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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO 
 
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 BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 SCHOOL DAYS AT RUGBY. 
 
 BY AN OLD BOY. 
 
 TWENTIETH EDITION. 
 PEIOE $1.00. 
 
 SCHOOL DAYS AT RUGBY. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED EDITION. 
 
 WITH TEN DESIGNS BY LAEKIN G. MEAD, JR. 
 
 PBICE $1.50. 
 
 OR 
 
 THE LONG VACATION HOLIDAY OF A LONDON CLERK. 
 
 "With Illustrations by Richard Doyle. 
 PRICE $1.00. 
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 2 Vols. 12mo. $2.00
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD: 
 
 A SEQUEL TO 
 
 SCHOOL DAYS AT RUGBY. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE AUTHOR OF 
 " SCHOOL DAYS AT RUGBY," " SCOURING OF THE WHITE HORSE," ETC. 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 TICKNOIt AND FIELDS 
 
 M DCCC LXII.
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1861, by 
 
 TICKNOR AND FIELDS, 
 
 la the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.
 
 TO 
 
 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL, 
 
 OP 
 
 HARVARD COLLEGE, MASSACHUSETTS, 
 
 THE AMERICAN EDITION OF THIS BOOK 
 
 IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED, 
 
 AS A SMALL ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF THE DELIGHT AND BENEFIT 
 WHICH THE AUTHOR HAS DERIVED FROM HIS WORKS. 
 
 Lincoln's Inn, June 15, 1861. 
 My Dear Lowell, You will see by the foregoing 
 that I have dedicated this book, at least the American 
 edition of it, to you, at which I hope you will neither be 
 surprised nor offended. It is one of the highest rewards 
 an English author can hope for, to be read on your side 
 of the Atlantic, and I have had so many proofs of hearty 
 and kindly sympathy from over the water since I have 
 taken to publishing, that I feel as though I had old friends 
 scattered all about your States, and think of New England 
 pretty much as I do of Yorkshire. To you, as the fore- 
 most of such friends, though unhappily only known to 
 me as yet on paper and by photograph, I turn when I 
 
 iii
 
 IV DEDICATION. 
 
 hear that the last sheets of proof are being made up for 
 Messrs. Ticknor & Fields, and cannot resist the tempta- 
 tion of thus associating your name with a book of mine, 
 as I have already over here had the honor of associating 
 my name with a book of yours. 
 
 The book itself needs no comment. Superficially our 
 youngsters no doubt differ from yours, and the lesson of 
 life has to be learnt under very different surroundings 
 at Harvard and Oxford, in New York or Boston and 
 London. But at bottom it is the same battle, and the 
 Devil, I doubt not, has just such subtle ways, with you as 
 with us, of keeping them back from steady growth in pu- 
 rity, and manliness, and truthfulness. But, however un- 
 like one another the young men of New England and Old 
 England may be, they are a thousand times more like one 
 another than they are like any other human creature the 
 sun shines on. So if the book is, as I hope, one which 
 will do some good to Oxford and Cambridge men if they 
 will try to find out what it means to say, however feebly 
 the meaning may be brought out, I have no fear but that 
 it will do as much for your pupils at Harvard. 
 
 But enough about the book. It seems like fiddling 
 while Rome is burning to be talking of such matters now 
 to any American. My dear friend, you cannot know how 
 deeply all that is soundest and noblest in England is sym- 
 pathizing with you in your great struggle. You must not 
 judge by newspapers or magazines, though so far as I see 
 the best of them are speaking decidedly on the right side. 
 Not so warmly or decidedly as I could wish ; for this our 
 free-trade notions and some hasty and inconsiderate speak- 
 ing and writing on your side will account. But be sure 
 that the issues are appreciated here, and while we see the 
 awfulness of the task you have in hand, we have faith in
 
 DEDICATION. V 
 
 you, we believe that if it can be done you will do it, and 
 we wish you, from the bottom of our hearts, God speed! 
 
 The great tasks of the world are only laid on the strong- 
 est shoulders. We, who have India to guide and train, 
 who have for our task the educating of her wretched peo- 
 ples into free men, who feel that the work cannot be shifted 
 from ourselves and must be done as God would have 
 it done, at the peril of England's own life, can and do feel 
 for you. But as we hope to get through with our own 
 work, as we would ask no meaner work for ourselves, so 
 we rejoice that you, our brethren, have shaken yourselves 
 up to your work, and have put your hands to it in such 
 grim earnest as assures us that the old blood is still the 
 same despite all difference of latitude or longitude. 
 
 And so, with firm faith that your country will quit her- 
 self as England's sister should in this fiery trial time, and 
 with all good wishes to you and yours, believe me ever 
 gratefully and most truly yours, 
 
 THOS. HUGHES.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 VOLUME II; 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PACE 
 
 The Schools, 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Commemoration, 19 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 The Long Walk in Christ-Church Meadows, 34 
 
 CHAPTER TV. 
 Lecturing a Lioness, 56 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 The End of the Freshman's Year, 73 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 The Long Vacation Letter-Bag, 87 
 
 CHAPTER Vn. 
 Amusements at Barton Manor, 107 
 
 CHAPTER Vm. 
 Behind the Scenes, 117 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 A Crisis, 128 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 Brown Patronus, 147 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 Mrjdkv uyav, 1~3 
 
 CHAPTER Xn. 
 Second Year, 193 
 
 vii
 
 Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 PACE. 
 
 CIIAPTER XIII. 
 The River Side, 210 
 
 CHAPTER xrv. 
 The Night-Watch, 22 1 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 Mary in Mayfair, 239 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 What came of the Night-Watch, 253 
 
 CHAPTER XVTI. 
 Hue and Cry, 269. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIH. 
 The Lieutenant's Sentiments and Problems, 283 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 Third Year, 299 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 Afternoon Visitors, 317 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 The Intercepted Letter-Bag, 332 
 
 CHAPTER XXH. 
 Master's Term, 354 
 
 CHAPTER XXIH. 
 From India to Englebourn, 366 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 The Wedding-Day , 378 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 A Meeting in the Street, 891 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 The End, 405 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 The Postscript, 419
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 TIIE SCHOOLS. 
 
 There is no more characteristic spot in Oxford than 
 the quadrangle of the schools. Doubtless in the times 
 when the university held and exercised the privileges of 
 infang-thief and outfang-thief, and other such old-world 
 rights, there must have been a place somewhere within 
 the liberties devoted to examinations even more exciting 
 that the great-go. But since alma mater has ceased to 
 take cognizance of " treasons, insurrections, felonies, and 
 mayhem," it is here in that fateful and inexorable quad- 
 rangle, and the buildings which surround it, that she ex- 
 ercises her most potent spells over the spirits of her chil- 
 dren. I suppose that a man being tried for his life must 
 be more uncomfortable than an undergraduate being ex- 
 amined for his degree, and that to be hung, perhaps 
 even to be pilloried, must be worse than to be plucked. 
 But after all, the feelings in both cases must be essentially 
 the same, only more intense in the former ; and an institu- 
 tion which can examine a man (in literis humanioribus, in 
 humanities so called) once a year for two or three days at 
 a time, has nothing to complain of, though it has no longer 
 the power of hanging him at once out of hand. 
 
 The schools' quadrangle is for the most part a lonely 
 place. Men pass through the melancholy iron gates by 
 which that quadrangle is entered on three sides, from 
 Broad Street, from the Ratcliffe, and from New College 
 Lane, when necessity leads them that way, with alert
 
 2 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 step and silently. No nursemaids or children play about 
 it. Nobody lives in it. Only when the examinations are 
 going on you may see a few hooded figures who walk as 
 though conscious of the powers of academic life and death 
 which they wield, and a good deal of shuddering under- 
 graduate life flitting about the place, luckless youths, in 
 white ties and bands, who arc undergoing the peine forte 
 et dure with different degrees of composure ; and their 
 friends who are there to look after them. You may go in 
 and watch the torture yourself if you are so minded, for 
 the viva voce schools are open to the public. But one 
 such experiment will be enough for you, unless you are 
 very hard-hearted. The sight of the long table, behind 
 which sit Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Co., full-robed, stern 
 of face, soft of speech, seizing their victim in turn, now 
 letting him run a little way as a cat does a mouse, then 
 drawing him back, with claw of wily question, probing him 
 on this side and that, turning him inside out, the row of 
 victims opposite, pale or flushed, of anxious or careless 
 mien, according to temperament, but one and all on the 
 rack as they bend over the alloted paper, or read from the 
 well-thumbed book, the scarcely-less-to-be-pitied row 
 behind, of future victims, " sitting for the schools," as it is 
 called, ruthlessly brought hither by statutes, to watch the 
 sufferings they must hereafter undergo, should fill the 
 friend of suffering humanity with thoughts too deep for 
 tears. Through the long day till four o'clock, or later, the 
 torture lasts. Then the last victim is dismissed ; the men 
 who are " sitting for the schools " fly all ways to their col- 
 leges, silently, in search of relief to their over-wrought 
 feelings, probably also of beer, the undergraduate's uni- 
 versal specific. The beadles close those ruthless doors for 
 a mysterious half-hour on the examiners. Outside in the 
 quadrangle collect by twos and threes the friends of the
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 3 
 
 victims waiting for the re-opening of the door and the dis- 
 tribution of the " testamurs." The testamurs, lady readers 
 will be pleased to understand, are certificates under the 
 hands of the examiners, that your sons, brothers, husbands, 
 perhaps, have successfully undergone the torture. But, if 
 husbands, oh, go not yourselves, and send not your sons to 
 wait for the testamur of the head of your house ; for Ox- 
 ford has seldom seen a sight over which she would more 
 willingly draw the veil with averted face than that of the 
 youth rushing wildly, dissolved in tears, from the schools' 
 quadrangle, and shouting, " Mamma ! papa's plucked ; 
 papa's plucked ! " 
 
 On the occasion at which we have now arrived, the 
 pass-schools are over already ; the paper-work of the can- 
 didates for honors has been going on for the last week. 
 Every morning our three St. Ambrose acquaintance have 
 mustered with the rest for the anxious day's work, after 
 such breakfasts as they have been able to eat under the 
 circumstances. They take their work in very different 
 ways. Grey rushes nervously back to his rooms when- 
 ever he is out of the schools for ten minutes, to look up 
 dates and dodges. lie worries himself sadly over every 
 blunder which he discovers himself to have made, and sits 
 up nearly all night cramming, always hoping for a better 
 to-morrow. Blake keeps up his affected carelessness to 
 the last, quizzing the examiners, laughing over the shots 
 he has been making in the last paper. His shots, it must 
 be said, turn out well for the most part ; in the taste 
 paper particularly, as they compare notes, he seems 
 to have almost struck the bull's-eye in his answers to 
 one or two questions which Hardy and Grey have 
 passed over altogether. When he is wide of the mark 
 he passes it off with some jesting remark " that a fool can 
 ask in five minutes more questions than a wise man
 
 4 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 can answer in a week," or wish " that the examiners would 
 play fair, and change sides of the table for an hour with 
 the candidates, for a finish." But he, too, though he does 
 it on the sly, is cramming with his coach at every availa- 
 ble spare moment. Hardy had finished his reading a full 
 thirty-six hours before the first day of paper-work, and 
 had braced himself for the actual struggle by two good 
 nights' rest and a long day on the river with Tom. He 
 had worked hard from the first, and so had really mastered 
 his books. And now feeling that he has fairly and hon- 
 estly done his best, and that if he fails it will be either from 
 bad luck or natural incapacity, and not from his own fault, 
 he manages to keep a cooler head than any of his compan- 
 ions in trouble. 
 
 The week's paper-work passes off uneventfully ; then 
 comes the viva voce work for the candidates for honors. 
 They go in in alphabetical order, four a day, for one more 
 day's work, the hardest of all, and then there is nothing 
 more to do but wait patiently for the class list. On these 
 days there is a good attendance in the inclosed space to 
 which the public are admitted. The front seats are often 
 occupied by the private tutors of the candidates, who are 
 there, like Newmarket trainers, to see the performances of 
 their stables, marking how each colt bears pressing and 
 comports himself when the pinch comes. They watch the 
 examiners too, carefully, to see what line they take, whether 
 science, or history, or scholarship is likely to tell most, 
 that they may handle the rest of their starters accordingly. 
 Behind them, for the most part, on the hindermost benches 
 of the flight of raised steps, anxious younger brothers and 
 friends sit, for a few minutes at a time, flitting in and out 
 in much unrest, and making the objects of their solicitude 
 more nervous than ever by their sympathy. 
 
 It ia now the afternoon of the second day of the vivd
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 5 
 
 voce examinations in honors. Blake is one of the men in. 
 His tutor, Hardy, Grey, Tom, and other St. Ambrose 
 men, have all been in the schools more or less during his 
 examination, and now Hardy and Tom are waiting outside 
 the doors for the issuing of the testamurs. 
 
 The group is small enough. It is so much of course 
 that a class-man should get his testamur that there is no 
 excitement about it ; generally the man himself stops t<? 
 receive it. 
 
 The only anxious faces in the group are Tom's and 
 Hardy's. They have not exchanged a word for the last 
 few minutes in their short walk before the door. Now 
 the examiners come out and walk away towards their col- 
 leges, and the next minute the door again opens and the 
 clerk of the schools appears with the slips of paper in his 
 hand. 
 
 " Now you'll see if I'm not right," said Hardy, as they 
 gathered to the door with the rest. " I tell you there isn't 
 the least chance for him." 
 
 The clerk read out the names inscribed on the testamurs 
 which he held, and handed them to the owners. 
 
 " Haven't you one for Mr. Blake of St. Ambrose ? " said 
 Tom, desperately, as the clerk was closing the door. 
 
 " No, sir ; none but those I have just given out," an- 
 swered the clerk, shaking his head. The door closed, and 
 they turned away in silence for the first minute. 
 
 " I told you how it would be," said Hardy, as they 
 passed out of the south gate into the Ratcliffe Quadrangle. 
 
 " But he seemed to be doing so well when I was in." 
 
 " You were not there at the time. I thought at first 
 they would have sent him out of the schools at once." 
 
 "In hio divinity, wasn't it?" 
 
 " Yes ; he was asked to repeat one of the Articles, and 
 didn't know three words of it. From that moment I saw 
 1*
 
 6 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 it was all over. The examiner and he both lost their 
 tempers, and it went from bad to worse, till the examiner 
 remarked that he could have answered one of the ques- 
 tions he was asking when he was ten years old, and Blake 
 replied, So could he. They gave him a paper in divinity 
 afterwards, but you could see there was no chance for 
 him." 
 
 " Poor fellow ! what will he do, do you think ? How 
 will he take it?" 
 
 " I can't tell. But I'm afraid it will be a very serious 
 matter for him. He was the ablest man in our year too. 
 What a pity ! " 
 
 They got into St. Ambrose just as the bell for afternoon 
 chapel was going down, and went in. Blake was there, 
 and one look showed him what had happened. In fact he 
 had expected nothing else all day since his breakdown in 
 the Articles. Tom couldn't help watching him during 
 chapel, and afterwards, on that evening, acknowledged to 
 a friend that whatever else you might think of Blake, there 
 was no doubt about his gameness. 
 
 After chapel he loitered outside the door in the quad- 
 rangle, talking just as usual, and before Hall he loitered 
 on the steps in well-feigned carelessness. Everybody else 
 was thinking of his breakdown ; some with real sorrow 
 and sympathy ; others as of any other nine-days' wonder, 
 pretty much as if the favorite for the Derby had broken 
 down ; others with ill-concealed triumph, for Blake had 
 many enemies amongst the men. He himself was con- 
 scious enough of what they were thinking of, but main- 
 tained his easy gay manner through it all, though the effort 
 it cost him was tremendous. The only allusion he made 
 to what had happened which Tom heard was when he 
 asked him to wine. 
 
 "Are you engaged to-night, Brown?" he said. Tom
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFOKD. ( 
 
 answered in the negative. " Come to me, then," he went 
 on. " You won't get another chance in St. Ambrose. I 
 have a few bottles of old wine left ; we may as well floor 
 them ; they won't bear moving to a Hall with their mas- 
 ter." 
 
 And then he turned to some other men and asked them, 
 every one in fact whom he came across, especially the 
 dominant fast set with whom he had chieily lived. These 
 young gentlemen (of whom we had a glimpse at the out- 
 set, but whose company we have carefully avoided ever 
 since, seeing that their sayings and doings were of a kind 
 of which the less said the better) had been steadily going 
 on in their way, getting more and more idle, reckless, and 
 insolent. Their doings had been already so scandalous on 
 several occasions as to call for solemn meetings of the 
 college authorities ; but, no vigorous measures having fol- 
 lowed, such deliberations had only made matters worse, 
 and given the men a notion that they could do what they 
 pleased with impunity. This night the climax had come ; 
 it was as though the flood of misrule had at last broken 
 banks and overflowed the whole college. 
 
 For two hours the wine party in Blake's large ground- 
 floor rooms was kept up with a wild reckless mirth, in 
 keeping with the host's temper. Blake was on his mettle. 
 lie had asked every man with whom he had a speaking 
 acquaintance, as if he wished to face out his disaster at 
 once to the whole world. Many of the men came feeling 
 uncomfortable, and would sooner have stayed away and 
 treated the pluck as a real misfortune. But after all 
 Blake was the best judge of how he liked it to be treated, 
 and, if he had a fancy for giving a great wine on the 
 occasion, the civilest thing to do was to go to it. And so 
 they went, and wondered as much as he could desire at 
 the brilliant coolness of their host, speculating and doubt-
 
 8 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ing nevertheless in their own secret hearts whether it 
 wasn't acting after all. Acting it was, no doubt, and not 
 worth the doing; no acting is. But one must make 
 allowances. No two men take a thing just alike, and 
 very few can sit down quietly when they have lost a fall 
 in life's wrestle, and say, " Well, here I am, beaten no 
 doubt this time. By my own fault too. Now, take a 
 good look at me, my good friends, as I know you all want 
 to do, and say your say out, for I mean getting up again 
 directly and having another turn at it." 
 
 Blake drank freely himself, and urged his guests to 
 drink, which was a superfluous courtesy for the most part. 
 Many of the men left his rooms considerably excited. 
 They had dispersed for an hour or so to billiards, or a 
 stroll in the town, and at ten o'clock reassembled at sup- 
 per parties, of which there were several in college this 
 evening, especially a monster one at Chanter's rooms 
 a " champagne supper," as he had carefully and osten- 
 tatiously announced on the cards of invitation. This 
 flaunting the champagne in their faces had been resented 
 by Drysdale and others, who drank his champagne in 
 tumblers, and then abused it and clamored for beer in 
 the middle of the supper. Chanter, whose prodigality in 
 some ways was only exceeded by his general meanness, 
 had lost his temper at this demand, and insisted that, if 
 they wanted beer, they might send for it themselves, for 
 he wouldn't pay for it. This protest was treated with 
 uproarious contempt, and gallons of ale soon made their 
 appearance in college jugs and tankards. The tables 
 were cleared, and songs (most of them of more than 
 doubtful character), cigars, and all sorts of compounded 
 drinks, from claret cup to egg flip, succeeded. The com- 
 pany, recruited constantly as men came into college, was
 
 TOM BEOWN AT OXFORD. 9 
 
 getting more and more excited every minute. The scouts 
 cleared away and carried off all relics of the supper, and 
 then left ; still the revel went on, till, by midnight, the 
 men were ripe for any mischief or folly -which those 
 among them who retained any brains at all could suggest. 
 The signal for breaking up was given by the host's falling 
 from his seat. Some of the men rose with a shout to put 
 him to bed, which they accomplished with difficulty, after 
 dropping him several times, and left him to snore off the 
 effects of his debauch with one of his boots on. Others 
 took to doing what mischief occurred to them in his rooms. 
 One man, mounted on a chair with a cigar in his mouth 
 which had gone out, was employed in pouring the contents 
 of a champagne bottle with unsteady hand into the clock 
 on the mantel-piece. Chanter was a particular man in 
 this sort of furniture, and his clock was rather a speciality. 
 It was a large bronze figure of Atlas, supporting the 
 globe in the shape of a time-piece. Unluckily the maker, 
 not anticipating the sort of test to which his work would 
 be subjected, had ingeniously left the hole for winding up 
 in the top of the clock, so that unusual facilities existed 
 for drowning the world carrier, and he was already almost 
 at his last tick. One or two men were morally aiding and 
 qbetting, and physically supporting the experimenter on 
 clocks, who found it difficult to stand to his work by him- 
 self. Another knot of young gentlemen stuck to the 
 tables, and so continued to shout out scraps of song, 
 sometimes standing on their chairs, and sometimes 
 tumbling off them. Another set were employed on the 
 amiable work of pouring beer and sugar into three new 
 {fairs of polished leather dress boots, with colored tops 
 to them, which they discovered in the dressing-room. 
 Certainly, as they remarked, Chanter could have no
 
 10 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 possible use for so many dress boots at once, and it was a 
 pity the beer should be wasted ; but on the whole, perhaps, 
 the materials were never meant for combination, and had 
 better have been kept apart. Others had gone away to 
 break into the kitchen, headed by one who had just come 
 into college and vowed he would have some supper ; and 
 others, to screw up an unpopular tutor, or to break into 
 the rooms of some inoffensive freshman. The remainder 
 mustered on the grass in the quadrangle, and began 
 playing leap-frog and larking one another. Amongst 
 these last was our hero, who had been at Blake's wine 
 and one of the quieter supper parties ; and, though not 
 so far gone as most of his companions, was by no means 
 in a state in which he would have cared to meet the Dean. 
 He lent his hearty aid accordingly to swell the noise and 
 tumult, which was becoming something out of the way 
 even for St. Ambrose's. As the leap-frog was flagging, 
 Drysdale suddenly appeared carrying some silver plates 
 which were used on solemn occasions in the common room, 
 and allowed to be issued on special application for gentle- 
 men commoners' parties. A rush was made towards him. 
 
 " Halloo, here's Drysdale with lots of swag," shouted 
 one. " What are you going to do with it ? " cried another. 
 Drysdale paused a moment with the peculiarly sapient 
 look of a tipsy man who has suddenly lost the thread of 
 his ideas, and then suddenly broke out with 
 
 "Hang it; I forget. But let's play at quoits with 
 them." 
 
 The proposal was received with applause, and the game 
 began, but Drysdale soon left it. He had evidently some 
 notion in his head which would not suffer him to turn to 
 any thing else till he had carried it out. He went off 
 accordingly to Chanter's rooms, while the quoits went on 
 in the front quadrangle.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 11 
 
 About this time, however, the Dean and bursar, and 
 the tutors who lived in college, began to be conscious that 
 something unusual was going on. They were quite used 
 to distant choruses, and great noises in the men's rooms, 
 and to a fair amount of shouting and skylarking in the 
 quadrangle, and were long-suffering men not given to 
 interfering ; but there must be an end to all endurance, 
 and the state of things which had arrived could no longer 
 be met by a turn in bed and a growl at the uproars and 
 follies of undergraduates. 
 
 Presently some of the rioters on the grass caught sight 
 of a figure gliding along the side of the quadrangle 
 towards the Dean's staircase. A shout arose that the 
 enemy was up, but little heed was paid to it by the greater 
 number. Then another figure passed from the Dean's 
 staircase to the porter's lodge. Those of the men who 
 had any sense left saw that it was time to quit, and, after 
 warning the rest, went off towards their rooms. Tom on 
 his way to his staircase caught sight of a figure seated in 
 a remote corner of the inner quadrangle, and made for it, 
 impelled by natural curiosity. He found Drysdale seated 
 on the ground with several silver tankards by his side, 
 employed to the best of his powers in digging a hole with 
 one of the college carving-knives. 
 
 " Hollo, Drysdale ! what are you up to ? " he shouted, 
 laying his hand on his shoulder. 
 
 " Providing for poshterity," replied Drysdale, gravely, 
 without looking up. 
 
 " What the deuce do you mean ? Don't be such an ass. 
 The Dean will be out in a minute. Get up and come along." 
 
 " I tell you, old fellow," said Drysdale, somewhat inar- 
 ticulately, and driving his knife into the ground again, 
 " the dons are going to spout the college plate. So I am 
 burying these articles for poshterity "
 
 12 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Hang posterity," said Tom ; " come along directly, or 
 you'll be caught and rusticated." 
 
 " Go to bed, Brown you're drunk, Brown," replied 
 Drysdale, continuing his work, and striking the carving- 
 knife into the ground so close to his own thigh that it 
 made Tom shudder. 
 
 " Here they are then," he cried the next moment, seiz- 
 ing Drysdale by the arm, as a rush of men came through 
 the passage into the back quadrangle, shouting and tum- 
 bling along, and making in small groups for the different 
 staircases. The Dean and two of the tutors followed, and 
 the porter bearing a lantern. There was no time to be 
 lost ; so Tom, after one more struggle to pull Drysdale 
 up and hurry him off, gave it up, and leaving him to his 
 fate, ran across to his own staircase. 
 
 For the next half-hour the Dean and his party patrolled 
 the college, and succeeded at last in restoring order, 
 though not without some undignified and disagreeable pas- 
 sages. The lights on the staircases, which generally 
 burnt all night, were of course put out as they approached. 
 On the first staircase which they stormed, the porter's 
 lantern was knocked out of his hand by an unseen adver- 
 sary, and the light put out on the bottom stairs. On the 
 first landing the bursar trod on a small terrier belonging 
 to a fast freshman, and the dog naturally thereupon bit 
 the bursar's leg ; while his master and other enfants per- 
 dus, taking advantage of the diversion, rushed down the 
 dark stairs, past the party of order, and into the quad- 
 rangle, where they scattered amidst a shout of laughter. 
 While the porter was gone for a light, the Dean and his 
 party rashly ventured on a second ascent. Here an un- 
 expected catastrophe awaited them. On the top landing 
 lived one of the steadiest men in college, whose door had 
 been tried shortly before. He had been roused out of his 
 first sleep, and, vowing vengeance on the next comers.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 13 
 
 stood behind his oak, holding his brown George, or huge 
 earthenware receptacle, half full of dirty water, in which 
 his bed-maker had been washing up his tea-things. Hear- 
 ing stealthy steps and whisperings on the stairs below, he 
 suddenly threw open his oak, discharging the whole con- 
 tents of his brown George on the approaching authorities, 
 with a shout of, " Take that for your skulking." 
 
 The exasperated Dean and tutors rushing on, seized 
 on their astonished and innocent assailant, and after re- 
 ceiving explanations, and the offer of clean towels, hur- 
 ried off again after the real enemy. And now the porter 
 appeared again with the light, and, continuing their 
 rounds, they apprehended and disarmed Drysdale, col- 
 lected the college plate, marked down others of the rioters, 
 visited Chanter's rooms, held a parley with the one of 
 their number who was screwed up in his rooms, and dis- 
 covered that the bars had been wrenched out of the 
 kitchen window. After which they retired to sleep on 
 their indignation, and quietly settled down again on the 
 ancient and venerable college. 
 
 The next morning at chapel many of the revellers met ; 
 in fact, there was a fuller attendance than usual, for every 
 one felt that something serious must be pending. After 
 such a night the dons must make a stand, or give up alto- 
 gether. The most reckless only of the fast set were ab- 
 sent. St. Cloud was there", dressed even more precisely 
 than usual, and looking as if he were in the habit of going 
 to bed at ten, and had never heard of milk punch. Tom 
 turned out not much the worse himself, but in his 
 heart feeling not a little ashamed of the whole business ; 
 of the party, the men ; but above all, of himself. He 
 thrust the shame back, however, as well as he could, and 
 put a cool face on it. Probably most of the men were in 
 much the same state of mind. Even in St. Ambrose's, 
 
 reckless and vicious as the college had become, by fur the 
 2
 
 14 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 greater part of the undergraduates would gladly have 
 seen a change in the direction of order and decency, and 
 were sick of the wretched license of doing right in their 
 own eyes, and wrong in every one's else. 
 
 As the men trooped out of chapel, they formed in cor- 
 ners of the quadrangle, except the reading set, who went 
 off quietly to their rooms. There was a pause of a 
 minute or two. Neither principal, dean, tutor, nor fel- 
 low, followed as on ordinary occasions. " They're hatch- 
 ing something in the outer chapel," said one. 
 
 " It'll be a coarse time for Chanter, I take it," said 
 another. 
 
 " Was your name sent to the buttery for his supper?" 
 
 " No, I took d d good care of that," said St. Cloud, 
 who was addressed. 
 
 " Drysdale was caught ; wasn't he ? " 
 
 " So I hear, and nearly frightened the dean and the 
 porter out of their wits by staggering after them with a 
 carving-knife." 
 
 " He'll be sacked, of course." 
 
 " Much he'll care for that." 
 
 " Here they come, then ; by Jove, how black they look ! " 
 
 The authorities now came out of the antechapel door, 
 and walked slowly across towards the principal's house in 
 a body. At this moment, as ill-luck would have it, Jack 
 trotted into the front quadrangle, dragging after him the 
 light steel chain with which he was usually fastened up in 
 Drysdale's scout's room at night. He came innocently 
 towards one and another of the groups, and retired from 
 each much astonished at the low growl with which his 
 acquaintance was repudiated on all sides. 
 
 "Porter, whose dog is that?" said the Dean, catching 
 sight of him. 
 
 "Mr. Drysdale's dog, sir, I think, sir," answered the 
 porter.
 
 TOM BROWN. AT OXFORD. 15 
 
 " Probably the animal who bit me last night," said the 
 bursar. His knowledge of dogs was small ; if Jack had 
 fastened on him he would probably have been in bed from 
 the effects. 
 
 " Turn the dog out of college," said the Dean. 
 
 " Please, sir, he's a very savage dog, sir," said the por- 
 ter, whose respect for Jack was unbounded. 
 
 " Turn him out immediately," replied the Dean. 
 
 The wretched porter, arming himself with a broom 
 approached Jack, and after some coaxing managed to 
 catch hold of the end of his chain, and began to lead him 
 towards the gates, carefully holding out the broom tow- 
 ards Jack's nose with his other hand, to protect himself. 
 Jack at first hauled away at his chain, and then began 
 circling round the porter at the full extent of it, evidently 
 meditating an attack. Notwithstanding the seriousness 
 of the situation, the ludicrous alarm of the porter set the 
 men laughing. 
 
 " Come along, or Jack will be pinning the wretched 
 Copas," said Jervis, and he and Tom stepped up to the 
 terrified little man, and, releasing him, led Jack, who knew 
 them both well, out of college. 
 
 " Were you at that supper party," said Jervis, as they 
 deposited Jack with an ostler, who was lounging outside 
 the gates to be taken to Drysdale's stables. 
 
 " No," said Tom. 
 
 " I'm glad to hear it, there will be a pretty clean sweep 
 after last night's doings." 
 
 " But I was in the quadrangle when they came out." 
 
 " Not caught, eh ? " said Jervis. 
 
 " No, luckily I got to my own rooms at once." 
 
 " Were any of the crew caught ? " 
 
 " Not that I know of." 
 
 " Well, we shall hear enough of it before lecture time.'
 
 16 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Jervis was right. There was a meeting in the common 
 room directly after breakfast. Drysdale anticipating his 
 fate, took his name off before they sent for him. Chanter 
 and three or four others were rusticated for a year, and 
 Blake was ordered to go down at once. He was a 
 scholar, and what was to be done in his case would be set- 
 tled at the meeting at the end of term. 
 
 For twenty-four hours it was supposed that St. Cloud 
 had escaped altogether, but at the end of that time he was 
 summoned before a meeting in the common room. The 
 tutor, whose door had been so effectually screwed up that 
 he had been obliged to get out of his window by a ladder 
 to attend morning chapel, proved wholly unable to appre- 
 ciate the joke, and set himself to work to discover the 
 perpetrators of it. The door was fastened with long 
 gimlets, which were screwed firmly in, and when driven 
 well home their heads had been knocked off. The tutor 
 collected the shafts of the gimlets from the carpenter, who 
 came to effect an entry for him ; and after careful 
 examination, discovered the trade mark. So, putting 
 them in his pocket, he walked off into the town, and soon 
 came back with the information he required, which resulted 
 in the rustication of St. Cloud, an event which was borne 
 by the college with the greatest equanimity. 
 
 Shortly afterwards Tom attended in the schools' quad- 
 rangle again, to be present at the posting of the class list. 
 This time there were plenty of anxious faces ; the 
 quadrangle was full of them. He felt almost as nervous 
 himself as if he were waiting for the third gun. He 
 thrust himself forward, and was amongst the first who 
 caught sight of the document. One look was enough for 
 him, and the next moment he was off at full speed to St. 
 Ambrose, and, rushing headlong into Hardy's rooms, 
 seized him by the hand, and shook it vehemently.
 
 TOM BltOWN AT OXFORD. 17 
 
 " It's all right, old fellow," he cried, as soon as he could 
 catch his breath ; " it's all right. Four firsts ; you're one 
 of them : well done ! " 
 
 " And Grey, where's he ? is he all right ? " 
 
 " Bless me, I forgot to look," said Tom ; " I only read 
 the firsts, and then come off as hard as I could." 
 
