36
The University Courier.
LITERARY.
A STUDENT'S VACATION EXPERIENCE.
"Would you like a nice job as traveling salesman the coming summer's vacation at a handsome salary? If so meet me at the Lawrence House this afternoon." Such was the question asked me by the dapper smiling agent of an eastern book concern one spring morning as I entered the main university building. Did I want "a nice job?" Certainly! Students generally have inclinations for such things.
I kept the appointment and found at the hotel about a dozen other students, all intent on the same "nice job." At first I was a little skeptical of the plan but the flattery and golden promises of the general agent soon convinced me that there was a fortune in it; absolutely no risk, salary guaranteed, opportunity to see some new country, and other advantages almost unlimited. It was a golden opportunity and it is hardly necessary to state I with a dozen or more others eagerly embraced it. In ten days we met the agent in Kansas City for "instructions." Here we remained several days ere we went to our various fields. I here met Ed Wilson, an old friend, also intent on the "job," and we agreed to form a partnership.
We chose southern Nebraska for the field of our labors, but when we informed the agent of this he coolly told us that Nebraska was taken by students from various colleges. We were in despair. But the agent came to our relief. "Here's Arkansas: fine country. Take your choice, any part of the state." We chose Van Buren, Ft. Smith, and Little Rock to begin with, and that night we started for Van Buren. The car fare took most of our cash but we didn't mind that, for were we not going to start a little mint as soon as we got to Arkansas?
The next day at noon we arrived in Van Buren. We were a little disappointed in the place, as the houses were small and the people did not appear to be very good subjects for the book business. Goats and hogs—"razor backs" or "wind splitters," roamed the streets at will. We noticed the goats had a fashion of climbing in farmers' wagons and eating their produce while the hogs, their tails twisted in several spirals, hurried up and down the streets with anxious concerned faces as if they were afraid the bank would close before they could get to it. We ate our dinner and began business, or at least tried to. I worked hard and I am sure Ed did, but we failed to score a single order during that long hot afternoon. The town had been "worked" by a similar business two weeks before. That night we held a consultation. Evidently Little Rock and Fort Smith had also been canvassed, so it would be useless to go to either of those places. Paris, Texas was the nearest place of any size. We counted our cash, found we lacked three dollars of having enough to pay the fare. But a bright idea struck me. I hurried down street to three-ball sign and pawned my watch for five dollars. I regretted to part with it but the necessity was pressing and sentiment was out of the question.
The train left for Paris at 12 that night. We dozed in the boarding house until half past eleven and then walked to the depot in a heavy rain. Discouraged, wet and almost penniless we were not quite so enthusiastic as when we left Kansas City. The next morning about ten o'clock we arrived in Paris. The clouds had disappeared and the sun was shinning brightly. We invested 15 cents in a lunch and then hunted a room. We finally secured a room with an old Dutchman who kept a boarding house over a grocery. We declined to board with him, as we took our meals "out." Our cash was now reduced to two dollars. Ed suddenly remembered he had relations in Sherman and that he ought to visit them. But as I had the money he was reduced to the necessity of trying to "beat his way" on a freight. He got in a box car all right but he had made a mistake about the road. The brakeman kindly informed him of this fact
after the train had gotten up a respectable rate of speed. Ed jumped off the car and was fortunate enough to a light on a pile of ties. He limped back up town and pawned his watch for enough to pay his fare.
Thus our partnership was dissolved and I was left alone. I had excellent success in the book business and soon had a goodly number of orders. The problem before me was how to make my two dollars last until I could get some returns, which would be at least two weeks. Economy became a necessity. The Dutchman agreed to wait for his room rent. For breakfast I had peaches—five cents' worth; took dinner at a 15 cent restaurant, and for supper ate a hot "tomale." But an unexpected good fortune awaited me. I sold a set of books and was asked to board out the price of the set. For a time I got along very well. I sent for my watch and paid the Dutchman his room-rent. I canvassed the town in three weeks and then went on to Honey Grove. Several misfortunes befel me there. The book company failed to send me books for a time, and as a result I again got out of cash. Moreover one night a "stinging lizard," a species of small scorpion, very common in that state, got in my bed. I raised such a howl about eleven o'clock that my landlady thought I was having a fight with a burglar. My injuries, however, were not serious. At last my books came. But fate was not done with me yet. The local book dealer, jealous of my success, had me arrested for selling goods without a license. I languished one night in the city bastile. Five dollars paid to a young attorney the next day freed me. He showed the police judge very clearly what a vast difference there was between selling goods and merely taking orders. And so the long hot summer slowly passed. My hardest trials were over. True the mosquitoes occasionally made life a burden to me, and I had to pass through the usual discomforts and discouragements of a book agent's life, but I prospered fairly well. By September I actually had accumulated enough to pay my way back to Kansas.
A. K.
EXCHANGES.
The cadets of West Point and Annapolis have appealed to the War and Navy departments from the decision of Secretaries Lamont and Herbert forbidding foot-ball at those institutions.
The Universities of Wisconsin and Minnesota will hold a joint debate April 20.
Harvard has decided to take the negative in the coming debate with Yale, on the question, "Resolved, that members of President's cabinet should have a seat in the House of Representatives."
The last issue of the Sequoia is a Benjamin Harrison issue. An excellent half tone cut of the ex-president adorn the front page, while the contents contain a biographical sketch, a eulogy on Leland Stanford and the introductory lecture on The Development of the National Constitution.
Colorado College at Colorado Springs dedicated her new library building last week. It was erected at a cost of $45,000 and is the gift of N. P. Coburn of Newton, Mass. President Harper of Chicago delivered the dedicatory address.
The University of Wisconsin has a Co-operative Book-buying Association which is meeting with well-merited success.
The Iola Register is one of the ablest weeklies in Kansas. It is edited by genial, brilliant Senator Chas. F. Scott, whom we are proud to count among the friends of the suffrage movement.-The Woman's Column.
The annual report of President Seth Low of Columbia College has just been issued. The number of books added to the library during the year was 19,791. Number of instructors 226. Students 1641.