about her which opened my eyes; she was a baggage, but pretty, very pretty: an alluring little spider. I felt at the time I would go through fire and water to her——"

"Not to mention a pantry window," said Mark, grinning.

"You don't mean to say that you knew that too? Well, well, it might have proved an ugly scrape."

For a year after this incident, the sun shone serenely in the Samphire firmament. The brothers moved up out of Paradise, into the Second Fifth, Paradise Lost, and thence into the First Fifth, Paradise Regained, singing pæans of praise and thanksgiving. This was at the beginning of Mark's third summer half, the half when Archie made a great score at Lord's, carrying out his bat for eighty-seven runs in the first innings; the half, also, when Mark received his "cap,"[#] the night before the match wherein Billy's became cock house at cricket!

[#] The "cap" is the house cricket-cap, given to members of the house eleven.

CHAPTER II

BILLY'S v. BASHAN'S

During this summer half Mark and Jim built some castles, in which, as you will see, they were not called upon to live. If Fate made men dwell in the mansions of their dreams how many of us would find ourselves queerly housed? Mark's castles were military fortresses. He had the pipeclay in his marrow, whereas Jim saw the Queen's red through his friend's spectacles. The boys studied the lives of famous captains, from Miltiades to Wellington, and at tea and breakfast would fight the world's great battles with such well-seasoned troops as chipped plates and saucers, a battered salt-cellar and pepper-pot, a glass milk-jug, and a Britannia metal teapot, which would not pour properly. India, and in particular the Indian frontier, was their battlefield: the scene of a strife such as the world has not yet witnessed; a struggle between the Slav and the Anglo-Saxon for the supremacy of the world. Mark boldly reached for a marshal's bâton; Jim modestly contented himself with the full pay of a general, the Victoria Cross, and a snug little crib in a good hunting country.

Sometimes Archie deigned to listen to them, but he was not encouraging in his comments.

"You, a soldier!" he would exclaim, looking at Mark's narrow chest and skinny arms; "why you'd die of fatigue in your first campaign. I advise you to be a schoolmaster."

"You have f-f-forgotten" (most boys would have said "you don't know"), "you have forgotten," Mark replied, "that Alexander was a small man; and Nelson, and Napoleon, and Wellington."

"Pooh, they were hard as nails."

That same evening Mark said: "I'm g-going to the Gym" (gymnasium) "every day, till I get hard as nails."

"Not in the summer?" Jim exclaimed.

"Yes; I'll have the place to myself—so much the better."

He worked indefatigably, and Jim was asked to feel his biceps about four times a day.

About the middle of June Jim made a discovery. High up, on one of the inside panels of his bedstead, he found the name of a gallant fellow who had fought gloriously in the Indian Mutiny.

"I'd like to sleep in his bed," said Mark.

"What a rum chap you are!" Jim exclaimed.

"If I sleep in his bed I may d-dream of him," Mark replied.

They changed beds with mutual satisfaction; for Jim's had a trick of collapsing in the middle of the night.

Later on Jim made another discovery: subjective this time. Mark was overdoing himself: working mind and muscle too hard. Never was spirit more willing, nor flesh more weak. One day, a sultry day in the middle of July, he fainted in school. That night Billy detained Jim after prayers.

"Entre nous, I am uneasy about Samphire minor," he said. "And as two heads are better than one I've sent for you, his friend and—er—mine. What do you suggest?"

At that moment Jim would have gone to the rack for Billy. As Jim suggested nothing, Billy continued: "The case presents difficulties, but difficulties give an edge to life—don't they?"

"Sometimes," said Jim cautiously; for Billy had a trick of leading fellows on to make fools of themselves.

"Samphire minor goes too fast at his fences."

Billy knew that any allusion to the hunting-field was not wasted on Jim.

"And the fences," continued Billy thoughtfully, "are rather big for Samphire minor."

"And he won't ride cunning," added Jim.

"Just so. Thank you, my dear fellow; you follow me, I see. Now Samphire major, big though he is, takes advantage of the—er—gaps."

"Rather," said Jim.

"Humph!" Billy stroked his ample chin. Jim was reflecting that his tutor was too heavy for a first-flight man, but that in his day he must have been a thruster.

"In fine, not to put too fine a point on it, we must interfere."

"Yes," said Jim, swelling visibly.

"We must head him off, throw him out, teach him that valuable lesson, how to reculer pour mieux sauter."

If Billy had a weakness (a faible, he would have said), it was in the use of French, which he spoke perfectly.

"Ye-es," said Jim, not so confidently.

"Now, how would you set about it?"

"I, sir? If you please, sir, I don't see my way, but I'll follow your lead blindly, sir!"

Billy smiled, and polished his pince-nez.

"We shall move slow. The blind leading the blind. Both of you expect to be in the Sixth next September? Yes. Suppose—I only say suppose—suppose you were left—where you are?"

"Oh, sir!"

"Come, come, I thought Paradise Regained was the jolliest form in the school."

"It is," said Jim, "but——"

"You are rather young and small for the Sixth. Why, God bless me! only the other day you were fags. Now, if I gave you my word that there would be no real loss of time, that you would fare farther and better by taking it easy, what would you say?"

"I say—all right, sir."

"Good boy! Wise boy! Leave the rest to me! I shall see that Samphire major goes up, which is fitting. The height will give him—er—poise, not avoirdupois, of which he has enough already. Samphire minor will not complain if you keep him company. Good night. À propos—will you and Samphire minor dine with us next Tuesday? A glass of champagne will do