Professor Ditson

“ Oliver, my professor, was a scientific bounder, a journalist by instinct, a thief of ideas,—he was always prying! And you know the knavish system of the scientific world. I simply would not publish, and let him share my credit I went on working, I got nearer and nearer making my formula into an experiment, a reality. I told no living soul, because I meant to flash my work upon the world with crushing effect,—to become famous at a blow. I took up the question of pigments to fill up certain gaps. And suddenly, not by design but by accident, I made a discovery in physiology." ”

“ That Doctor Dixon has always recognized the claims of the community as a whole on members of his profession is sufficiently proven by the fact that he is officially connected with so large a number of scientific, philanthropic and educational institutions. ”

“ Ellinor took the candle again; kneeling behind Mr. Dunster’s head, she tried the futile experiment once more.
“Could not a doctor do some good?” she asked of Dixon, in a hopeless voice.
“No!” said he, shaking his head, and looking with a sidelong glance at his master, who seemed to shrivel up and to shrink away at the bare suggestion. “Doctors can do nought, I’m afeard. All that a doctor could do, I take it, would be to open a vein, and that I could do along with the best of them, if I had but my fleam here.” ”

“ Suddenly the Professor started as if he had been electrified. “Why, I had nearly forgotten the most important part of the entertainment! The Other Professor is to recite a Tale of a Pig—I mean a Pig-Tale,” he corrected himself. “It has Introductory Verses at the beginning, and at the end.”
364
“It ca’n’t have Introductory Verses at the end, can it?” said Sylvie.
“Wait till you hear it,” said the Professor: “then you’ll see. I’m not sure it hasn’t some in the middle, as well.” ”

“ At London he was known as a poet, but was still to make his way as a physician; and would perhaps have been reduced to great exigencies but that Mr. Dyson, with an ardour of friendship that has not many examples, allowed him three hundred pounds a year. Thus supported, he advanced gradually in medical reputation, but never attained any great extent of practice or eminence of popularity. A physician in a great city seems to be the mere plaything of fortune; his degree of reputation is, for the most part, totally casual—they that employ him know not his excellence ”

“ Everybody who knows you says you're a regular hard-working old dig."
"There are fools who know other people's business a great deal better than their own," said Dismal stiffly.
"That's right," nodded Ditson, who made a great effort to be rakish in his appearance, but always appeared rather foxy instead. "But I tell you this matter of burning the midnight oil and grinding is not what it's cracked up to be. It makes a man old before his time, and it doesn't amount to much after he has been all through it. Goodness knows we freshmen have to cram hard enough to get through! ”

“ So engrossed had Dixon been in the final stages of his work that for the last seventy-two hours he had literally lived there in his laboratory. It remained now only for him to step outside and test the effect of the little contact grenade, and at the same time get a badly needed taste of fresh air.
He set the safety catch on the little bomb and slipped it into his pocket. As he started for the door he threw back his hood, revealing the ruggedly good-looking face of a young man in the early thirties, with lines of weariness now etched deeply into the clean-cut features. ”

“ Everybody was wanting to do something in recognition of the young man. You brought Mr. Marsellus to our house and introduced him. After that he came alone, again and again, and he got round my husband. Robert thought he was disinterested, and was only taking a scientific interest, and he told him a great deal about what he and Outland had been working on. Then Rosamond’s lawyers came for the papers. Tom Outland had no laboratory of his own. He was allowed the use of a room in the physics building, at my husband’s request. He wanted to be there, because he constantly needed Robert’s help. ”

“ Dr. Dixon] defended their doctrines from the Thirty-nine Articles of the established church, and spoke in the highest terms of the piety and exemplariness of their lives; but his motion was overruled, and sentence pronounced against them. Dr. ——, [Dixon,] one of the heads of houses present, observed, that as these six gentlemen were expelled for having too much religion, it would be very proper to inquire into the conduct of some who had too little; and Mr. —— [Dr. Nowell] was heard to tell their chief accuser, that the university was much obliged to him for his good work. ”

