The Courage of the Commonplace
The Courage of the Commonplace by Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews The girl and her chaperon had been deposited early in the desirable second-story window in Durfee, looking down on the tree. Brant was a senior and a "Bones" man, and so had a leading part to play in the afternoon's drama. He must get the girl and the chaperon off his hands, and be at his business. This was "Tap Day." It is perhaps well to explain what "Tap Day" means; there are people who have not been at Yale or had sons or sweethearts there. In New Haven, on the last Thursday of May, toward five in the afternoon, one becomes aware that the sea of boys which ripples always over the little city has condensed into a river flowing into the campus. There the flood divides and re-divides; the junior class is separating and gathering from all directions into a solid mass about the nucleus of a large, low-hanging oak tree inside the college fence in front of Durfee Hall. The three senior societies of Yale, Skull and Bones, Scroll and Key, and Wolf's Head, choose to-day fifteen members each from the junior
bout in which man is never uppermost, I replace it by an insight into
all the springs of action in man and woman. To sum up, the world is
mine without effort of mine, and the world has not the slightest hold
on me. Listen to this,' he went on, 'I will tell you the history of my
morning, and you will divine my pleasures.'
"He got up, pushed the bolt of the door, drew a tapestry curtain
across it with a sharp grating sound of the rings on the rod, then he
sat down again.
"'This morning,' he said, 'I had only two amounts to collect; the
rest of the bills that were due I gave away instead of cash to my
customers yesterday. So much saved, you see, for when I discount a
bill I always deduct two francs for a hired brougham--expenses of
collection. A pretty thing it would be, would it not, if my clients
were to set _me_ trudging all over Paris for half-a-dozen francs of
discount, when no man is my master, and I only pay seven francs in the
shape of taxes?
"'The first bill for a thousand francs was presented by a young
fellow, a smart buck with a spangled waistcoat, and an eyeglass, and a
tilbury and an English horse, and all the rest of it. The bill bore
the signature of one of the prettiest women in Paris, married to a
Count, a great landowner. Now, how came that Countess to put her name
to a bill of exchange, legally not worth the paper it was written
upon, but practically very good business; for these women, poor
The Courage of the Commonplace by Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews The girl and her chaperon had been deposited early in the desirable second-story window in Durfee, looking down on the tree. Brant was a senior and a "Bones" man, and so had a leading part to play in the afternoon's drama. He must get the girl and the chaperon off his hands, and be at his business. This was "Tap Day." It is perhaps well to explain what "Tap Day" means; there are people who have not been at Yale or had sons or sweethearts there. In New Haven, on the last Thursday of May, toward five in the afternoon, one becomes aware that the sea of boys which ripples always over the little city has condensed into a river flowing into the campus. There the flood divides and re-divides; the junior class is separating and gathering from all directions into a solid mass about the nucleus of a large, low-hanging oak tree inside the college fence in front of Durfee Hall. The three senior societies of Yale, Skull and Bones, Scroll and Key, and Wolf's Head, choose to-day fifteen members each from the junior