fe, was a Grind of the pure
type. The Grind is a fixture, a few being found at every University, even
unto this day. The present writer, once in a book of fiction, founded on
fact, took occasion to refer to the genus Grind, with Samuel Johnson in
mind, as follows: He is poor in purse, but great in frontal development.

He goes to school because he wishes to (no one ever "sent" a Grind to
college). He has a sallow skin, a watery eye, a shambling gait, but he has
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
he was, of course, the unconscious object.

Johnson's face was scarred by the King's Evil, which even the touch of
Queen Anne had failed to cure. While a youth he talked aloud to himself--a
privilege that should be granted only to those advanced in years. He would
grunt out prayers and expletives at uncertain times, keep up a clucking
sound with his tongue, sway his big body from side to side, and drum a
tattoo upon his knee. Now and again would come a suppressed whistle, and