The Youth of Parnassus
and Other Stories
by Logan Pearsall Smith
London
Macmillan and Co.
and New York
1895
All rights reserved
To
Philip Morrell
Contents
| Page | |
| The Youth of Parnassus | 1 |
| The Will to Live. I. | 79 |
| The Will to Live. II. | 99 |
| The Claim of the Past | 125 |
| A Broken Journey | 143 |
| The Sub-Warden | 183 |
| Idyll | 201 |
| Buller Intervening | 243 |
| The Optimist | 259 |
The Youth of Parnassus
I.
He came straight to Oxford from his American home, Parnassus City, atown in the Western State of Indiana.
The first time Foley saw him was one wet October evening, when,splashing across the quadrangle towards his rooms, he noticed a largeumbrella moving through the dripping twilight—an umbrella which, fromits undecided motion, must belong, he had told himself, to some tourist,who, in spite of the rain and darkness, was finishing a day ofsight-seeing at St. Mary's. But when the umbrella collapsed in front ofhis own staircase, and Foley saw the spectacles and pale face of a youngman who turned to enter there, he decided that it must be an agent, cometo collect money for missions or something of the kind. And as hefollowed upstairs, in the wet footprints of the feet he could still hearmounting above him, he asked himself with vague annoyance what rightthey had—people like that—to push themselves into the rooms of Oxfordmen.
The melancholy footsteps went on till they reached the top; nor didFoley hear them again descend. Soon after he was told that an Americanhad come into College, and was living above him; and when he went tocall, he recognized, in the person who awkwardly rose to receive him,the young man he had taken for a mission agent in the rain that evening.A thin, small young man, in a long, black broadcloth coat of provincialcut, he seemed at first sight nothing but the traditional WesternAmerican Foley had read of in books, or seen in the theatre sometimes—astudent who looked curiously out of place in that old panelled room.
The young Englishman talked to him as best he could, asking thequestions always asked of a new-comer; questions which this one answeredwith the usual shyness, but in a very unusual voice and accent.
He had just come from America; he had left there on the sixth. He hadcome to study under Dr. Joseph at the new Methodist College. Dr. Josephhad arranged for him to come to St. Mary's; their own College wasn'tbuilt yet. Foley asked if he thought he would like