The Courage of the Commonplace | Page 2

after three years
of college life, has in the eyes of the student body "made good." It is a
crucial test, a heart-rending test for a boy of twenty years.
The girl sitting in the window of Durfee understood thoroughly the
character and the chances of the day. The seniors at the tree wear derby
hats; the juniors none at all; it is easier by this sign to distinguish the
classmen, and to keep track of the tapping. The girl knew of what
society was each black-hatted man who twisted through the bareheaded
throng; in that sea of tense faces she recognized many; she could find a
familiar head almost anywhere in the mass and tell as much as an
outsider might what hope was hovering over it. She came of Yale
people; Brant, her brother, would graduate this year; she was staying at
the house of a Yale professor; she was in the atmosphere.
There, near the edge of the pack, was Bob Floyd, captain of the crew, a
fair, square face with quiet blue eyes, whose tranquil gaze was

characteristic. To-day it was not tranquil; it flashed anxiously here and
there, and the girl smiled. She knew as certainly as if the fifteen seniors
had told her that Floyd would be "tapped for Bones." The crew captain
and the foot-ball captain are almost inevitably taken for Skull and
Bones. Yet five years before Jack Emmett, captain of the crew, had not
been taken; only two years back Bert Connolly, captain of the foot-ball
team, had not been taken. The girl, watching the big chap's unconscious
face, knew well what was in his mind. "What chance have I against all
these bully fellows," he was saying to himself in his soul, "even if I do
happen to be crew captain? Connolly was a mutt--couldn't take
him--but Jack Emmett--there wasn't any reason to be seen for that. And
it's just muscles I've got--I'm not clever--I don't hit it off with the
crowd--I've done nothing for Yale, but just for the crew. Why the
dickens should they take me?" But the girl knew.
The great height and refined, supercilious face of another boy towered
near--Lionel Arnold, a born litterateur, and an artist--he looked more
confident than most. It seemed to the girl he felt sure of being taken;
sure that his name and position and, more than all, his developed,
finished personality must count as much as that. And the girl knew that
in the direct, unsophisticated judgments of the judges these things did
not count at all.
So she gunned over the swarm which gathered to the oak tree as bees to
a hive, able to tell often what was to happen. Even to her young eyes all
these anxious, upturned faces, watching silently with throbbing pulses
for this first vital decision of their lives, was a stirring sight.
"I can't bear it for the ones who aren't taken," she cried out, and the
chaperon did not smile.
"I know," she said. "Each year I think I'll never come again-- it's too
heart-rending. It means so much to them, and only forty-five can go
away happy. Numbers are just broken-hearted. I don't like it--it's
brutal."
"Yes, but it's an incentive to the under-classmen--it holds them to the
mark and gives them ambition, doesn't it?" the girl argued doubtfully.
The older woman agreed. "I suppose on the whole it's a good institution.
And it's wonderful what wisdom the boys show. Of course, they make
mistakes, but on the whole they pick the best men astonishingly. So
many times they hit the ones who come to be distinguished."

"But so many times they don't," the girl followed her words. Her father
and Brant were Bones men--why was the girl arguing against senior
societies? "So many, Mrs. Anderson. Uncle Ted's friend, the President
of Hardrington College, was in Yale in the '80's and made no senior
society; Judge Marston of the Supreme Court dined with us the other
night--he didn't make anything; Dr. Hamlin, who is certainly one of the
great physicians of the country, wasn't taken. I know a lot more. And
look at some who've made things. Look at my cousin, Gus
Vanderpool--he made Keys twenty years ago and has never done a
thing since. And that fat Mr. Hough, who's so rich and dull--he's
Bones."
"You've got statistics at your fingers' ends, haven't you?" said Mrs.
Anderson. "Anybody might think you had a brother among the juniors
who you weren't hopeful about." She looked at the girl curiously. Then:
"They must be about all there," she spoke, leaning out. "A full fifty feet
square of dear frightened laddies. There's Brant, coming across the
campus. He looks as if he was going to make some one president. I
suppose he feels so. There's