“Look here, if you fellows keep interrupting, I won’t sit down for
half an hour,” said Joe, well knowing that eloquence was not his
gift, but bound to have his say out.
Deep silence reigned, for that threat quelled the most impatient
member, and Joe prosed on, using all the arguments he had ever
heard, and paying off several old scores by siy hits of a personal
nature, as older orators often do.
“It is clear to my mind that boys would get on better without any
girls fooling round. As for their being as smart as we are, it is all
nonsense, for some of ’em cry over their lessons every day, or go
home with headaches, or get mad and scold all recess, because
something ‘isn’t fair.’ No, sir; girls ain’t meant to know much, and
they can’t. Wise folks say so and I believe ’em. Haven’t got any
sisters myself, and I don’t want any, for they’d on’t seem to amount
to much, according to those who do have ’em.”
Groans from Gus and Ed greeted the closing remarks of the
ungallant Joe, who sat down, feeling that he had made somebody
squirm. Up jumped Grif, the delight of whose life was practical
jokes, which amiable weakness made him the terror of the girls,
though they had no other fault to find with the merry lad.
“Mr. Chairman, the ground I take is this: girls have not the strength
to go to college with us. They couldn’t row a race, go on a lark, or
take care of themselves, as we do. They are all well enough at
home, and I like them at parties, but for real fun and go I wouldn’t
give a cent for them,” began Grif, whose views of a collegiate life
were confined to the enjoyments rather than the studies of that
festive period. “I have tried them, and they can’t stand anything.
They scream if you tell them there is a mouse in the room, and run
if they see a big dog. I just put a cockroach in Molly’s desk one
day, and when she opened it she jumped as if she was shot.”
So did the gentlemen of the club, for at that moment half-a-dozen
fire-crackers exploded under the chair Grif had left, and flew
wildly about the room. Order was with difficulty restored, the
mischievous party summarily chastised and commanded to hold
his tongue, under penalty of ejectment from the room if he spoke
again. Firmly grasping that red and unruly member, Grif composed
himself to listen, with his nose in the air and his eyes shining like
black beads.
Ed was always the peace-maker, and now, when he rose with his
engaging smile, his voice fell like oil upon the troubled waters,
and his bright face was full of the becoming bashfulness which
afflicts youths of seventeen when touching upon such subjects of
newly acquired interest as girls and their pleasant but perplexing
ways.
“It seems to me we have hardly considered the matter enough to be
able to say much. But I think that school would be awfully dry and
dismal without–ahem!–any young ladies to make it nice. I
wouldn’t give a pin to go if there was only a crowd of fellows,
though I like a good game as well as any man. I pity any boy who
has no sisters,” continued Ed, warming up as he thought of his
own, who loved him dearly, as well they might, for a better brother
never lived. “Home wouldn’t be worth having without them to look
after a fellow, to keep him out of scrapes, help him with his
lessons, and make things jolly for his friends. I tell you we can’t do
without girls, and I’m not ashamed to say that I think the more we
see of them, and try to be like them in many ways, the better men
we shall be by and by.”
“Hear! hear!” cried Frank, in his deepest tone, for he heartily
agreed to that, having talked the matter over with his mother, and
received much light upon things which should always be set right
in young heads and hearts. And who can do this so wisely and well