 " Then he is not a first." 
 
 " No ; I'm sure of that." 
 
 " I must go and see him ; he deserved it far more than 
 I." 
 
 " No, by Jove, old boy ! " said Tom, seizing him again 
 by the hand, " that he didn't ; nor any man that ever went 
 into the schools." 
 
 " Thank you, Brown," said Hardy, returning his warm 
 grip. " You do one good. Now to see poor Grey, and 
 to write to my dear old father before Hall. Fancy him 
 opening the letter at breakfast the day after to-morrow ! 
 I only hope it won't hurt him." 
 
 " Never fear. I don't believe in people dying of joy, 
 and any thing short of sudden death he won't mind at the 
 price." 
 
 Hardy hurried off, and Tom went to his own rooms, and 
 smoked a cigar to allay his excitement, and thought about 
 his friend and all they had felt together and laughed and 
 mourned over in the short months of their friendship. A 
 pleasant dreamy half-hour he spent thus, till the hall bell 
 roused him, and he made his toilette and went to his 
 dinner. 
 
 It Avas with very mixed feelings that Hardy walked by 
 the servitors' table and took his seat with the bachelors, 
 an equal at last amongst equals. No man who is worth 
 his salt can leave a place where he has gone through hard 
 and searching discipline and been tried in the very depths 
 of his heart without regret, however much he may have 
 2*
 
 18 TOM BKOWN.AT OXFORD. 
 
 winced under the discipline. It is no light thing to fold 
 up and lay by forever a portion of one's life, even when 
 it can be laid by with honor and in thankfulness. 
 
 But it was with no mixed feelings, but with a sense of 
 entire triumph and joy, that Tom watched his friend 
 taking his new place, and the Dons one after another 
 coming up and congratulating him, and treating him as 
 the man who had done honor to them and his college.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 COMMEMORATION. 
 
 The end of the academic year was now at hand, and 
 Oxford was beginning to put on her gayest clothing. The 
 college gardeners were in a state of unusual activity, and 
 the lawns and flower-beds, which form such exquisite 
 settings to many of the venerable grey-gabled buildings, 
 were as neat and as bright as hands could make them. 
 Cooks, butlers, and their assistants, were bestirring them- 
 selves in kitchen and butlery, under the direction of 
 bursars jealous of the fame of their houses, in the 
 preparation of the abundant and solid fare with which 
 Oxford is wont to entertain all comers. Every thing the 
 best of its kind, no stint but no nonsense, seems to be the 
 wise rule which the University hands down and lives up 
 to in these matters. However we may differ as to her 
 degeneracy in other departments, all who have ever visited 
 her will admit that in this of hospitality she is still a great 
 national teacher, acknowledging and preaching by exam- 
 ple the fact, that eating and drinking are important parts 
 of man's life, which are to be allowed their due promi- 
 nence, and not thrust into a corner, but arc to be done 
 soberly and thankfully, in the sight of God and man. 
 The coaches were bringing in heavy loads of visitors ; 
 carriages of all kinds were coming in from the neighboring 
 counties ; and lodgings in the High Street were going up 
 to fabulous prices. 
 
 In one of these Iliirh Street lod^in^s, on the evening
 
 20 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 of the Saturday before Commemoration, Miss Winter and 
 her cousin are sitting. They have been in Oxford during 
 the greater part of the day, having posted up from Engle- 
 bourne, but they have only just come in, for the younger 
 lady is still in her bonnet, and Miss Winter's lies on the 
 table. The windows are wide open, and Miss Winter is 
 sitting at one of them, while her cousin is busied in 
 examining the furniture and decorations of their tempo- 
 rary home, now commenting upon these, now pouring out 
 praises of Oxford. 
 
 " Isn't it too charming ? I never dreamt that any town 
 could be so beautiful. Don't you feel wild about it, 
 Katie?" 
 
 " It is the queen of towns, dear. But I know it well, 
 you see, so that I can't be quite so enthusiastic as you." 
 
 " Oh, those dear gardens ! what was the name of those 
 ones with the targets up, where they were shooting? 
 Don't you remember ? " 
 
 "New College Gardens, on the old city walls, you 
 
 mean 
 
 ?' 
 
 " No, no. They were very nice and sentimental. I 
 should like to go and sit and read poetry there. But I 
 mean the big ones, the gorgeous, princely ones ; with 
 wicked old Bishop Laud's gallery looking into them." 
 
 "Oh! St. John's, .of course." 
 
 " Yes, St. John's. Why do you hate Laud so, Katie?" 
 
 " I don't hate him, dear. He was a Berkshire man, 
 you know. But I think he did a great deal of harm to 
 the Church." 
 
 " How do you think my new silk looked in the gardens ? 
 How lucky I brought it, wasn't it? I shouldn't have 
 liked to have been in nothing but muslins. They don't 
 suit here ; you want something richer amongst the old
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 21 
 
 buildings, and on the beautiful velvety turf of the gardens. 
 How do you think I looked ? " 
 
 " You looked like a queen, dear ; or a lady in waiting, 
 at least." 
 
 " Yes, a lady in waiting on Henrietta Maria. Didn't 
 you hear one of the gentlemen say that she was lodged in 
 St. John's when Charles marched to relieve Gloucester ? 
 Ah ! can't you fancy her sweeping about the gardens, with 
 her ladies following her, and Bishop Laud walking just a 
 little behind her, and talking in a low voice about let 
 me see something very important! " 
 
 " O Mary ! where has your history gone? He was 
 Archbishop, and was safely locked up in the Tower." 
 
 " "Well, perhaps he was ; then he couldn't be with her, 
 of course. How stupid of you to remember, Katie. 
 Why can't you make up your mind to enjoy yourself 
 when you come out for a holiday ? " 
 
 " I sbouldn't enjoy myself any the more for forgetting 
 dates," said Katie, laughing. 
 
 " Ob, you would though ! only try. But, let me see, it 
 can't be Laud. Then it shall be that cruel drinking old 
 man, with the wooden leg made of gold, who was governor 
 of Oxford when the king was away. He must be hob- 
 bling along after the queen in a buff coat and breast-plate, 
 holding his hat with a long drooping white feather in his 
 hand." 
 
 " But you wouldn't like it at all, Mary ; it would be too 
 serious for you. The poor queen would be too anxious 
 to gossip, and you ladies in waiting would be obliged to 
 walk after her without saying a word." 
 
 " Yes, that would be stupid. But then she would have 
 to go away with the old governor to write dispatches ; and 
 some of the young officers with long hair and beautiful 
 lace sleeves, and large boots, whom the king had left be-
 
 22 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 hind, wounded, might come and walk perhaps, or sit in the 
 sun in the quiet gardens." 
 
 Mary looked over her shoulder with the merriest twinkle 
 in her eye, to see how her steady cousin would take this 
 last picture. " The college authorities would never allow 
 that," she said, quietly, still looking out of the window ; 
 "if you wanted beaus, you must have them in black 
 gowns." 
 
 " They would have been jealous of the soldiers, you 
 think ? Well, I don't mind ; the black gowns are very 
 pleasant, only a little stiff. But how do you think my 
 bonnet looked ? " 
 
 " Charmingly. But when are you going to have done 
 looking in the glass ? You don't care for the buildings, I 
 believe, a bit Come and look at St. Mary's; there is such 
 a lovely light on the steeple ! " 
 
 " I'll come directly, but I must get these flowers right 
 I'm sure there are too many in this trimming." 
 
 Mary was tiying her new bonnet on over and over 
 again before the mantel-glass, and pulling out and chang- 
 ing the places of the blush-rose buds with which it was 
 trimmed. Just then a noise of wheels, accompanied by a 
 merry tune on a cornopean, came in from the street. 
 
 " "What's that, Katie ? " she cried, stopping her work for 
 a moment. 
 
 " A coach coming up from Magdalen bridge. I think 
 it is a cricketing party coming home." 
 
 " Oh, let me see ! " and she tripped across to the window, 
 bonnet in hand, and stood beside her cousin. And then, 
 sure enough, a coach covered with cricketers returning 
 from a match, drove past the window. The young ladies 
 looked out at first with great curiosity ; but suddenly find- 
 ing themselves the mark for a whole coach-load of male 
 eyes, shrank back a little before the cricketers had passed
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 23 
 
 on towards the " Mitre." As the coach passed out of sight, 
 Mary gave a pretty toss of her head, and said, 
 
 " Well, they don't want for assurance, at any rate. I 
 think they needn't have stared so." 
 
 " It was our fault," said Katie ; " we shouldn't have been 
 at the window. Besides, you know you are to be a lady 
 in waiting on Henrietta Maria up here, and of course you 
 must get used to being stared at." 
 
 " Oh, yes ! but that was to be by young gentlemen 
 wounded in the wars, in lace ruffles, as one sees them in 
 pictures. That's a very different thing from young gen- 
 tlemen in flannel trousers and straw hats, driving up the 
 High Street on coaches. I declare one of them had the 
 impudence to bow, as if lie knew you." 
 
 " So he does. That was my cousin." 
 
 " Your cousin ! Ah, I remember ! Then he must be 
 my cousin too." 
 
 " No, not at all. He is no relation of yours." 
 
 " "Well, I sha'n't break my heart. But is he a good 
 partner?" 
 
 " I should say, yes. But I hardly know. We used to 
 be a great deal together as children, but papa has been 
 such an invalid lately." 
 
 " Ah ! I wonder how uncle is getting on at the Vice- 
 Chancellor's. Look, it is past eight by St. Mary's. When 
 were we to go ? " 
 
 " We were asked for nine." 
 
 " Then we must go and dress. Will it be very slow 
 and stiff, Katie ? I wish we were going to something not 
 quite so grand." 
 
 " You'll find it very pleasant, I dare say." 
 
 " There won't be any dancing, though, I know ; will 
 there ? " 
 
 " No ; I should think certainly not."
 
 24 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Dear me ! I hope there will be some young men 
 there, I shall be so shy, I know, if there are nothing but 
 wise people. How do you talk to a Regius Professor, 
 Katie ? It must be awful." 
 
 " He will probably be at least as uncomfortable as you, 
 dear," said Miss Winter, laughing, and rising from the 
 window ; " let us go and dress." 
 
 " Shall I wear my best gown ? What shall I put in 
 my hair ? " 
 
 At this moment the door opened, and the maid-servant 
 introduced Mr. Brown. 
 
 It was the St. Ambrose drag which had passed along 
 shortly before, bearing the eleven home from a triumphant 
 match. As they came over Magdalen bridge, Drysdale, 
 who had returned to Oxford as a private gentleman after 
 his late catastrophe, which he had managed to keep a 
 secret from his guardian, and was occupying his usual 
 place on the box, called out, 
 
 " Now, boys, keep your eyes open, there must be plenty 
 of lionesses about ; " and thus warned, the whole load, in- 
 cluding the cornopean player, were on the look-out for 
 lady visitors, profanely called lionesses, all the way up the 
 street. They had been gratified by the sight of several 
 walking in the High Street or looking out of the windows, 
 before they caught sight of Miss Winter and her cousin. 
 The appearance of these young ladies created a sensation. 
 
 " I say, look ! up there in the first floor." 
 
 " By George, they're something like." 
 
 " The sitter for choice." 
 
 " No, no, the standing-up one ; she looks so saucy." 
 
 " Hollo, Brown ! do you know them ? " 
 
 " One of them is my cousin," said Tom, who had just 
 been guilty of the salutation which, as we saw, excited the 
 indignation of the younger lady.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 25 
 
 " What luck ! You'll ask me to meet them when 
 shall it be ? To-morrow at breakfast, I A T ote." 
 
 " I say, you'll introduce me before the ball on Monday ? 
 promise now," said another. 
 
 " I don't know that I shall see any thing of them," said 
 Tom ; " I shall just leave a pasteboard, but I'm not in the 
 humor to be dancing about lionizing." 
 
 A storm of indignation arose at this speech ; the notion 
 that any of the fraternity who had any hold on lionesses, 
 particularly if they were pretty, should not use it to the 
 utmost for the benefit of the rest, and the glory and honor 
 of the college, was revolting to the undergraduate mind. 
 So the whole body escorted Tom to the door of the lodg- 
 ings, impressing upon him the necessity of engaging both 
 his lionesses for every hour of every day in St. Ambrose's, 
 and left him not till they had heard him ask for the young 
 ladies, and seen him fairly on his way up stairs. They 
 need not have taken so much trouble, for in his secret soul 
 he was no little pleased at the appearance of creditable 
 ladies, more or less belonging to him, and would have 
 found his way to see them quickly and surely enough 
 without any urging. Moreover, he had been really fond 
 of his cousin, years before, when they had been boy and 
 girl together. 
 
 So they greeted one another very cordially, and looked 
 one another over as they shook hands, to see what changes 
 time had made. He makes his changes rapidly enough at 
 that age, and mostly for the better, as the two cousins 
 thought. It was nearly three years since they had met, 
 and then he was a fifth-form boy and she a girl in the 
 schoolroom. They were both conscious of a strange 
 pleasure in meeting again, mixed with a feeling of shy- 
 ness, and wonder, whether they should be able to step 
 back into their old relations. 
 3
 
 26 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Mary looked on demurely, really watching them, hut 
 ostensibly engaged on the rosebud trimming. Presently 
 Miss Winter turned to her and said, " I don't think you 
 two ever met before ; I must introduce you, I suppose ; 
 my cousin Tom, my cousin Mary." 
 
 " Then we must be cousins too," said Tom, holding out 
 his hand. 
 
 " No, Katie says not," she answered. 
 
 " I don't mean to believe her, then," said Tom ; " but 
 what are you going to do now, to-night ? Why didn't you 
 write and tell me you were coming ? " 
 
 " We have been so shut up lately, owing to papa's bad 
 health, that I really had almost forgotten you were at 
 Oxford." 
 
 " By the by," said Tom, " where is uncle ? " 
 
 " Oh ! he is dining at the Vice Chancellor's, who is an 
 old College friend of his. We have only been up here 
 three or four hours, and it has done him so much good 
 I am so glad we spirited him up to coming." 
 
 " You haven't made any engagements yet, I hope ? " 
 
 " Indeed we have ; I can't tell how many. We came 
 in time for luncheon in Balliol. Mary and I made it our 
 dinner, and we have been seeing sights ever since, and 
 have been asked to go to, I don't know how many lunch- 
 eons, and breakfasts." 
 
 "What, with a lot of dons, I suppose?" said Tom, 
 spitefully ; " you won't enjoy Oxford then ; they'll bore you 
 to death." 
 
 " There now, Katie ; that is just what I was afraid 
 of," joined in Mary ; " you remember we didn't hear a 
 word about balls all the afternoon." 
 
 " You haven't got your tickets for the balls, then ? " 
 said Tom, brightening up. 
 
 " No ; how shall we get, them ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 27 
 
 " Oh ! I can manage that, I've no doubt." 
 
 " Stop ; how are we to go ? Papa will never take us.' 
 
 " You needn't think about that ; anybody will chap- 
 eron you. Nobody cares about that sort of thing at com- 
 memoration." 
 
 " Indeed I think you had better wait till I have talked 
 to papa." 
 
 " Then all the tickets will be gone," said Tom. " You 
 must go. Why shouldn't I chaperon you ? I know sev- 
 eral men whose sisters are going with them." 
 
 " No, that will scarcely do, I'm afraid. But really, 
 Mary, we must go and dress." 
 
 " Where are you going then ? " said Tom. 
 
 " To an evening party at the Vice-Chancellor's ; we are 
 asked for nine o'clock, and the hall-hour has struck." 
 
 " Hang the dons ; how unlucky that I didn't know be- 
 fore ! Have you any flowers, by the way." 
 
 " Not one." 
 
 " Then I will try to get you some by the time you are 
 ready. May I ? " 
 
 " Oh ! yes, pray do," said Mary. " That's capital, Katie, 
 isn't it? Now I shall have something to put in my hair; 
 I couldn't think what I was to wear." 
 
 Tom took a look at the hair in cmestion, and then left 
 them and hastened out to scour the town for flowers, as if 
 his life depended on success. In the morning, he would 
 probably have resented as insulting, or laughed at as 
 wildly improbable, the suggestion that he would be so em- 
 ployed before night. 
 
 A double chair was thrown up opposite the door when 
 he came back, and the ladies were coming down into the 
 sitting room. 
 
 " Oh, look, Katie ! What lovely flowers ! How very 
 kind of you."
 
 28 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Tom surrendered as much of his burden as that young 
 lady's little round white hands could clasp, to her, and 
 deposited the rest on the table. 
 
 "Now, Katie, which shall I wear this beautiful white 
 rose all by itself, or a wreath of these pansies ? Here, I 
 have a wire : I can make them up in a minute." She 
 turned to the glass, and held the rich cream-white against 
 her hair, and then turning on Tom, added, " What do you 
 think ? " 
 
 " I thought fern would suit your hair better than any 
 thing else," said Tom ; " and so I got these leaves," and 
 he picked out two slender fern leaves. 
 
 " How very kind of you ! Let me see, how do you 
 mean ? Ah ! I see ; it will be charming ; " and so saying, 
 she held the leaves each in one hand to the sides of her 
 head, and then floated about the room for needle and thread, 
 and with a few nimble stitches fastened together the sim- 
 ple green crown, which her cousin put on for her, making 
 the points meet above her forehead. Mary was wild with 
 delight at the effect, and full of thanks to Tom as he 
 helped them hastily to tie up bouquets, and then, amidst 
 much laughing, they squeezed into the wheel chair to- 
 gether, (as the fashions of that day allowed two young 
 ladies to do), and went off to their party, leaving a last 
 injunction on him to go up and put the rest of the flowers 
 in water, and to call directly after breakfast the next day. 
 He obeyed his orders, and pensively arranged the rest of 
 the flowers in the china ornaments on the mantelpiece, 
 and in a soup plate, which he got and placed in the mid- 
 dle of the table, and then spent some minutes examining 
 a pair of gloves and other small articles of women's gear 
 which lay scattered about the room. The gloves particu- 
 larly attracted him, and he flattened them out and laid 
 them on his own large brown hand, and smiled at the
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 29 
 
 contrast, and took other unjustifiable liberties with them ; 
 after which he returned to college and endured much 
 banter as to the time his call had lasted, and promised to 
 engage his cousins, as he called them, to grace some fes- 
 tivities in St. Ambrose's at their first spare moment. 
 
 The next day, being Show Sunday, was spent by the 
 young ladies in a ferment of spiritual and other dissipa- 
 tion. They attended morning service at eight at the 
 cathedral ; breakfasted at a Morton fellow's, from whence 
 they adjourned to University sermon. Here, Mary, after 
 two or three utterly ineffectual attempts to understand 
 what the preacher was meaning, soon relapsed into an ex- 
 amination of the bonnets present, and the doctors and 
 proctors on the floor, and the undergraduates in the gal- 
 lery. On the whole, she was, perhaps, better employed 
 than her cousin, who knew enough of religious party 
 strife to follow the preacher, and was made very uncom- 
 fortable by his discourse, which consisted of an attack 
 upon the recent publications of the most eminent and best 
 men in the University. Poor Miss "Winter came away 
 with a vague impression of the wickedness of all persons 
 who dare to travel out of beaten tracks, and that the most 
 unsafe state of mind in the world is that which inquires 
 and aspires, and cannot be satisfied with the regulation 
 draught of spiritual doctors in high places. Being nat- 
 urally of a reverent turn of mind, she tried to think that 
 the discourse had done her good. At the same time she 
 was somewhat troubled by the thought that somehow the 
 best men in all times of which she had read seemed to her 
 to be just those whom the preacher was in fact denounc- 
 ing, although in words he had praised them as the great 
 lights of the Church. The words which she had heard in 
 one of the lessons kept running in her head, " Truly ye 
 bear witness that ye do allow the deeds of your fathers, 
 3*
 
 30 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 for they indeed killed them, but ye build their sepul- 
 chres." But she had little leisure to think on the subject, 
 and, as her father praised the sermon as a noble protest 
 against the fearful tendencies of the day to Popery and 
 Pantheism, smothered the questionings of her own heart 
 as well as she could, and went off to luncheon in a com- 
 mon room ; after which her father retired to their lodg- 
 ings, and she and her cousin were escorted to afternoon 
 service at Magdalen, in achieving which last feat they had 
 to encounter a crush only to be equalled by that at the pit 
 entrance between the opera on a Jenny Lind night. But 
 what will not a delicately nutured British lady go through 
 when her mind is bent either on pleasure or duty ? 
 
 Poor Tom's feelings throughout the day may be more 
 easily conceived than described. He had called according 
 to order, and waited at their lodgings after breakfast. Of 
 course they did not arrive. He had caught a distant 
 glimpse of them in St. Mary's, but had not been able to 
 approach. He had called again in the afternoon unsuc- 
 cessfully, so far as seeing them was concerned ; but he had 
 found his uncle at home, lying upon the sofa. At first he 
 was much dismayed by this rencontre, but recovering his 
 presence of mind he proceeded, I regret to say, to take the 
 length of the old gentleman's foot, by entering into a 
 minute and sympathizing inquiry into the state of his 
 health. Tom had no faith whatever in his uncle's ill 
 health, and believed, as many persons of robust consti- 
 tution are too apt to do when brought face to face with 
 nervous patients, that he might shake off the whole of 
 his maladies at any time by a resolute effort, so that his 
 sympathy was all sham, though, perhaps, one may pardon 
 it, considering the end in view, which was that of persuad- 
 ing the old gentleman to entrust the young ladies to his 
 nephew's care for that evening in the long walk ; and gen-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 31 
 
 orally to look upon his nephew, Thomas Brown, as his 
 natural prop and supporter in the university, whose one 
 object in life just now would be to take trouble off his 
 hands, and who was of that rare and precocious steadiness 
 of character that he might be as safely trusted as a Span- 
 ish duenna. To a very considerable extent the victim fell 
 into the toils. He had many old friends at the colleges, 
 and was very fond of good dinners, and long sittings after- 
 wards. This very evening he was going to dine at St. 
 John's, and had been much troubled at the idea of having 
 to leave the unrivalled old port of that learned house to 
 escort his daughter and niece to the long walk. Still he 
 was too easy and good-natured not to wish that they might 
 get there, and did not like the notion of their going with 
 perfect strangers. Here was a compromise. His nephew 
 was young, but still he was a near relation, and in fact it 
 gave the poor old man a plausible excuse for not exerting 
 himself as he felt he ought to do, which was all he ever 
 required for shifting his responsibilities and duties upon 
 other shoulders. 
 
 So Tom waited quietly till the young ladies came home, 
 which they did just before hall-time. Mr. Winter was 
 getting impatient. As soon as they arrived he started for 
 St. John's, after advising them to remain at home for the 
 rest of the evening, as they looked quite tired and knocked 
 up ; but if they were resolved to go to the long walk, his 
 nephew would escort them. 
 
 " How can Uncle Robert say we look so tired ? " said 
 Mary, consulting the glass on the subject ; " I feel quite 
 fresh. Of course, Katie, you mean to go to the long 
 walk?" 
 
 " I hope you will go," said Tom ; " I think you owe mo 
 borne amends. I came here according to order this morn-
 
 32 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ing, and you were not in, and I have been trying to catch 
 you ever since." 
 
 " We couldn't help it," said Miss Winter ; " indeed we 
 have not had a minute to ourselves all day. I was very 
 sorry to think that we should have brought you here for 
 nothing this morning." 
 
 " But about the long walk, Katie? " 
 
 " Well, don't you think we have done enough for to-day ? 
 I should like to have tea and sit quietly at home, as papa 
 suggested." 
 
 " Do you feel very tired, dear ? " said Mary, seating 
 herself by her cousin on the sofa, and taking her hand. 
 
 " No, dear ; I only want a little quiet and a cup of tea." 
 
 " Then let us stay here quietly till it is time to start. 
 When ought we to get to the long walk ? " 
 
 " About half-past seven," said Tom ; " you shouldn't be 
 much later than that." 
 
 " There you see, Katie, we shall have two hours' per- 
 fect rest. You shall lie upon the sofa and I will read to 
 you, and then we shall go on all fresh again." 
 
 Miss Winter smiled and said, "Very well." She saw 
 that her cousin was bent on going, and she could deny her 
 nothing. 
 
 " May I send you any thing from college ? " said Tom ; 
 " you ought to have something more than tea, I'm sure." 
 
 " Oh ! no, thank you. We dined in the middle of the 
 day." 
 
 " Then I may call for you about seven o'clock," said 
 Tom, who had come unwillingly to the conclusion that he 
 had better leave them for the present. 
 
 " Yes, and mind you come in good time ; we mean to 
 see the whole sight, remember. We are country cousins." 
 
 " You must let me call you cousin then, just for the 
 look of the thiner."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 33 
 
 " Certainly, just for the look of the thing, we will be 
 cousins till further notice." 
 
 " "Well, you and Tom seem to get on together, Mary," 
 said Miss Winter, as they heard the front door close. 
 " I'm learning a lesson from you, though I doubt whether 
 I shall ever be able to put it in practice. "What a blessing 
 it must be not to be shy ! " 
 
 " Are you shy, then ? " said Mary, looking at her cousin 
 with a playful loving smile. 
 
 " Yes, dreadfully. It is positive pain to me to walk 
 into a room where there are people I do not know." 
 
 " But I feel that too. I'm sure now you were much less 
 embarrassed than I last night at the Vice-Chancellor's. I 
 cpiite envied you, you seemed so much at your ease." 
 
 " Did I ? I would have given any thing to be back 
 here quietly. But it is not the same thing with you. You 
 have no real shyness, or you would never have got on so 
 fast with my cousin." 
 
 " Oh ! I don't feel at all shy with him," said Mary, 
 laughing. " How lucky it is that he found us out so soon ! 
 I like him so much. There is a sort of way about him as 
 if he couldn't help himself. I am sure one could turn him 
 round one's finger. Don't you think so ? " 
 
 " I'm not so sure of that. But he always was eoft- 
 hearted, poor boy ! But he isn't a boy any longer. You 
 must take care, Mary. Shall we ring for tea ? "
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE LONG WALK IN CHRISTCHURCH MEADOWS. 
 
 Do well unto thyself and men will speak good of thee, 
 is a maxim as old as King David's time, and just as true 
 now as it was then. Hardy had found it so since the 
 publication of the class list. Within a few days of that 
 event, it was known that his was a very good first. His 
 college tutor had made his own inquiries, and repeated 
 on several occasions in a confidential way the statement 
 that, " with the exception of a want of polish in his Latin 
 and Greek verses, which we seldom get, except in the 
 most finished public school men, Etonians in particular, 
 there has been no better examination in the schools for 
 several years." The worthy tutor went on to take glory 
 to the college, and in a lower degree to himself. He called 
 attention, in more than one common room, to the fact that 
 Hardy had never had any private tuition, but had attained 
 his intellectual development solely in the curriculum pro- 
 vided by St. Ambrose's College for the training of the 
 youth intrusted to her. " He himself, indeed," he would 
 add, " had always taken much interest in Hardy, and had, 
 perhaps, done more for him than would be possible in 
 every case, but only with direct reference to, and in sup- 
 plement of, the college course." 
 
 The principal had taken marked and somewhat pom- 
 pous notice of him, and had graciously intimated his wish, 
 or, perhaps I should say, his will (for he would have 
 been much astonished to be told that a wish of his could
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 35 
 
 count for less than a royal mandate to any man who had 
 been one of his servitors), that Hardy should stand for a 
 fellowship, which had lately fallen vacant. A few weeks 
 before, this excessive affability and condescension of the 
 great man would have wounded Hardy ; but, somehow, 
 the sudden rush of sunshine and prosperity, though it had 
 not thrown him off his balance, or changed his estimate 
 of men and things, had pulled a sort of comfortable sheath 
 over his sensitiveness, and given him a second skin, as it 
 were, from which the principal's shafts bounded off in- 
 nocuous, instead of piercing and rankling. At first, the 
 idea of standing for a fellowship at St. Ambrose's was not 
 pleasant to him. He felt inclined to open up entirely new 
 ground for himself, and stand at some other college, where 
 he had neither acquaintance nor association. But on sec- 
 ond thoughts, he resolved to stick to his old college, 
 moved thereto partly by the lamentations of Tom, when 
 he heard of his friend's meditated emigration, but chiefly 
 by the unwillingness to quit a hard post for an easier one, 
 which besets natures like his to their own discomfort, but, 
 may one hope, to the signal benefit of the world at large. 
 Such men may see clearly enough all the advantages of a 
 move of this kind may quite appreciate the ease which 
 it would bring them may be impatient with themselves 
 for not making it at once but when it comes to the ac- 
 tual leaving the old post, even though it may be a march 
 out with all the honors of war, drums beating and colors 
 flying, as it would have been in Hardy's case, somehow 
 or another, nine times out of ten, they throw up the 
 chance at the last moment, if not earlier ; pick up their 
 old arms, growling perhaps at the price they are paving 
 to keep their own self-respect, and .shoulder back into the 
 press to face their old work, muttering, " We are asses :
 
 36 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 we don't know what's good for us ; but we must see this 
 job through somehow, come what may." 
 
 So Hardy stayed on at St. Ambose, waiting for the fel- 
 lowship examination, and certainly, I am free to confess, 
 not a little enjoying the changes in his position and affairs. 
 
 He had given up his low, dark, back rooms to the new 
 servitor, his successor, to whom he had presented all the 
 rickety furniture, except his two Windsor chairs and Ox- 
 ford reading table. The intrinsic value of the gift was 
 not great certainly, but was of importance to the poor 
 raw boy, who was taking his place ; and it was made with 
 the delicacy of one who knew the situation. Hardy's 
 good offices did not stop here. Having tried the bed him- 
 self for upwards of three long years, he knew all the hard 
 places, and was resolved while he stayed up that they 
 should never chafe another occupant as they had him. 
 So he set himself to provide stuffing, and took the lad 
 about with him, and cast a skirt of his newly acquired man- 
 tle of respectability over him, and put him in the way of 
 making himself as comfortable as circumstances would al- 
 low ; never disguising from him all the while that the bed 
 was not to be a bed of roses. In which pursuit, though 
 not yet a fellow, perhaps he was qualifying himself better 
 for a fellowship than he could have done by any amount 
 of cramming for polish in his versification. Not that the 
 electors of St. Ambrose would be likely to hear of or ap- 
 preciate this kind of training. Polished versification 
 would no doubt have told more in that quarter. But we 
 who are behind the scenes may disagree with them, and 
 hold that he who is thus acting out, and learning to un- 
 derstand the meaning of the word "fellowship," is the 
 man for our votes. 
 
 So Hardy had left his rooms and gone out of college, into
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 37 
 
 lodgings near at hand. The sword, epaulettes, and picture 
 of his father's old ship his tutelary divinities, as Tom 
 called them occupied their accustomed place in his new 
 rooms, except that there was a looking-glass over the 
 mantel-piece here, by the side of which the sword hung, 
 instead of in the centre, as it had done while he had no 
 such luxury. His Windsor chairs occupied each side of 
 the pleasant window of his sitting-room, and already the 
 taste for luxuries, with which he had so often accused him- 
 self to Tom, began to peep out in the shape of one or two 
 fine engravings. Altogether Fortune was smiling on 
 Hardy, and he was making the most of her, like a wise 
 man, having brought her round by proving that he could 
 get on without her, and was not going out of his way to 
 gain her smiles. Several men came at once, even before 
 he had taken his B.A. degree, to read with him, and 
 others applied to know whether he would take a reading 
 party in the long vacation. In short, all things went well 
 with Hardy, and the Oxford world recognized the fact, 
 and tradesmen and college servants became obsequious, 
 and began to bow before him, and recognize him as one 
 of their lords and masters. 
 
 It was to Hardy's lodgings that Tom repaired straight- 
 way, when he left his cousin by blood, and cousin by cour- 
 tesy, at the end of the last chapter. For, running over 
 in his mind all his acquaintance, he at once fixed upon 
 Hardy as the man to accompany him in escorting the 
 ladies to the Long Walk. Besides being his own most 
 intimate friend, Hardy was the man whom he would prefer 
 to all others to introduce to ladies now. " A month ago it 
 might have been different," Tom thought ; " he was such 
 an old guy in his dress. But he has smartened up, and 
 wears as good a coat as I do, and looks well enough for 
 anybody, though he never will be much of a dresser. 
 4
 
 38 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Then he will be in a bachelor's gown too, which will look 
 respectable." 
 
 " Here you are ; that's all right ; I'm so glad you're in," 
 he said as he entered the room. " Now I want you to 
 come to the Long Walk with me to-night." 
 
 " Very well ; will you call for me ? " 
 
 " Yes, and mind you come in your best get-up, old fel- 
 low : we shall have two of the prettiest girls who are up, 
 with us." 
 
 " You wont want me, then ; they will have plenty of 
 escort." 
 
 " Not a bit of it. They are deserted by their natural 
 guardian, my old uncle, who has gone out to dinner. Oh, 
 it's all right ; they are my cousins, more like sisters, and 
 my uncle knows we are going. In fact, it was he who 
 settled that I should take them." 
 
