Page:The Fraternity and the Undergraduate (1923).pdf/189

 nine thousand dollars. Without much trouble we were able to make this refund, and so to reduce our monthly payments to less than one hundred dollars a month. This reduction in our monthly payments made it possible to reduce the rent exacted from the local chapter to one hundred and fifty dollars a month for ten months, and later to one hundred and twenty-five dollars a month, and so to relieve the chapter of a burden which for so many years it had been carrying without complaint. It has never seemed to me that we should quickly relieve the property of debt. The more people who have a part in helping to bear the burden, the more will these men after they become alumni appreciate the value of the house. Perhaps later it may seem desirable again to refund the loan in order that the rent may be reduced to one hundred dollars a month, an amount which the chapter could always easily pay.

There is no likelihood that we shall for many years at least abandon the house notes. There are constant improvements and repairs which need to be made on the house; as it grows, older these will proportionately increase. We realize that the best possible economy is to keep the house in first-class repair, and all this takes money and a good deal of it. Besides this, the house notes give every man an interest in the house and a sense of