Most of Battle Field's youth came from the farms of that western
country, the young men with bodies and brains that were strong
but awkward. Almost all were working their way through--as were
not a few of the women. They felt that life was a large, serious
business impatiently waiting for them to come and attend to it in
a large, serious way better than it had ever been attended to
before. They studied hard; they practised oratory and debating.
Their talk was of history and philosophy, religion and politics.
They slept little; they thought--or tried to think--even more
than they talked.

At a glance this man was one of them, a fine type.

"He's handsome, isn't he?" said Pauline.

"But--" She did not finish; indeed it was not clear to her
what the rest of her protest was. He reminded her of
Dumont--there was the same look of superiority, of the "born to
lead." But his face seemed to, have some quality which Dumont's
lacked--or was it only the idealizing effect of the open sky and
the evening light?

When the bell rang for supper he apparently did not hear it. The
two girls went down and had talked to the others a few minutes
and all had seated themselves before he entered. An inch or so
above six feet, powerful in the chest and shoulders, he moved
with a large grace until he became self-conscious or approached
the, by comparison, frail pieces of furniture. He had
penetrating, candid eyes that looked dark in the gaslight but
were steel-blue. His face now wore the typical western-American