 " Yes, but you see I don't know them." 
 
 ''That doesn't matter. I can't take them both myself 
 I must have somebody with me, and I'm so glad to get the 
 chance of introducing you to some of my people. You'll 
 know them all, I hope, before long." 
 
 " Of course I should like it very much, if you are sure 
 it's all right." 
 
 Tom was as perfectly sure as usual, and so the mat- 
 ter was arranged. Hardy was very much pleased and 
 gratified at this proof of his friend's confidence ; and I am 
 not going to say that he did not shave again, and pay most 
 unwonted attention to his toilet before the hour fixed for 
 Tom's return. The fame of Brown's lionesses had spread 
 through St. Ambrose's already, and Hardy had heard of 
 them as well as other men. There was something so 
 unusual to him in being selected on such an occasion, 
 when the smartest men in the college were wishing and 
 plotting for that which came to him unasked, that he may
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 39 
 
 be pardoned for feeling something a little like vanity, 
 while he adjusted the coat which Tom had recently thought 
 of with such complacency, and looked in the glass to see 
 that his gown hung gracefully. The effect on the whole 
 was so good, that Tom was above measure astonished 
 when he came back, and could not help indulging in some 
 gentle chaff as they walked towards the High Street arm 
 in arm. 
 
 The young ladies were quite rested, and sitting dressed 
 and ready for their walk when Tom and Hardy were an- 
 nounced, and entered the room. Miss Winter rose up, 
 surprised and a little embarrassed at the introduction of a 
 total stranger in her father's absence. But she put a good 
 face on the matter, as became a well-bred young woman, 
 though she secretly resolved to lecture Tom in private, 
 as he introduced " My great friend, Mr. Hardy, of our col- 
 lege. My cousins." Mary dropped a pretty little demure 
 courtesy, lifting her eyes for one moment for a glance at 
 Tom, which said as plain as look could speak, " Well, I 
 must say you are making the most of your new-found 
 relationship." He was a little put out for a moment, but 
 then recovered himself, and said, apologetically, 
 " Mr. Hardy is a bachelor, Katie I mean a Bachelor 
 of Arts, and he knows all the people by sight up here. 
 We couldn't have gone to the walk without some one to 
 show us the lions." 
 
 " Indeed, I'm afraid you give me too much credit," said 
 Hardy. " I know most of our dons by sight certainly, but 
 scarcely any of the visitors." 
 
 The awkwardness of Tom's attempted explanation set 
 every thing wrong again. 
 
 Then came one of those awkward pauses, which will oc- 
 cur so very provokingly at the most inopportune times. 
 Miss Winter was seized with one of tlie uncontrollable lits
 
 40 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 of shyness, her bondage to which she had so lately been 
 grieving over to Mary ; and in self-defence, and without 
 meaning in the least to do so, drew herself up, and looked 
 as proud as you please. Hardy, whose sensitiveness, as 
 we have seen, was as keen as a woman's, felt in a mo- 
 ment the awkwardness of the situation, and became as shy 
 as Miss "Winter herself. If the floor would have suddenly 
 opened, and let him through into the dark shop, he would 
 have been thankful ; but, as it would not, there he stood, 
 meditating a sudden retreat from the room, and a tremen- 
 dous onslaught on Tom, as soon as he could catch him 
 alone, for getting him into such a scrape. Tom was pro- 
 voked with them all, for not at once feeling at ease with 
 one another, and stood twirling his cap by the tassel, and 
 looking fiercely at it, resolved not to break the silence. 
 He had been at all the trouble of bringing about this 
 charming situation, and now nobody seemed to like it, or 
 to know what to say or do. They might get themselves 
 out of it as they could, for any thing he cared ; he was not 
 going to bother himself any more. 
 
 Mary looked in the glass, to see that her bonnet was 
 quite right, and then from one to another of her com- 
 panions, in a little wonder at their unaccountable beha- 
 vior, and a little pique that two young men should be 
 standing there like unpleasant images, and not availing 
 themselves of the privilege of trying, at least, to make 
 themselves agreeable to her. Luckily, however, for the 
 party, the humorous side of the tableau struck her with great 
 force, so that when Tom lifted his misanthropic eyes for a 
 moment, and caught hers, they were so full of fun that he 
 had nothing to do but to allow himself, not without a 
 struggle, to break first into a smile and then into a laugh. 
 This brought all eyes to bear on him, and the ice, being 
 once broken, dissolved as quickly as it had gathered.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 41 
 
 " I really can't see what there is to laugh at, Tom," 
 said Miss Winter, smiling herself, nevertheless, and blush- 
 ing a little, as she worked or pretended to work at button- 
 ing one of her gloves. 
 
 " Can't you, Katie ? Well then, isn't it very ridiculous, 
 and enough to make one laugh, that we four should be 
 standing here in a sort of Quaker's meeting, when we 
 ought to be half-way to the Long Walk by this time ? " 
 
 " Oh, do let us start," said Mary ; " I know we shall be 
 missing all the best of the sight." 
 
 " Come along, then," said Tom, leading the way down- 
 stairs, and Hardy and the ladies followed, and they de- 
 scended into the High Street, walking all abreast, the two 
 ladies together, with a gentleman on either flank. This 
 formation answered well enough in High Street, the 
 broad pavement of that celebrated thoroughfare being fa- 
 vorable to an advance in line. But when they had 
 wheeled into Oriel Lane the narrow pavement at once 
 threw the line into confusion, and after one or two fruit- 
 less attempts to take up the dressing they settled down in- 
 to the more natural formation of close column of couples, 
 the leading couple consisting of Mary and Tom, and the 
 remaining couple of Miss Winter and Hardy. It was a 
 lovely midsummer evening, and Oxford was looking her 
 best under the genial, cloudless sky, so that, what with the 
 usual congratulations on the weather, and explanatory re- 
 marks on tfie buildings as they passed along, Hardy man- 
 aged to keep up a conversation with his companion with- 
 out much difficulty. Miss Winter was pleased with his 
 quiet, deferential manner, and soon lost her feeling of shy- 
 ness, and, before Hardy had come to the end of such re- 
 marks as it occurred to him to make, she was taking her 
 fair share in the talk. In describing their day's doings 
 she spoke with enthusiasm of the beauty of Magdalen 
 4*
 
 42 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Chapel, and betrayed a little knowledge of traceries and 
 mouldings, which gave an opening to her companion to 
 travel out of the weather and the names of colleges. 
 Church architecture was just one of the subjects which 
 was sure at that time to take more or less hold on every 
 man at Oxford whose mind was open to the influences of 
 the place. Hardy had read the usual text-books, and 
 kept his eyes open as he walked about the town and 
 neighborhood. To Miss Winter he seemed so learned on 
 the subject, that she began to doubt his tendencies, and 
 was glad to be re-assured by some remarks which fell from 
 him as to the University sermon which she had heard. 
 She was glad to lind that her cousin's most intimate friend 
 was not likely to lead him into the errors of Tractari- 
 anism. 
 
 Meantime, the leading couple were getting on satisfac- 
 torily in their way. 
 
 " Isn't it good of Uncle Robert ? he says that he shall 
 feel quite comfortable as long as you and Katie are with 
 me. In fact, I feel quite responsible already, like an old 
 dragon in a story-book watching a treasure." 
 
 " Yes, but what does Katie say to being made a treas- 
 ure of ? She has to think a good deal for herself; and I 
 am afraid you are not quite certain of being our sole 
 knight and guardian because Uncle Robert wants to get 
 rid of us. Poor old uncle ! " 
 
 " But you wouldn't object, then ? " *" 
 
 " Oh, dear, no at least, not unless you take to looking 
 as cross as you did just now in our lodgings. Of course, 
 I'm all for dragons who are mad about dancing, and never 
 think of leaving a ball-room till the band packs up and 
 the old man shuffles in to put out the lights." 
 
 " Then I shall be a model dragon," said Tom. Twen- 
 ty-four hours earlier he had declared that nothing should
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 43 
 
 induce him to go to the balls ; but his views on the subject- 
 had been greatly modified, and he had been worrying all 
 his acquaintance, not unsuccessfully, for the necessary 
 tickets, ever since his talk with his cousins on the preced- 
 ing evening. 
 
 The scene became more and more gay and lively as 
 they passed out of Christchurch towards the Long "Walk. 
 The town turned out to take its share in the show ; the 
 citizens of all ranks, the poorer ones accompanied by chil- 
 dren of all ages, trooped along cheek by jowl Avith members 
 of the University of all degrees and their visitors, some- 
 what indeed to the disgust of certain of these latter, many 
 of whom declared that the whole thing was spoilt by the 
 miscellaneousness of the crowd, and that " those sort of peo- 
 ple " ought not to be allowed to come to the Long Walk 
 on Show Sunday. However, " those sort of people " 
 abounded, nevertheless, and seemed to enjoy very much, 
 in sober fashion, the solemn march up and down beneath 
 the grand avenue of elms, in the midst of their betters. 
 
 The University was there in strength, from the vice- 
 chancellor downwards. Somehow or another, though it 
 might seem an unreasonable thing at first sight for grave 
 and reverend persons to do, yet most of the gravest of 
 them found some reason for taking a turn in the Long 
 "Walk. As for the undergraduates, they turned out al- 
 most to a man, and none of them more certainly than the 
 young gentlemen, elaborately dressed, who had sneered at 
 the whole ceremony as snobbish an hour or two before. 
 
 As for our hero, he sailed into the meadows thoroughly 
 satisfied for the moment with himself and his convoy. lie 
 had every reason to be so, for though there were many 
 gayer and more fashionably dressed ladies present than 
 his cousin, and cousin by courtesy, there were none there 
 whose laces, figures, and dresses curried more uumistaka-
 
 44 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 bly the marks of that thorough, quiet, high breeding, that 
 refinement which is no mere surface polish, and that fear- 
 less unconsciousness which looks out from pure hearts, 
 which are still, thank God, to be found in so many homes 
 of the English gentry. 
 
 The Long Walk was filling rapidly, and at every half- 
 dozen paces Tom was greeted by some of his friends or 
 acquaintance, and exchanged a word or two with them. 
 But he allowed them one after another to pass by without 
 effecting any introduction. 
 
 " You seem to have a great many acquaintances," said 
 his companion, upon whom none of these salutations were 
 lost. 
 
 " Yes, of course ; one gets to know a great many men 
 up here." 
 
 " It must be very pleasant. But does it not interfere 
 a great deal with your reading ? " 
 
 " No ; because one meets them at lectures, and in Hall 
 and Chapel. Besides," he added in a sudden fit of honesty, 
 " it is my first year. One doesn't read much in one's first 
 year. It is a much harder thing than people think to take 
 to reading, except just before an examination." 
 
 " But your great friend who is walking with Katie 
 what did you say his name is ? " 
 
 " Hardy." 
 
 " Well, he is a great scholar, didn't you say ? " 
 
 " Yes, he has just taken a first class. He is the best 
 man of his year." 
 
 " How proud you must be of him ! I suppose now he 
 is a great reader ? " 
 
 " Yes, he is great at every thing. He is nearly the best 
 oar in our boat. By the way, you will come to the pro- 
 cession of boats to-morrow night ? We are the head boat 
 on the river."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 45 
 
 " Oh, I hope so. Is it a pretty sight? Let us ask Katie 
 about it." 
 
 " It is the finest sight in the world," said Tom, who had 
 never seen it ; " twenty-four eight oars, with their flags 
 flying, and all the crews in uniform. You see the barges 
 over there, moored along the side of the river. You will 
 sit on one of them as we pass." 
 
 "Yes, I think I do," said Mary, looking across the 
 meadow in the direction in which he pointed ; " you mean 
 those great gilded things. But I don't see the river." 
 
 " Shall we walk round there ? It wont take us ten 
 minutes." 
 
 " But we must not leave the walk and all the people. 
 It is so amusing here." 
 
 " Then you will wear our colors at the procession to- 
 morrow ? " 
 
 " Yes, if Katie doesn't mind. At least if they are 
 pretty. "What are your colors ? " 
 
 " Blue and white. I will get you some ribbons to-mor- 
 A>w morning." 
 
 " Very well, and I will make them up into rosettes." 
 
 " Why, do you know them ? " asked Tom, as she bowed 
 to two gentlemen in masters' caps and gowns, whom they 
 met in the crowd. 
 
 " Yes ; at least we met them last night." 
 
 " But do you know who they are ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes ; they were introduced to us, and I talked a 
 great deal to them. And Katie scolded me for it when 
 we got home. No ; I wont say scolded me, but looked 
 very grave over it." 
 
 " They are two of the leaders of the Tractarians." 
 
 " Yes. That was the fun of it. Katie was so pleased 
 and interested with them at first ; much more than I was. 
 But when she found out who they were, she fairly ran
 
 46 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 away, and I stayed and talked on. I don't think they said 
 any thing very dangerous. Perhaps one of them wrote 
 No. 90. Do you know ? " 
 
 " I dare say. But I don't know much about it. How- 
 ever, they must have a bad time of it, I should think, up 
 here with the old dons." 
 
 " But don't you think one likes people who are perse- 
 cuted ? I declare I would listen to them for an hour, 
 though I didn't understand a word, just to show them that I 
 wasn't afraid of them, and sympathized with them. How 
 can people be so ill-natured ? I'm sure they only write 
 what they believe, and think will do good." 
 
 "That's just what most of us feel," said Tom; "we 
 hate to see them put down because they don't agree with 
 the swells up here. You'll see how they will be cheered 
 in the theatre." 
 
 " Then they are not unpopular and persecuted after 
 all?" 
 
 " Oh, yes, by the dons. And that's why we all like 
 them. From fellow-feeling you see, because the dons 
 bully them and us equally." 
 
 " But I thought they were dons too ? " 
 
 " Well, so they are, but not regular dons, you know, 
 like the proctors, and deans, and that sort." 
 
 His companion did not understand this delicate distinc- 
 tion, but was too much interested in watching the crowd 
 to inquire further. 
 
 Presently they met two of the heads of houses walking 
 with several strangers. Every one was noticing them as 
 they passed, and of course Tom was questioned as to 
 who they were. Not being prepared with an answer he 
 appealed to Hardy, who was just behind them talking to 
 Miss Winter. They were some of the celebrities on whom 
 honorary degrees were to be conferred, Hardy said ; a fa-
 
 TOM BROWN AX OXFORD. 47 
 
 mous American author, a foreign ambassador, a "well- 
 known Indian soldier, and others. Then came some more 
 M.A.'s, one of whom this time bowed to Miss Winter. 
 
 " Who was that, Katie ? " 
 
 " One of the gentlemen we met last night. I did not 
 catch his name, but he was very agreeable." 
 
 " Oh, I remember. You were talking to him for a long 
 time after you ran away from me. I was very curious 
 to know what you were saying, you seemed so interested." 
 
 " Well, you seem to have made the most of your time 
 last night," said Tom ; " I should have thought, Katie, you 
 would hardly have approved of him either." 
 
 " But who is he ? " 
 
 " Why, the most dangerous man in Oxford. What do 
 they call him a Germanizer and a rationalist ; isn't it, 
 Ilardv ? " 
 
 " Yes, I believe so," said Hardy. 
 
 " Oh, think of that ! There, Katie ; you had much 
 better have stayed by me after all. A Germanizer, didn't 
 you say ? What a hard word. It must be much worse 
 than Tractarian. Isn't it now ? " 
 
 " Mary, dear, pray take care ; everybody will hear you," 
 said Miss Winter. 
 
 " I wish I thought that everybody would listen to me," 
 replied Miss Mary. " But I really will be very quiet, 
 Katie, only I must know which is the worst, my Trac- 
 tarians or your Germanizer ? " 
 
 " Oh, the Germanizer of course," said Tom. 
 
 " But why ? " said Hardy, who could do no less than 
 break a lance for his companion. Moreover he happened 
 to have strong convictions on these subjects. 
 
 " Why ? Because one knows the worst of where the 
 Tractarians are going. They may go to Home and there's
 
 48 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 an end of it. But the Germanizers are going into tlie 
 abysses, or no one knows where." 
 
 " There, Katie, you hear, I hope," intei*rupted Miss 
 Mary, coming to her companion's rescue before Hardy 
 could bring his artillery to bear, " but what a terrible 
 place Oxford must be. I declare it seems quite full of 
 people whom it is unsafe to talk with." 
 
 " I wish it were, if they were all like Miss Winter's 
 friend," said Hardy. And then the crowd thickened, and 
 they dropped behind again. Tom was getting to think 
 more of his companion and less of himself every minute, 
 when he was suddenly confronted in the walk by Benja- 
 min, the Jew money-lender, smoking a cigar and dressed 
 in a gaudy-figured satin waistcoat and water fall of the 
 same material, and resplendent with jewellery. He had 
 business to attend to in Oxford at this time of the year. 
 Nothing escaped the eyes of Tom's companion. 
 
 " Who was that ? " she said ; " what a dreadful-looking 
 man ! Surely, he bowed as if he knew you ? " 
 
 " I dare say. He is impudent enough for any thing," 
 said Tom. 
 
 " But who is he ? " 
 
 " Oh, a rascally fellow who sells bad cigars and worse 
 wine." 
 
 Tom's equanimity was much shaken by the apparition 
 of the Jew. The remembrance of the bill scene at the 
 public house in the Corn-market, and the unsatisfactory 
 prospect in that matter, with Blake plucked and Drysdale 
 no longer a member of the University and utterly care- 
 less as to his liabilities, came across him, and made him 
 silent and absent. 
 
 He answered at hazard to his companion's remarks for 
 the next minute or two, until, after some particularly in- 
 appropriate reply, she turned her head and looked at him
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 49 
 
 for a moment with steady, wide-open eyes, which brought 
 him to himself, or rather drove him into himself, in no 
 time. 
 
 " I really beg your pardon," he said ; " I was very rude, 
 I fear. It is so strange to me to be walking here with 
 ladies. What were you saying ? " 
 
 "Nothing of any consequence I really forget. But 
 is it a very strange thing for you to walk with ladies 
 here ? " 
 
 " Strange ! I should think it was ! I have never seen a 
 lady that I knew up here, till you came." 
 
 " Indeed ! but there must be plenty of ladies living in 
 Oxford ? " 
 
 " I don't believe there are. At least, we never see 
 them." 
 
 " Then you ought to be on your best behavior when we 
 do come. I shall expect you now to listen to every thing 
 I say, and to answer my silliest questions." 
 
 " Oh, you ought not to be so hard on us." 
 
 " You mean that you are not used to answering silly 
 questions ? How Avise you must all grow, living up here 
 together." 
 
 " Perhaps. But the wisdom doesn't come down to the 
 first-year men ; and so " 
 
 " Well, why do you stop ? " 
 
 " Because I was going to say something you might not 
 like." 
 
 " Then I insist on hearing it. Now, I shall not let you 
 off. You were saying that wisdom does not come so low 
 as first-year men ; and so what? " 
 
 "And so and so, they are not wise." 
 
 " Yes, of course ; but that was not what you were going 
 to say ; and so " 
 
 " And so they were generally agreeable, for wise pco-
 
 50 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 pie are always dull ; and so ladies ought to avoid the 
 dons." 
 
 " And not avoid first-year men ? " 
 
 " Exactly so." 
 
 " Because they are foolish, and therefore fit company 
 for ladies. Now, really " 
 
 " No, no ; because they are foolish, and therefore, they 
 ought to be made wise ; and ladies are wiser than dons." 
 
 " And, therefore, duller, for all wise people, you said, 
 were dull." 
 
 " Not all wise people ; only people who are wise by 
 cramming, as dons ; but ladies are wise by inspiration." 
 
 " And first-year men, are they foolish by inspiration 
 and agreeable by cramming, or agreeable by inspiration 
 and foolish by cramming ? " 
 
 " They are agreeable by inspiration in the society of 
 ladies." 
 
 " Then they can never be agreeable, for you say they 
 never see ladies." 
 
 " Not with the bodily eye, but with the eye of fancy." 
 
 " Then their agreeableness must be all fancy." 
 
 "But it is better to be agreeable in fancy than dull in 
 reality." 
 
 " That depends upon whose fancy it is. To be agree- 
 able in your own fancy is compatible with being as dull 
 in reality as " 
 
 " How you play with words ; I see you wont leave me 
 a shred either of fancy or agreeableness to stand on." 
 
 " Then I shall do you good service. I shall destroy 
 your illusions ; you cannot stand on illusions." 
 
 " But remember what my illusions were, fancy and 
 agreeableness." 
 
 *' But your agreeableness stood on fancy, and your
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 51 
 
 fancy on nothing. You had better settle down at once on 
 the solid baseness of dulness, like the dons." 
 
 " Then I am to found myself on fact, and try to be dull ? 
 "What a conclusion ! But perhaps dulness is no more a 
 fact than fancy ; what is dulness ? " 
 
 " Oh, I do not undertake to define ; you are the best 
 judge." 
 
 " How severe you are! Now, see how generous I am. 
 Dulness in society is the absence of ladies." 
 
 " Alas, poor Oxford ! "Who is that in the velvet 
 sleeves ? Why do you touch your cap ? " 
 
 " That is the proctor. He is our Cerberus ; he has to 
 keep all undergraduates in good order." 
 
 " What a task ! He ought to have three heads." 
 
 " He has only one head, but it is a very long one. And 
 he has a tail like any Basha, composed of pro-proctors, 
 marshals, and bull-dogs, and I don't know what all. But 
 to go back to what we were saying " 
 
 " No don't let us go back. I'm tired of it ; besides, you 
 were just beginning about dulness. How can you expect 
 me to listen now ? " 
 
 " Oh, but do listen, just for two minutes. Will you be 
 serious ? I do want to know what you really think when 
 you hear the case." 
 
 " Well, I will try, for two minutes, mind." 
 
 Upon gaining which permission Tom went off into an 
 interesting discourse on the unnaturalness of men's lives 
 at Oxford, which it is by no means necessary to inflict on 
 my readers. As he was waxing eloquent and sentimen- 
 tal, he chanced to look from his companion's face for a 
 moment in search of a simile, when his eyes alighted on 
 that virtuous member of society, Dick, the factotum of the 
 Choughs, who was taking his turn in the Long Walk with 
 his betters. Dick's face was twisted into an uncomfbrta-
 
 52 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ble grin ; his eyes were fixed on Tom and his companion ; 
 and he made a sort of half motion towards touching his 
 hat, but couldn't quite carry it through, and so passed by. 
 
 " Ah ! aint he a going of it again," he muttered to him- 
 self; "jest like 'em all." 
 
 Tom didn't hear the words, but the look had been quite 
 enough for him, and he broke off short in his speech, and 
 turned his head away, and, after two or three flounder- 
 ings which Mary seemed not to notice, stopped short, and 
 let Miss Winter and Hardy join them. 
 
 " It's getting dark," he said, as they came up ; " the 
 walk is thinning ; ought we not to be going ? Remember, 
 I am in charge." 
 
 " Yes, I think it is time." 
 
 At this moment the great Christ Church bell Tom, 
 by name began to toll. 
 
 " Surely, that can't be Tom ? " Miss "Winter said, who 
 had heard the one hundred and one strokes on former 
 occasions. 
 
 "Indeed it is, though." 
 
 " But how very light it is." 
 
 " It is almost the longest day in the year, and there 
 hasn't been a cloud all day." 
 
 They started to walk home all together, and Tom grad- 
 ually recovered himself, but left the laboring oar to Hardy, 
 who did his work very well, and persuaded the ladies to 
 go on and see the Ratclifie by moonlight, the only time 
 to see it, as he said, because of the shadows, and just to 
 look in at the old quadrangle of St. Ambrose. 
 
 It was almost ten o'clock when they stopped at the lodg- 
 ings in High Street. While they were waiting for the 
 door to be opened, Hardy said, 
 
 " I really must apologize, Miss Winter, to you, for my
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 53 
 
 intrusion to-night. I hope your father will allow me to 
 call on him." 
 
 " Oh, yes ! pray do ; he will be so glad to see any friend 
 of my cousin." 
 
 " And if I can be of any use to him ; or to you, or your 
 sister " 
 
 " My sister ! Oh, you mean Mary ? She is not my 
 sister." 
 
 " I beg your pardon. But I hope you will let me know 
 if there is any thing I can do for you." 
 
 " Indeed we will. Now, Mary, papa will be worrying 
 about us." And so the young ladies said their adieus, and 
 disappeared. 
 
 " Surely, you told me they were sisters," said Hardy, as 
 the two walked away towards college. 
 
 " No, did I ? I don't remember." 
 
 " But they are your cousins ? " 
 
 " Yes ; at least Katie is. Don't you like her ? " 
 
 " Of course ; one can't help liking her. But she says 
 you have not met for two years or more." 
 
 " No more we have." 
 
 " Then I suppose you have seen more of her companion 
 lately ? " 
 
 " Well, if you must know, I never saw her before yes- 
 terday." 
 
 " You don't mean to say that you took me in there to- 
 night when you had never seen one of the young ladies 
 before, and the other not for two years ! Well, upon my 
 word, Brown " 
 
 "Now don't blow me up, old fellow, to-night please 
 don't. There, I give in. Don't hit a fellow when he's 
 down. I'm so low." Tom spoke in such a deprecating 
 tone, that Hardy's wrath passed away. 
 
 " Why, what's the matter ? " he said. " You seemed to
 
 54 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 be full of talk. I was envying your fluency, I know, 
 often." 
 
 " Talk ; yes, so I was. But didn't you see Dick in tlie 
 walk ? You have never heard any thing more ? " 
 
 " No ; but no news is good news." 
 
 " Heigho ! I'm awfully down. I want to talk to you. 
 Let me come up." 
 
 " Come along then." And so they disappeared into 
 Hardy's lodgings. 
 
 The two young ladies, meanwhile, soothed old Mr. Win- 
 ter, who had eaten and drunk more than was good for 
 him, and was naturally put out thereby. They soon man- 
 aged to persuade him to retire, and then followed them- 
 selves first to Mary's room, where that young lady burst 
 out at once, " What a charming place it is ! Oh ! didn't 
 you enjoy your evening, Katie ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but I felt a little awkward without any chape- 
 rone. You seemed to get on very well with my cousin. 
 You scarcely spoke to us in the Long Walk till just be- 
 fore we came away. What were you talking about?" 
 
 Mary burst into a gay laugh. " All sorts of nonsense," 
 she said. " I don't think I ever talked so much nonsense 
 in my life. I hope he isn't shocked. I don't think he is. 
 But I said any thing that came into my head. I couldn't 
 help it. You don't think it wrong?" 
 
 " Wrong, dear ? No, I'm sure you could say nothing 
 wrong." 
 
 " I'm not so sure of that. But, Katie dear, I know 
 there is something on his mind." 
 
 " Why do you think so ? " 
 
 " Oh! because he stopped short twice, and became quite 
 absent, and seemed not to hear any thing I said." 
 
 " How odd ! I never knew him do so. Did you see 
 any reason for it ? "
 
 TOJI BROWN AT OXFORD. 55 
 
 " No ; unless it was two men we passed in the crowd. 
 One was a vulgai"-looking wretch, who Avas smoking 
 a fat black thing, with such a thick nose, covered with 
 jewellery " 
 
 " Not his nose, dear ? " 
 
 "No, but his dress ; and the other was a homely, dried- 
 up little man, like one of your Englebourn troubles. I'm 
 sure there is some mystery about them, and I shall find it 
 out. But how did you like his friend, Katie ? " 
 
 " Very much indeed. I was rather uncomfortable at 
 walking so long with a stranger. But he was very pleas- 
 ant, and is so fond of Tom. I am sure he is a very good 
 friend for him." 
 
 " He looks a good man ; but how ugly ! " 
 
 " Do you think so ? We shall have a hard day to-mor- 
 row. Good-night, dear." 
 
 " Good-night, Katie. But I don't feel a bit sleepy." 
 And so the cousins kissed one another, and Miss Winter 
 went to her own room.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 LECTURING A LIONESS. 
 
 The evening of Show Sunday may serve as a fair 
 sample of what this eventful Commemoration was to our 
 hero. The constant intercourse with ladies, with such 
 ladies as Miss Winter and Mary, young, good-looking, 
 well-spoken, and creditable in all ways, was very delight- 
 ful, and the more fascinating, from the sudden change 
 which their presence wrought in the ordinary mode of life 
 of the place. They would have been charming in any 
 room, but were quite irresistible in his den, which no 
 female presence, except that of his blowsy old bedmaker, 
 had lightened since he had been in possession. All the 
 associations of the freshman's rooms were raised at once. 
 When he came in at night now, he could look sentimen- 
 tally at his arm-chair (christened " The Captain," after 
 Captain Hardy), on which Katie had sat to make break- 
 fast ; or at the brass peg on the door, on which Mary had 
 hung her bonnet and shawl, after displacing his gown. 
 His very teacups and saucers, which were already a mis- 
 cellaneous set of several different patterns, had made a 
 move almost into his affections ; at least, the two one 
 brown, one blue which the young ladies had used. A 
 human interest belonged to them now, and they were no 
 longer mere crockery. He thought of buying two very 
 pretty China ones, the most expensive he could find in 
 Oxford, and getting them to use these for the first time,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 57 
 
 but rejected the idea. The fine new ones, he felt, would 
 never be the same to him. They had come in and used 
 his own rubbish ; that was the great charm. If he had 
 been going to give them cups, no material would have been 
 beautiful enough ; but for his own use after them, the com- 
 moner the better. The material was nothing, the associa- 
 tion every thing. It is marvellous the amount of healthy 
 sentiment of which a naturally soft-hearted undergraduate 
 is capable by the end of the summer term. But sentiment 
 is not all one-sided. The delights which spring from sud- 
 den intimacy with the fairest and best part of the creation, 
 are as far above those of the ordinary unmitigated, under- 
 graduate life, as the British citizen of 18G0 is above the 
 rudimentary personage in prehistoric times from whom he 
 has been gradually improved, up to his present state of 
 enlightenment and perfection. But each state has also its 
 own troubles as well as its pleasures ; and, though the 
 former are a price which no decent fellow would boggle at 
 for a moment, it is useless to pretend that paying them is 
 pleasant. 
 
 Now, at Commemoration, as elsewhere, where men do 
 congregate, if your lady-visitors are not pretty or agreea- 
 ble enough to make your friends and acquaintance eager 
 to know them, and to cater for their enjoyment, and try in 
 all ways to win their favor and cut you out, you have the 
 satisfaction at any rate of keeping them to yourself, 
 though you lose the pleasures which arise from being 
 sought after, and made mucli of for their sakes, and feel- 
 ing raised above the ruck of your neighbors. On the 
 other hand, if they are all this, you might as well try to 
 keep the sunshine and air to yourself. Universal human 
 nature rises up against you ; and, besides, they will not 
 stand it themselves. And, indeed, why should they ?
 
 58 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Women, to be very attractive to all sorts of different 
 people, must have great readiness of sympathy. Many 
 have it naturally, and many work hard in acquiring a good 
 imitation of it. In the first case it is against the nature of 
 such persons to be monopolized for more than a very short 
 time ; in the second, all their trouble would be thrown 
 away if they allowed themselves to be monopolized. 
 Once in their lives, indeed, they will be, and ought to be, 
 and that monopoly lasts, or should last, forever ; but in- 
 stead of destroying in them that which was their great 
 charm, it only deepens and widens it, and the sympathy 
 which was before fitful, and, perhaps, wayward, flows on 
 in a calm and healthy stream, blessing and cheering all 
 who come within reach of its exhilarating and life-giving 
 waters. 
 
 But man of all ages is a selfish animal, and unreasona- 
 ble in his selfishness. It takes every one of us in turn 
 many a shrewd fall in our wrestlings with the world to 
 convince us that we are not to have every thing our own 
 way. "We are conscious in our inmost souls that man is 
 the rightful lord of creation ; and, starting from this eter- 
 nal principle, and ignoring, each man-child of us in turn, 
 the qualifying truth that it is to man in general, including 
 woman, and not to Thomas Brown in particular, that the 
 earth has been given, we set about asserting our kingships 
 each in his own way, and proclaiming ourselves kings 
 from our own little ant-hills of thrones. And then come 
 the struggling* and the downfallings, and some of us learn 
 our lesson and some learn it not. But what lesson ? That 
 we have been dreaming in the golden hours when the 
 vision of a kingdom rose before us ? That there is, in 
 short, no kingdom at all, or that, if there be, we are no 
 heirs of it ?
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 59 
 
 No I take it that, while we make nothing better than 
 that out of our lesson, we shall have to go on spelling at 
 it and stumbling over it, through all the days of our life, 
 till we make our last stumble, and take our final header 
 out of this riddle of a world, which we once dreamed we 
 were to rule over, exclaiming " vanitas vanitatum ! " to the 
 end. But man's spirit will never be satisfied without a 
 kingdom, and was never intended to be satisfied so ; and a 
 wiser than Solomon tells us day by day that our kingdom 
 is about us here, and that we may rise up and pass in 
 when we will at the shining gates which He holds open, 
 for that it is His, and we are joint heirs of it with Him. 
 
