378 NATHANIEL SOUTHGATE SHALER 



up beside a bed, feel a pulse, diagnose the case, tell the boy 

 that he heard good reports of his work, and then fall into dis- 

 pute with the doctor on the effects of anti-toxin on diphtheria. 

 He inaugurated a system of sick reports whereby a student's 

 illness might become immediately known to the authorities 

 and his condition promptly looked after by competent phy- 

 sicians. He disliked anything like haphazard methods. He 

 urged that supervision in this and other regards be pushed to 

 the military standard of inevitableness, for which he had a great 

 respect, his early hauntings of a military post having given him 

 an understanding and appreciation of order, regularity, and 

 system. 



If he was thus concerned for the sick body he was still more 

 solicitous about the sick soul of a youth. There were few occa- 

 sions when he was not accessible to a student. It is told by 

 one of them, now a man of distinction, that time and again when 

 he was in trouble, or when feeling the need of stimulating talk 

 and counsel, he would go in the evening to Mr. Shaler's office 

 and, since the door was fastened against intruders, attract at- 

 tention by throwing pebbles up at his window. Not only was 

 he never refused admittance, but, on the contrary, was cor- 

 dially welcomed and given the best of fellowship and advice. 

 Mr. Shaler's courtesy at that place and time is especially note- 

 worthy, for he particularly enjoyed the peace of the empty 

 building and the sense that, free from interruption, he might 

 get on with his work. 



He had intense sympathy for the lonely youth who for the 

 first time had left behind him home and friends. He remem- 

 bered the time when he too had been a stranger in a strange 

 land and had somehow got the impression that a man from 

 outside of New England did not count, indeed that the rest of 

 the country was in a way superfluous. He therefore exerted 

 himself to fortify the youth's good opinion of himself and to 

 hearten him up as to the value of his locality, even if it was in 

 the far West. One feature of the College administration which 



