A Masters Degree | Page 6

a hard-headed, far-seeing, masterful man, who took the West as he found it, but did not leave it so. Not he! All the power of higher learning he still held supreme. But by days of hard work in the college halls, and nights of meditation out in the silent sanctuary spaces of the prairies round about him, he had been learning how to compute the needs of men as the angel with the golden reed computed the walls and gates of the New Jerusalem--*according to the measure of a man.
Such was Dean Fenneben who came after six years of service to the little town of Lagonda Ledge to plant Sunrise on the crest above the Walnut Valley beyond reach of prairie fire or bursting boom. Firm set as the limestone of its foundations, he reared here a college that should live, for that its builder himself with his feet on the ground and his face toward the light had learned the secret of living.
Miles away across the valley, the dome of Sunrise could be seen by day. By night, the old college lantern at first, and later the studding of electric lights, made a beacon for all the open countryside. But if the wayfarer, by chance or choice, turned his footsteps to those rocky bluffs and glens beyond the Walnut River, wherefrom the town of Lagonda Ledge takes its name, he lost the guiding ray from the hilltop and groped in black and dangerous ways where darkness rules.
Above the south turret hung the Sunrise bell, whose resonant voice filled the whole valley, and what the sight of Sunrise failed to do for Lagonda Ledge, the sound of the bell accomplished. The first class to enter the school nicknamed its head "Dean Funnybone," but this gave him no shock any more. He had learned the humor of life now, the spirit of the open land where the view is broad to broadening souls.
And it was to the hand of Dean Fenneben that Professor Vincent Burgess, A.B., Greek instructor from Boston, and Vic Burleigh, the big country boy from a claim beyond the Walnut, came on a September day; albeit, the one had his head in the clouds, while the other's feet were clogged with the grass roots.
CHAPTER II
POTTER'S CLAY
This clay, well mixed with marl and sand, Follows the motion of my hand, For some must follow and some command, Though all are made of clay. --LONGFELLOW THE afternoon sunshine was flooding the September landscape with molten gold, filling the valley with intense heat, and rippling back in warm waves from the crest of the ridge. Dean Fenneben's study in the south tower of Sunrise looked out on the new heaven and the new earth, every day-dawn created afresh for his eyes; for truly, the Walnut Valley in any mood needs only eyes that see to be called a goodly land. And it was because of the magnificent vista, unfolding in woodland, and winding river, and fertile field, and far golden prairie-- it was because of the unconscious power of all this upon the student mind, that Dr. Fenneben had set his college up here.
On this September afternoon, the Dean sat looking out on this land of pure delight a-quiver in the late summer sunshine. Nature had done well by Lloyd Fenneben. His height was commanding, and he was slender, rather than heavy, with ease of movement as if the play of every muscle was nerved to harmony. His heavy black hair was worn a trifle long on the upper part of his head and fell in masses above his forehead. His eyes were black and keen under heavy black brows. Every feature was strong and massive, but saved from sternness by a genial kindliness and sense of humor. Whoever came into his presence felt that magnetic power only a king of his kind can possess.
Long the Dean sat gazing at the gleaming landscape and the sleepy town beyond the campus and the pigeons circling gracefully above a little cottage, hidden by trees, up the river.
"A wonderful region!" he murmured. "If that old white-haired brother of mine digging about the roots of Greek and Sanscrit back in Harvard could only see all this, maybe he might understand why I choose to stay here with my college instead of tying up with a university back East. But, maybe not. We are only step-brothers. He is old enough to be my father, and with all his knowledge of books he could never read men. However, he sent me West with a fat pocketbook in the interest of higher education. I hope I've invested well. And our magnificent group of buildings up here and our broad-acred campus, together with our splendid enrollment of students justify my hope. Strange, I have never known whose money I