 On the whole, however, making allowances for all draw- 
 backs, those Commemoration days were the pleasantest 
 days Tom had ever known at Oxford. He was with his 
 uncle and cousins early and late, devising all sorts of 
 pleasant entertainments and excursions for them, intro- 
 ducing all the pleasantest men of his acquaintance, and 
 taxing all the resources of the college, which at such times 
 were available for undergraduates as well as their betters, 
 to minister to their comfort and enjoyment. And he was 
 well repaid. There was something perfectly new to the 
 ladies, and very piquant in the life and habits of the place. 
 They found it very diverting to be receiving in Tom's 
 rooms, presiding over his breakfasts and luncheons, alter- 
 ing the position of his furniture, and making the place 
 look as pretty as circumstances would allow. Then there 
 was pleasant occupation for every spare hour, and the fetes 
 and amusements were all unlike every thing but them- 
 selves. Of course the ladies at once became enthusiastic 
 St. Ambrosians, and managed in spite of all distractions 
 to find time lor making up rosettes and bows of blue and 
 white, in which to appear at the procession of the boats, 
 which was the great event of the Monday. Fortunately,
 
 GO TO.U BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Mr. Winter had been a good oar in his day, and had pulled 
 in one of the first four-oars in which the University races' 
 liad commenced some thirty-five years before ; and Tom, 
 who had set his mind on managing his uncle, worked him 
 up almost into enthusiasm and forgetfulness of his mala- 
 dies, so that he raised no objection to a five o'clock dinner, 
 find an adjournment to the river almost immediately after- 
 wards. Jervis, who was all-powerful on the river, at 
 Tom's instigation got an arm-chair for him in the best part 
 of the University barge, while the ladies, after walking 
 along the bank with Tom and others of the crew, and 
 being instructed in the colors of the different boats, and 
 the meaning of the ceremony, took their places in the front 
 row on the top of the barge, beneath the awning and the 
 flags, and looked down with hundreds of other fair strang- 
 ers on the scene, which certainly merited all that Tom had 
 said of it on faith. 
 
 The barges above and below the University barge, 
 which occupied the post of honor, were also covered with 
 ladies, and Christchurch meadow swarmed with gay dresses 
 and caps and gowns. On the opposite side the bank was 
 lined with a crowd in holiday clothes, and the punts plied 
 across without intermission loaded with people, till the 
 groups stretched away down the towing-path in an almost 
 continuous line to the starting-place. Then, one after 
 another, the racing-boats, all painted and polished up for 
 the occasion, with the college flags drooping at their sterns, 
 put out and passed down to their stations, and the bands 
 played, and the sun shone his best. And then after a short 
 pause of expectation, the distant bank became all alive, 
 and the groups all turned one way, and came up the tow- 
 ing-path again, and the foremost boat with the blue and 
 white flag shot through the Gut and came up the reach, 
 followed by another, and another, and another, till they
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. Gl 
 
 were tired of counting, and the leading boat was already 
 close to them before the last had come within sight. And 
 the bands played up altogether, and the crowd on both 
 sides cheered as the St. Ambrose boat spurted from the 
 Cherwell, and took the place of honor at the winning-post, 
 opposite the University barge, and close under where they 
 were sitting. 
 
 " Oh, look, Katie dear ; here they are. There's Tom, 
 and Mr. Hardy, and Mr. Jervis ; " and Mary waved her 
 handkerchief and clapped her hands, and was in an 
 ecstasy of enthusiasm, in which her cousin was no whit 
 behind her. The gallant crew of St. Ambrose were by 
 no means unconscious of, and fully appreciated, the com- 
 pliment. 
 
 Then the boats passed up one by one ; and, as each 
 came opposite to the St. Ambrose boat, the crews tossed 
 their oars and cheered, and the St. Ambrose crew tossed 
 their oars and cheered in return ; and the whole ceremony 
 went off in triumph, notwithstanding the casualty which 
 occurred to one of the torpids. The torpids being filled 
 with the refuse of the rowing-men, generally awkward 
 or very young oarsmen, find some difficulty in the act 
 of tossing ; no very safe operation for an unsteady crew. 
 Accordingly, the torpid in question, having sustained her 
 crew gallantly till the saluting point, and allowed them to 
 get their oars fairly into the air, proceeded gravely to 
 turn over on her side, and shoot them out into the stream. 
 
 A thrill rang along the top of the barges, and a little 
 
 scream or two might have been heard even through the 
 
 notes of Annie Laurie, which were filling the air at the 
 
 moment ; but the band played on, and the crew swam 
 
 ashore, and two of the punt-men laid hold of the boat and 
 
 collected the oars, and nobody seemed to think any thing 
 
 of it. 
 
 G
 
 62 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Katie drew a long breath. 
 
 " Are they all out, dear ? " she said ; " can you see ? 1 
 can only count eight." 
 
 " Oh, I was too frightened to look. Let me see ; yes, 
 there are nine ; there's one by himself, the little man pull- 
 ing the weeds off his trousers." 
 
 And so they regained their equanimity, and soon after 
 left the barge, and were escorted to the hall of St. Am- 
 brose by the crew, who gave an entertainment there to 
 celebrate the occasion ; which Mr. Winter was induced to 
 attend and pleased to approve, and which lasted till it was 
 time to dress for the ball, for which a proper chaperone 
 had been providentially found. And so they passed the 
 days and nights of Commemoration. 
 
 But it is not within the scope of this work to chronicle 
 all their doings how, notwithstanding balls at night, 
 they were up to chapel in the morning, and attended 
 flower-shows at Worcester and musical promenades in 
 New College, and managed to get down the river for a 
 picnic at Nuneham, besides seeing every thing that was 
 worth seeing in all the colleges. How it was done, no 
 man can tell ; but done it was, and they seemed only the 
 better for it all. They were waiting at the gates of the 
 theatre amongst the first, tickets in hand, and witnessed 
 the whole scene, wondering no little at the strange mix- 
 ture of solemnity and license, the rush and crowding of 
 the undergraduates into their gallery, and their free and 
 easy way of taking the whole proceedings under their 
 patronage, watching every movement in the amphitheatre 
 and on the floor, and shouting approval or disapproval of 
 the heads of their republic of learning, or of the most 
 illustrious visitors, or cheering with equal vigor the ladies, 
 Her Majesty's ministers, or the prize poems. It is a 
 strange scene certainly, and has probably puzzled many
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. G3 
 
 persons besides young ladies. One can well fancy the as- 
 tonishment of the learned foreigner, for instance, when he 
 sees the head of the University, which he has reverenced 
 at a distance from his youth up, rise in his robes in sol- 
 emn convocation to exercise one of the highest of univer- 
 sity functions, and hears his sonorous Latin periods inter- 
 rupted by " three cheers for the ladies in pink bonnets ! " 
 or, when some man is introduced for an honorary degree, 
 whose name may be known throughout the civilized 
 world, and the vice-chancellor, turning to his compeers, 
 inquires, " Placetne vobis, domini doctores, placetne vobis, 
 magistri," and he hears the voices of doctors and masters 
 drowned in contradictory shouts from the young Demos in 
 the gallery, " Who is he ? " " Non placet ! " " Placet ! " 
 " Why does he carry an umbrella ? " It is thoroughly 
 English, and that is just all that need, or indeed can, be 
 said for it all ; but not one in a hundred of us would alter 
 it if we could, beyond suppressing some of the personali- 
 ties which of late years have gone somewhat too far. 
 
 After the theatre there was a sumptuous lunch in All 
 Souls', and then a fete in St. John's Gai'dens. Now, at 
 the aforesaid luncheon, Tom's feelings had been severely 
 tried ; in fact, the little troubles which, as has been before 
 hinted, are incident to persons, especially young men in 
 his fortunate predicament, came to a head. lie was sep- 
 arated from his cousins a little way. Being a guest, and 
 not an important one in the eyes of the All Souls' fel- 
 lows, he had to find his level ; which was very much be- 
 low that allotted to his uncle and cousins. In short, he 
 felt that they were taking him about, instead of he them 
 which change of position was in itself trying ; and Mary's 
 conduct fanned his slumbering discontent into a flame. 
 There she was, sitting between a fellow of All Souls', 
 who was a collector of pictures and an authority in fine-
 
 64 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 art matters, and the Indian officer who had been so re- 
 cently promoted to the degree of D.C.L. in the theatre. 
 There she sat, so absorbed in their conversation that she 
 did not even hear a remark which he was pleased to ad- 
 dress to her. 
 
 Whereupon he began to brood on his wrongs, and to 
 take umbrage at the catholicity of her enjoyment and en- 
 thusiasm. So long as he had been the medium through 
 which she was brought in contact with others, he had been 
 well enough content that they should amuse and interest 
 her ; but it was a very different thing now. 
 
 So he watched her jealously, and raked up former con- 
 versations, and came to the conclusion that it was his duty 
 to remonstrate with her. He had remarked, too, that she 
 never could talk with him now without breaking away af- 
 ter a short time into badinage. Her badinage certainly 
 was very charming and pleasant, and kept him on the 
 stretch ; but why should she not let him be serious and 
 sentimental when he pleased ? She did not break out in 
 this manner with other people. So he really felt it to be 
 his duty to speak to her on the subject not in the least 
 for his own sake, but for hers. 
 
 Accordingly, when the party broke up, and they started 
 for the fete at St. John's, he resolved to carry out his in- 
 tentions. At first he could not get an opportunity while 
 they were walking about on the beautiful lawn of the 
 great garden, seeing and being seen, and listening to mu- 
 sic, and looking at choice flowers. But soon a chance of- 
 fered. She stayed behind the rest without noticing it, to 
 examine some specially beautiful plant, and he was by her 
 side in a moment, and proposed to show her the smaller 
 garden, which lies beyond, to which she innocently con- 
 sented ; and they were soon out of the crowd, and in com- 
 parative solitude.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. G5 
 
 She remarked that he was somewhat silent and grave, 
 but thought nothing of it, and chatted on as usual, re- 
 marking upon the pleasant company she had been in at 
 luncheon. 
 
 This opened the way for Tom's lecture. 
 
 " How easily you seem to get interested with new peo- 
 ple ! " he began. 
 
 " Do I ? " she said. " Well, don't you think it very 
 natural ? " 
 
 " Wouldn't it be a blessing if people would always say 
 just what they think and mean, though ? " 
 
 " Yes, and a great many do," she replied, looking at 
 him in some wonder, and not quite pleased with the turn 
 things were taking. 
 
 " Any ladies, do you think ? You know we haven't 
 many opportunities of observing." 
 
 " Yes, I think quite as many ladies as men. More, in 
 deed, as far as my small experience goes." 
 
 " You really maintain deliberately that you have met 
 people men and women who can talk to you or any 
 one else for a quarter of an hour quite honestly, and say 
 nothing at all which they don't mean nothing for the 
 sake of flattery, or effect, for instance ? " 
 
 " Oh dear me ! yes, often." 
 
 " Who, for example ? " 
 
 " Our Cousin Katie. Why are you so suspicious and 
 misanthropical ? There is your friend Mr. Hardy, again ; 
 what do you say to him ? " 
 
 " Well, I think you may have hit on an exception. But 
 I maintain the rule." 
 
 " You look as if I ought to object. But I sha'n't. It 
 is no business of mine if you choose to believe any such 
 disagreeable thing about your fellow-creatures." 
 6*
 
 GG TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I don't believe any thing worse about them than 1 do 
 about myself. I know that I can't do it." 
 
 " Well, I am very sorry for you." 
 
 " But I don't think I am any worse than my neighbors." 
 
 " I don't suppose you do. Who are your neighbors ? " 
 
 " Shall I include you in the number ? " 
 
 " Oh, by all means, if you like." 
 
 " But I may not mean that you are like the rest. The 
 man who fell among thieves, you know, had one good 
 neighbor." 
 
 " Now, Cousin Tom," she said, looking up with sparkling 
 eyes, "I can't return the compliment. You meant to 
 make me feel that I was like the rest at least, like what 
 you say they are. You know you did. And now you 
 are just turning round, and trying to slip out of it by say- 
 ing what you don't mean." 
 
 " Well, Cousin Mary, perhaps I was. At any rate, I 
 was a great fool for my pains. I might have known by 
 this time that you would catch me out fast enough." 
 
 " Perhaps you might. I didn't challenge you to set up 
 your palace of truth. But, if we are to live in it, you are 
 not to say all the disagreeable things and hear none of 
 them." 
 
 " I hope not, if they must be disagreeable. But why 
 should they be ? I can't see why you and I, for instance, 
 should not say exactly what we are thinking to one another 
 without being disagreeable." 
 
 " Well, I don't think you made a happy beginning just 
 now." 
 
 " But I am sure we should all like one another the bet- 
 ter for speaking the truth." 
 
 " Yes ; but I don't admit that I haven't been speaking 
 the truth."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. G7 
 
 "You wont understand me. Have I said that you 
 don't speak the truth ? " 
 
 " Yes, you said just now that I don't say what I think 
 and mean. Well, perhaps you didn't exactly say that, but 
 that is what you meant." 
 
 " You are very angry, Cousin Mary. Let us wait 
 till " 
 
 " No, no. It was you who began, and I will not let you 
 off now." 
 
 " Very well, then. I did mean something of the sort. 
 It is better to tell you than to keep it to myself." 
 
 " Yes, and now tell me your reasons," said Mary, look- 
 ing down and biting her lip. Tom was ready to bite his 
 tongue off, but there was nothing now but to go through 
 with it. 
 
 " You make everybody that comes near you think that 
 you are deeply interested in them and their doings. Poor 
 Grey believes that you are as mad as he is about rituals 
 and rubrics. And the boating-men declare that you would 
 sooner see a race than go to the best ball in the world. 
 And you listened to the dean's stale old stories about the 
 schools, and went into raptures in the Bodleian about pic- 
 tures and art with that fellow of Allsouls'. Even our old 
 butler and the cook " 
 
 Here Mary, despite her vexation, after a severe struggle 
 to control it, burst into a laugh, which made Tom pause. 
 
 " Now you can't say that I am not really fond of jellies," 
 she said. 
 
 " And you can't say that I have said any thing so very 
 disagreeable." 
 
 " Oli, but you have, though." 
 
 "At any rate, I have made you laugh." 
 
 " But you didn't mean to do it. Now, go on."
 
 68 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I have nothing more to say. You see my meaning, 
 or you never will." 
 
 " If you have nothing more to say you should not have 
 said so much," said Mary. " You wouldn't have me rude 
 to all the people I meet, and I can't help it if the cook 
 thinks I am a glutton." 
 
 " But you could help letting Grey think that you should 
 like to go and see his night schools." 
 
 " But I should like to see them of all things." 
 
 " And I suppose you would like to go through the 
 manuscripts in the Bodleian with the dean. I heard you 
 talking to him as if it was the dearest wish of your heart, 
 and making a half engagement to go with him this after- 
 noon, when you know that you are tired to death of him, 
 and so full of other engagements that you don't know 
 where to turn." 
 
 Mary began to bite her lips again. She felt half in- 
 clined to cry, and half inclined to get up and box his ears. 
 However, she did neither, but looked up after a moment 
 or two, and said, 
 
 " Well, have you any more unkind things to say ? " 
 
 Unkind, Mary ? " 
 
 " Yes, they are unkind. How can I enjoy any thing 
 now when I shall know you are watching me, and think- 
 ing all sorts of harm of every thing I say and do. How- 
 ever, it doesn't much matter, for we go to-morrow morn- 
 ing." 
 
 " But you will give me credit at least for meaning you 
 well ? " 
 
 " I think you are very jealous and suspicious." 
 
 " You don't know how you pain me when you say 
 that." 
 
 " But I must say what I think."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. G9 
 
 Mary set her little mouth, and looked down, and began 
 tapping her boot with her parasol. There was an awk- 
 ward silence while Tom considered within himself whether 
 she was not right, and whether after all, his own jealousy 
 had not been the cause of the lecture he had been deliver- 
 ing much more than any unselfish wish for Mary's im- 
 provement. 
 
 " It is your turn now," he said presently, leaning for- 
 ward with his elbows on his knees, and looking hard at 
 the gravel. " I may have been foolishly jealous, and I 
 thank you for telling me so. But you can tell me a great 
 deal more if you will, quite as good for me to hear." 
 
 " No, I have nothing to say. I dare say you are open 
 and true, and have nothing to hide or disguise, not even 
 about either of the men we met in the Long Walk on 
 Sunday." 
 
 He winced at this random shaft as if he had been stung, 
 and she saw that it had gone home, and repented the next 
 moment. The silence became more and more embarrass- 
 ing. By good luck, however, their party suddenly ap- 
 peared strolling towards them from the large garden. 
 
 " There's Uncle Robert and Katie, and all of them. 
 Let us join them." 
 
 She rose up and he with her, and as they walked tow- 
 ards the rest he said quickly in a low voice, " Will you 
 forgive me if I have pained you ? I w*as very selfish, and 
 am very sorry." 
 
 " Oh, yes ; we were both very foolish. But we wont do 
 it again." 
 
 " Here you are at last. We have been looking for you 
 everywhere," said Miss Winter, as they came up. 
 
 " I'm sure I don't know how we missed you. We came 
 straight from the music tent to this seat, and have not 
 moved. We knew you must come by sooner or later."
 
 70 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " But it is quite out of the way. It was quite by chance 
 that we came round here." 
 
 " Isn't Uncle Robert tired, Katie ? " said Tom ; " he 
 doesn't look well this afternoon." 
 
 Katie instantly turned to her father, and Mr. Winter 
 declared himself to be much fatigued. So they wished 
 their hospitable entertainers good-by, and Tom hurried 
 off and got a wheel chair for his uncle, and walked by his 
 side to their lodgings. The young ladies walked near the 
 chair also, accompanied by one or two of their acquaint- 
 ance ; in fact, they could not move without an escort. 
 But Tom never once turned his head for a glance at what 
 was going on, and talked steadily on to his uncle, that he 
 might not catch a stray word of what the rest were saying. 
 Despite of all which self-denial, however, he was quite 
 aware somehow when he made his bow at the door that 
 Mary had been very silent all the way home. 
 
 Mr. Winter retired to his room to lie down, and his 
 daughter and niece remained in the sitting-room. Mary 
 sat down and untied her bonnet, but did not burst into her 
 usual flood of comments on the events of the day. Miss 
 Winter looked at her and said, 
 
 " You look tired, dear, and over-excited." 
 
 " Oh, yes, so I am. I've had such a quarrel with Tom." 
 
 " A quarrel you're not serious ? " 
 
 "Indeed I am* though. I quite hated him for five 
 minutes at least." 
 
 " But what did he do ? " 
 
 " Why he taunted me with being too civil to everybody, 
 and it made me so angry. He said I pretended to take 
 an interest in ever so many things, just to please people, 
 when I didn't really care about them. And it isn't true 
 now, Katie ; is it ? " 
 
 " No, dear. He never could have said that. You 
 must have misunderstood him."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 71 
 
 " There, I knew you would say so. And if it were 
 true, I'm sure it isn't wrong. When people talk to you, it 
 is so easy to seem pleased and interested in what they are 
 saying and then they like you, and it is so pleasant to 
 he liked. Now, Katie, do you ever snap people's noses 
 off, or tell them you think them very foolish, and that you 
 don't care, and that what they are saying is all of no con- 
 sequence ? " 
 
 " I, dear ? I couldn't do it to save my life ! " 
 
 " Oh, I was sure you couldn't. And he may say what 
 he will, but I'm quite sure he would not have been pleased 
 if we had not made ourselves pleasant to his friends." 
 
 " That's quite true. He has told me himself half a 
 dozen times how delighted he was to see you so popular." 
 
 " And you, too, Katie ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes. He is very well pleased with me. But it is 
 you who have turned all the heads in the college, Mary. 
 You are queen of St. Ambrose beyond a doubt just now." 
 
 " No, no, Katie ; not more than you, at any rate." 
 
 " I say yes, yes, Mary. You will always be ten times 
 as popular as I ; some people have the gift of it ; I wish 
 I had. But why do you look so grave again ? " 
 
 " Why, Katie, don't you see you are just saying over 
 again, only in a different way, what your provoking cousin 
 I shall call him Mr. Brown, I think, in future was 
 telling me for my good in St. John's Gardens. You saw 
 how long we were away from you : well, he was lecturing 
 me all the time, only think ; and now you are going to 
 tell it me all over again. But go on, dear; I sha'n't 
 mind any thing from you." 
 
 She put her arm round her cousin's waist, and looked 
 up playfully into her face. Miss Winter saw at once that 
 no great harm, perhaps some good, had been done in the 
 passage of arms between her relatives.
 
 72 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " You made it all up," she said, smiling, " before we 
 found you." 
 
 " Only just, though. He begged my pardon just at 
 last, almost in a whisper, when you were quite close to us." 
 
 " And you granted it ? " 
 
 " Yes, of course ; but I don't know that I shall not 
 recall it." 
 
 " I was sure you would be falling out before long, you 
 got on so fast. But he isn't quite so easy to turn round 
 your finger as you thought, Mary." 
 
 " Oh, I don't know that," said Mary, laughingly ; " you 
 saw how humble he looked at last, and what good order 
 he was in." 
 
 " "Well, dear, it's time to think whether we shall go out 
 again." 
 
 " Let me see ; there's the last ball. What do you say ? " 
 
 " Why, I'm afraid poor papa is too tired to take us, and 
 I don't know with whom we could go. We ought to begin 
 packing, too, I think." 
 
 " Very well. Let us have tea quietly at home." 
 
 " I will write a note to Tom to tell him. He has done 
 his best for us, poor fellow, and we ought to consider him 
 a little." 
 
 " Oh, yes, and ask him and his friend Mr. Hardy to tea, 
 as it is the last night." 
 
 " If you wish it, I should be very glad ; they will amuse 
 papa." 
 
 " Certainly, and then he will see that I bear him no 
 malice. And now I will go and just do my hair." 
 
 " Very well ; and we will pack after they leave. How 
 strange home will seem after all this gayety." 
 
 " Yes ; we seem to have been here a month." 
 
 " I do hope we shall find all quiet at Englebourn. I 
 am always afraid of some trouble there."
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 TIIE END OF TIIE FRESHMAN'S TEAK. 
 
 On the morning after Commemoration, Oxford was in 
 a bustle of departure. The play had been played, the 
 long vacation had begun, and visitors and members seemed 
 equally anxious to be off. At the gates of the colleges 
 groups of men in travelling-dresses waited for the coaches, 
 omnibuses, dog-carts, and all manner of vehicles, which 
 were to carry them to the Great Western railway station, 
 at Steventon, or elsewhere to all points of the compass. 
 Porters passed in and out with portmanteaus, gun-cases, 
 and baggage of all kinds, which they piled outside the 
 gates, or carried off to the Mitre or the Angel, under the 
 vigorous and not too courteous orders of the owners. Col- 
 lege servants flitted round the groups to take last instruc- 
 tions, and, if so might be, to extract the balances of extor- 
 tionate bills out of their departing masters. Dog-fanciers 
 were there also, holding terriers ; and scouts from the 
 cricketing-grounds, with bats and pads under their arms ; 
 and hostlers, and men from the boats, all on the same er- 
 rand of getting the last shilling out of their patrons a 
 fawning, obsequious crowd for the most part, with here 
 and there a sturdy Briton who felt that he was only come 
 after his due. 
 
 Through such a group, at the gate of St. Ambrose, 
 Torn and Hardy passed soon after breakfast time, in cap 
 and gown, which costume excited no small astonishment. 
 7
 
 74 TOM BROWN AT OXFOUB. 
 
 " Hullo, Brown, old fellow ! aint you off this morn- 
 ing?" 
 
 " No, I shall be up for a day or two yet." 
 
 " AVish you joy. I wouldn't be staying up over to-day 
 for something." 
 
 " But you'll be at Henley to-morrow ? " said Diogenes, 
 confidently, who stood at the gate in boating coat and flan- 
 nels, a big stick and knapsack, waiting for a companion, 
 with whom he was going to walk to Henley. 
 
 " And at Lord's on Friday," said another. " It will be 
 a famous match ; come and dine somewhere afterwards, 
 and go to the Haymarket with us." 
 
 " You know the Leander are to be at Henley," put in 
 Diogenes, " and Cambi'idge is very strong. There Avill 
 be a splendid race for the cup, but Jervis thinks we are 
 all right." 
 
 " Bother your eternal races ; haven't you had enough 
 of them ? " said the Londoner. " You had much better 
 come up to the little village at once, Brown, and stay 
 there while the coin lasts." 
 
 " It' I get away at all, it will be to Henley," said Tom. 
 
 " Of course, I knew that," said Diogenes, triumphantly ; 
 " our boat ought to be on for the ladies' plate. If only 
 Jervis were not in the University crew ! I thought you 
 were to pull at Henley, Hardy ? " 
 
 " I was asked to pull, but I couldn't manage the time 
 with the schools coming on, and when the examinations 
 were over, it was too late. The crew were picked and 
 half trained, and none of them have broken down." 
 
 " What! every one of them stood putting through the 
 sieve ? They must be a rare crew, then," said another. 
 
 " You're right," said Diogenes. " Oh ! here you are at 
 last," he added, as another man in flannels and knapsack 
 came out of college. " Well, good-by, all, and a pleasant
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 75 
 
 vacation ; we must be off, if we are to be in time to sec 
 our crew pull over the course to-night : " and the two 
 marched off towards Magdalen bridge. 
 
 " By Jove ! " remarked a fast youth, in most elaborate 
 toilette, looking after them, " fancy two fellows grinding 
 off to Henley, five miles an hour, in this sun, when they 
 might drop up to the metropolis by train in half the time ? 
 Isn't it marvellous ? " 
 
 " I should like to be going with them," said Tom. 
 
 " Well, there's no accounting for tastes. Here's our 
 coach." 
 
 " Good-by, then ; " and Tom shook hands, and leaving 
 the coach to get packed with portmanteaus, terriers, and 
 undergraduates, he and Hardy walked off towards the 
 High Street. 
 
 " So you're not going to-day ? " Hardy said. 
 
 " No ; two or three of my old school-fellows are coming 
 up to stand for scholarships, and I must be here to receive 
 them. But it's very unlucky ; I should have liked so to 
 have been at Henley." 
 
 " Look, their carriage is already at the door," said 
 Hardy, pointing up High Street, into which they now 
 turned. There were a dozen post-chaises and carriages 
 loading in front of different houses in the street, and 
 amongst them Mr. Winter's old-fashioned travelling-ba- 
 rouche. 
 
 " So it is," said Tom ; " that's some of uncle's fidgeti- 
 ness ; but he will be sure to dawdle at the last. Come 
 along in." 
 
 " Don't you think I had better stay down-stairs ? It 
 may seem intrusive." 
 
 " No, come along. Why, they asked you to come and 
 Bee the last of them last night, didn't they?" 
 
 Hardy did not require any further urging to induce
 
 76 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 him to follow his inclination ; so the two went up together. 
 The breakfast things were still on the table, at which sat 
 Miss Winter, in her bonnet, employed in examining the 
 bill, with the assistance of Mary, who leant over her 
 shoulder. She looked up as they entered. 
 
 " Oh ! I'm so glad you are come. Poor Katie is so 
 bothered, and I can't help her. Do look at the bill ; is it 
 all right ? " 
 
 Shall I, Katie ? " 
 
 " Yes, please do. I don't see any thing to object to, 
 except, perhaps, the things I have marked. Do you think 
 we ought to be charged half a crown a day for the kitchen 
 fire ? " 
 
 " Fire in June ! and you have never dined at home 
 once ? " 
 
 " No, but we have had tea several times." 
 
 " It is a regular swindle," said Tom, taking the bill and 
 glancing at it. " Here, Hardy, come and help me cut 
 down this precious total." 
 
 They sat down to the bill, the ladies willingly giving 
 place. Mary tripped off to the glass to tie her bonnet. 
 
 " Now that is all right ! " she said, merrily ; " why can't 
 one go on without bills or horrid money ? " 
 
 " Ah ! why can't one ? " said Tom, " that would suit 
 most of our complaints. But where's uncle ? has he seen 
 the bill ? " 
 
 " No ; papa is in his room ; he must not be worried, 
 or the journey will be too much for him." 
 
 Here the ladies'-maid arrived, with a message that her 
 father wished to see Miss Winter. 
 
 " Leave your money, Katie," said her cousin ; " this is 
 gentlemen's business, and Tom and Mr. Hardy will settle 
 it all for us, I am sure." 
 
 Tom professed his entire willingness to accept the
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 77 
 
 charge, delighted at finding himself re-instated in his office 
 of protector at Mary's suggestion. Had the landlord been 
 one of his own tradesmen, or the bill his own bill, he might 
 not have been so well pleased, but, as neither of these was 
 the case, and he had Hardy to back him, he went into the 
 matter with much vigor and discretion, and had the land- 
 lord up, made the proper deductions, and got the bill set- 
 tled and receipted in a few minutes. Then he and Hardy 
 addressed themselves to getting the carriage comfortably 
 packed, and vied with one another in settling and stowing 
 away in the most convenient places the many little odds 
 and ends which naturally accompany young ladies and in- 
 valids on their travels ; in the course of which employ- 
 ment he managed to snatch a few words here and there 
 with Mary, and satisfied himself that she bore him no ill- 
 will for the events of the previous day. 
 
 At last, all was ready for the start, and Tom reported 
 the fact in the sitting-room. " Then I will go and fetch 
 papa," said Miss Winter. 
 
 Tom's eyes met Mary's at the moment. He gave a 
 slight shrug with his shoulders, and said, as the door 
 closed after his cousin, " Really I have no patience with 
 Uncle Robert ; he leaves poor Katie to do every thing." 
 
 " Yes ; and how beautifully she does it all, without a 
 word or, I believe, a thought of complaint ! I could never 
 be so patient." 
 
 " I think it is a pity. If Uncle Robert were obliged to 
 exert himself it would be much better for him. Katie is 
 only spoiling him and wearing herself out." 
 
 " Yes, it is very easy for you and me to think and say 
 so. Rut he is her father ; and then he is really an inva- 
 lid. So she goes on devoting herself to him more and 
 more, and feels she can never do too much for him." 
 
 " But if she believed it would be better for him to ex-
 
 78 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ert himself ? I'm sure it is the truth. Couldn't you try 
 to persuade her ? " 
 
 " No, indeed ; it would only worry her, and he so cruel. 
 But then I am not used to give advice," she added, alter 
 a moment's pause, looking demurely at her gloves ; " it 
 might do good, perhaps, now, if you were to speak to her." 
 
 " You think me so well qualified, I suppose, after the 
 specimen you had yesterday. Thank you ; I have had 
 enough of lecturing for the present." 
 
 " I am very much obliged to you, really, for what you 
 said to me," said Mary, still looking at her gloves. 
 
 The subject was a very distasteful one to Tom. He 
 looked at her for a moment, to see whether she was laugh- 
 ing at him, and then broke it off abruptly, 
 
 " I hope you have enjoyed your visit ? " 
 
 " Oli, yes, so very much. I shall think of it all the 
 summer." 
 
 " Where shall you be all the summer ? " asked Tom. 
 
 " Not so very far from you. Papa has taken a house 
 only eight miles from Englebourn, and Katie says you 
 live within a day's drive of them." 
 
 " And shall you be there all the vacation ? " 
 
 " Yes, and we hope to get Katie over often. Could not 
 you come and meet her ? it would be so pleasant." 
 
 " But do you think I might ? I don't know your father 
 or mother." 
 
 " Oh, yes ; papa and mamma are very kind, and will 
 ask anybody I like. Besides, you are a cousin, you 
 know." 
 
 " Only up at Oxford, I am afraid." 
 
 " Well, now you will see. We are going to have a 
 great archery party next month, and you shall have an 
 invitation." 
 
 " Will you write it for me yourself? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 79 
 
 " Very likely ; but why ? " 
 
 " Don't you think I shall value a note in your hand 
 more than " 
 
 " Nonsense ; now, remember your lecture Oh, here 
 are Uncle Robert and Katie." 
 
 Mr. Winter was very gracious, and thanked Tom for 
 all his attentions. lie had been very pleased, he said, to 
 make his nephew's acquaintance again so pleasantly, and 
 hoped he would come and pass a day or two at Engle- 
 bourn in the vacation. In his sad state of health he could 
 not do much to entertain a young man, but he could pro- 
 cure him some good fishing and shooting in the neighbor- 
 hood. Tom assured his uncle that nothing would please 
 him so much as a visit to Englebourn. Perhaps the re- 
 membrance of the distance between that parish and the 
 place where Mary was to spend the summer may have 
 added a little to his enthusiasm. 
 
 " I should have liked also to have thanked your friend 
 for his hospitality," Mr. Winter went on. " I understood 
 my daughter to say he was here." 
 
 " Yes, he was here just now," said Tom ; " he must be 
 below, I think." 
 
 " What, that good Mr. Hardy ? " said Mary, who was 
 looking out of the window ; " there he is in the street. 
 He has just helped Hopkins into the rumble, and handed 
 her things to her as if she were a duchess. She has been 
 so cross all the morning, and now she looks quite gra- 
 cious." 
 