“ In the one branch he most needed,—mathematics,—barring the few first scholars, failure was so nearly universal that no attempt at grading could have had value, and whether he stood fortieth or ninetieth must have been an accident or the personal favor of the professor. ”

“ William Hepworth Dixon.
The reputation of a very successful literary man might have been made on a fourth of what the ex-editor of the 'Athenæum' has done. In the catalogue of the British Museum—excluding his last work, 'The Switzers'—there are fifty-four titles bearing Mr. Dixon's name. He has, from his first literary effort—a play—to his last book of travel, written successively history, biography, essays, and travel, besides having filled the post of editor of the first among literary papers. ”

“ I can say with truth, monsieur, that since I became the head of this establishment no master or teacher has ever been dismissed from it.”
“Yet some have left it, mademoiselle?”
“Many; I have found it necessary to change frequently—a change of instructors is often beneficial to the interests of a school; it gives life and variety to the proceedings; it amuses the pupils, and suggests to the parents the idea of exertion and progress.”
“Yet when you are tired of a professor or maitresse, you scruple to dismiss them?” ”

“ There too he had been treated with revolting injustice. His struggles, his privations, his hard work to raise himself in the social scale, had filled him with such an exalted conviction of his merits that it was extremely difficult for the world to treat him with justice—the standard of that notion depending so much upon the patience of the individual. The Professor had genius, but lacked the great social virtue of resignation. ”

“ Dixon explained. "Things are not going right over there. We have our suspicions of the manager. ... I chose you because I felt when I first met you that you were essentially a man to be trusted. ... I should send you in the first place as an assistant engineer at a salary of two hundred dollars a month, and I want you to report to me, privately, on the general management. Later. ..."
"I must go home first, to Devonshire," Angus put in, and then realized that his stipulation was a form of acceptance.
"By all means," Dixon agreed. "Do you think you could be ready to sail in a fortnight's time? ”

“ "Now, I do not mean to suggest that scientific differences should be settled by universal suffrage, but I do conceive that solid proofs must be met by something more than empty and unsupported assertions. Yet during the two years through which this preposterous controversy has dragged its weary length. Professor Owen has not ventured to bring forward a single preparation in support of his often-repeated assertions.
"The case stands thus, therefore:—Not only are the statements made by me in consonance with the doctrines of the best older authorities, and with those of all recent investigators, but I am quite ready to demonstrate them on the first monkey that comes to hand; ”

“ Mathematics were taught (till 1714) by John Barclay. Among Dixon's pupils John Taylor, of the Hebrew concordance, George Benson, the biblical critic, Caleb Rotheram, head of the Kendal academy, and Henry Winder, author of the ‘History of Knowledge.’
In 1723 (according to Evans's manuscript; Taylor, followed by other writers, gives 1719) Dixon removed to Bolton, Lancashire, as successor to Samuel Bourn (1648–1719) [q. v.] He still continued his academy, and educated several ministers; but took up, in addition, the medical profession, obtaining the degree of M.D. from Edinburgh. ”

“ I'll watch over missus; and as for master, his books are company enough for him, if he should come in."
"I will go," said Margaret. She hung about Dixon for a minute or so, as if afraid and irresolute; then suddenly kissing her, she went quickly out of the room.
"Bless her!" said Dixon. She's as sweet as a nut. There are three people I love: it's missus, Master Frederick, and her. Just them three. That's all. The rest be hanged, for I don't know what they're in the world for. Master was born, I suppose, for to marry missus. If I thought he loved her properly, I might get to love him in time. ”

“ Hewitt shook his head. "I'm afraid you're not quite so lucky as you think, Mr. Dixon," he said. "These drawings have most certainly been out of the house for a little while. Never mind how—we'll talk of that after. There is no time to lose. Tell me, how long would it take a good draughtsman to copy them?"
"They couldn't possibly be traced over properly in less than two or two and a half long days of very hard work," Dixon replied, with eagerness.
"Ah! then, it is as I feared. These tracings have been photographed, Mr. Dixon, and our task is one of every possible difficulty. ”

