Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 05 - Little Journeys to the Homes of English Authors by Elbert Hubbard
page 105 of 249 (42%)
page 105 of 249 (42%)
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the facts. His clothes are outgrown, his coat shiny, his linen a dull
ecru, his hands clammy. He reads a book as he walks, and when he bumps into you, he always exculpates himself in Attic Greek. This absent-mindedness and habit of reading on the street affords the Sport (another college type) great opportunity for the playing of pranks. It is very funny to walk along in front of a Grind who is reading as he walks, and then suddenly stop and stoop, and let the Grind fall over you; for the innocent Grind, thinking he has been at fault, is ever profuse in apologies. Many years ago there was a Grind. A party of Sports saw him approaching, deeply immersed in his book. "Look you," quoth the chief of the Sports--"look you and observe him fall over me." And they looked. Onward blindly trudged the Grind, reading as he came. The Sport stepped ahead of him, stooped, and ---- one big foot of the Grind shot out and kicked him into the gutter. Then the Grind continued his walk and his reading without saying a word. This incident is here recorded for the betterment of the Young, to show them that things are not always what they seem. Samuel Johnson, I have said, was a Grind of the pure type. He was so nearsighted that he fell over chairs in drawing-rooms, and so awkward that his long arms occasionally brushed the bric-a-brac from mantels. No lady's train was safe if he was in the room. At gatherings of young people, if Johnson appeared, his presence was at once the signal for mirth, of which |
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