Of the two other teachers, Herr Linden was an elderly German of majestic proportions who contented himself, as far as the boys were concerned, with instilling into them a generous amount of the French and German tongues. That done, and to his credit it must be distinctly stated that it was well done, he went his own way in calm unconcern of his pupils who, on their side, accepted his labors as a necessary evil and thought no more about him outside of school hours.
But the new teacher, Luke Boniface, though a very common type in northern New England, was a foreign element at Flemming Hall. The son of a poor country minister, he had early made up his mind to work his own way through college and fit himself for the life of a missionary to India. With this end kept constantly in view, the years of his boyhood had been years of hard labor and stern self-denial. By working through all his vacations, and occasionally giving up one year of study, in order to earn enough money to carry him through the next, he had toiled his way along until, at the age of twenty-eight, he had just completed the undergraduate course in a small inland college. Then more money must be had before he could take his special professional course, and to Luke Boniface it seemed that a year of teaching was the best and easiest way to gain that end. Some months of this work in a little country school, a few years before, gave him the right to call himself experienced; and with the help of friends, he asked and obtained the position of classical teacher at Flemming Hall, although his only practical knowledge of boys was that gained from teaching the overgrown striplings whose school life was limited to a few weeks of every winter, and the chubby, pinafored urchins of the A B C class. The boys at Flemming filled him with terror when they assembled before him, on the first morning of the term. So elegant and worldly-wise were they that, in comparison, he felt himself a mere child in their presence. His embarrassment made him appear even more awkward and constrained than ever, and long before the hour was over, he heartily wished himself away from Flemming Hall once more. Could he go through with it? His heart almost failed him; but Luke Boniface was not the man to abandon the set purpose of years, in the face of a roomful of rollicking boys. He would remain in his place and conquer them. During the summer he had often dreamed of the coming year, of the strong influence for good which he would exert over the boys, of the popularity he would gain. Now, as he glanced about the room, he instinctively tried to hide his large feet under his chair, and to pull down the sleeves of his best coat, which all of a sudden seemed to him to be pitiably mean and shabby. His years of toil and care had drawn anxious lines on the face that now flushed a deep, dark red, as he caught sight of Max who was roguishly imitating him for the benefit of his mates. The young man raised his eyebrows, and pressed firmly together his lips which had shaped themselves into a melancholy droop. It is a true old saying that “God makes the other features, man makes his own mouth.” In the midst of his petty anxieties and struggles, Luke Boniface had found neither time nor disposition to be genial; to him, life was all a hard, stern reality, and his mouth showed that he felt it to be so. Taken all in all, he was a man to be honored and respected rather than loved, sensitive and, like many sensitive people, fond of pulling himself up by the roots occasionally, to inspect his growth; conscientious and anxious for the good of those around him, nevertheless he was ill at ease, cold and forbidding in his manner to the very persons whom he most desired to approach. Moreover, as has been said, he had little knowledge of boys and their ways and small desire to increase that knowledge, though he regarded them as a class of young savages whom it was his duty to try to improve, just as one day he hoped to work among the heathen of India.
The large grounds of Flemming Hall lay a little to the south of the town. Turning abruptly from the street, the drive wound up a steep hillside to the group of brick buildings on the level ground at the top. From there, a magnificent view opened out in every direction. Old Flemming, as it was called, the dormitory where the boys all lived, fronted towards the west, and, standing on its broad piazza, one could look far away into the Green Mountains, beyond the river whose gray water shone here and there through the trees below. At the south the hills rose, range on range, some thickly wooded, others more open and dotted with white farmhouses, long, rambling barns, and herds of black and white cattle grazing over the smooth pastures. In the other direction lay the little village nestled among its trees, and beyond that, the mountains, blue and misty in the distance. Directly in front, the smooth green lawn sloped away to the street, and half-way down the hill was the pretty red cottage where Dr. Flemming lived with his wife and little daughter. At the right of the dormitory rose the square tower on the recitation hall; at the left was the armory, with the stars and stripes flying above it. Back of the armory was the much-trodden parade-ground, and beyond lay the great fields given up to baseball, football and tennis, for Dr. Flemming believed that boys needed plenty of out-door exercise and that, indulged in moderately, such exercise was a help rather than a hindrance to the lessons. Having once made sure of sound bodies, by a careful selection of his teachers and a no less careful oversight of their work, he would succeed in developing the sound minds to put into them. So well did he carry out his ideas that there was nearly as much rivalry in the class-rooms as in the games, and it was by no means uncommon to find the same boy excelling in both connections.
As Leon followed his brother into the great dining-room, that first night, he glanced curiously up and down the room to see his new companions. The seventy or more cadets who were grouped about the four long tables, looked so much alike, in their gray uniforms, that he had some difficulty in recognizing the half-dozen of them to whom Harry had introduced him, in the afternoon. But soon Jack Howard’s tall figure caught his eye, and the next moment, he found himself sitting down opposite Max Eliot who was casting significant glances towards the far corner of the room. Leon followed the direction of his eyes and saw a young man with a discouraged, anxious face and a head of bristly brown hair, seated at the upper end of the table diagonally across from the one at which they were taking their places.
“That’s Bony,” whispered Max, leaning across the table. “Isn’t he fine?”
Leon gave a nod of assent.
“Hope I don’t get at his table,” Max went on, in the same tone; “his face would sour the milk on the oatmeal, mornings, and I don’t want to have my appetite destroyed in that way.”
“You look as if you were pining away, Max,” remarked Leon’s right-hand neighbor.
“So I am,” responded Max, with a pretended sigh. “You could pack my appetite in a pill-box, and put on the cover. By the way, Alex, this is Leon Arnold, Hal’s brother. Arnold, this fellow is Alex Sterne, a bright and shining light of the senior class.”
Leon turned slightly, to be met by two blue eyes which gazed so squarely and steadily into his own that they would have had a look almost of defiance, had they not been softened by the mouth below them. There was an air of candor and truthfulness about the lad, about his broad, open forehead and the clear eyes which looked into Leon’s, that gave the new-comer a sudden feeling that this was a friend to be trusted. Moved by this attraction, he said, with a laugh,—