“I wouldn’t be a damned fool if I were you,” I once overheard him say to a certain young man who was suffering from an attack of what Carl called misdirected energy.

More than one he took in hand this way; and, though I used to call it—­to tease him—­his man-to-man manner, I saw that it was effective.  I, too, grew fond of these frank, ingenuous youths.  We used to have them at our house when we could spare an evening—­often when we could not.

None of this work, it may be mentioned, is referred to in the annual catalogue or provided for in the annual budget; and yet it is often the most vital and lasting service a teacher renders his students—­especially when their silly parents provide them with more pocket money than the professor’s entire income for the support of himself, his family, his scholarship and his dignity.

“Your husband is not a professor,” one of them confided shyly to me—­“he’s a human being!”

After the success of our book we were called to another college—­a full professorship at three thousand a year!  Carl loved his Alma Mater with a passion I sometimes failed to understand; but he could not afford to remain faithful to her forever on vague promises of future favor.  He went to the president and said so plainly, hating the indignity of it and loathing the whole system that made such methods necessary.

The president would gladly have raised all the salaries if he had had the means.  He could not meet the competitor’s price, but he begged Carl to stay, offering the full title—­meaning empty—­of professor and a minimum wage of twenty-five hundred dollars, with the promise of full pay when the funds could be raised.

Now we had demonstrated that, even on the Faculty of an Eastern college, two persons could live on fifteen hundred.  Therefore, with twenty-five hundred, we could not only exist but work efficiently.  So we did not have to go.

* * * * *

I look back on those days as the happiest period of our life together.  That is why I have lingered over them.  Congenial work, bright prospects, perfect health, the affection of friends, the respect of rivals—­what more could any woman want for her husband or herself?

Only one thing.  And now that, too, was to be ours!  However, with children came trouble, for which—­bless their little hearts!—­they are not responsible.  Were we?  I wonder!  Had we a right to have children?  Had we a right not to have children?  It has been estimated by a member of the mathematical department that, at the present salary rate, each of the college professors of America is entitled to just two-fifths of a child.

Does this pay?  Should only the financially fit be allowed to survive—­to reproduce their species?  Should or should not those who may be fittest physically, intellectually and morally also be entitled to the privilege and responsibility of taking their natural part in determining the character of America’s future generations, for the evolution of the race and the glory of God?