“ The reason I give higher wisdom to Professor Huskins' wife's thought is, being unprejudiced, but desirous of wisdom, she draws from my spirit more power to probe and penetrate into the aura of those persons who possess the knowledge requisite to answer the questions from a standpoint of experience rather than theory. ”

“ Mr. Richard Yeadon, Simms' great friend; the fascinating Doctor S. H. Dickson, Mr. Wm. Elliott, the champion captor of Devil Fish, and several others. Dr. Dickson introduced him to his literary club, where an agreeable and instructive evening was passed and more of the literati met. Dr. Dickson became an able contributor to the Messenger, and the faculty of the Richmond Medical College once authorized the editor to try to get him to be their associate; and he came very near succeeding. Dr. Dickson was afterwards invited to both New York and Philadelphia. ”

“ Perhaps you have seen a gentleman, Doctor, a fearless man, avoid a quarrel thrust upon him by a low fellow, and avoid it quietly and without loss of dignity. This was Dixie’s behavior.
“We were not a pleasant party on that schooner. I had come to detest Deshay, and he knew it; Lentz would no longer speak to him; the old fellow simply grunted when Deshay addressed him, as if he considered the captain a swine and able to understand the language. Claud did not hate him; he simply loathed him, and yet was dominated by him, and the same was true of Dixie. ”

“ Friedrich Dittes, director of the institute of pedagogy in Vienna, has published a School of Pedagogy, several editions of which have appeared, in which he gives much attention to logic. Dittes is a prominent pedagogue, well known through his writings. He confines himself in his School to teaching only that which is well established and accepted without a doubt. As a practical man who addresses himself mainly to teachers of primary grades, he would not place himself on the pinnacle of the outcome of philosophy, even if he could. ”

“ It's everything. When we were at home, Rosamond was a kind of ideal to me. What she thought about anything, decided it for me. But she's entirely changed. She's become Louie. Indeed, she's worse than Louie. He and all this money have ruined her. Oh, Daddy, why didn't you and Professor Crane get to work and stop all this before it began? You were to blame. You knew that Tom had left something that was worth a lot, both of you. Why didn't you do something? You let it lie there in Crane's laboratory for this—this Marsellus to come along and exploit, until he almost thinks it's his own idea. ”

“ Know, O incredulous reader! that a master stands in a somewhat different relation towards a pretty, light-headed, probably ignorant girl, to that occupied by a partner at a ball, or a gallant on the promenade. A professor does not meet his pupil to see her dressed in satin and muslin, with hair perfumed and curled, neck scarcely shaded by aerial lace, round white arms circled with bracelets, feet dressed for the gliding dance. It is not his business to whirl her through the waltz, to feed her with compliments, to heighten her beauty by the flush of gratified vanity. ”

“ Shepard will take more pains to tell all he knows about it. Nobody takes pains to explain things to boys."
"There is a good enough reason for that," said Julia: "how much would such a boy as Felix or Jack listen to explanations? I think you are a kind of a man, Johnny: you only look like a boy. And you don't look so very much like a boy when you have your glasses on. I think I shall call you Professor, as Sue and Felix do."
"It's great if a boy must be called a man and a professor just because he likes to understand about matters! ”

“ Peter’s life. When he accepted almost the first position offered him, in order to marry at once, and came to take the chair of European history at Hamilton, he was thrown upon his wife for mental companionship. Most of his colleagues were much older than he, but they were not his equals either in scholarship or in experience of the world. The only other man in the faculty who was carrying on important research work was Doctor Crane, the professor of physics. St. Peter saw a good deal of him, though outside his specialty he was uninteresting—a narrow-minded man, and painfully unattractive. ”