 " Then, I think, papa, we had better start." 
 
 "Let me give you an arm down-stairs, uncle," said 
 Tom ; and so he helped his uncle down to the carriage, 
 the two young ladies following behind, and the landlord 
 standing witli obsequious bows at his shop door as if ho 
 had never made an overcharge in his life.
 
 80 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 While Mr. Winter was making his acknowledgments 
 to Hardy and being helped by him into the most comfort- 
 able seat in the carriage, Tom was making tender adieus 
 to the two young ladies behind, and even succeeded in 
 keeping a rose-bud which Mary was carrying when they 
 took their seats. She parted from it half-laughingly, and 
 the post-boy cracked his whip and the barouche went 
 lumbering along High Street. Hardy and Tom watched 
 it until it turned down St. Aldates towards Folly bridge, 
 the latter waving his hand as it disappeared, and then 
 they turned and strolled slowly away side by side in si- 
 lence. The sight of all the other departures increased 
 the uncomfortable, unsatisfied feeling which that of his 
 own relatives had already produced in Tom's mind. 
 
 " Well, it isn't lively stopping up here when everybody 
 is going, is it ? What is one to do ? " 
 
 " Oughtn't you to be looking after your friends who 
 are coming up to try for the scholarships ? " 
 
 " No, they wont be up till the afternoon by coach." 
 
 " Shall we go down the river, then ? " 
 
 " No, it would be miserable. Hullo, look here, what's 
 
 up 
 
 ? 
 
 The cause of Tom's astonishment was the appearance 
 of the usual procession of University beadles carrying 
 silver-headed maces, and escorting the vice-chancellor tow- 
 ards St. Mary's. 
 
 " Why, the bells are going for service ; there must be a 
 University sermon." 
 
 " Where's the congregation to come from ? Why, half 
 Oxford is off by this time, and those that are left wont 
 want to be hearing sermons." 
 
 k ' Well, I don't know. A good many men seem to be 
 going. I wonder who is to preach." 
 
 * I vote we go. It will help to pass the time."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 81 
 
 Hardy agreed, and they followed the procession and 
 went up into the gallery of St. Mary's. There was a 
 very fair congregation in the body of the church, as the 
 college staffs had not yet broken up, and even in the gal- 
 lery the undergraduates mustered in some force. The 
 restless feeling which had brought our hero there seemed 
 to have had a like effect on most of the men who were for 
 one reason or another unable to start on that day. 
 
 Tom looked steadily into his cap during the bidding 
 prayer, and sat down composedly afterwards ; expecting 
 not to be much interested or benefited, but comforted 
 with the assurance that at any rate it would be almost 
 luncheon time before he would be again thrown on his own 
 resources. But he was mistaken in his expectations, and, 
 before the preacher had been speaking for three minutes, 
 was all attention. The sermon was upon the freedom 
 of the Gospel, the power by which it bursts all bonds and 
 lets the oppressed go free. Its burden was, " Ye shall 
 know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." 
 The preacher dwelt on many sides of these words ; the 
 freedom of nations, of societies, of universities, of the 
 conscience of each individual man, were each glanced at 
 in turn ; and then reminding his hearers of the end of the 
 academical year, he went on, 
 
 " "We have heard it said in the troubles and toils and 
 temptations of the world,* 'Oh, that I could begin life 
 over again ! oh, that I could fall asleep, and wake up, 
 twelve, six, three months hence, and find my difficulties 
 solved!' That which we may vainly wish elsewhere by 
 
 * This quotation is from the sermon preached by Dr. Stanley be- 
 fore the University on Act Sunday, 1859 (published by J. II. 
 Parker, of Oxford). I hope that the distinguished professor whoso 
 words they are will pardon the liberty I have taken in quoting them. 
 No words of my own could have given so vividly what I wanted to 
 say.
 
 82 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 a happy Providence is furnished to us by the natural 
 divisions of meeting and parting in this place. To every 
 one of us, old and young, the long vacation on which 
 we are now entering, gives us a breathing space, and 
 time to break the bonds which place and circumstance 
 have woven round us during the year that is past. From 
 all our petty cares, and confusions, and intrigues ; from 
 the dust and clatter of this huge machinery amidst 
 which we labor and toil ; from whatever cynical con- 
 tempt of what is generous and devout ; from whatever 
 fanciful disregard of what is just and wise ; from what- 
 ever gall and bitterness is secreted in our best motives ; 
 from whatever bonds of unequal dealing in which we 
 have entangled ourselves or others, we are now for a time 
 set free. We stand on the edge of a river which shall 
 for a time at least sweep them away ; that ancient river, 
 the river Kishon, the river of fresh thoughts, and fresh 
 scenes and fresh feelings, and fresh hopes ; one surely 
 amongst the blessed means whereby God's free and lov- 
 ing grace works out our deliverance, our redemption from 
 evil, and renews the strength of each succeeding year, so 
 that ' we may mount up again as eagles, may run and not 
 be weary, may walk and not faint.' 
 
 " And, if turning to the younger part of my hearers, 
 I may still more directly apply this general lesson to 
 them. Is there no one who, in some shape or other, does 
 not feel the bondage of which I have been speaking ? He 
 has something on his conscience ; he has something on his 
 mind; extravagance, sin, debt, falsehood. Every morning 
 in the first few minutes after waking, it is the first thought 
 that occurs to him ; he drives it away in the day ; he drives 
 it off by recklessness, which only binds it more and more 
 closely round him. Is there any one who has ever felt, 
 who is at this moment feeling, this grievous burden ?
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 83 
 
 What is the deliverance ? How shall he set himself free ? 
 In what special way does the redemption of Christ, the 
 free grace of God, present itself to him ? There is at 
 least one way clear and simple. He knows it better than 
 any one can tell him. It is those same words which I 
 used with another purpose. ' The truth shall make him 
 free.' It is to tell the truth to his friend, to his parent, to 
 any one, whosoever it be, from whom he is concealing 
 that which he ought to make known. One word of open, 
 frank disclosure one resolution to act sincerely and 
 honestly by himself and others one ray of truth let into 
 that dark corner will indeed set the whole man free. 
 
 " Liberavi animam meam. ' I have delivered my soul.' 
 What a faithful expression is this of the relief, the deliv- 
 erance effected by one strong effort of will in one moment 
 of time. ' I will arise and go to my father, and will say 
 unto him, Father, I have sinned against Heaven and be- 
 fore thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.' 
 So we heard the prodigal's confession this morning. So 
 may the thought well spring up in the minds of any who 
 in the course of this last year have wandered into sin, 
 have found themselves beset with evil habits of wicked 
 idleness, of wretched self-indulgence. Now that you are 
 indeed in the literal sense of the word about to rise and 
 go to your father, now that you will be able to shake off 
 the bondage of bad companionship, now that the whole 
 length of this long absence "will roll between you and the 
 past take a long breath, break off the yoke of your sin, 
 of your fault, of your wrong-doing, of your folly, of your 
 perverseness, of your pride, of your vanity, of your weak- 
 ness ; break it off by truth, break it off by one stout effort, 
 in one steadfast prayer ; break it off by innocent and free 
 enjoyment ; break it off by honest work. Put your ' hand 
 to the nail and your right hand to the workman's ham-
 
 84 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 mer : ' strike through the enemy which has ensnared you, 
 pierce and strike him through and through. However 
 powerful he seems ' at your feet lie will bow, he will fall, 
 he will lie down ; at your feet he will bow and fall, and 
 where he bows, there will he rise up no more. So let all 
 thine enemies perish, O Lord ; but let them that love 
 thee be as the sun when he goeth forth in his might.''' 
 
 The two friends separated themselves from the crowd 
 in the porch and walked away, side by side, towards their 
 college. 
 
 " Well, that wasn't a bad move of ours. It is worth 
 something to hear a man preach that sort of doctrine," said 
 Hardy. 
 
 " How does he get to know it all ? " said Tom, medita- 
 tively. 
 
 "All what? I don't see your puzzle." 
 
 " Why, all sorts of things that are in a fellow's mind : 
 what he thinks about the first thing in the morning, for 
 instance." 
 
 " Pretty much like the rest of us, I take it : by looking 
 at home. You don't suppose that University preachers 
 are unlike you and me." 
 
 " Well, I don't know. Now do you think he ever had 
 any thing on his mind that was always coming up and 
 plaguing him, and which he never told to anybody ? " 
 
 " Yes, I should think so ; most of us must have had." 
 
 " Have you ? " 
 
 " Ay, often and often " 
 
 " And you think his remedy the right one ? " 
 
 " The only one. Make a clean breast of it, and the 
 sting is gone. There's plenty more to be done afterwards, 
 of course ; but there's no question about step No. 1." 
 
 " Did you ever owe a hundred pounds that you couldn't 
 pay ? " said Tom, with a sudden effort ; and his secret had
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 85 
 
 hardly passed his lips before he felt a relief which sur- 
 prised himself. 
 
 " My dear fellow," said Hardy, stopping in the street, 
 " you don't mean to say you are speaking of yourself? " 
 
 " I do though," said Tom, " and it has been on my mind 
 ever since the beginning of Easter term, and has spoilt 
 my temper and every thing that and something else 
 that you know of. You must have seen me getting more 
 and more ill-tempered, I'm sure. And I have thought of 
 it the first thing in the morning and the last thing at night, 
 and tried to drive the thought away just as he said one 
 did in his sermon. By Jove, I thought he knew all about 
 it, for he looked right at me just when he came to that 
 place." 
 
 " But, Brown, how do you mean you owe a hundred 
 pounds? You haven't read much, certainly ; but you 
 haven't hunted, or gambled, or tailored much, or gone into 
 any other extravagant folly. You must be dreaming." 
 
 " Am I though ? Come up to my rooms and I'll tell 
 you all about it : I feel better already, now I've let it 
 out. I'll send over for your commons, and we'll have 
 some lunch." 
 
 Hardy followed his friend in much trouble of mind, 
 considering in himself whether with the remainder of his 
 savings he could not make up the sum which Tom had 
 named. Fortunately for both of them a short calculation 
 showed him that he could not, and he gave up the idea of 
 delivering his friend in this summary manner with a sigh. 
 He remained closeted with Tom for an hour, and then 
 came out, looking serious still, but not uncomfortable, and 
 went down to the river. He sculled down to Sandford, 
 bathed in the lasher, and returned in time for chapel. He 
 stayed outside afterwards, and Tom came up to hiax and 
 seized his arms.
 
 8G TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I've done it, old fellow," he said ; " look here ; " and 
 produced a letter. Hardy glanced at the direction, and 
 saw that it was to his father. 
 
 " Come along and post it," said Tom, " and then I shall 
 feel all right." 
 
 They walked off quickly to the post-office and dropped 
 the letter into the box. 
 
 " There," he said, as it disappeared, " liberavi animam 
 meant. I owe the preacher a good turn for that ; I've a 
 good mind to write and thank him. Fancy the poor old 
 governor's face to-morrow at breakfast ! " 
 
 " Well, you seem to take it easy enough now," said 
 Hardy. 
 
 " I can't help it. I tell you I haven't felt so jolly this 
 two months. What a fool I was not to have done it be- 
 fore. After all, now I come to think of it, I can pay it 
 myself, at least as soon as I am of age, for I know I've 
 some money, a legacy or something, coming to me then. 
 But that isn't what I care about now." 
 
 " I'm very glad, though, that you have the money of 
 your own." 
 
 " Yes ; but the having told it all is the comfort. Come 
 along, and let's see whether those boys are come. The 
 Old Pig ought to be in by this time, and I want them to 
 dine in Hall. It's only ten months since I came up on it 
 to matriculate, and it seems twenty years. But I'm going 
 to be a boy again for to-night ; you'll see if I'm not."
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE LONG VACATION LETTER-BAG. 
 
 June 24, 184-. 
 
 " My dear Tom, Your letter came to hand this 
 morning, and it has of course given your mother and me 
 much pain. It is not the money that we care about, but 
 that our son should have deliberately undertaken, or pre- 
 tended to undertake, what he must have known at the 
 time he could not perform himself. 
 
 "I have written to my bankers to pay 100 at once to 
 your account at the Oxford Bank. I have also requested 
 my solicitor to go over to Oxford, and he will probably 
 call on you the day after you receive this. You say that 
 this person who holds your note of hand is now in Oxford.. 
 You will see him in the presence of my solicitor, to whom 
 you will hand the note when you have recovered it. I 
 shall consider afterwards what further steps will have to 
 be taken in the matter. 
 
 " You will not be of age for a year. It will be time 
 enough then to determine whether you will repay the bal- 
 ance of this money out of the legacy to which you will be 
 entitled under your grandfather's will. In the mean time, 
 I shall deduct at the rate of 50 a year from your allow- 
 ance, and I shall hold you bound in honor to reduce your 
 expenditure by this amount. You are no longer a boy, 
 and one of the first duties which a man owes to his friends 
 and to society is to live within his income.
 
 88 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I make this advance to you on two conditions. First, 
 that you will never again put your hand to a note or hill 
 in a transaction of this kind. If you have money, lend it 
 or spend it. You may lend or spend foolishly, but that 
 is not the point here ; at any rate, you are dealing with 
 what is your own. But in transactions of this kind you 
 are dealing with what is not your own. A gentleman 
 should shrink from the possibility of having to come on 
 others, even on his own father, for the fulfilment of his 
 obligations as he would from a lie. I would sooner see a 
 son of mine in his grave than crawling on through life a 
 slave to wants and habits which he must gratify at other 
 people's expense. 
 
 " My second condition is, that you put an end to your 
 acquaintance with these two gentlemen who have led you 
 into this scrape, and have divided the proceeds of your 
 joint note between them. They are both your seniors in 
 standing, you say, and they appear to be familiar with this 
 plan of raising money at the expense of other people. 
 The plain English word for such doings is swindling. 
 What pains me most is that you should have become inti- 
 mate with young men of this kind. I am not sure that it 
 will not be my duty to lay the whole matter before the 
 authorities of the college. You do not mention their 
 names, and I respect the feeling which has led you not to 
 mention them. I shall know them quite soon enough 
 through my solicitor, who will forward me a copy of the 
 note of hand and signatures in due course. 
 
 " Your letter makes general allusion to other matters ; 
 and I gather from it that you are dissatisfied Avith the man- 
 ner in which you have spent your first year at Oxford. I 
 do not ask for specific confessions, which you seem inclined 
 to offer me ; in fact, I would sooner not have them, unless 
 there is any other matter in which you want assistance or
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 89 
 
 advice from me. I know from experience that Oxford is 
 a place full of temptation of all kinds, offered to young 
 men at the most critical time of their lives. Knowing 
 this, I have deliberately accepted the responsibility of 
 sending you there, and I do not repent it. I am glad that 
 you are dissatisfied with your first year. If you had not 
 been, I should have felt much more anxious about your 
 second. Let bygones be bygones between you and me. 
 You know where to go for strength, and to make confes- 
 sions which no human ear should hear, for no human judg- 
 ment can weigh the cause. The secret places of a man's 
 heart are for himself and God. Your mother sends her 
 love. 
 
 " I am, ever your affectionate father, 
 
 "John Brown." 
 
 June 2Gth, 184-. 
 
 " My dear Boy, I am not sorry that you have taken 
 my last letter as you have done. It is quite right to be 
 sensitive on these points, and it will have done you no 
 harm to have fancied for forty-eight hours that you had 
 in my judgment lost caste as a gentleman. But now I 
 am very glad to be able to ease your mind on this point. 
 You have done a very foolish thing ; but it is only the 
 habit, and the getting others to bind themselves, and not 
 the doing it one's self for others, which is disgraceful. You 
 are going to pay honorably for your folly, and will owe 
 me neither thanks nor money in the transaction. I have 
 chosen my own terms for repayment, which you have ac- 
 cepted, and so the financial question is disposed of. 
 
 " I have considered what you say as to your compan- 
 ions, friends I will not call them, and will promise 
 you not to take any further steps, or to mention the sub- 
 ject to any one. But I must insist on my second condi- 
 8*
 
 90 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 tion, that you avoid all further intimacy with them. I do 
 not mean that you are to cut them, or to do any thing that 
 will attract attention. But, no more intimacy. 
 
 " And now, my dear boy, as to the rest of your letter. 
 Mine must indeed have failed to express my meaning. 
 God forbid that there should not be the most perfect con- 
 fidence between us. There is nothing which I desire or 
 value more. I only question whether special confessions 
 will conduce to it. My experience is against them. I 
 almost doubt whether they can be perfectly honest be- 
 tween man and man ; and, taking into account the differ- 
 ence of our ages, it seems to me much more likely that 
 we should misunderstand one another. But having said 
 this, I leave it to you to follow your own conscience in the 
 matter. If there is any burden which I can help you to 
 bear, it will be my greatest pleasure, as it is my duty to 
 do it. So now say what you please, or say no more. If 
 you speak, it will be to one who has felt and remembers 
 a young man's trials. 
 
 " We hope you will be able to come home to-morrow, 
 or the next day, at latest. Your mother is longing to see 
 you, and I should be glad to have you here for a day or 
 two before the assizes, which are held next week. I 
 should rather like you to accompany me to them, as it 
 will give me the opportunity of introducing you to my 
 brother magistrates from other parts of the county, whom 
 you are not likely to meet elsewhere, and it is a good 
 thing for a young man to know his own county well. 
 
 " The cricket club is very flourishing you will be glad 
 to hear, and they have put off their best matches, espe- 
 cially those with the South Hants and Landsdown, till your 
 return ; so you are in great request, you see. I am told 
 that the fishing is very good this year, and am promised 
 several days for you in the club water.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 91 
 
 " September is a long way off, but there is nothing like 
 being beforehand. I have put your name down for a li- 
 cense : and it is time you should have a good gun of your 
 own ; so I have ordered one for you from a man who has 
 lately settled in the county. He was Purdy's foreman, 
 with whom I used to build, and, I can see, understands 
 his business thoroughly. His locks are as good as any I 
 have ever seen. I have told him to make the stock rather 
 longer, and not quite so straight as that of my old double 
 with which you shot last year. I think I remember you 
 criticised my weapon on these points ; but there will be 
 time for you to alter the details after you get home, if 
 you disapprove of my orders. It will be more satisfactory 
 if it is built under your own eye. If you continue in the 
 mind for a month's reading with your friend Mr. Hardy, 
 we will arrange it towards the end of the vacation ; but 
 would he not come here ? From what you say we should 
 very much like to know him. Pray ask him from me 
 whether he will pass the last month of the vacation here 
 coaching you. I should like you to be his first regular 
 pupil. Of course, this will be my affair. And now God 
 bless you, and come home as soon as you can. Your 
 mother sends her best love. 
 
 " Ever your most affectionate 
 
 "John Brown." 
 
 "Engleeourn Rectory, 
 June 28th, 184-. 
 " Dearest Mary, How good of you to write to me 
 so soon ! Your letter has come like a gleam of sunshine. 
 I am in the midst of worries already. Indeed, as you 
 know, I could never quite throw off the fear of what 
 might be happening here, while we were enjoying our- 
 selves at Oxford, and it has all turned out even worse
 
 92 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 than I expected. I shall never be able to go away again 
 in comfort, I think. And yet, if I had been here, I don't 
 know that I could have done any good. It is so very sad 
 that poor papa is unable to attend to his magistrate's busi- 
 ness, and he has been worse than usual, quite laid up in 
 fact, since our return. There is no other magistrate 
 not even a gentleman in the place, as you know, except 
 the curate, and they will not listen to him, even if he 
 would interfere in their quarrels. But he says he will 
 not meddle with secular matters ; and, poor man, I cannot 
 blame him, for it is very sad and wearing to be mixed up 
 in it all. 
 
 " But now I must tell you all my troubles. You re- 
 member the men whom we saw mowing together just be- 
 fore we went to Oxford. Betty Winburn's son was one 
 of them, and I am afraid the rest are not at all good com- 
 pany for him. When they had finished papa's hay, they 
 went to mow for Farmer Tester. You must remember 
 him, dear, I am sure ; the tall, gaunt man, with heavy, 
 thick lips, and a broken nose, and the top of his head 
 quite flat, as if it had been cut off a little above his eye- 
 brows. He is a very miserly man, and a hard master ; 
 at least, all the poor people tell me so, and he looks cruel. 
 I have always been afraid of him, and disliked him, for I 
 remember as a child hearing papa complain how trouble- 
 some he was in the vestry ; and except old Simon, who, 
 I believe, only does it from perverseness, I have never 
 heard anybody speak well of him. 
 
 " The first day that the men went to mow for Farmer 
 Tester, he gave them sour beer to drink. You see, dear, 
 they bargain to mow for so much money and their beer. 
 They were very discontented at this, and they lost a good 
 deal of time going to complain to him about it, and they 
 had high words.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 93 
 
 " The men said that the beer wasn't fit for pigs, and the 
 farmer said it was quite good enough ' for such as they,' 
 and if they didn't like his beer they might buy their own. 
 In the evening, too, he came down and complained that 
 the mowing was bad, and then there were more high 
 words, for the men are very jealous about their work. 
 However, they went to work as usual the next morning, 
 and all might have gone off, but in the day Farmer Tester 
 found two pigs in his turnip-field which adjoins the com- 
 mon, and had them put in the pound. One of these pigs 
 belonged to Betty Winburn's son, and the other to one of 
 the men who was mowing with him ; so, when they came 
 home at night, they found what had happened. 
 
 " The constable is our pound-keeper, the little man who 
 amused you so much : he plays the bass-viol in church. 
 When he puts any beasts into the pound he cuts a stick 
 in two, and gives one piece to the person who brings the 
 beasts, and keeps the other himself; and the owner of the 
 beasts has to bring the other end of the stick to him be- 
 fore he can let them out. Therefore, the owner, you see, 
 must go to the person who has pounded his beasts, and 
 make a bargain with him for payment of the damage 
 which has been done, and so get back the other end of 
 the stick, which they call the tally, to produce to the 
 pound-keeper. 
 
 " Well, the men went off to the constable's when they 
 heard their pigs were pounded, to find who had the tally, 
 and. when they found it was Farmer Tester, they went in 
 a body to his house, to remonstrate with him, and learn 
 what he set the damages at. The farmer used dreadful 
 language to them, I hear, and said they weren't fit to 
 have pigs, and must pay half a crown for each pig, before 
 they should have the tally ; and the men irritated him by 
 telling him that his fences were a shame to the parish, be-
 
 94 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 cause he was too stingy to have them mended, and that 
 the pigs couldn't have found half a crown's worth of tur- 
 nips in the whole field, for he never put any manure on 
 it, except what he could get off the road, which ought to 
 belong to the poor. At last the farmer drove them away, 
 saying that he should stop the money out of the price he 
 was to pay for their mowing. 
 
 " Then there was very near being a riot in the parish ; 
 for some of the men are very reckless people, and they 
 went in the evening, and blew horns, and beat kettles be- 
 fore his house, till the constable, who has behaved very 
 well, persuaded them to go away. 
 
 " In the morning one of the pigs had been taken out of 
 the pound ; not Betty's son's, I am glad to say, for no doubt 
 it was very wrong of the men to take it out. The farmer 
 was furious, and went with the constable in the morning 
 to find the pig, but they could hear nothing of it anywhere. 
 James Pope, the man to whom it belonged, only laughed 
 at them, and said that he never could keep his pig in 
 himself, because it was grandson to one of the acting pigs 
 that went about to the fairs, and all the pigs of that fam- 
 ily took to climbing naturally ; so his pig must have 
 climbed out of the pound. This of course was all a story ; 
 the men had lifted the pig out of the pound, and then killed 
 it, so that the farmer might not find it, and sold the meat 
 cheap all over the parish. Betty went to the farmer that 
 morning, and paid the half-crown, and got her son's pig 
 out before he came home ; but Farmer Tester stopped the 
 other half-crown out of the men's wages, which made mat- 
 ters worse than ever. 
 
 " The day that we were in the theatre at Oxford, Farmer 
 Tester was away at one of the markets. He turns his big 
 cattle out to graze on the common, which the poor people 
 say lie has no right to do, and in the afternoon a pony of
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 05 
 
 his got into the allotments, and Betty's son caught it, and 
 took it to the constable, and had it put in the pound. The 
 constable tried to persuade him not to do it, but it was of 
 no use ; and so, when Farmer Tester came home, he found 
 that his turn had come. I am afraid that he was not 
 sober, for I hear that he behaved dreadfully both to the 
 constable and to Betty's son, and when he found that he 
 could not frighten them, he declared he would have the 
 law of them, if it cost him twenty pounds. So in the 
 morning he went to fetch his lawyer, and when we got 
 home you can fancy what a scene it was. 
 
 " You remember how poorly papa was when you left 
 us at Lanibourn. By the time we got home he was quite 
 knocked up, and so nervous that he was fit for nothing 
 except to have a quiet cup of tea in his own room. I was 
 sure, as we drove up the street, there was something the 
 matter. The hostler was watching outside the Red Lion, 
 and ran in as soon as we came in sight ; and, as we passed 
 the door, out came Farmer Tester, looking very flushed in 
 the face, and carrying his great iron-handled whip, and a 
 person with him, who I found was his lawyer, and they 
 marched after the carriage. Then the constable was 
 standing at his door, too, and he came after us, and there 
 was a group of men outside the rectory gate. "VVe had 
 not been in the house five minutes before the servant came 
 in to say that Farmer Tester and a gentleman wanted to 
 see papa on particular business. Papa sent out word he 
 was very unwell, and that it was not the proper time to 
 come on business ; he would see them the next day at 
 twelve o'clock. But they would not go away, and then 
 papa asked me to go out and see them. You can fancy 
 how disagreeable it was ; and I was so angry with them 
 for coming, when they knew how nervous papa is after a 
 journey, as well as that I could not have patience to per-
 
 96 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 suade them to leave ; and so at last they made poor papa 
 see them after all. lie was lying on a sofa, and quite unfit 
 to cope with a hard, bad man like Farmer Tester, and a 
 fluent, plausible lawyer. They told their story all their own 
 way, and the farmer declared that the man had tempted 
 the pony into the allotments with corn. And the lawyer 
 said that the constable had no right to keep the pony in 
 the pound, and that he was liable to all sorts of punish- 
 ments. They wanted papa to make an order at once for 
 the pound to be opened, and I think he would have done 
 so,"but I asked him in a whisper to send for the constable, 
 and hear what he had to say. The constable was waiting 
 in the kitchen, so he came in in a minute. You can't 
 think how well he behaved ; I have quite forgiven him all 
 his obstinacy about the singing. He told the whole story 
 about the pigs, and how Farmer Tester had stopped money 
 out of the men's wages. And when the lawyer tried to 
 frighten him, he answered him quite boldly, that he 
 mightn't know so much about the law, but he knew what 
 was always the custom long before his time at Englebourn 
 about the pound, and if Farmer Tester wanted his beast 
 out, he must bring the tally like another man. Then the 
 lawyer appealed to papa about the law, and said how ab- 
 surd it was, and that if such a custom were to be upheld, 
 the man who had the tally might charge 100 for the 
 damage. And poor papa looked through his law books, 
 and could find nothing about it all ; and while he was 
 doing it Farmer Tester began to abuse the constable, and 
 said he sided with all the good-for-nothing fellows in the 
 parish, and that bad blood would come of it. But the con- 
 stable quite fired up at that, and told him that it was such 
 as he who made bad blood in the parish, and that poor 
 folks had their rights as well as their betters, and should 
 have them while he was constable. If he got papa's or-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 97 
 
 der to open the pound, he supposed he must do it, and 
 'twas not for him to say what was law, hut Harry Win- 
 hurn had had to get the tally for his pig from Farmer 
 Tester, and what was fair for one was fair for all. 
 
 " I was afraid papa would have made the order, but the 
 lawj r er said something at last which made him take the 
 other side. So he settled that the farmer should pay five 
 shillings for the tally, which was what he had taken from 
 Betty, and had stopped out of the wages, and that was the 
 only order he would make, and the lawyer might do what 
 he pleased about it. The constable seemed satisfied with 
 this, and undertook to take the money down to Harry 
 Winburn, for Farmer Tester declared he would sooner 
 let the pony starve than go himself. And so papa got rid 
 of them after an hour and more of this talk. The lawyer 
 and Farmer Tester went away grumbling and very angry 
 to the Red Lion. I was very anxious to hear how the 
 matter ended ; so I sent after the constable to ask him 
 to come back and see me when he had settled it all, and 
 about nine o'clock he came. He had had a very hard job 
 to get Harry Winburn to take the money, and give up the 
 tally. The men said that if Farmer Tester could make 
 them pay half a crown for a pig in his turnips, which 
 were no bigger than radishes, he ought to pay ten shil- 
 lings at least for his pony trampling down their corn, 
 which was half grown ; and I couldn't help thinking this 
 seemed very reasonable. In the end, however, the con- 
 stable had persuaded them to take the money, and so the 
 pony was let out. 
 
 " I told him how pleased I was at the way he had be- 
 haved, but the little man didn't seem quite satisfied him- 
 self. He should have liked to have given the lawyer a 
 piece more of his mind, he said, only he was no scholar ; 
 ' but I've a got all the feelin's of a man, miss, though J. 
 9
 
 98 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 mecTnt have the ways o' bringin' on 'em out.' You see I 
 am quite coming round to your opinion about him. But 
 when I said that I hoped all the trouble was over, he 
 shook his head, and he seems to think that the men will not 
 forget it, and that some of the wild ones will be trying to 
 pay Farmer Tester out in the winter nights, and I could 
 see he was very anxious about Harry Winburn ; so I 
 promised him to go and see Betty. 
 
 " I went down to her cottage yesterday, and found her 
 very low, poor old soul, about her son. She has had a 
 bad attack again, and I am afraid her heart is not right. 
 She will not live long if she has much to make her anx- 
 ious, and how is that to be avoided ? For her son's court- 
 ing is all going wrong, she can see, though he will not tell 
 her any thing about it ; but he gets more moody and rest- 
 less, she says, and don't take a pride in any thing, not even 
 in his flowers or his allotment ; and he takes to going 
 about, more and more every day, with these men, who will 
 be sure to lead him into trouble. 
 
 " After I left her, I walked up to the Hawk's Lynch, to 
 see whether the view and the air would not do me good ; 
 and it did do me a great deal of good, dear, and I thought 
 of you, and when I should see your bright face and hear 
 your happy laugh again. The village looked so pretty 
 and peaceful, I could hardly believe, while I was up there, 
 that there were all these miserable quarrels and heart- 
 burnings going on in it. I suppose they go on everywhere, 
 but one can't help feeling as if there was something spe- 
 cially hard in those which come under one's own eyes, and 
 touch one's self. And then they are so frivolous, and every 
 thing might go on so comfortably if people would only be 
 reasonable. I ought to have been a man, I am sue, and 
 then I might, perhaps, be able to do more, and should have 
 more influence If poor papa were only well and strong J
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 99 
 
 " But, dear, I shall tire you with all these long histories 
 and complainings. I have run on till I have no room left 
 for any thing else ; but you can't think what a comfort it 
 is to me to write it all to you, for I have no one to tell it 
 to. I feel so much better, and more cheerful since I sat 
 down to write this. You must give my dear love to uncle 
 and aunt, and let me hear from you again whenever you 
 have time. If you could come over again and stay for a 
 few days it would be very kind ; but I must not press it, 
 as there is nothing to attract you here, only we might talk 
 over all that we did and saw at Oxford. 
 
 "Ever, dearest Mary, your very affectionate cousin, 
 
 " Katie. 
 
 " P.S. I should like to have the pattern of the jacket 
 you wore the last day at Oxford. Could you cut it out in 
 thin paper, and send it in your next ? " 
 
 July , 18 4-. 
 
 " My dear Brown, I was very glad to see your 
 hand, and to hear such flourishing accounts of your vaca- 
 tion doings. You wont get any like announcement out 
 of me, for cricket has not yet come so far west as this, at 
 least not to settle. We have a few pioneers and squatters 
 in the villages ; but, I am sorry to say, nothing yet like 
 matches between the elevens of districts. Neighbors we 
 have none, except the rector ; so I have plenty of spare 
 time, some of which I feel greatly disposed to devote to 
 you ; and I hope you wont find me too tedious to read. 
 
 " It is very kind of your father to wish that you should 
 be my first pupil, and to propose that I should spend the 
 last month of this vacation with you in Berkshire. But I 
 do not like to give up a whole month. My lather is get- 
 ting old and infirm, and I can see that it would be a great 
 trial to him, although he urges it, and is always telling me
 
 100 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 not to let him keep me at home. What do you say to 
 meeting me half-way ? I mean, that you should come 
 here for half of the time, and then that I should return 
 with you for the last fortnight of the vacation. This I 
 could manage perfectly. 
 
