THE UNKNOWN QUANTITY

Averages are usually uninteresting and impersonal, and of late they have been losing popularity and influence. The "average man" has found himself the fortunate possessor of inhibitions and high-blood pressure. The "man in the street" has become a Ford owner. The "dangerous criminal" has become a Chicagoan or a victim of temporary insanity. In every class the generality has given way to the particular in point of interest except in the case of the "college student."

Individually the college student is nothing, but collectively he is a problem. As an individual he receives only routine attention; as a class he receives all sorts of gratuitous comment, mostly unfavorable. Individually he only wears clothes, but collectively he sets fashions, or at least such is the opinion of the Illinois Retail Clothiers and Furnishers Association, an organization which can justly afford to be interested in the "college man" inasmuch as it proposes to do something about it. It is prophesied that next spring this problematical personage will array himself in a light gray suit. His hat will be gray: his shoes black. His shirt will be white; his collar soft. His tie will be of a rich cream color. Thus clad he will appear as a figure infinitely more unique than any ordinary individual, for he is in the position of a stranger in his own land.

Now it is certain that the "college man" exists. Too much is written about him to make it possible that he does not. But he is too elusive a person to be easily recognized in his complete state. Now at least a step has been taken toward his identification, but if he is inclined to come forth at last from his long seclusion it is to be feared that upon perceiving that he has cast ahead of him such a shadow as this, he may bolt back into hiding like the ground hog to wait for a more favorable opportunity.