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Elsie Venner by Oliver Wendell Holmes
page 12 of 456 (02%)
bull-terriers, with their hair combed straight up from their foreheads,
which were not commonly very high or broad. The special form of physical
life I have been describing gives you a right to expect more delicate
perceptions and a more reflective, nature than you commonly find in
shaggy-throated men, clad in heavy suits of muscles.

The student lingered in the lecture-room, looking all the time as if he
wanted to say something in private, and waiting for two or three others,
who were still hanging about, to be gone.

Something is wrong!--I said to myself, when I noticed his
expression.--Well, Mr. Langdon,--I said to him, when we were alone,--can
I do anything for you to-day?

You can, Sir,--he said.--I am going to leave the class, for the present,
and keep school.

Why, that 's a pity, and you so near graduating! You'd better stay and
finish this course and take your degree in the spring, rather than break
up your whole plan of study.

I can't help myself, Sir,--the young man answered.--There 's trouble at
home, and they cannot keep me here as they have done. So I must look out
for myself for a while. It's what I've done before, and am ready to do
again. I came to ask you for a certificate of my fitness to teach a
common school, or a high school, if you think I am up to that. Are you
willing to give it to me?

Willing? Yes, to be sure,--but I don't want you to go. Stay; we'll make
it easy for you. There's a fund will do something for you, perhaps.
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