 " But you cannot in any case be my first pupil ; for, not 
 to mention that I have been, as you know, teaching for 
 some years, I have a pupil here at this minute. You are 
 not likely to guess who it is, though you know him well 
 enough, perhaps I should say too well, so, in a word, 
 it is Blake. I had not been at home three days before I 
 got a letter from him, asking me to take him, and putting 
 it in such a way that I couldn't refuse. I would sooner 
 not have had him, as I had already got out of taking a 
 reading party with some trouble, and felt inclined to enjoy 
 myself here in dignified idleness till next term. But what 
 can you do when a man puts it to you as a great personal 
 favor, etc., etc. ? So I wrote to accept. You may im- 
 agine my disgust a day or two afterwards, at getting a let- 
 ter from an uncle of his, some official person in London 
 apparently, treating the whole matter in a business point 
 of view, and me as if I were a training groom. He is 
 good enough to suggest a stimulant to me in the shape of 
 extra pay and his future patronage in the event of his 
 nephew's taking a first in Michaelmas term. If I had 
 received this letter before, I think it would have turned 
 the scale, and I should have refused. But the thing was 
 done, and Blake isn't fairly responsible for his relative's 
 views. " So here he has been for a fortnight. He took 
 a lodging in the village at first ; but of course my dear 
 old father's ideas of hospitality were shocked at this, and 
 here he is, our inmate. 
 
 " He reads fiercely by fits and starts. A feeling of per-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 101 
 
 sonal hatred against the examiners seems to urge him on 
 more than any other motive ; but this will not be strong 
 enough to keep him to regular work, and without regular 
 work he wont do, notwithstanding all his cleverness, and 
 he is a marvellously clever fellow. So the first thing I 
 have to do is to get him steadily to the collar, and how to 
 do it is a pretty particular puzzle. For he hasn't a grain 
 of enthusiasm in his composition, nor any power, as far as 
 I can see, of throwing himself into the times and scenes 
 of which he is reading. The philosophy of Greece and 
 the history of Rome are matters of perfect indifference to 
 him to be got up by catch-words and dates for exam- 
 ination, and nothing more. I don't think he would care 
 a straw if Socrates had never lived, or Hannibal had de- 
 stroyed Rome. The greatest names and deeds of the Old 
 World are just so many dead counters to him the Jew- 
 ish just as much as the rest. I tried him with the story 
 of the attempt of Antiochus Epiphanes to conquer the 
 Jews, and the glorious rising of all that was living in the 
 Holy Land under the Maccabees. Not a bit of it ; I 
 couldn't get a spark out of him. He wouldn't even read 
 the story, because it is in the Apocrypha, and so, as he 
 said, the d d examiners couldn't ask him any tiling about 
 it in the schools. 
 
 " Then his sense of duty is quite undeveloped. He has 
 no notion of going on doing any thing disagreeable because 
 he ought. So here I am at fault again. Ambition he has 
 in abundance ; in fact, so strongly, that very likely it may 
 in the end pull him through, and make him work hard 
 enough for his Oxford purposes at any rate. But it wants 
 repressing rather than encouragement, and I certainly 
 sha'n't appeal to it. 
 
 " You will begin to think I dislike him and want to get 
 9*
 
 102 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 rid of him, but it isn't the case. You know what a good 
 temper he has, and how remarkably well he talks ; so he 
 makes himself very pleasant, and my father evidently en- 
 joys his company ; and then to be in constant intercourse 
 with a subtle intellect like his, is pleasantly exciting, and 
 keeps one alive and at high pressure, though one can't help 
 always wishing that it had a little heat in it. You would 
 be immensely amused if you could drop in on us. 
 
 " I think I have told you, or you must have seen it for 
 yourself, that my fathei''s principles are true blue, as be- 
 comes a sailor of the time of the great war, while his in- 
 stincts and practice are liberal in the extreme. Our 
 rector, on the contrary, is liberal in principles, but an 
 aristocrat of the aristocrats in instinct and practice. They 
 are always ready enough therefore to do battle, and Blake 
 delights in the war, and fans it and takes part in it as a 
 sort of free lance, laying little logical pit-falls for the 
 combatants alternately, with that deferential manner of 
 his. He gets some sort of intellectual pleasure, I sup- 
 pose, out of seeing where they ought to tumble in ; for 
 tumble in they don't, but clear his pit-falls in their stride, 
 at least my father does, quite innocent of having 
 neglected to distribute his middle term ; and the rector, if 
 he has some inkling of these traps, brushes them aside, 
 and disdains to spend powder on any one but his old ad- 
 versary and friend. I employ myself in trying to come 
 down ruthlessly on Blake himself; and so we spend our 
 evenings after dinner, which comes off at the primitive 
 hour of five. "We used to dine at three, but my father 
 lias conformed now to college hours. If the rector does 
 not come, instead of argumentative talk, Ave get stories 
 out of my father. In the mornings we bathe and boat 
 and read. So, you see, he and I have plenty of one
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 103 
 
 another's company, and it is certainly odd that we get on 
 so well with so very few points of sympathy. But, luckily, 
 besides his good temper and cleverness, he has plenty of 
 humor. On the whole, I think we shall rub through the 
 two months which he is to spend here without getting to 
 hate one another, though there is little chance of our be- 
 coming friends. Besides putting some history and science 
 into him (scholarship he does not need), I shall be satis- 
 fied if I can make him give up his use of the pronoun 
 'you' before he goes. In talking of the corn laws, or 
 foreign policy, or India, or any other political subject, 
 however interesting, he never will identify himself as an 
 Englishman; and 'you do this,' or ' you expect that,' is 
 forever in his mouth, speaking of his own countrymen. 
 I believe if the French were to land to-morrow on Port- 
 land, he would comment on our attempts to dislodge 
 them as if he had no concern with the business, except as 
 a looker-on. 
 
 " You will think all this a rather slow return for your 
 jolly, gossiping letter, full of cricket, archery, fishing, and 
 I know not what pleasant goings-on. But what is one to 
 do ? one can only write about what is one's subject of in- 
 terest for the time being, and Blake stands in that rela- 
 tion to me just now. I should prefer it otherwise, but si 
 on n'a jhis ce qiCon aime ilfaut aimer ce qu'on a. I have 
 no incident to relate ; these parts get on without incidents 
 somehow, and without society. I wish there were some, 
 particularly ladies' society. I break the tenth command- 
 ment constantly, thinking of Commemoration, and that 
 you are within a ride of Miss Winter and her cousin. 
 When you sec them next, pray present my respectful 
 compliments. It is a sort of consolation to think that one 
 may cross their fancy for a moment and be remembered
 
 104 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 as part of a picture which gives them pleasure. With 
 which piece of sentiment I may as well shut up. Don't 
 you forget my message now, and 
 
 " Believe me, ever yours most truly, 
 
 "John Hardy. 
 
 " P.S. I mean to speak to Blake, when I get a chance, 
 of that wretched debt which you have paid, unless you 
 object. I should think better of him if he seemed more 
 uncomfortable about his affairs. After all he may be 
 more so than I think, for he is very reserved on such sub- 
 jects." 
 
 "Englebourn Rectory, 
 "July, 184-. 
 *' Dearest Mary, I send the coachman with this 
 note, in order that you may not be anxious about me. I 
 have just returned from poor Betty Winburn's cottage to 
 write it. She is very, very ill, and I do not think can last 
 out more than a day or two ; and she seems to cling to me 
 so that I cannot have the heart to leave her. Indeed, if I 
 could make up my mind to do it, I should never get her 
 poor, white eager face out of my head all day, so that I 
 should be very bad company and quite out of place at your 
 party, making everybody melancholy and uncomfortable 
 who came near me. So, dear, I am not coming. Of 
 course, it is a great disappointment. I had set my heart 
 on being with you, and enjoying it all thoroughly ; and 
 even at breakfast this morning knew of nothing to hinder 
 me. My dress is actually lying on the bed at this minute, 
 and it looks very pretty, especially the jacket like yours, 
 which I and Hopkins have managpd to make up from the 
 pattern you sent, though you forgot the sleeves, which
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 105 
 
 made it rather hard to do. Ah, well ! it is of no use to 
 think of how pleasant things would have been which one 
 cannot have. You must write me an account of how it 
 all went off, dear ; or perhaps you can manage to get over 
 here before long to tell me. 
 
 " I must now go back to poor Betty. She is such a 
 faithful, patient old thing, and has been such a good 
 woman all her life that there is nothing painful in being 
 by her now, and one feels sure that it will be much hap- 
 pier and better for her to be at rest. If she could only 
 feel comfortable about her son I am sure she would think 
 so herself. Oh, I forgot to say that her attack was brought 
 on by the shock of hearing that he had been summoned for 
 an assault. Farmer Tester's son, a young man of about 
 his own age, has, it seems, been of late waylaying Simon's 
 daughter and making love to her. It is so very hard to 
 make out the truth in matters of this kind. Hopkins 
 says she is a dressed-up little minx who runs after all the 
 young men in the parish ; but really, from what I see and 
 hear from other persons, I think she is a good girl enough. 
 Even Betty, who looks on her as the cause of most of her 
 own trouble, has never said a word to make me think that 
 she is at all a light person, or more fond of admiration 
 than any other good-looking girl in the parish. 
 
 "But those Testers are a very wicked set. You can- 
 not think what a misfortune it is in a place like this to 
 have these rich families with estates of their own, in 
 which the young men begin to think themselves beyond 
 the common farmers. They ape the gentlemen, and give 
 themselves great airs, but of course no gentleman will as- 
 sociate with them, as they are quite uneducated ; and the 
 consequence is that they live a great deal at home, and 
 give themselves up to all kinds of wickedness. This
 
 106 TOM BROWN AT OXFOKD. 
 
 young Tester is one of these. His father is a very bad 
 old man, and does a great deal of harm here ; and the son 
 is following in his steps, and is quite as bad, or worse. 
 So you see I shall not easily believe that Harry Winburn 
 has been much in the wrong. However, all I know of it 
 at present is that young Tester was beaten by Harry yes- 
 terday evening in the village street, and that they came 
 to papa at once for a summons. 
 
 " Oh, here is the coachman ready to start ; so I must 
 conclude, dear, and go back to my patient. I shall often 
 think of you during the day. I am sure you will have a 
 charming party. With best love to all, believe me, ever, 
 dearest, 
 
 " Your most affectionate 
 
 " Katie. 
 
 " P.S. I am very glad that uncle and aunt take to 
 Tom, and that he is staying with you for some days. You 
 will find him very useful in making the party go off well, 
 I am sure."
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 AMUSEMENTS AT BARTON MANOR. 
 
 " A letter, miss, from Englebourn," said a footman, 
 coming up to Mary with the note given at the end of the 
 last chapter on a waiter. She took it and tore it open ; 
 and, while she is reading it, the reader may be introduced 
 to the place and company in which we find her. The 
 scene is a large old-fashioned square brick house, backed 
 by fine trees, in the tops of which the rooks live, and the 
 jackdaws and starlings in the many holes which time has 
 worn in the old trunks ; but they are all away on this 
 fine summer morning, seeking their meal and enjoying 
 themselves in the neighboring fields. In front of the house 
 is a pretty flower-garden, separated by a haw-haw from a 
 large pasture, sloping southwards gently down to a brook, 
 which glides along through water-cress and willow beds 
 to join the Kennet. The beasts have all been driven off, 
 and on the upper part of the field, nearest the house, two 
 men are fixing up a third pair of targets on the rich short 
 grass. A large tent is pitched near the archery-ground, 
 to hold quivers and bow-cases, and luncheon, and to shel- 
 ter lookers-on from the midday sun. Beyond the brook 
 a pleasant, well-timbered country lies, with high chalk- 
 downs for an horizon, ending in Marlborough hill, faint 
 and blue in the west. This is the place which Mary's 
 father has taken for the summer and autumn, and where 
 she is fast becoming the pet of the neighborhood. 
 
 It will not perhaps surprise readers to ' find that our
 
 108 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 hero has managed to find his way to Barton Manor in the 
 second week of the vacation, and, having made the most 
 of his opportunities, is acknowledged as a cousin by Mr. 
 and Mrs. Porter. Their boys are at home for the holi- 
 days, and Mr. Porter's great wish is that they should get 
 used to the country in their summer holidays. And as 
 they have spent most of their childhood and boyhood in 
 London, to which he has been tied pretty closely hitherto, 
 this is a great opportunity. The boys only wanted a pre- 
 ceptor, and Tom presented himself at the right moment, 
 and soon became the hero of Charley and Neddy Porter. 
 He taught them to throw flies and bait crawfish nets, to 
 bat fowl, and ferret for rabbits, and to saddle and ride 
 their ponies, besides getting up games of cricket in the 
 spare evenings, which kept him away from Mr. Porter's 
 dinner-table. This last piece of self-denial, as he consid- 
 ered it, quite won over that gentleman, who agreed with 
 his wife that Tom was just the sort of companion they 
 would like for the boys, and so the house was thrown 
 open to him. 
 
 The boys were always clamoring for him when he was 
 away, and making their mother write off to press him to 
 come again ; which he, being a very good-natured young 
 man, and particularly fond of boys, was ready enough to 
 do. So this was the third visit he had paid in a month. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Brown wondered a little that he should 
 be so very fond of the young Porters, who were good 
 boys enough, but very much like other boys of thirteen 
 and fifteen, of whom there were several in the neighbor- 
 hood. He had indeed just mentioned an elder sister, but 
 so casually that their attention had not been drawn to the 
 fact, which had almost slipped out of their memories. On 
 the other hand, Tom seemed so completely to identify him- 
 self with the boys and their pursuits, that it never occurred
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 109 
 
 to their father and mother, who were doatingly fond of 
 them, that, after all, they might not be the only attraction. 
 Mary seemed to take very little notice of him, and went on 
 with her own pursuits much as usual. It was true that she 
 liked keeping the score at cricket, and coming to look at 
 them fishing or rabbiting in her walks ; but all that was 
 very natural. It is a curious and merciful dispensation 
 of Providence that most fathers and mothers seem never 
 to be capable of remembering their own experience, and 
 will probably go on till the end of time thinking of their 
 sons of twenty and daughters of sixteen or seventeen as 
 mere children, who may be allowed to run about together 
 as much as they please. And, where it is otherwise, the 
 results are not very different, for there are certain myste- 
 rious ways of holding intercourse implanted in the youth 
 of both sexes, against which no vigilance can avail. 
 
 So on this, her great fete day, Tom had been helping 
 Mary all the morning in dressing the rooms with flowers, 
 and arranging all the details where people were to sit 
 at the cold dinner ; how to find the proper number of 
 seats ; how the dining-room was to be cleared in time for 
 dancing when the dew began to fall. In all which mat- 
 ters there were many obvious occasions for those petits 
 soins which are much valued by persons in like situations ; 
 and Tom was not sorry that the boys had voted the whole 
 preparations a bore, and had gone off to the brook to 
 gropple in the bank for crawfish till the shooting began. 
 The arrival of the note had been the first contre-temps of 
 the morning, and they were now expecting guests to ar- 
 rive every minute. 
 
 " What is the matter ? No bad news, I hope," he said, 
 seeing her vexed expression. 
 
 u Why, Katie can't come. I declare I could sit down 
 10
 
 110 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 and cry. I sha'n't enjoy the party a bit now, and I wish 
 it were all over." 
 
 " I am sure Katie would be very unhappy if she thought 
 you were going to spoil your day's pleasure on her ac- 
 count." 
 
 " Yes, I know she would ; but it is so provoking when 
 I had looked forward so to having her." 
 
 " You have never told me why she cannot come ; she 
 was quite full of it all when I saw her a few days back." 
 
 " Oh, there is a poor old woman in the village dying 
 who is a great friend of Katie's. Here is her letter ; let 
 me see," she said, glancing over it to see that there was 
 nothing in it which she did not wish him to read, " you 
 may read it, if you like." 
 
 Tom began reading. " Betty Winburn," he said, when 
 he came to the name, " what, poor dear old Betty ! why, 
 I've known her ever since I was born. She used to live 
 in our parish, and I haven't seen her this eight years 
 nearly. And her boy Harry, I wonder what has become 
 of him ? " 
 
 " You will see if you read on," said Mary ; and so he 
 read to the end, and then folded it up and returned it. 
 
 " So poor old Betty is dying. Well, she was always a 
 good soul, and very kind to me when I was a boy. I 
 should like to see her once again, and perhaps I might be 
 able to do something for her son." 
 
 " Why should we not ride over to Englebourn to-mor- 
 row ? They will be glad to get us out of the way while 
 the house is being straightened." 
 
 " I should like it of all things, if it can be managed." 
 
 " Oh, I will manage it somehow, for I must go and see 
 that dear Katie. I do feel so ashamed of myself when I 
 think of all the good she is doing, and I do nothing but
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. Ill 
 
 put flowers about, and play the piano. Isn't she an angel 
 
 now 
 
 " Of course she is." 
 
 " Yes ; but I wont have that sort of matter-of-course 
 acquiescence. Now, do you really mean that Katie is as 
 good as an angel ? " 
 
 " As seriously as if I saw the wings growing out of her 
 shoulders, and dewdrops hanging on them." 
 
 " You deserve to have some things not at all like wings 
 growing out of your head. How is it that you never see 
 when I don't want you to talk your nonsense ? " 
 
 " How am I to talk sense about angels ? I don't know 
 any thing about them." 
 
 " You know what I mean, perfectly. I say that dear 
 Katie is an angel, and I mean that I don't know any thing 
 in her no, not one single thing which I should like 
 to have changed. If the angels are all as good as 
 she " 
 
 " If! why I shall begin to doubt your orthodoxy." 
 
 " You don't know what I was going to say." 
 
 " It doesn't matter what you were going to say. You 
 couldn't have brought that sentence round to an orthodox 
 conclusion. Oh, please don't look angry, now. Yes, I 
 quite see what you mean. You can think of Katie just 
 as she is now in heaven, without being shocked." 
 
 Mary paused for a moment before she answered, as if 
 she were rather taken by surprise at this way of putting 
 her meaning, and then said seriously, 
 
 " Indeed, I can. I think we should all be perfectly 
 happy if we were all as good as she is." 
 
 " But she is not very happy herself, I am afraid." 
 
 " Of course not ; how can she be, when all the people 
 about her are so troublesome and selfish ? "
 
 112 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I can't fancy an angel the least like Uncle Robeit; 
 can you ? " 
 
 " I wont talk about angels any more. You have made 
 me feel quite as if I had been saying something wicked." 
 
 " Now really, it is too hard that you should lay the 
 blame on me, when you began the subject yourself. You 
 ought at least to let me say what I have to say about an- 
 gels." 
 
 " Why, you said you knew nothing about them half a 
 minute ago." 
 
 " But I may have my notions like other people. You 
 have your notions. Katie is your angel." 
 
 " Well, then, what are your notions ? " 
 
 " Katie is rather too dark for my idea of an angel. I 
 can't fancy a dark angel." 
 
 " Why, how can you call Katie dark ? " 
 
 " I only say she is too dark for my idea of an angel." 
 
 " Well, go on." 
 
 " Then, she is rather too grave." 
 
 " Too grave for an angel ! " 
 
 " For my idea of an angel one doesn't want one's 
 angel to be like one's self, and I am so grave, you know." 
 
 " Yes, very. Then your angel is to be a laughing 
 angel. A laughing angel, and yet very sensible ; never 
 talking nonsense ? " 
 
 " Oh, I didn't say that." 
 
 " But you said he wasn't to be like you." 
 
 " He ! who in the world do you mean by he?" 
 
 " Why, your angel, of course." 
 
 " My angel ! You don't really suppose that my angel 
 is to be a man ? " 
 
 " I have no time to think about it. Look, they are put- 
 ting those targets quite crooked. You are responsible for 
 the targets ; we must go and get them straight."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 113 
 
 They walked across the ground towards the targets, and 
 Tom settled them according to his notions of opposites. 
 
 " After all, archery is slow work," he said, when the 
 targets were settled satisfactorily. " I don't believe any- 
 body really enjoys it." 
 
 "Now that is because you men haven't it all to your- 
 selves. You are jealous of any sort of game in which we 
 c;in join. I believe you are afraid of being beaten." 
 
 " On the contrary, that is its only recommendation, that 
 you can join in it." 
 
 "Well, I think that ought to be recommendation 
 enough. But I believe it is much harder than most of 
 jour games. You can't shoot half as well as you play 
 cricket ; can you ? " 
 
 " No, because I never practise. It isn't exciting to be 
 walking up and down between two targets, and doing the 
 same thing over and over again. Why, you don't find it 
 so yourself. You hardly ever shoot." 
 
 " Indeed I do, though, constantly." 
 
 " Why, I have scarcely ever seen you shooting." 
 
 " That is because you are away with the boys all day." 
 
 " Oh, I am never too far to know what is going on. I'm 
 sure you have never practised for more than a quarter of 
 an hour any day that I have been here." 
 
 " Well, perhaps I may not have. But I tell you I am 
 very fond of it." 
 
 Here the two boys came up from the brook, Neddy with 
 his Scotch cap full of cray-fish. 
 
 " Why, you wretched boys, where you been ? You are 
 not fit to be seen," said Mary, shaking the arrows at them, 
 which she was carrying in her hand. " Go and dress di- 
 rectly, or you will be late. I think I heard a carriage 
 drive up just now." 
 
 " Oh, there's plenty of time. Look what whackers, 
 10*
 
 114 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Cousin Tom," said Charley, holding out one of his prizes 
 by its back towards Tom, while the indignant cray-fish 
 flapped its tail and worked about with its claws in the 
 hopes of getting hold of something to pinch. 
 
 " I don't believe those boys have been dry for two 
 hours together in daylight since you first came here," said 
 Mary to Tom. 
 
 " Well, and they're all the better for it, I'm sure," said 
 Tom. 
 
 " Yes, that we are," said Charley. 
 
 " I say, Charley," said Tom, " your sister says she is 
 very fond of shooting." 
 
 " Ay, and so she is. And isn't she a good shot too ? 
 I believe she would beat you at fifty yards." 
 
 " There now, you see, you need not have been so unbe- 
 lieving," said Mary. 
 
 " Will you give her a shot at your new hat, Cousin 
 Tom ? " said Neddy. 
 
 " Yes, Neddy, that I will ; " and he added to Mary, " I 
 will bet you a pair of gloves you do not hit it in three 
 shots." 
 
 " Very well," said Mary, " at thirty yards ? " 
 
 " No, no ! fifty yards was the named distance." 
 
 " No, fifty yards is too far. Why, your hat is not big- 
 ger than the gold." 
 
 " Well, I don't mind splitting the difference ; we will 
 say forty." 
 
 " Very well three shots at forty yards." 
 
 " Yes ; here, Charley, run and hang my hat on that 
 target." The boys rushed off with the hat a new white 
 one and hung it with a bit of string over the centre of 
 one of the targets, and then, stepping a little aside, stood, 
 clapping their hands, shouting to Mary to take good aim. 
 
 " You must string my bow," she said, handing it to him
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD, 115 
 
 as she buckled on her guard. " Now, do you repent ? 
 I am going to do my best, mind, if I do shoot." 
 
 " I scorn repentance : do your worst," said Tom, string- 
 ing the bow and handing it back to her. " And now I 
 will hold your arrows ; here is the forty yards." 
 
 Mary came to the place which he had stepped, her eyes 
 full of fun and mischief; and he saw at once that she 
 knew what she was about as she took her position and 
 drew the first arrow. It missed the hat by some three 
 inches only, and the boys clapped and shouted. 
 
 " Too near to be pleasant," said Tom, handing the sec- 
 ond arrow. " I see you can shoot." 
 
 " Well, I will let you off still." 
 
 "Gloves and all?" 
 
 " No, of course you must pay the gloves." 
 
 " Shoot away then. Ah, that will do," he cried, as the 
 second arrow struck considerably above the hat, " I shall 
 get my gloves yet," and he handed the third arrow. They 
 were too intent on the business in hand to observe that 
 Mr. and Mrs. Porter and several guests were already on 
 the hand bridge which crossed the haw-haw. 
 
 Mary drew her third arrow, paused a moment, loosed 
 it, and this time with fatal aim. 
 
 The boys rushed to the target, towards which Mary 
 and Tom also hurried, Mr. and Mrs. Porter and the new- 
 comers following more quietly. 
 
 " Oli, look here what fun," said Charley, as Tom came 
 up, holding up the hat spiked on the arrow which he had 
 drawn out of the target. 
 
 " "What a wicked shot," he said, taking the hat and turn- 
 ing to Mary. " Look here, you have actually gone through 
 three places through crown, and side, and brim." 
 
 Mary began to feel quite sorry at her own success, and 
 looked at the wounded hat sorrowfully.
 
 116 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Hullo, look here here's papa and mamma and some 
 people, and we aint dressed ! Come along, Neddy," and 
 the hoys made away towards the back premises, while 
 Mary and Tom, turning round found themselves in the 
 presence of Mr. and Mrs. Porter, Mr. Brown, and two or 
 three other guests.
 
 CHAPTER Vm. 
 
 BEHIND THE SCENES. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Brown had a long way to drive home 
 that evening, including some eight miles of very indif- 
 ferent chalky road over the downs, which separate the 
 Vale of Kennet from the Vale of White Horse. Mr. 
 Brown was an early man, and careful of his horses, who 
 responded to his care by being always well up to much 
 more work than they were ever put to. The drive to 
 Barton Manor and back in a day was a rare event in 
 their lives. Their master, taking this fact into consider- 
 ation, was bent on giving them plenty of time for the re- 
 turn journey, and had ordered his groom to be ready to 
 start by eight o'clock ; but, that they might not disturb 
 the rest by their early departure, he had sent the carriage 
 to the village inn instead of to the Porters' stables. 
 
 At the appointed time, therefore, and when the even- 
 ing's amusements were just beginning at the manor house, 
 Mr. Brown sought out his wife ; and, after a few words 
 of leave-taking to their host and hostess, the two slipped 
 quietly away, and walked down the village. The car- 
 riage was standing before the inn all ready for them, with 
 the hostler and Mr. Brown's groom at the horses' heads. 
 The carriage was a high phaeton having a roomy front 
 seat with a hood to it, specially devised by Mr. Brown 
 with a view to his wife's comfort, and that he might with 
 a good conscience enjoy at the same time the pleasures 
 of her society and of driving his own horses. When
 
 118 TOM CROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 once in her place Mrs. Brown was as comfortable as she 
 would have been in the most luxurious barouche with C 
 springs, but the ascent was certainly rather a drawback. 
 The pleasure of sitting by her husband and of receiving 
 his assiduous help in the preliminary climb, however, 
 more than compensated to Mrs. Brown for this little in- 
 convenience. 
 
 Mr. Brown helped her up as usual, and arranged a 
 plaid carefully over her knees, the weather being too hot 
 for the apron. He then proceeded to walk round the 
 horses, patting them, examining the bits, and making in- 
 quiries as to how they had fed : and, having satisfied him- 
 self on these points, and feed the hostler, took the reins, 
 seated himself by his wife, and started at a steady pace 
 towards the hills at the back of Barton village. 
 
 For a minute or two neither spoke, Mr. Brown being 
 engrossed with his horses and she with her thoughts. 
 Presently, however, he turned to her, and, having ascer- 
 tained that she was quite comfortable, went on, 
 
 " Well, my dear, what do you think of them ? " . 
 
 "Oh, I think they are agreeable people," answered 
 Mrs. Brown ; " but one can scarcely judge from seeing 
 them to-day. It is too far for a drive ; we shall not be 
 heme till midnight." 
 
 "But I am very glad we came. After all they are 
 connections through poor Bobert, and he seems anxious 
 that they should start well in the county. Why, he has 
 actually written twice, you know about our coming to-day. 
 We must try to show them some civility." 
 
 " It is impossible to come so far often," Mrs. Brown 
 persisted. 
 
 " It is too far for ordinary visiting. What do you say 
 to asking them to come and spend a day or two with 
 us?"
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 119 
 
 " Certainly, my dear, if you wish it," answered Mrs. 
 Brown, but without much cordiality in her voice. 
 
 " Yes, I should like it ; and it will please Robert so 
 much. We might have him and Katie over to meet 
 them, don't you think ? " 
 
 " Let me see," said Mrs. Brown, with much more alac- 
 rity, " Mr. and Mrs. Porter will have the best bedroom 
 and dressing-room ; Robert must have the south room, 
 and Katie the chintz. Yes, that will do ; I can manage 
 it very well." 
 
 " And their daughter ; you have forgotten her." 
 
 " "Well, you see, dear, there is no more room." 
 
 " Why, there is the dressing-room, next to the south 
 i-oom, with a bed in it. I'm sure nobody can want a bet- 
 ter room." 
 
 " You know, John, that Robert cannot sleep if there is 
 the least noise. I could never put any one into his dress- 
 ing-room ; there is only a single door between the rooms, 
 and, even if they made no noise, the fancy that some one 
 was sleeping there would keep him awake all night." 
 
 " Plague take his fancies ! Robert has given way to 
 them till he is fit for nothing. But you can put him in 
 the chintz room, and give the two girls the south bedroom 
 and dressing-room." 
 
 " What, put Robert in a room which looks north ? My 
 dear John, what can you be thinking about ? " 
 
 Mr. Brown uttered an impatient grunt, and, as a vent 
 to his feelings more decorous on the whole than abusing 
 his brother-in-law, drew his whip more smartly than usual 
 across the backs of his horses. The exertion of muscle 
 necessary to reduce those astonished animals to their ac- 
 customed steady trot restored his temper, and he returned 
 to the charge, 
 
 " I suppose we must manage it on the second floor,
 
 120 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 then, unless you could get a bed run up in the school- 
 room." 
 
 " No, dear ; I really should not like to do that it 
 would be so very inconvenient. We are always wanting 
 the room for workwomen or servants ; besides, I keep my 
 account books and other things there." 
 
 " Then I'm afraid it must be on the second floor. 
 Some of the children must be moved. The girl seems 
 a nice girl with no nonsense about her, and wont mind 
 sleeping up there. Or, why not put Katie up-stairs ? " 
 
 " Indeed, I should not think of it. Katie is a dear 
 good girl, and I will not put any one over her head." 
 
 " Nor I, dear. On the contrary, I was asking you to 
 put her over another person's head," said Mr. Brown, 
 laughing at his own joke. This unusual reluctance on 
 the part of his wife to assist in carrying out any hospi- 
 table plans of his began to strike him ; so, not being an 
 adept at concealing his thoughts, or gaining his point by 
 any attack except a direct one, after driving on for a 
 minute in silence he turned suddenly on his wife, and 
 said, 
 
 " Why, Lizzie, you seem not to want to ask the girl." 
 
 " Well, John, I do not see the need of it at all." 
 
 " No, and you don't want to ask her." 
 
 " If you must know, then, I do not." 
 
 " Don't you like her ? " 
 
 " I do not know her well enough either to like or dis- 
 like." 
 
 " Then, why not ask her, and see what she is like ? 
 But the truth is, Lizzie, you have taken a prejudice 
 against her." 
 
 " Well, John, I think she is a thoughtless girl, and ex- 
 travagant ; not the sort of girl, in fact, that I should wish 
 to be much here."
 
 TOM DROWN AT OXFORD. 121 
 
 " Thoughtless and extravagant ! " said Mr. Brown, 
 looking grave ; " how you women can be so sharp on one 
 another ! Her dress seemed to me simple and pretty, and 
 her manners very lady-like and pleasing." 
 
 " You seem to have quite forgotten about Tom's hat," 
 said Mrs. Brown. 
 
 "Tom's white hat so I had," said Mr. Brown, and 
 he relapsed into a low laugh at the remembrance of the 
 scene. " I call that his extravagance, and not hers." 
 
 " It was a new hat, and a very expensive one, which 
 he had bought for the vacation, and it is quite spoilt." 
 
 " Well, my dear ; really, if Tom will let girls shoot at 
 his hats, he must take the consequences. He must wear 
 it with the holes, or buy another." 
 
 " How can he afford another, John ? You know how 
 poor he is." 
 
 Mr. Brown drove on for several minutes without 
 speaking. He knew perfectly well what his wife was 
 coming to now, and, after weighing in his mind the alter- 
 natives of accepting battle or making sail and changing 
 the subject altogether, said, 
 
 " You know, my dear, he has brought it on himself. A 
 headlong, generous sort of youngster, like Tom, must be 
 taught early that he can't have his cake and eat his cake. 
 If he likes to lend his money, he must find out that he 
 hasn't it to spend." 
 
 " Yes, dear, I quite agree with you. But 50 a year 
 is a great deal to make him pay." 
 
 "Not a bit too much, Lizzie. His allowance is quite 
 enough without it to keep him like a gentleman. Be- 
 sides, after all, he gets it in meal or in malt ; I have just 
 paid 25 for his gun." 
 
 " I know how kind and liberal you are to him ; only I 
 am so afraid of his getting into debt." 
 11
 
 122 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I wonder what men would do, if they hadn't pomt? 
 soft-hearted woman always ready to take their parts and 
 pull them out of scrapes," said Mr. Brown. " Well, dear, 
 how much do you want to give the boy ? " 
 
 " Twenty-five pounds, just for this year. But out of 
 my own allowance, John." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " replied Mr. Brown ; " you want your al- 
 lowance for yourself and the children." 
 
 " Indeed, dear John, I would sooner not do it at all 
 then, if I may not do it out of my own money." 
 
