was ready to keep it for me if I had no place for it; and then I was told not to be a fool. That man's opinion of Murray is not worth mentioning.

When we got back to college it was past five o'clock, and between us we managed to find everything that was necessary for tea. I had a fire in my room, but Murray had not one in his; he had tea-cups, but I had none; while I had things to eat, which our cook at home had declared would be useful and I had most reluctantly brought with me. We were in the middle of this very substantial meal when Fred Foster came in, and from his glance round my room I saw that he thought it was a fairly dismal spot.

"Rather like an up-stairs dungeon," I said. "Have you got a better place than this?"

"It is bigger and not so stuffy," he answered; "but it won't make you very jealous."

"You wait until I have got all the things I have just bought, and then you will think this no end of a place," I remarked.

"If any one can get inside," Murray put in.

"It will be rather a squash," I admitted; "I've spent over twelve pounds already."

"That's just the sort of thing you would do," Foster said.

We sat and talked for an hour until Ward burst in, knocking and opening the door at the same moment.

Murray and Foster had been getting on splendidly together, but directly Ward came they hardly said a word. Possibly they did not get much chance, but any one could see that Foster had taken a dislike to Ward at sight.

Murray went away very soon and left the three of us together.

"I've been over to Woodstock in a dog-cart with Bunny Langham and Bob Fraser," Ward said. "By Jove, that cob of Bunny's can move. We got back in five-and-twenty minutes."

As I didn't know how far it was to Woodstock and didn't care, I said nothing, so Ward went on, "Bunny's a rare good sort; you ought to meet him."

"What college is he at?" I asked.

"At the House—Christchurch, you know." I did know, and thought the explanation cheek. "I have hired a gee from Carter's to-morrow, and am going to drive over to Abingdon with Bunny, will you come?"

"To-morrow's Sunday," I said.

"Yes, there is nothing else to do. The better the day the——" But I interrupted him.

"Don't talk rot, I hate those things. Are you going in a dog-cart?" I asked.

"Yes, it is Bunny's cart."

"I am jolly well not going to sit on the back seat of a dog-cart if I can help it; I would rather go about in a perambulator," I said.

"You are so confoundedly particular," he went on with a great guffaw of laughter, "but since it is Bunny's cart and I am going to drive I don't see how we can offer you any other seat."

"Who the blazes is Bunny?" I asked, for his name was beginning to get on my nerves, and Fred Foster sitting as dumb as a mute was enough to upset any one.

"I know him at home, his father is the Marquis of Tillford and his real name is Lord Augustus Langham, only his teeth stick out and every one calls him Bunny," Ward answered.

"Heaps of money?" I said.

"Plenty, I should think."

"Then he is no use to me, though he may be the best fellow in the world," I declared.

"You are a rum 'un, why he is just the sort of man who is some use."

"That depends," Foster said suddenly.

"Yes, it depends," I repeated, though I didn't know exactly what depended.

"What depends?" Ward asked Foster.

"Well, if a man hasn't got much money it is no use knowing a lot of men who have got no end."

"It never struck me that way. Perhaps you are right," and then turning to me, he added, "Come to breakfast anyhow to-morrow morning, Bunny won't be there then."

I promised to go, and then he left us. I walked back to Oriel with Foster and he had got a lot to say about Jack Ward. "Where in the world did you find that man?" was his first remark after we were alone.

"He found me," I said.

"I should lose him as soon as possible," Fred went on.

"I don't think that would be very easy," I answered, "and I don't believe he is a bad sort really."

"I'll bet he never came back from Woodstock in five-and-twenty minutes," Foster said.

CHAPTER III

THE RESULT OF THE FRESHERS' MATCH

If I had to describe in detail the first two or three weeks of my life at Oxford, I think that accusations might be brought against me of having eaten too much, or at any rate too often. Fortunately I had a good digestion, I cannot imagine the fate of a dyspeptic freshman if he had to attend a series of Oxford breakfasts. I have, however, only once encountered a fresher who suffered from dyspepsia, and if there was any other man so afflicted at St. Cuthbert's he probably did not admit his complaint. For we were supposed to be very cultivated at St. Cuthbert's, and at that time it was not good form to hold a roll-call of our diseases at breakfast, to discuss surgical operations at luncheon, and to provide tales of sea-sickness by way of humour at dinner. We kept our complaints to ourselves and were in truth more than a little ashamed of them.

St. Cuthbert's had a reputation of its own. Men in other colleges criticized us very freely. They said that we were prigs, that the 'Varsity boat would never be any good as long as there was a St. Cuthbert's man in it, and other pleasant things which did not annoy me, since I, having been a butt for much personal criticism all my life, can even get some satisfaction from finding that a crowd of other people are as bad as I am. Besides, we had nearly one hundred and fifty men at St. Cuthbert's, and I thought it was absolutely stupid to say we were all prigs and that none of us could row.

The truth of the matter was, as far as I could judge, that at St. Cuthbert's there were often a large number of clever men, and clever men when young can get on one's nerves most terribly. It is all right for men to be clever when they are old or even middle-aged, then allowances are made for them and they may be as odd as they please. But if any one happens to be clever when he is at Oxford, he will have to watch himself closely or he will be called either a genius or a lunatic, and the one is almost as fatal as the other.

In a college as large as St. Cuthbert's it was natural that there should be a number of different sets. We had several men who are best described by the word "bloods"; two or three of them belonged to the Bullingdon, a few of them to Vincent's, of which Club most of "the blues" in the 'Varsity were members, and nearly all had plenty of money and every one of them lived as if they had plenty. I cannot call them athletic, though they and the really athletic set were more or less mixed up together. We had also a very serious set who, I thought, gave themselves far too many airs. Perhaps serious is not quite the right word to apply to them, for one of this gang wrote a comic opera and another wrote a farce; but these were just thrown out in their spare time, and when I attended a reading of the libretto of the comic opera I went so fast asleep that I cannot say how comic it was. But if it had been very funny I should think some one would have laughed loud enough to wake me up. Generally speaking this set seemed to be bent on the reformation of England, a thing which has happened once and is rather a difficult matter for a college debating society to bring about again. The reformation which they were bent upon was not, however, religious, for they thought little of the religion which satisfies ordinary people. One of them told me that religion was merely emotional and sentimental, a crutch for a weak man, and went on to say that their scheme was moral and social, a cry for a better life and against the oppression of the poor. That man bored me terribly, but since one of his own set had told me that he was the cleverest man in Oxford I did not like to tell him what I thought. Besides I was only a fresher who had not yet looked