"Well, I just feel as if I had played sixteen holes of golf," Mr. Wright replied. They laughed together.
"But, Jove! It was worth it though, wasn't it?" cried Paul.
"I think so."
"I, too! Only," added the boy, "I still believe we ought to pay more for our newspapers."
CHAPTER XV
THE DECISION
For the next few days after his return from Boston Paul thought and talked of little else save the great newspaper press that he had seen. Beside a project as tremendous as the publication of a widely circulated daily the March Hare became a pitifully insignificant affair.
Nevertheless the March Hare was not to be thrust aside. It clamored for attention. Its copy came in as before from students and staff, and mixed with this material were some exceptionally fine articles from patents and distant alumnæ. Judge Damon had taken to contributing a short, crisp editorial almost every month, something of civic or national importance; and two of Burmingham's graduates who were in France sent letters that added an international flavor to the magazine. Never had the issues been so good. Certainly the monthly so modestly begun had ripened into an asset that all the town would regret to part with.
In the meantime graduation was approaching and the day was drawing near when 1920 must bid good-by to the familiar halls of the school, and instead of standing and looking down from the top of the ladder, as it now did, it must set forth into the turmoil of real life where its members would once again be beginners. What an ironic transformation that would be! A senior was a person looked up to by the entire student body, a dignitary to be treated with profound respect. But once outside the sheltering walls of his Alma Mater he would suddenly become a very ordinary being who, like Samson shorn of his locks, would enter business or college a weak, timid neophyte. It seemed absurd that such a change could be wrought in so short a time.