 " Well, have it your own way. I believe you would 
 always look well dressed, if you never bought another 
 gown. Then, to go back to what we were talking about 
 just now you will find a room for the girl, somehow ? " 
 
 " Yes, dear, certainly, as I see you are bent on it." 
 
 " I think it would be scarcely civil not to ask her, espe- 
 cially if Katie comes. And I own I think her very 
 pretty, and have taken a great fancy to her." 
 
 " Isn't it odd that Tom should never have said any 
 thing about her to us ? He has talked of all the rest, till 
 I knew them quite well before I went there." 
 
 " No ; it seems to me the most natural thing in the 
 world." 
 
 " Yes, dear, very natural. But I can't help wishing he 
 had talked about her more ; I should think it less danger- 
 ous." 
 
 " Oh, you think Master Tom is in love with her, eh ? " 
 said Mr. Brown, laughing. 
 
 " More unlikely things have happened. You take it 
 very easily, John." 
 
 " Well, we have all been boys and girls, Lizzie. The 
 world hasn't altered much, I suppose, since I used to get 
 up at five on winter mornings, to ride some twenty miles 
 to cover, on the chance of meeting a young lady on a
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 123 
 
 gray pony. I remember how my poor dear old father 
 used to wonder at it, when our hounds met close by, in a 
 better country. I'm afraid I forgot to tell him what a 
 pretty creature ' Gipsey ' was, and how well she was 
 ridden." 
 
 " But Tom is only twenty, and he must go into a pro- 
 fession." 
 
 " Yes, yes ; much too young, I know too young for 
 any thing serious. We had better see them together, 
 and then, if there is any thing in it, we can keep them 
 apart. There cannot be much the matter yet." 
 
 " Well, dear, if you are satisfied, I am sure I am." 
 
 And so the conversation turned on other subjects, and 
 Mr. and Mrs. Brown enjoyed their moonlight drive home 
 through the delicious summer night, and were quite sorry 
 when the groom got down from the hind-seat to open their 
 own gates at half-past twelve. 
 
 About the same time, the festivities at Barton Manor 
 were coming to a close. There had been cold dinner in 
 the tent at six, after the great match of the day ; and, 
 after dinner, the announcement of the scores, and the dis- 
 tribution of prizes to the winners. A certain amount of 
 toasts and speechifying followed, which the ladies sat 
 through with the most exemplary appearance of being 
 amused. When their healths had been proposed and ac- 
 knowledged, they retired, and were soon followed by the 
 younger portion of the male sex ; and, while the J. P.'s 
 and clergymen sat quietly at tiieir wine, which Mr. Por- 
 ter took care should be remarkably good, and their wives 
 went in to look over the house and have tea, their sons 
 and daughters split up into groups, and some shot handi- 
 caps, and some walked about and flirted, and some played 
 at bowls or lawn billiards. And soon the band appeared 
 again from the servants' hall, mightily refreshed, and
 
 124 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 dancing began on the grass, and in due time was trans- 
 ferred to the tent, when the grass got damp with the night 
 dew, and then to the hall of the house, when the lighting 
 of the tent began to fail. And then there came a supper, 
 extemporized out of the remains of the dinner ; after 
 which papas and mammas began to look at their watches, 
 and remonstrate with daughters, coming up with sparkling 
 eyes and hair a little shaken out of place, and pleading 
 for "just one more dance." "You have been going on 
 ever since one o'clock," remonstrated the parents ; " And 
 are ready to go on till one the next day," replied the chil- 
 dren. By degrees, however, the frequent sound of wheels 
 were heard, and the dancers got thinner and thinner, till, 
 for the last half-hour, some half-dozen couples of young 
 people danced an interminable reel, while Mr. and Mrs. 
 Porter, and a few of the most good-natured matrons of 
 the neighborhood looked on. Soon after midnight the 
 band struck ; no amount of negus could get any thing 
 more out of them but " God save the Queen," which they 
 accordingly played and departed ; and then came the final 
 cloaking and driving off of the last guests. Tom and 
 Mary saw the last of them into their carriage at the hall- 
 door, and lingered a moment in the porch. 
 
 " What a lovely night ! " said Mary. " How I hate go- 
 ing to bed ! " 
 
 " It is a dreadful bore," answered Tom ; " but here is 
 the butler waiting to shut up ; we must go in." 
 
 " I wonder where papa and mamma are." 
 
 " Oh, they are only seeing things put a little to rights. 
 Let us sit here till they come ; they must pass by to get 
 to their rooms." 
 
 So the two sat down on some hall chairs. 
 
 " Oli, dear ! I wish it were all coming over again to-mor- 
 row," said Tom, leaning back, and looking up at the ceil-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. - 125 
 
 ing. " By the way, remember I owe you a pair of gloves t 
 what color shall they be ? " 
 
 " Any color you like. I can't bear to think of it. I 
 felt so dreadfully ashamed when they all came up, and 
 your mother looked so grave ; I am sure she was very 
 angry." 
 
 " Poor mother, she was thinking of my hat with three 
 arrow holes in it." 
 
 " Well, I am very sorry, because I wanted them to 
 like me." 
 
 " And so they will ; I should like to know who can 
 help it." 
 
 " Now, I wont have any of your nonsensical compli- 
 ments. Do you think they enjoyed the day? " 
 
 " Yes, I am sure they did. My father said he had 
 never liked an archery meeting so much." 
 
 " But they went away so early." 
 
 " They had a very long drive, you know. Let me 
 see," he said, feeling in his breast-pocket, " mother left 
 me a note, and I have never looked at it till now." He 
 took a slip of paper out and read it, and his face fell. 
 
 " What is it ? " said Mary, leaning forward. 
 
 "Oh, nothing; only I must go to-morrow morning." 
 
 " There, I was sure she was angry." 
 
 " No, no ; it was written this morning before she came 
 here. I can tell by the paper." 
 
 " But she will not let you stay here a day, you see." 
 
 " I have been here a good deal, considering all things. 
 I should like never to go away." 
 
 " Perhaps papa might find a place for you, if you asked 
 him. Which should you like, to be tutor to the boys, 
 or gamekeeper ? " 
 
 " On the whole, I should prefer the tutorship at pres- 
 ent ; you take so much interest in the boys." 
 11*
 
 126 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Yes, because they have no one to look after them now 
 in the holidays. But, when you come as tutor, I shall 
 wash my hands of them." 
 
 " Then I shall decline the situation." 
 
 " How are you going home to-morrow ? " 
 
 " I shall ride round by Englebourn. They wish me to 
 go round and see Katie and Uncle Robert. You talked 
 about riding over there yourself this morning." 
 
 " I should like it so much. But how can we manage 
 it ? I can't ride back by myself." 
 
 " Couldn't you stay and sleep there ? " 
 
 " I will ask mamma. No, I am afraid it can hardly be 
 managed;" and so saying, Mary leant back in her chair, and 
 began to pull to pieces some flowers she held in her hand. 
 
 " Don't pull them to pieces ; give them to me," said 
 Tom. " I have kept the rosebud you gave me at Ox- 
 ford, folded up in " 
 
 " Which you took, you mean to say. No, I wont give 
 you any of them or, let me see yes, here is a sprig 
 of lavender ; you may have that." 
 
 " Thank you. But why lavender ? " 
 
 " Lavender stands for sincerity. It will remind you 
 of the lecture you gave me." 
 
 " I wish you would forget that. But you know what 
 flowers mean, then ? Do give me a lecture : you owe me 
 one. What do those flowers mean which you will not 
 give me, the piece of heather, for instance ? " 
 
 " Heather signifies constancy." 
 
 " And the carnations ? " 
 
 " Jealousy." 
 
 " And the heliotrope ? " 
 
 " Oh, never mind the heliotrope." 
 
 " But it is such a favorite of mine. Do tell me what it 
 means ? " 
 
 " Je vous aime" said Mary, with a laugh, and a slight
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 127 
 
 blush ; " it is all nonsense. Oh, here's mamma at last," 
 and she jumped up and went to meet her mother, who 
 came out of the drawing-room, candle in hand. 
 
 " My dear Mary, I thought you were gone to bed," 
 said Mrs. Porter, looking from one to the other, seriously. 
 
 " Oh, I'm not the least tired, and I couldn't go without 
 wishing you and papa good-night, and thanking you for 
 all the trouble you have taken." 
 
 " Indeed, we ought all to thank you," said Tom ; " every- 
 body said it was the pleasantest party they had ever been 
 at." 
 
 " I am very glad it went off well," said Mrs. Porter, 
 gravely ; " and now, Mary, you must go to bed." 
 
 " I am afraid I must leave you to-morrow morning," 
 said Tom. 
 
 " Yes ; Mrs. Brown said they expect you at home to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " I am to ride round by Uncle Robert's ; would you 
 like one of the boys to go with me? " 
 
 " O dear mamma, could not Charley and I ride over 
 to Englebourn ? I do so long to see Katie." 
 
 " No, dear ; it is much too far for you. We will drive 
 over in a few days' time." 
 
 And, so saying, Mrs. Porter wished Tom good-night, 
 and led off her daughter. 
 
 Tom went slowly up-stairs to his room, and, after pack- 
 ing his portmanteau for the carrier to take in the morn- 
 ing, threw up his window and leant out into the night, and 
 watched the light clouds swimming over the moon, and 
 the silver mist folding the water meadows and willows in 
 its soft, cool mantle. His thoughts were such as will occur 
 to any reader who has passed the witching age of twenty ; 
 and the scent of the heliotrope-bed, in the flower-garden 
 below, seemed to rise very strongly on the night air.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 A CRISIS. 
 
 In the forenoon of the following day Tom rode slowly 
 along the street of Englebourn towards the rectory gate. 
 He had left Barton soon after breakfast, without having 
 been able to exchange a word with Mary except in the 
 presence of her mother, and yet he had felt more anxious 
 than ever before at least to say good-by to her without 
 witnesses. With this view he had been up early, and 
 had whistled a tune in the hall, and held a loud conversa- 
 tion with the boys, who appeared half-dressed in the gal- 
 lery above, while he brushed the dilapidated white hat, 
 to let all whom it might concern know that he was on the 
 move. Then he had walked up and down the garden in 
 full view of the windows till the bell rang for prayers. 
 He was in the breakfast-room before the bell had done 
 ringing, and Mrs. Porter, followed by her daughter, en- 
 tered at the same moment. He could not help fancying 
 that the conversation at breakfast was a little constrained, 
 and particularly remarked that nothing was said by the 
 heads of the family when the boys vociferously bewailed 
 his approaching departure, and tried to get him to name 
 some day for his return before their holidays ended. In- 
 stead of encouraging the idea, Mrs. Porter reminded Neddy 
 and Charley that they had only ten days more, and had 
 not yet looked at the work they had to do for their tutor 
 in the holidays. Immediately after breakfast Mrs. Porter 
 wished him good-by herself very kindly, but (he could not
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 129 
 
 help thinking) without that air of near relationship which, 
 he had flattered himself was well established between 
 himself and all the members of the Porter family ; and 
 then she had added, " Now, Mary, you must say good-by ; 
 I want you to come and help me with some work this 
 morning." He had scarcely looked at her all the morn- 
 ing, and now one shake of the hand and she was sph'ited 
 away in a moment, and he was left standing, dissatisfied 
 and uncomfortable, with a sense of incompleteness in his 
 mind, and as if he had had a thread in his life suddenly 
 broken off which he could not tell how to get joined again. 
 However, there was nothing for it but to get off. He 
 had no excuse for delay, and had a long ride before him ; 
 so he and the boys went round to the stable. On their 
 passage through the garden the idea of picking a nosegay 
 and sending it to her by one of the boys came into his 
 head. He gathered the flowers, but then thought better 
 of it, and threw them away. What right, after all, had 
 he to be sending flowers to her above all, flowers to 
 which they had attached a meaning, jokingly it was true, 
 but still a meaning ? No, he had no right to do it ; it 
 would not be fair to her, or her father and mother, after 
 the kind way in which they had all received him. So he 
 threw away the flowers, and mounted and rode off, watched 
 by the boys, who waved their straw hats as he looked back 
 just before coming to a turn in the road which would take 
 him out of sight of the Manor House. He rode along at 
 a foot's pace for some time, thinking over the events of 
 the past week ; and then, beginning to feel purposeless, 
 and somewhat melancholy, urged his horse into a smart trot 
 along the waste land which skirted the road. But, go 
 what pace he would, it mattered not ; he could not leave 
 his thoughts behind. So he pulled up again after a mile 
 or so, slackened his reins, and, leaving his horse to pick
 
 130 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 his own way along the road, betook himself to the serious 
 consideration of his position. 
 
 The more he thought of it the more discontented he 
 became, and the day clouded over as if to suit his temper. 
 He felt as if within the last twenty-four hours he had been 
 somehow unwarrantably interfered with. His mother and 
 Mrs. Porter had both been planning something about him, 
 he felt sure. If they had any thing to say, why couldn't 
 they say it out to him ? But what could there be to say ? 
 Couldn't he and Mary be trusted together without making 
 fools of themselves ? He did not stop to analyze his feel- 
 ings towards her, or to consider whether it was very pru- 
 dent or desirable for her that they should be thrown so 
 constantly and unreservedly together. He was too much 
 taken up with what he chose to consider his own wrongs 
 for any such consideration. "Why can't they let me 
 alone ? " was the question which he asked himself perpet- 
 ually, and it seemed to him the most reasonable one in the 
 world, and that no satisfactory answer was possible to it, 
 except that he ought to be, and should be, let alone. And 
 so at last he rode along Englebourn Street, convinced that 
 what he had to do before all other things just now was to 
 assert himself properly, and show every one, even his own 
 mother, that he was no longer a boy to be managed ac- 
 cording to any one's fancies except his own. 
 
 He rode straight to the stables and loosed the girths of 
 his horse and gave particular directions about grooming 
 and feeding him, and stayed in the stall for some minutes 
 rubbing his ears and fondling him. The antagonism which 
 possessed him for the moment against mankind perhaps 
 made him appreciate the value of his relations with a well- 
 trained beast. Then he went round to the house and in- 
 quired for his uncle. He had not been in Englebourn for 
 6ome years, and the servant did not know him, and an-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 131 
 
 swered that Mr. "Winter was not out of his room and never 
 saw strangers till the afternoon. Where was Miss Win- 
 ter then ? She was down the village at Widow Win- 
 burn's, and he couldn't tell when she would be back, the 
 man said. The contents of Katie's note of the day before 
 had gone out of his head, but the mention of Betty's name 
 recalled them, and with them something of the kindly feel- 
 ing which he had had on hearing of her illness. So, say- 
 ing he would call later to see his uncle, he started again 
 to find the widow's cottage, and his cousin. 
 
 The servant had directed him to the last house in the 
 village, but, when he got outside the gate, there were 
 houses in two directions. He looked about for some one 
 from whom to inquire further, and his eye fell upon our 
 old acquaintance, the constable, coming out of his door 
 with a parcel under his arm. 
 
 The little man was in a brown study, and did not notice 
 Tom's first address. He was, in fact, anxiously thinking 
 over his old friend's illness and her son's trouble ; and was 
 on his way to Farmer Grove's, having luckily the excuse 
 of taking a coat to be tried on, in the hopes of getting 
 him to interfere and patch up the quarrel between young 
 Tester and Harry. 
 
 Tom's first salute had been friendly enough ; no one 
 knew better how to speak to the poor, amongst whom he 
 had lived all his life, than he. But, not getting any an- 
 swer, and being in a touchy state of mind, he was put out, 
 and shouted, 
 
 " Hullo, my man, can't you hear me ? " 
 
 " Ees, I beant dunch," replied the constable, turning 
 and looking at his questioner., 
 
 " I thought you were, for I spoke loud enough before. 
 Which is Mrs. Winburn's cottage ? " 
 
 " The furdest house down ther," he said, pointing, " 'tis
 
 132 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 in ray way if you've a mind to come." Tom accepted the 
 offer and walked along by the constable. 
 
 " Mrs. Winburn is ill, isn't she ? " he asked, after look- 
 ing his guide over. 
 
 " Ees, her be terreble bad," said the constable. 
 
 " What is the matter with her, do you know ? " 
 
 " Zummat o' fits, I hears. Her've had em this six 
 year, on and off." 
 
 " I suppose it's dangerous. I mean, she isn't likely to 
 get well ? " 
 
 " 'Tis in the Lord's hands," replied the constable, " but 
 her's that bad wi' pain, at times, 'twould be a mussy if 
 'twould plaase he to tak her out on't." 
 
 " Perhaps she mightn't think so," said Tom, supercil- 
 iously ; he was not in the mind to agree with any one. 
 The constable looked at him solemnly for a moment and 
 then said, 
 
 " Her's been a God-fearin' woman from her youth up, 
 and her's had a deal o' trouble. Thaay as the Lord lov- 
 eth he chasteneth, and 'tisn't such as thaay as is afeard to 
 go afore him." 
 
 " Well, I never found that having troubles made people 
 a bit more anxious to get ' out on't/ as you call it," said 
 Tom. 
 
 " It don't seem to me as you can 'a had much o' trouble 
 to judge by," said the constable, who was beginning to be 
 nettled by Tom's manner. 
 
 " How can you tell that ? " 
 
 " Leastways 'twould be whoam-made, then," persisted 
 the constable, " and ther's a sight o' odds atween whoam- 
 made troubles and thaay as. the Lord sends." 
 
 " So there may be ; but I may have seen both sorts for 
 any thing you can tell." 
 
 " Nay, nay ; the Lord's troubles leaves his marks."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 133 
 
 " And you don't see any of them in my face, eh ? " 
 
 The constable jerked his head after his own peculiar 
 fashion, but declined to reply directly to this interroga- 
 tory. He parried it by one of his own. 
 
 " In the doctorin' line, make so bould ? " 
 
 " No," said Tom. " You don't seem to have such very 
 good eyes, after all." 
 
 " Oh, I seed you wasn't old enough to be doin' for your- 
 self, like ; but I thought you med ha' been a 'sistant, or 
 summat." 
 
 " Well, then, you're just mistaken," said Tom, consider- 
 ably disgusted at being taken for a country doctor's assist- 
 ant. 
 
 " I ax your pardon," said the constable. u But if you 
 beant in the doctorin' line, what be gwine to Widow Win- 
 burn's for, make so bould ? " 
 
 " That's my look-out, I suppose," said Tom, almost an- 
 grily. " That's the house, isn't it ? " and he pointed to 
 the cottage already described at the corner of Engle- 
 bourn Copse. 
 
 " Ees." 
 
 " Good-day, then." 
 
 " Good-day," muttered the constable, not at all satislied 
 with this abrupt close of the conversation, but too un- 
 ready to prolong it. He went on his own way slowly, 
 looking back often, till he saw the door open ; after which 
 he seemed better satisfied, and ambled out of sight. 
 
 " The old snuffler ! " thought Tom, as he strode up to 
 the cottage door "a ranter, I'll be bound, with his 
 ' Lord's troubles,' and ' Lord's hands,' and ' Lord's marks.' 
 I hope Uncle Robert hasn't many such in the parish." 
 
 He knocked at the cottage door, and in a few seconds 
 it opened gently, and Katie slipped out with her finger on 
 12
 
 134 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 her lips. She made a slight gesture of surprise at seeing 
 him, and held out her hand. 
 
 " Hush ! " she said, " she is asleep. You are not in a 
 hurry ? " 
 
 " No, not particularly," he answered, abruptly ; for 
 there was something in her voice and manner which 
 jarred with his humor. 
 
 " Hush ! " she said again, " you must not speak so loud. 
 AVe can sit down here, and talk quietly. I shall hear if 
 she moves." 
 
 So he sat down opposite to her in the little porch of 
 the cottage. She left the door ajar, so that she might 
 catch the least movement of her patient, and then turned 
 to him with a bright smile, and said, 
 
 " Well, I am so glad to see you ! What good wind 
 blows you here ? " 
 
 " No particularly good wind, that I know of. Mary 
 showed me your letter yesterday, and mother wished me 
 to come round here on my way home ; and so here I 
 am." 
 
 " And how did the party go off ? I long to hear about 
 it." 
 
 " Very well ; half the county were there, and it was all 
 very well done." 
 
 " And how did dear Mary look ? " 
 
 " Oh, just as usual. But now, Katie, why didn't you 
 come ? Mary and all of us were so disappointed." 
 
 " I thought you read my letter." 
 
 " Yes, so I did." 
 
 " Then you know the reason." 
 
 " I don't call it a reason. Really, you have no right to 
 shut yourself up from every thing. You will be getting 
 moped to death." 
 
 "But do I look moped? " she said ; and he looked at
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. loO 
 
 her, and couldn't help admitting to himself, reluctantly, 
 that she did not. So he re-opened fire from another 
 point. 
 
 " You will wear yourself out, nursing every old woman 
 in the parish." 
 
 " But I don't nurse every old woman." 
 
 " Why, there is no one here but you to-day now," he 
 said, with a motion of his head towards the cottage. 
 
 " No, because I have let the regular nurse go home for 
 a few hours. Besides, this is a special case. You don't 
 know what a dear old soul Betty is." 
 
 " Yes, I do ; I remember her ever since I was a child." 
 
 " Ah, I forgot ; I have often heard her talk of you. 
 Then you ought not to be surprised at any thing I may 
 do for her." 
 
 " She is a good, kind old woman, I know. But still I 
 must say, Katie, you ought to think of your friends and 
 relations a little, and what you owe to society." 
 
 " Indeed, I do think of my friends and relations very 
 much, and I should have liked, of all things, to have been 
 with you yesterday. You ought to be pitying me, instead 
 of scolding me." 
 
 " My dear Katie, you know I didn't mean to scold you ; 
 and nobody admires the way you give yourself up to vis- 
 iting, and all that sort of thing, more than I ; only you 
 ought to have a little pleasure sometimes. People have 
 a right to think of themselves and their own happiness a 
 little." 
 
 " Perhaps I don't find visiting, and all that sort of 
 thing, as you call it, so very miserable. But now, Tom, 
 you saw in my letter that poor Betty's son has got into 
 trouble ? " 
 
 "Yes; and that is what brought on her attack, you 
 said "
 
 136 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I believe so. She was in a sad state about him all 
 yesterday, so painfully eager and anxious. She is 
 better to-day ; but still I think it would do her good if 
 you would see her, and say you will be a friend to her 
 son. Would you mind ? " 
 
 " It was just what I wished to do yesterday. I will do 
 all I can for him, I'm sure. I always liked him as a boy ; 
 you can tell her that. But I don't feel, somehow, to-day, 
 at least, as if I could do any good by seeing her." 
 
 " Oh, why not ? " 
 
 " I don't think I'm in the right humor. Is she very 
 ill ? " 
 
 " Yes, very ill indeed ; I don't think she can recover." 
 
 " Well, you see, Katie, I'm not used to death-beds. I 
 shouldn't say the right sort of thing." 
 
 " How do you mean the right sort of thing ? " 
 
 " Oh, you know. I couldn't talk to her about her soul. 
 I'm not fit for it, and it isn't my place." 
 
 " No, indeed, it isn't. But you can remind her of old 
 times, and say a kind word about her son." 
 
 " Very well, if you don't think I shall do any harm." 
 
 " I'm sure it will comfort her. And now tell me about 
 yesterday." 
 
 They sat talking for some time in the same low tone, 
 and Tom began to forget his causes of quarrel with the 
 world, and gave an account of the archery party from his 
 own point of view. Katie saw, with a woman's quick- 
 ness, that he avoided mentioning Mary, and smiled to 
 herself, and drew her own conclusions. 
 
 At last, there was a slight movement in the cottage, 
 and, laying her hand on his arm, she got up quickly and 
 went in. In a few minutes she came to the door again. 
 
 " How is she ? " asked Tom.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 137 
 
 " Oil, much the same ; but she has waked without pain, 
 which is a great blessing. Now, are you ready ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but you must go with me." 
 
 " Come in, then." She turned, and he followed into the 
 cottage. 
 
 Betty's bed had been moved into the kitchen, for the 
 sake of light and air. Pie glanced at the corner where it 
 stood with almost a feeling of awe, as he followed his 
 cousin on tip-toe. It was all he could do to recognize the 
 pale, drawn face which lay on the coarse pillow. The 
 rush of old memories which the sight called up, and the 
 thought of the suffering of his poor old friend, touched him 
 deeply. 
 
 Katie went to the bed-side, and stooping down, smoothed 
 the pillow, and placed her hand for a moment on the fore- 
 head of her patient. Then she looked up, and beckoned 
 to him, and said, in her low, clear voice, 
 
 " Betty, here is an old friend come to see you ; my 
 cousin, Squire Brown's son. You remember him quite a 
 little boy." 
 
 The old woman moved her head towards the voice and 
 smiled, but gave no further sign of recognition. Tom 
 stole across the floor, and sat down by the bed-side. 
 
 " Oh, yes, Betty," he said, leaning towards her and speak- 
 ing softly, " you must remember me. Master Tom, 
 who used to come to your cottage on baking days for hot 
 bread, you know." 
 
 " To be sure, I minds un, bless his little heart," said 
 the old woman faintly. " Hev he come to see poor 
 Betty ? Do'ee let un com, and lift un up so as I med see 
 un. My sight be getting dimlike." 
 
 " Here he is, Betty," said Tom, taking her hand a 
 hard-working hand, lying there with the skin all puckered 
 12*
 
 138 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 from long and daily acquaintance with the washing-tub 
 " I'm Master Tom." 
 
 " Ah, dearee me," she said, slowly, looking at him with 
 lustreless eyes. " Well, you be growed into a fine young 
 gentleman, surely. And how's the Squire, and Madam 
 Brown, and all the fam'ly ? " 
 
 " Oh, very well, Betty, they will be so sorry to hear 
 of your illness." 
 
 " But there aint no hot bread for un. 'Tis ill to bake 
 wi' no fuz bushes, and bakers' stuff is poor for hungry 
 folk." 
 
 " I'm within three months as old as your Harry, you 
 know," said Tom, trying to lead her back to the object of 
 his visit. 
 
 " Harry," she repeated, and then collecting herself went 
 on, " our Harry ? where is he ? They haven't sent un to 
 prison, and his mother a dyin' ? " 
 
 " Oh, no, Betty ; he will be here directly. I came to 
 ask whether there is any thing I can do for you." 
 
 " You'll stand by un, poor buoy our Harry, as you 
 used to play wi' when you was little 'twas they as ag- 
 gravated un so as he couldn't abear it, afore ever he'd a 
 struck a fly." 
 
 " Yes, Betty ; I will see that he has fair play. Don't 
 trouble about that ; it will be all right. You must be 
 quite quiet, and not trouble yourself about any thing, that 
 you may get well and about again." 
 
 " Nay, nay, Master Tom. I be gwine whoam ; ees, I 
 be gwine whoam to my maester, Harry's father I knows 
 I be and you'll stand by un when I be gone ; and Squire 
 Brown'll say a good word for un to the magistrates ? " 
 
 " Yes, Betty, that he will. But you must cheer up, and 
 you'll get better yet ; don't be afraid." 
 
 " I beant afeard, Master Tom : no, bless you. I beant
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 139 
 
 afeard but what the Lord'll be mussiful to a poor lone 
 woman like me, as has had a sore time of it since my 
 maester died, wi' a hungry boy like our Harry to kep, 
 back and belly ; and the rheumatics terrible bad all winter 
 time." 
 
 " I'm sure, Betty, you have done your duty by him, and 
 every one else." 
 
 " Dwontee speak o' doin's, Master Tom. 'Tis no doin's 
 o' owrn as'll make any odds where I be gwine." 
 
 Tom did not know what to answer ; so he pressed her 
 hand and said, 
 
 " "Well, Betty, I am very glad I have seen you once 
 more ; I sha'n't forget it. Harry sha'n't want a friend 
 while I live." 
 
 " The Lord bless you, Master Tom, for that word," said 
 the dying woman, returning the pressure, as her eyes 
 filled with tears. Katie, who had been watching her care- 
 fully from the other side of the bed, made him a sign to 
 go. 
 
 " Good-by, Betty," he said ; " I wont forget, you may 
 be sure ; God bless you ; " and then, disengaging his hand 
 gently, went out again into the porch, where he sat down 
 to wait for his cousin. 
 
 In a few minutes the nurse returned, and Katie came 
 out of the cottage soon afterwards. 
 
 " Now I will walk up home with you," she said. "You 
 must come in and see papa. Well, I'm sure, you must be 
 glad you went in. Was not I right?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed ; I wish I could have said something 
 more to comfort her." 
 
 " You couldn't have said more. It was just what she 
 wanted." 
 
 " But where is her son ? I ought to see him before I 
 go-"
 
 140 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " He has gone to the doctor's for some medicine. He 
 will be back soon." 
 
 " Well, I must see him ; and I should like to do some- 
 thing for him at once. I'm not very flush of money, but I 
 must give you something for him. You'll take it ; I 
 shouldn't like to offer it to him." 
 
 " I hardly think he wants money ; they are well off 
 now. He earns good wages, and Betty has done her 
 washing up to this week." 
 
 " Yes, but he will be fined, I suppose, for this assault ; 
 and then, if she should die, there will be the funeral ex- 
 penses." 
 
 " Very well ; as you please," she said ; and Tom pro- 
 ceeded to hand over to her all his ready money, except a 
 shilling or two. After satisfying his mind thus he looked 
 at her, and said, 
 
 " Do you know, Katie, I don't think I ever saw you so 
 happy and in such sph'its ? " 
 
 " There now ! And yet you began talking to me as if 
 I were looking sad enough to turn all the beer in the par- 
 ish sour." 
 
 " "Well, so you ought to be, according to Cocker, spend- 
 ing all your time in sick-rooms." 
 
 " According to who ? " 
 
 " According to Cocker." 
 
 "Who is Cocker?" 
 
 " Oh, I don't know ; some old fellow who wrote the 
 rules of arithmetic, I believe ; it's only a bit of slang. But, 
 I repeat, you have a right to be sad, and it's taking an un- 
 fair advantage of your relations to look as pleasant as you 
 do." 
 
 Katie laughed ; " You ought not to say so, at any rate," 
 she said, " for you look all the pleasanter for your visit to 
 a sick-room."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 141 
 
 " Did I look very unpleasant before ? " 
 
 " Well, I don't think you were in a very good humor." 
 
 " No, I was in a very bad humor, and talking to you 
 and poor old Betty has set me right, I think. But you 
 said hers was a special case. It must be very sad work 
 in general." 
 
 " Only when one sees people in great pain, or when 
 they are wicked, and quarrelling, or complaining about noth- 
 ing ; then I do get very low sometimes. But even then it 
 is much better than keeping to one's self. Any thing is bet- 
 ter than thinking of one's self, and one's own troubles." 
 
 " I dare say you are right," said Tom, recalling his 
 morning's meditations, " especially when one's troubles are 
 home-made. Look, here's an old fellow who gave me a 
 lecture on that subject before I saw you this morning, and 
 took me for the apothecary's boy." 
 
 They were almost opposite David's door, at which he 
 stood Avith a piece of work in his hand. He had seen 
 Miss "Winter from his look-out window, and had descended 
 from his board in hopes of hearing news. 
 
 Katie returned his respectful and anxious salute, and 
 said, " She is no worse, David. We left her quite out of 
 pain and very quiet." 
 
 " Ah, 'tis to be hoped as she'll hev a peaceful time on't 
 now, poor soul," said David; "I've a been to Farmer 
 Grove's, and I hopes as he'll do summat about Harry." 
 
 " I'm glad to hear it," said Miss Winter, " and my 
 cousin here, who knew Harry very well when they were 
 little boys together, has promised to help him. This is 
 Harry's best friend," she said to Tom, " who has done 
 more than any one to keep him right." 
 
 David seemed a little embarrassed, and began jerking 
 his head about when his acquaintance of the morning,
 
 142 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 whom he had scarcely noticed before, was introduced bj 
 Miss Winter as " my cousin." 
 
 " I wish to do all I can for him," said Tom, " and I'm 
 very glad to have made your acquaintance. You must 
 let me know whenever I can help ; " and he took out a 
 card and handed it to David, who looked at it, and then 
 said, 
 
 " And I be to write to you, sir, then, if Harry gets into 
 trouble ? " 
 
 " Yes, but we must keep him out of trouble, even 
 home-made ones, which don't leave good marks, you 
 know," said Tom. 
 
 " And thaay be nine out o' ten o' aal as comes to a 
 man, sir," said David, " as I've a told Harry scores o' 
 times." 
 
 " That seems to be your text, David," said Tom, laugh- 
 ing. 
 
 "Ah, and 'tis a good un too, sir. Ax Miss Winter 
 else. 'Tis a sight better to hev the Lord's troubles while 
 you be about it, for thaay as hasn't makes wus for their- 
 selves out o' nothin'. Dwon't em, miss ? " 
 
 " Yes ; you know that I agree with you, David." 
 
 " Good-by, then," said Tom, holding out his hand, " and 
 mind you let me hear from you." 
 
