Keeping One's Place 



of merriment. They held in check their gayety 

 by falling into sober moods of purple or reveries 

 of blue. There were things, moreover, that when 

 uttered in a tone of insolent magenta had better 

 not be said. 



All very well — ^the answer showed precocity — 

 the less one suffered from restrictions, the easier 

 to be subdued. Things popped out from the very 

 effort to hold in, things hke those jolly prim- 

 roses, unapropos beside the phlox, but quite pat 

 in their own place. The trouble was this garden 

 had to get a hearing all at once. If I wished for 

 more than jargon, for both brilliancy and depth, 

 I must give more space for utterance. How 

 have any sequence of ideas, how emphasize by 

 repetition, how work towards any climax in an 

 impromptu speech of at the most nine feet by 

 twelve? We must have extension courses before 

 its public speaking could be done with any form. 



Then should I have stilled the aspirations of 

 my place, with confession of my inabihty. Be- 

 fore worst came to worst, I should have abdi- 

 cated from my chair.^ However, I had known 

 most fallible instructors who managed somehow. 



[73] 



