s unaware of any need for the drink anodyne. I was not
disappointed. My career was retarded, that was all. Perhaps I did need
further preparation. I had learned enough from the books to realise that
I had only touched the hem of knowledge's garment. I still lived on the
heights. My waking hours, and most of the hours I should have used for
sleep, were spent with the books.

CHAPTER XXIV

Out in the country, at the Belmont Academy, I went to work in a small,
perfectly appointed steam laundry. Another fellow and myself did all the
work from sorting and washing to ironing the white shirts, collars and
cuffs, and the "fancy starch" of the wives of the professors. We worked
like tigers, especially as summer came on and the academy boys took to
the wearing of duck trousers. It consumes a dreadful lot of time to iron
one pair of duck trousers. And there were so many pairs of them. We
sweated our way through long sizzling weeks at a task that was never
done; and many a night, while the students snored in bed, my partner and
I toiled on under the electric light at steam mangle or ironing board.

The hours were long, the work was arduous, despite the fact that we
became past masters in the art of eliminating waste motion. And I was
receiving thirty dollars a month and board--a slight increase over my
coal-shovelling and cannery days, at least to the extent of board, which
cost my employer little (we ate in the kitchen), but which was to me the
equivalent of twenty dollars a month. My robuster strength of added
years, my increased skill, and all I had learned from the books, were
responsible for this increase of twenty dollars. Judging by my rate of
development, I might hope before I died to be a night watchman for sixty
dollars a month, or a policeman actually receiving a hundred dollars with
pickings.

So relentlessly did my partner and I spring into our work throughout the
week that by Saturday night we were frazzled wrecks. I found myself in
the old familiar work-beast condition, toiling longer hours than the
horses toiled, thinking scarcely more frequent thoughts than horses
think. The books were closed to me. I had brought a trunkful to the
laundry, but found myself unable to read them. I fell asleep the moment
I tried to read; and if I did manage to keep my eyes open for several
pages, I could not remember the contents of those pages. I gave over
attempts on heavy study, such as jurisprudence,