elders as the more agreeable avenue of promotion.

If we had had character credits in the good old days I might have won
distinction in school and been saved much embarrassment in later
years. Instead of learning the latitude and longitude of Madagascar,
Chattahoochee, and Kamchatka, I might have received high grades in
geography by abstaining from the chewing of gum, by not wearing my
hands in my trousers-pockets, by walking instead of ambling or
slouching, by wiping the mud from my shoes before entering the house,
by a personally conducted tour through the realms of manicuring, and
by learning the position and use of the hat-rack. Getting no school
credits for such incidental minors in the great scheme of life, I
grew careless and indifferent and acquired a reputation that I do not
care to dwell upon. If those who had me in charge, or thought they
had, had only been wise and given me school credits for all these
things, what a model boy I might have been!

Why, I would have swallowed my pride, donned a kitchen apron, and
washed the supper dishes, and no normal boy enjoys that ceremony. By
making passes over the dishes I should have been exorcising the
spooks of cube root, and that would have been worth some personal
sacrifice. What a boon it would have been for the home folks too!
They could have indulged their penchant for literary exercises,
sitting in the parlor making out certificates for me to carry to my
teacher next day, and so all the rough places in the home would have
been made smooth. But the crowning achievement would have been my
graduation from college. I can see the picture. I am husking corn
in the lower field. To reach this field one must go the length of
the orchard and then walk across the meadow. It is a crisp autumn
day, about ten o'clock in the morning, and the sun is shining. The