THE YOUNG PROFESSOR 149 
separation must have been of considerable length, how- 
ever, as the thing which probably makes me remember 
it was his having grown a beard, and that this was the 
first time that my mother and I had seen him with it. 
As a very young man, he shaved completely, not even 
wearing a moustache; and as was the custom with many in 
those days, wearing his hair rather long. I do not remem- 
ber him, however, very distinctly except with his hair 
cut short as was his custom in later life. His hair was 
very dark brown and straight, but his beard was decidedly 
sandy in color. His eyes were a rather dark, clear gray. 
In his youth and early middle life he was slender, but 
later he grew stout. He was very simple in his habits, 
and cared but little for amusements, his favorite recreation 
being novel reading. He liked clean, wholesome stories, 
and had no taste for the problem novel; but, aside from 
this, he could read and enjoy almost anything from King 
‘ Solomon’s Mines to Miss Yonge, and he particularly 
delighted in children’s stories. He could read the veriest 
trash with zest as long as virtue was triumphant and vice 
did not make itself too prominent. He was charmed 
with Treasure Island, being almost ready to indorse Mr. 
Gladstone’s verdict that it was the ‘best story he ever 
read,’ which, as Lord Playfair told us Mr. Gladstone had 
oncetold him. In the days of Bonner’s New York Ledger, 
the Professor read the weekly numbers regularly and 
especially enjoyed the stories of Mrs. E. D. N. South- 
worth, a Georgetown neighbor. He used to say that 
reading the Ledger rested his mind. Little Lord Fauntle- 
roy took his heart from the time it was published in St. 
Nicholas. On one occasion I remember his being missed 
during the busiest hours of the morning’s work in the 
office. His secretary sat there with his notebook in hand, 
