this apparently necessary result, some of his grandest and most startling flights of oratory have had their inspiration from incidents connected with stove-nigrification.  Bill has, as it were, soared on the legs of the stove, like Perseus on Mercury’s sandals, to unexplored realms of space and thought.  At such moments the stove-pipe becomes to him a magic telescope, through which he peers far into the unfathomable depths.

There are times when, through the influence of passion, he for a little time lays aside his oratorical embellishments.  We remember one such occasion.  He had just finished sawing a pile of wood, when a student, who was looking from a window, told him there was one stick which he had not sawed, and taunted him with intending to purloin it.  Instantly his countenance became livid with rage, his lips separated, showing a fine dental formation, and he exclaimed in pure Anglo-Saxon:—­

“You’re a liar.  You lie.”

The student, perceiving from Bill’s descent to the vernacular of common men that his ire was roused, abjectly and unqualifiedly apologized.

“Well,” said the orator, threateningly, “you’d better take that back.  I’ve sawed wood more’n thirty year, an’ no man ever ‘cused me o’ stealin’.”  Then gradually becoming good-natured, he added, “Crucifixin’ yourself in the observatories of life in the gray dawn over your jewelry.  No sir, I never stole nothin’. You do.  You’d steal if you wan’t afraid to.  Ottah!”

We regret to be obliged to chronicle one incident that would seem to indicate something of malevolence.  The impartial historian, however, must not shrink from the full performance of his duty.

Another of the notables of this region, of sable lineage, called, on account of a peculiar propensity to split two-inch planks with his head, “Abe Bunter,” not long since honored the students of this institution with a series of calls for the purpose of soliciting money to purchase for himself a bovine, to replace one providentially taken from him.  His success may he inferred from a remark let fall by Bill, accompanied by a demoniac chuckle: 

“Say, old Abe Bunter’s round with an inscription, an’ he hain’t got a cent.”

Like all great men, Bill has his eccentricities.  Fresh meat, and, indeed, meat of any kind except pork, he abominates.  Beefsteak, especially, is an object of indescribable aversion.  Untold wealth would not suffice to induce him to partake of it.  This repugnance is due partly to a fear of being choked with bones, and partly to a scorn of its tenderness.  The physical weaknesses of students he attributes entirely to their consuming so much of it.  Viewed from his standpoint, perhaps students are effeminate, for he possesses the strength of brass, and an amount of endurance astonishing to contemplate.