I finally took a deferred pass， as they called it， and waited a year and tried again. (You had to pass one of the biological sciences or you couldn’t graduate.) The professor had come back from vacation brown as a berry， brightened， and eagered to explain cellstructure again to his classes. “Well，” he said to me， cheerily when we met in the fist laboratory hour of the term，“we’re going to see cells this time， aren’t we？ ”“Yes， sir，” I said. Students to right of me and to left of me and in front of me were seeing cells， and what’s more， they were quietly drawing pictures of them on their notebooks. Of course， I didn’t see anything.
“We’ll try it，” the professor said to me grimly， “with every adjustment the microscope known to man. As God is my witness， I’ll arrange this glass so that you see cells through it or I’ll give up teaching. In 22 years of botany， I—” He cut off abruptly for he was beginning to quiver all over， like Lionel Barrymore.
So we tried it with every adjustment of the microscope known to man. With only one of them did I see anything but blackness or the familiar lacteal opacity， and that time I saw， to my pleasure and amazement， a variegated constellation of flecks， specks and dots. These I hastily drew. The instructor， noting my activity， came back from an adjoining desk， a smile on his lips and his eyebrows high in hope. He looked at my cell drawing. “What’s that？” He demanded， with a hint of squeal in his voice. “That’s what I saw，” I said. “You didn’t， you didn’t， you didn’t！” He screamed， losing control of his temper instantly， and he bent over and squinted into the microscope. His head snapped up. “That’s your eye！” He shouted. “You’ve fixed the lens so that it reflects！ You’ve drawn your eye！”
我通过了大学里所有要修的课程，然而，植物学却怎么也无法通过。原因是这样的：在一周中，修植物学的学生总要在实验室中花几个小时，透过显微镜观察植物细胞，然而，我在显微镜里从来没有看见过任何东西。