The school never
went on more smoothly than during the first period of his administration,
after he had arranged its duties, and taken his share, and even more than
his share, upon himself. But human nature does not wait for the diploma
of the Apollinean Institute to claim the exercise of it, instincts and
faculties. These young girls saw but little of the youth of the
neighborhood. The mansion-house young men were off at college or in the
cities, or making love to each other's sisters, or at any rate
unavailable for some reason or other. There were a few "clerks,"--that
is, young men who attended shops, commonly called "stores,"--who were
fond of walking by the Institute, when they were off duty, for the sake
of exchanging a word or a glance with any one of the young ladies they
might happen to know, if any such were stirring abroad: crude young men,
mostly, with a great many "Sirs" and "Ma'ams" in their speech, and with
that style of address sometimes acquired in the retail business, as if
the salesman were recommending himself to a customer, "First-rate family
article, Ma'am; warranted to wear a lifetime; just one yard and three
quarters in this pattern, Ma'am; sha'n't I have the pleasure?" and so
forth.
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