Frequently I had a maid, commonly called along our row the “gurrul”—­and quite frequently I had none; for we could afford only young beginners, who, as soon as I had trained them well, left me for other mistresses who could afford to pay them well.

“Oh, we should not accuse the poor creatures of ingratitude,” I told Carl one day.  “Not every economist can learn at first hand the law of supply and demand.”

If, however, as my fashionable aunt in town remarked, we were picturesquely impecunious—­which, to that soft lady, probably meant that, we had to worry along without motor cars—­we were just as desperately happy as we were poor; for we had each other at least.  Every other deprivation seemed comparatively easy or amusing.

Nor were we the only ones who had each other—­and therefore poverty.  Scholarship meant sacrifice, but all agreed that it was the ideal life.

To be sure, some members of the Faculty—­or their wives—­had independent means and could better afford the ideal life.  They were considered noble for choosing it.  Some of the alumni who attended the great games and the graduating exercises were enormously wealthy, and gave the interest of their incomes—­sometimes a whole handful of bonds at a time—­to the support of the ideal life.

Was there any law compelling them to give their money to their Alma Mater?  No—­just as there was none compelling men like Carl to give their lives and sacrifice their wives.  These men of wealth made even greater sacrifices.  They could have kept in comfort a dozen wives apiece—­modest ones—­on what they voluntarily preferred to turn over to the dear old college.  Professors, being impractical and visionary, cannot always see these things in their true proportions.

We, moreover, in return for our interest in education, did we not shamelessly accept monthly checks from the university treasurer’s office?  It was quite materialistic in us.  Whereas these disinterested donors, instead of receiving checks, gave them, which is more blessed.  And were they not checks of a denomination far larger than those we selfishly cashed for ourselves?  Invariably.  Therefore our princely benefactors were regarded not only as nobler but as the Nobility.

Indeed, the social stratification of my new home, where the excellent principles of high thinking and plain living were highly recommended for all who could not reverse the precept, struck me, a neophyte, as for all the world like that of a cathedral town in England, except that these visiting patrons of religion and learning were treated with a reverence and respect found only in America.  Surely it must have amused them, had they not been so used to it; for they were quite the simplest, kindest, sweetest overrich people I had ever met in my own country—­and they often took pains to tell us broad-mindedly that there were better things than money.  Their tactful attempts to hide their awful affluence were quite appealing—­occasionally rather comic.  Like similarly conscious efforts to cover evident indigence, it was so palpable and so unnecessary.