 " What a queer old bird, with his whole wisdom of man 
 packed up small for ready use, like a quack doctor," he 
 said, as soon as they were out of hearing. 
 
 " Indeed, he isn't the least like a quack doctor. I don't 
 know a better man in the parish, though he is rather ob- 
 stinate, like all the rest of them." 
 
 " I didn't mean to say any thing against him, I assure 
 you," said Tom ; " on the contrary I think him a fine old 
 fellow. But I didn't think so this morning, when he
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 143 
 
 showed me the way to Betty's cottage." The fact was 
 that Tom saw all things and persons with quite a different 
 pair of eyes from those which he had been provided with 
 when he arrived in Englebourn that morning. He even 
 made allowances for old Mr. Winter, who was in his usual 
 querulous state at luncheon, though perhaps it would have 
 been difficult in the whole neighborhood to find a more 
 pertinent comment on and illustration of the constable's 
 text than the poor old man furnished, with his complaints 
 about his own health and all he had to do and think 
 of, and everybody about him. It did strike Tom, how- 
 ever, as very wonderful how such a character as Katie's 
 could have grown up under the shade of, and in constant 
 contact with, such an one as her father's. He wished his 
 uncle good-by soon after luncheon, and he and Katie 
 started again down the village she to return to her 
 nursing and he on his way home. He led his horse by 
 the bridle and walked by her side down the street. She 
 pointed to the Hawk's Lynch as they walked along, and 
 said, " You should ride up there ; it is scarcely out of 
 your way. Mary and I used to walk there every day 
 when she was here, and she was so fond of it." 
 
 At the cottage they found Harry Winburn. He came 
 out, and the two young men shook hands, and looked one 
 another over, and exchanged a few shy sentences. Tom 
 managed with difficulty to say the little he had to say, but 
 tried to make up for it by a hearty manner. It was not 
 the time or place for any unnecessary talk ; so in a few 
 minutes he was mounted and riding up the slope towards 
 the heath. " I should say he must be half a stone lighter 
 than I," he thought, " and not quite so tall ; but he looked 
 as hard as iron, and tough as whipcord. What a No. 7 
 he'd make in a heavy crew ! Poor fellow, he seems 
 dreadfully cut up. I hope I shall be able to be of use
 
 144 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 to him. Now for this place which Katie showed me from 
 the village street." 
 
 He pressed his horse up the steep side of the Hawk's 
 Lynch. The exhilaration of the scramble, and the sense 
 of power, and of some slight risk, which he felt as he 
 helped on the gallant beast with hand and knee and heel, 
 and the loose turf and stones flew from his hoofs and 
 rolled down the hill behind him, made his eyes kindle and 
 his pulse beat quicker as he reached the top and pulled 
 up under the Scotch firs. " This was her favorite walk, 
 then. No wonder. What an air, and what a view ! " 
 He jumped off his horse, slipped the bridle over his arm 
 and let him pick away at the short grass and tufts of heath 
 as he himself first stood, and then sat, and looked out over 
 the scene which she had so often looked over. She might 
 have sat on the very spot he was sitting on ; she must have 
 taken in the same expanse of wood and meadow, village 
 and park, and dreamy, distant hill. Her presence seemed 
 to fill the air round him. A rush of new thoughts and 
 feelings swam through his brain and carried him, a will- 
 ing piece of drift-man, along with them. He gave him- 
 self up to the stream, and revelled in them. His eye 
 traced back the road along which he had ridden in the 
 morning, and rested on the Barton woods, just visible in 
 the distance, on this side of the point where all outline 
 except that of the horizon began to be lost. The flicker- 
 ing July air seemed to beat in a pulse of purple glory 
 over the spot. The soft wind which blew straight from 
 Barton seemed laden with her name, and whispered it in 
 the firs over his head. Every nerve in his body was 
 bounding with new life, and he could sit still no longer. 
 He rose, sprang on his horse, and, with a shout of joy, 
 turned from the vale and rushed away on to the heath, 
 northwards, towards his home behind the chalk hills. He
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 115 
 
 had ridden into Englebourn in the morning an almost un- 
 conscious dabbler by the margin of the great stream ; he 
 rode from the Hawk's Lynch in the afternoon over head 
 and ears, and twenty, a hundred, ay, unnumbered fathoms 
 below that, deep, consciously, and triumphantly in love. 
 
 But at what a pace, and in what a form ! Love, at 
 least in his first access, must be as blind a horseman as 
 he is an archer. The heath was rough with peat-cutting 
 and turf-cutting, and many a deep-rutted farm road and 
 tracks of heather and furze. Over them and through 
 them went horse and man horse rising seven, and man 
 twenty off, a well-matched pair in age for a wild ride 
 headlong towards the north, till a blind rut somewhat 
 deeper than usual put an end to their career, and sent the 
 good horse staggering forward some thirty feet on to his 
 nose and knees, and Tom over his shoulder, on to his back 
 in the heather. 
 
 " Well, it's lucky it's no worse," thought our hero, as 
 he picked himself up and anxiously examined the horse, 
 who stood trembling and looking wildly puzzled at the 
 whole proceeding ; " I hope he hasn't overreached. "What 
 will the governor say ? His knees are all right. Poor 
 old boy," he said, patting him, " no wonder you look as- 
 tonished. You're not in love. Come along ; we wont 
 make fools of ourselves any more. What is it ? 
 
 " ' A true love forsaken a new love may get, 
 
 But a neck that's once broken can never be set.' 
 
 What stuff; one may get a neck set for any thing I know ; 
 but a new love blasphemy ! " 
 
 Tlie rest of the ride passed off soberly enough, except 
 in Tom's brain, wherein were built up in gorgeous suc- 
 cession castles such as we have all built, I suppose, be- 
 fore now. And with the castles were built up side by sido 
 13
 
 140 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 good honest resolves to be worthy of her, and win her and 
 worship her with body, and mind, and soul. And, as a 
 first instalment away to the winds went all the selfish 
 morning thoughts ; and he rode down the northern slope 
 of the chalk hills a dutiful and affectionate son, at peace 
 with Mrs. Porter, and honoring her for her care of the 
 treasure which he was seeking, and in good time for din- 
 ner. 
 
 " Well, dear," said Mrs. Brown to her husband when 
 they were alone that night, " did you ever see Tom in 
 such spirits, and so gentle and affectionate ? Dear boy ; 
 there can be nothing the matter." 
 
 " Didn't I tell you so ? " replied Mr. Brown ; " you 
 women have always got some nonsense in your heads as 
 soon as your boys have a hair on their chin or your girls 
 begin to put up their back hair." 
 
 " Well, John, say what you will, I'm sure Mary Porter 
 is a very sweet, taking girl, and " 
 
 "I am quite of the same opinion," said Mr. Brown, 
 " and am very glad you have written to ask them here." 
 
 And so the worthy couple went happily to bed.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 BROWN PATRONUS. 
 
 Ox a Saturday afternoon in August, a few weeks after 
 his eventful ride, Tom returned to Englebourn Rectory, 
 to stay over Sunday and attend Betty Winburn's funeral. 
 He was strangely attracted to Harry by the remembrance 
 of their old boyish rivalry ; by the story which he had 
 heard from his cousin, of the unwavering perseverance 
 with which the young peasant clung to and pursued his 
 suit for Simon's daughter; but, more than all, by the feel- 
 ing of gratitude with which he remembered the effect his 
 visit to Betty's sick-room had had on him, on the day of 
 his ride from Barton Manor. On that day he knew that 
 he had ridden into Englebourn in a miserable mental fog, 
 and had ridden out of it in sunshine, which had lasted 
 through the intervening weeks. Somehow or another he 
 had got set straight then and there, turned into the right 
 road and out of the wrong one, at what he very naturally 
 believed to be the most critical moment of his life. 
 
 Without stopping to weigh accurately the respective 
 merits of the several persons whom he had come in con- 
 tact with on that day, he credited them all witli a large 
 amount of gratitude and good-will, and Harry with his 
 mother's share as well as his own. So he had been long- 
 ing to do something for him ever since; the more he re- 
 joiced in and gave himself up to his own new sensations, 
 the more did his gratitude become as it were a burden to 
 him, and yet no opportunity offered of letting off some of
 
 148 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 it in action. The magistrates, taking into consideration 
 the dangerous state of his mother, had let Harry off with 
 a reprimand for his assault, so there was nothing to be 
 done there. He wrote to Katie, offering more money for 
 the Winburns, but she declined, adding, however, to her 
 note by way of postscript, that he might give it to her 
 clothing club, or coal club. Then came the news of Bet- 
 ty's death, and an intimation from Katie that she thought 
 Harry would be much gratified if he would attend the 
 funeral. He jumped at the suggestion. All Englebourn, 
 from the Hawk's Lynch to the Rectory, was hallowed 
 ground to him. The idea of getting back there, so much 
 nearer to Barton Manor, filled him with joy which he 
 tried in vain to repress when he thought of the main ob- 
 ject of his visit. 
 
 He arrived in time to go and shake hands with Harry 
 before dinner, and though scarcely a word passed between 
 them, he saw with delight that he had evidently given 
 pleasure to the mourner. Then he had a charming long 
 evening with Katie, walking in the garden with her be- 
 tween dinner and tea, and after tea discoursing in low 
 tones over her work-table, while Mr. Winter benevolently 
 slept in his arm-chair. Their discourse branched into 
 many paths, but managed always somehow to end in the 
 sayings, beliefs, and perfections of the young lady of Bai'- 
 ton Manor. Tom wondered how it had happened so when 
 he got to his own room, as he fancied Jje had not betrayed 
 himself in the least. He had determined to keep reso- 
 lutely on his guard, and to make a confidant of no living 
 soul till he was twenty-one ; and though sorely tempted 
 to break his resolution in favor of Katie, had restrained 
 himself. He might have spared himself all the trouble, 
 but that he did not know, being unversed in the ways of 
 women, and all unaware of the subtlety and quickness of
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 149 
 
 their intuitions in all matters connected with the heart. 
 Poor, dear, stolid, dim-sighted mankind, how they do sec 
 through us and walk round us ! 
 
 The funeral on the Sunday afternoon between churches 
 had touched him much, being the first he had ever 
 attended. He walked next behind the chief mourner, 
 the few friends, amongst whom David was conspicuous, 
 yielding place to him. He stood beside him in church, 
 and at the open grave, and made the responses as firmly 
 as he could, and pressed his shoulder against his, when he 
 felt the strong frame of the son trembling with the weight 
 and burden of his resolutely suppressed agony. When 
 they parted at the cottage door, to which Tom accompa- 
 nied the mourner and his old and tried friend David, though 
 nothing but a look and a grasp of the hand passed be- 
 tween them, he felt that they were bound by a new and 
 invisible bond ; and as he walked back up the village and 
 past the churchyard, where the children were playing 
 about on the graves, stopping every now and then to watch 
 the sexton as he stamped down and filled in the mould on 
 the last-made one, beside which he had himself stood as 
 a mourner, and heard the bells beginning to chime for the 
 afternoon service, resolved within himself that he would 
 be a true and helpful friend to the widow's son. On this 
 subject he could talk freely to Katie, and did so that even- 
 ing, expounding how much one in his position could do 
 for a young laboring man if he really was bent upon it, 
 and building up grand castles for Harry, the foundations 
 of which rested on his own determination to benefit and 
 patronize him. Katie listened half doubtingly at first, 
 but was soon led away by his confidence, and poured out 
 the tea in the full belief that, with Tom's powerful aid, 
 all would go well. After which they took to reading the 
 Christian Year together, and branched into discussions on 
 13*
 
 150 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 profane poetry, which Katie considered scarcely proper 
 for the evening, but which, nevertheless, being of such 
 rare occurrence with her, she had not the heart to stop. 
 
 The next morning Tom was to return home, and after 
 breakfast began the subject of his plans for Harry again. 
 When Katie produced a small paper packet, and handed 
 it to him, saying, 
 
 " Here is your money again ! " 
 
 " What money ? " 
 
 " The money you left with me for Harry Winburn. I 
 thought at the time that most probably he would not take 
 it." 
 
 " But are you sure he doesn't want it ? Did you try 
 hard to get him to take it ? " said Tom, holding out his 
 hand reluctantly for the money. 
 
 " Not myself. I couldn't offer him money myself, of 
 course ; but I sent it by David, and begged him to do all 
 he could to persuade him to take it." 
 
 " Well, and why wouldn't he ? " 
 
 " Oh, he said the club-money which was coming in was 
 more than enough to pay for the funeral, and for himself 
 he didn't want it." 
 
 " How provoking ! I wonder if old David really did 
 his best to get him to take it ? " 
 
 " Yes, I am sure he did. But you ought to be very 
 glad to find some independence in a poor man." 
 
 " Bother his independence. I don't like to feel that it 
 costs me nothing but talk I want to pay." 
 
 " Ah, Tom, if you knew the poor as well as I do, you 
 wouldn't say so. I am afraid there are not two other 
 men in the parish who would have refused your money. 
 The fear of undermining their independence takes away 
 all my pleasure in giving." 
 
 " Undermining ! Why, Katie, I am sure I have heard 
 you mourn over their stubbornness and unreasonableness."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 151 
 
 " Oh, yes ; they are often provokingly stubborn and un- 
 reasonable, and yet not independent about money, or any 
 thing they can get out of you. Besides, I acknowledge 
 that I have become wiser of late ; I used to like to see 
 them dependent, and cringing to me, but now I dread it." 
 
 " But you would like David to give in about the sing- 
 ing, wouldn't you ? " 
 
 " Yes, if he would give in, I should be very proud. I 
 have learnt a great deal from him ; I used positively to 
 dislike him, but now that I know him, I think him the 
 best man in the parish. If he ever does give in, and I 
 think he will, it will be worth any thing, just because he 
 is so independent." 
 
 " That's all very well, but what am I to do to show 
 Harry Winburn that I mean to be his friend, if he wont 
 take money ? " 
 
 " You have come over to his mother's funeral he will 
 think more of that than of all the money you could give 
 him ; and you can show sympathy for him in a great many 
 ways." 
 
 " Well, I must try. By the way, about his love affair ; 
 is the young lady at home ? I have never seen her, you 
 know." 
 
 " No, she is away with an aunt, looking out for a place. 
 I have persuaded her to get one, and leave home again 
 for the present. Her father is quite well now, and she is 
 not wanted." 
 
 " Well, it seems I can't do any good with her, then, but 
 could not I go and talk to her father about Harry ? I 
 might help him in that way." 
 
 " You must be very careful, Simon is such an odd-tem- 
 pered old man." 
 
 " Oh, I'm not afraid ; he and I are great chums, and a 
 little soft soap will go a long way with him. Fancy if I
 
 152 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 could get him this very morning to ' sanction Harry's suit,' 
 as the phrase is ; what should you thing of me ? " 
 
 " I should think very highly of your powers of persua- 
 sion." 
 
 Not the least daunted by his cousin's misgivings, Tom 
 started in quest of Simon, and found him at work in front 
 of the greenhouse, surrounded by many small pots and 
 heaps of finely sifted mould, and absorbed in his occupa- 
 tion. 
 
 Simon was a rough, stolid Berkshire rustic, somewhat 
 of a tyrant in the bosom of his family, an unmanageable 
 servant, a cross-grained acquaintance ; as a citizen, stiff- 
 necked and a grumbler, who thought that nothing ever 
 went right in the parish ; but, withal, a thorough honest 
 worker, and when allowed to go his own way, and no 
 other way would he go, as his mistress had long since dis- 
 covered, there was no man who earned his daily bread 
 more honestly. He took a pride in his work, and the 
 rectory garden was always trim and well kept, and the 
 beds bright with flowers from early spring till late au- 
 tumn. 
 
 He was absorbed in what he was about, and Tom came 
 up close to him without attracting the least sign of recog- 
 nition, so he stopped, and opened the conversation. 
 
 " Good-day, Simon ; it's a pleasure to see a garden 
 looking so gay as yours." 
 
 Simon looked up from his work, and, when he saw who 
 it was, touched his battered old hat, and answered, 
 
 " Mornin', sir. Ees, you finds me alius in blume." 
 
 "Indeed I do, Simon ; but how do you manage it? I 
 should like to tell my father's gardener." 
 
 " 'Tis no use to tell un if a hevn't found out for his- 
 self ; 'tis nothing but lookin' a bit forrard and farmyard 
 8tuff as does it."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 153 
 
 " Well, there's plenty of farmyard stuff at home, and 
 yet, somehow, we never look half so bright as you do." 
 
 " May be as your gardener just takes and hits it auver 
 the top o' the ground, and lets it lie. That's no kinder 
 good, that beant 'tis the roots as wants the stuff; and 
 you med jist as well take and put a round o' beef agin 
 my back bwone as hit the stuff auver the ground, and 
 never see as it gets to the roots o' the plants." 
 
 " No, I don't think it can be that," said Tom, laughing ; 
 " our gardener seems always to be digging his manure in, 
 but somehow he can't make it come out in flowers as you 
 do." 
 
 " Ther' be mwore waays o' killin' a cat besides choking 
 on un wi' cream," said Simon, chuckling in his turn. 
 
 " That's true, Simon," said Tom ; " the fact is, a gardener 
 must know his business as well as you to be always in 
 bloom, eh ? " 
 
 " That's about it, sir," said Simon, on whom the flattery 
 was beginning to tell. 
 
 Tom saw this, and thought he might now feel his way 
 a little further with the old man. 
 
 ' : I'm over on a sad errand," he said ; " I've been to 
 poor Widow Winburn's funeral she was an old friend 
 of yours, I think ? " 
 
 " Ees ; I minds her long afore she wur married," said 
 Simon, turning to his pots again. 
 
 " She wasn't an old woman, after all," said Tom. 
 
 " Sixty-two year old cum Michaelmas," said Simon. 
 
 "Well, she ought to have been a strong woman for 
 another ten years at least ; why, you must be older than 
 she by some years, Simon, and you can do a good day's 
 work yet with any man." 
 
 Simon went on with his potting without replying, ex- 
 cept by a carefully measured grunt, sufficient to show that
 
 154 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 he had heard the remark, and was not much impressed by 
 it. 
 
 Tom saw that he must change his attack, so, after watch- 
 ing Simon for a minute, he began again. 
 
 " I wonder why it is that the men of your time of life 
 are so much stronger than the young ones in constitution. 
 Now, I don't believe there are three young men in Engle- 
 bourn who would have got over that fall you had at 
 Farmer Groves' so quick as you have ; most young men 
 would have been crippled for life by it." 
 
 " Zo 'em would, the young wosbirds. I dwon't make no 
 account on 'em," said Simon. 
 
 "And you don't feel any the worse for it, Simon?" 
 
 " Narra mossel," replied Simon ; but presently he seemed 
 to recollect something, and added, " I wunt saay but what 
 I feels it at times when I've got to stoop about much." 
 
 " Ah, I'm sorry to hear that, Simon. Then you oughtn't 
 to have so much stooping to do ; potting, and that sort of 
 thing, is the work for you, I should think, and just giving 
 an eye to every thing about the place. Anybody could do 
 the digging and setting out cabbages, and your time is 
 only wasted at it." Tom had now found the old man's 
 weak point. 
 
 " Ees, sir, and so I tells miss," he said ; " but wi' nothin' 
 but a bit o' glass no bigger 'n a cowcumber frame, 'tis all 
 as a man can do to keep a few plants alive droo' the 
 winter." 
 
 " Of course," said Tom, looking round at the very re- 
 spectable greenhouse which Simon had contemptuously 
 likened to a cucumber-frame, " you ought to have at least 
 another house as big as this for forcing." 
 
 " Master aint pleased, he aint," said Simon, " if he 
 dwont get his things, his spring wegebatles, and his straw- 
 berries, as early as though we'd a got forcin pits, and glass
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 155 
 
 like other folk. 'Tis a year and mwore since he promised 
 as I sh'd hev glass along that ther' Avail, but 'tis no nigher 
 comin' as I can see. I be to spake to miss about it 
 now he says, and when I spakes to her, 'tis, ' Simon, 
 we must wait till the 'spensary's 'stablished,' or, ' O Si- 
 mon, last winter wur a werry tryin' wun, and the sick 
 club's terrible bad off for funds,' and so we gwoes on, 
 and med gwo on for aught as I can see, so long as ther's 
 a body sick or bad off in all the parish. And that'll be 
 alius. For what wi' miss' wisitin' on 'em, and sendin' on 
 'em dinners, and a'al the doctor's stuff as is served out o' 
 the 'spensary wy, 'tis enough to keep 'em bad a'al ther' 
 lives. Ther aint no credit in gettin' well. Ther wur no 
 sich a caddie about sick folk when I wur a buoy." 
 
 Simon had never been known to make such a long 
 speech before, and Tom augured well for his negotiation. 
 
 " "Well, Simon," he said, " I've been talking to my 
 cousin, and I think she will do what you want now. The 
 dispensary is set up, and the people are very healthy. 
 How much glass should you want now along that wall?" 
 
 "A matter o' twenty fit or so," said Simon. 
 
 " I think that can be managed," said Tom, " I'll speak 
 to my cousin about it, and then you would have plenty to 
 do in the houses, and you'd want a regular man under 
 you." 
 
 " Ees ; t'would take two on us reg'lar to kep things as 
 should be." 
 
 " And you ought to have somebody who knows what he 
 is about. Can you think of any one who would do, Si- 
 mon ? " 
 
 " Ther's a young chap as works for Squire "VVurley. 
 I've heard as he wants to better hisself." 
 
 "But he isn't an Englebourn man. Isn't there any one 
 in the parish ? "
 
 156 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Ne'er a one as I knows on." 
 
 " What do you think of Harry Winburn he seems a 
 good hand with flowers ? " The words had scarcely passed 
 his lips when Tom saw that he had made a mistake. Old 
 Simon retired into himself at once, and a cunning, distrust- 
 ful look came over his face. There was no doing any 
 thing with him. Even the new forcing-house had lost its 
 attractions for him, and Tom, after some further ineffect- 
 ual attempts to bring him round, returned to the house 
 somewhat crest-fallen. 
 
 " Well, how have you succeeded ? " said Katie, looking 
 up from her work, as he came in and sat down near her 
 table. Tom shook his head. 
 
 " I'm afraid I've made a regular hash of it," he said. 
 " I thought at first I had quite come round the old savage 
 by praising the garden, and promising that you would let 
 him have a new house." 
 
 " You don't mean to say you did that ! " said Katie, 
 stopping her work. 
 
 " Indeed, but I did, though. I was drawn on, you 
 know. I saw it was the right card to play, so I couldn't 
 help it." 
 
 " O Tom ! how could you do so ? We don't want an- 
 other house the least in the world ; it is only Simon's van- 
 ity. He wants to beat the gardener at the Grange at the 
 flower-shows. Every penny will have to come out of 
 what papa allows me for the parish." 
 
 " Don't be afraid, Katie, you wont have to spend a 
 penny. Of course I reserved a condition. The new 
 house was to be put up if he would take Harry as under- 
 gardener." 
 
 " What did he say to that ? " 
 
 " Well, he said nothing. I never came across such an 
 old Turk. How you have spoiled him. If he isn't pleased,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. ] 57 
 
 he wont take the trouble to answer you a word. I was 
 very near telling him a piece of my mind. But he looked 
 all the more. I believe he would poison Harry if he 
 came here. What can have made him hate him so ? " 
 
 " He is jealous of him. Mary and I were so foolish as 
 to praise poor Betty's flowers before Simon, and he has 
 never forgiven it. I think, too, that he suspects, some- 
 how, that Ave talked about getting Harry here. I ought 
 to have told you, but I crnite forgot it." 
 
 " Well, it can't be helped. I don't think I can do any 
 good in that quarter, so now I shall be off to the Grange, 
 to see what I can do there." 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 " Why, Harry is afraid of being turned out of his cot- 
 tage. I saw how it worried him, thinking about it ; so I 
 shall go to the Grange, and say a good word for him. 
 Wurley can't refuse, if I offer to pay the rent myself it's 
 only six pounds a year. Of course I shan't tell Harry ; 
 and he will pay it all the same ; but it may make all the 
 difference with Wurley, who is a regular screw." 
 
 " Do you know Mr. Wurley ? " 
 
 " Yes, just to speak to. He knows all about me, and 
 he will be very glad to be civil." 
 
 " No doubt he will ; but I don't like your going to his 
 house. You don't know what a bad man he is. Nohody 
 but men on the turf, and that sort of people, go there now ; 
 and I believe he thinks of nothing but gambling and game 
 preserving." 
 
 " Oil, yes, I know all about him. The county people 
 are beginning to look shy at him, so he'll be all the more 
 likely to do what I ask him." 
 
 " But you wont get intimate with him ? " 
 
 " You needn't be afraid of that." 
 14
 
 158 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " It is a sad house to go to ; I hope it wont do you any 
 harm." 
 
 " Ah, Katie ! " said Tom, with a smile, not altogether 
 cheerful, " I don't think you need be anxious about that. 
 When one has been a year at Oxford, there isn't much 
 snow left to soil ; so now I am off. I must give myself 
 plenty of time to cook Wurley." 
 
 " Well, I suppose I must not hinder you," said Katie. 
 " I do hope you will succeed in some of your kind plans 
 for Harry." 
 
 " I shall do my best ; and it is a great thing to have 
 somebody besides one's self to think about, and try to help 
 some poor person don't you think so, even for a man?" 
 
 " Of course I do. I am sure you can't be happy with- 
 out it, any more than I. We shouldn't be our mother's 
 children if we could be." 
 
 "Well, good-by, dear; you can't think how I enjoy 
 these glimpses of you and your work. You must give 
 my love to Uncle Robert." 
 
 And so they bade one another adieu, lovingly, after the 
 manner of cousins, and Tom rode away with a very soft 
 place in his heart for his Cousin Katie. It was not the 
 least the same sort of passionate feeling of worship with 
 which he regarded Mary. The two feelings could lie side 
 by side in his heart with plenty of room to spare. In fact, 
 his heart had been getting so big in the last few weeks, 
 that it seemed capable of taking in the whole of mankind, 
 not to mention woman. Still, on the whole, it may be 
 safely asserted, that, had matters been in at all a more 
 forward state, and could she have seen exactly what was 
 passing in his mind, Mary would probably have objected 
 to the land of affection which he felt for his cousin at this 
 particular time. The joke about cousinly love is prob-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 159 
 
 ably as old, and certainly as true, as Solomon's proverbs. 
 However, as matters stood, it could be no concern of 
 Mary what his feelings were towards Katie, or any other 
 person. 
 
 Tom rode in at the lodge gate of the Grange soon after 
 eleven o'clock, and walked his horse slowly through the 
 park, admiring the splendid timber, and thinking how he 
 should break his request to the owner of the place. But 
 his thoughts were interrupted by the proceedings of the 
 rabbits, which were out by hundreds all along the sides of 
 the plantations, and round the great trees. A few of the 
 nearest just deigned to notice him by scampering to their 
 holes under the roots of the antlered oaks, into which some 
 of them popped with a disdainful kick of their hind legs, 
 while others turned round, sat up, and looked at him. As 
 he neared the house, he passed a keeper's cottage, and 
 was saluted by the barking of dogs from the neighboring 
 kennel; and the young pheasants ran about round some 
 twenty hen-coops, which were arranged along opposite the 
 door where the keeper's children were playing. The 
 pleasure of watching the beasts and birds kept him from 
 arranging his thoughts, and he reached the hall-door with- 
 out having formed the plan of his campaign. 
 
 A footman answered the bell, who doubted whether his 
 master was down, but thought he would see the gentleman 
 if he would send in his name. Whereupon Tom handed 
 in his card ; and in a few minutes, a rakish-looking stable- 
 boy came round for his horse, and the butler appeared, 
 with his master's compliments, and a request that he would 
 step into the breakfast-room. Tom followed this portly 
 personage through the large, handsome hall, on the walls 
 of which hung a buff coat or two and some old-fashioned 
 arms, and large paintings of dead game and fruit through 
 a drawing-room, the furniture of which was all covered
 
 160 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 up in melancholy cases into the hreakfast-parlor, where 
 the owner of the mansion was seated at tahle in a loung- 
 ing jacket. He was a man of forty, or thereabouts, who 
 would have been handsome, but for the animal look about 
 his face. His cheeks were beginning to fall into chops, 
 his full lips had a liquorish look about them, and bags were 
 beginning to form under his light blue eyes. His hands 
 were very white and delicate, and shook a little as he 
 poured out his tea ; and he was full and stout in body, with 
 small shoulders, and thin arms and legs ; in short, the last 
 man whom Tom would have chosen as bow in a pair oar. 
 The only part of him which showed strength were his 
 dark whiskers, which were abundant, and elaborately oiled 
 and curled. The room was light and pleasant, with two 
 windows looking over the park, and furnished luxui"iously, 
 in the most modern style, with all manner of easy-chairs 
 and sofas. A glazed case or two of well-bound books 
 showed that some former owner had cared for such things ; 
 but the doors had, probably, never been opened in the 
 present reign. The master, and his usual visitors, found 
 sufficient food for the mind in the Racing Calendar, Box- 
 iana, the Adventures of Corinthian Tom, and Bell's Life, 
 which lay on a side table ; or in the pictures and prints 
 of racers, opera dancers, and steeple-chases, which hung 
 in profusion on the walls. The breakfast-table was beau- 
 tifully appointed, in the matter of China and plate ; and 
 delicate little rolls, neat pats of butter in ice, and two 
 silver hot dishes containing curry and broiled salmon, and 
 a plate of fruit, piled in tempting profusion, appealed, 
 apparently in vain, to the appetite of the lord of the 
 feast. 
 
 " Mr. Brown, sir," said the butler, ushering in our hero 
 to his master's presence. 
 
 " Ah, Brown, I'm very glad to see you here," said Mr.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 161 
 
 Wurley, standing up and holding out his hand. " Have 
 any breakfast ? " 
 
 " Thank you, no ; I have breakfasted," said Tom, some- 
 what astonished at the intimacy of the greeting ; but it 
 was his cue to do the friendly thing, so he shook the prof- 
 fered hand, which felt very limp, and sat down by the 
 table, looking pleasant. 
 
 " Ridden from home this morning ? " said Mr. Wurley, 
 picking over daintily some of the curry to which he had 
 helped himself. ' 
 
 ' ; No ; I was at my uncle's, at Englebourn, last night. 
 It is very little out of the way, so I thought I would just 
 call on my road home." 
 
 " Quite right. I'm very glad you came without cere- 
 mony. People about here are so d d full of ceremony. 
 It don't suit me all that humbug. But I wish you'd just 
 pick a bit." 
 
 " Thank you. Then I will eat some fruit," said Tom, 
 helping himself to some of the freshly picked grapes ; 
 " how very fine these are ! " 
 
 " Yes, I'm open to back my houses against the field for 
 twenty miles round. This curry isn't fit for a pig. Take 
 it out, and tell the cook so." The butler solemnly obeyed, 
 while his master went on with one of the frequent oaths 
 with which he garnished his conversation. " You're right, 
 they can't spoil the fruit. They're a set of skulking dev- 
 ils, are servants. They think of nothing but stuffing 
 themselves, and how they can cheat you most, and do the 
 least work." Saying which, he helped himself to some 
 fruit ; and the two eat their grapes for a short time in. 
 silence. But even fruit seemed to pall quickly on him, 
 and he pushed away his plate. The butler came back 
 with a silver tray, with soda water, and a small decanter 
 of brandy, and long glasses on it. 
 14*
 
 1G2 TOM BHOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Wont you have something after your ride ? " said the 
 host to Tom ; " some soda water, with a dash of bingo 
 clears one's head in the morning." 
 
 " No, thank you," said Tom, smiling ; " it's bad for train- 
 ing." 
 
 "Ah, you Oxford men are all fo? training," said his 
 host, drinking greedily of the foaming mixture which the 
 butler handed to him. " A glass of bitter ale is what you 
 take, eh ? I know. Get some ale for Mr. Brown." 
 
 Tom felt that it would be uncivil to refuse this orthodox 
 offer, and took his beer accordingly, after which his host 
 produced a box of Hudson's Regalias, and proposed to 
 look at the stables. So they lighted their cigars, and 
 went out. Mr. Wurley had taken of late to the turf, and 
 they inspected several young horses which were entered 
 for country stakes. Tom thought them weedy-looking 
 animals, but patiently listened to their praises and pedi- 
 grees, upon which his host was eloquent enough; and 
 rubbing up his latest readings in BelVs Life, and the rac- 
 ing talk which he had been in the habit of hearing in 
 Drysdale's rooms, managed to hold his own, and asked, 
 with a grave face, about the price of the Coronation colt 
 for the next Derby, and whether Scott's lot was not the 
 right thing to stand on for the St. Leger, thereby raising 
 himself considerably in his host's eyes. There were no 
 hunters in the stable, at which Tom expressed his sur- 
 prise. In reply, Mr. Wurley abused the country, and 
 declared that it was not worth riding across, the fact be- 
 ing that he had lost his nerve, and that the reception 
 which he was beginning to meet with in the field, if he 
 came out by chance, was of the coldest. 
 
 From the stables they strolled to the keeper's cottage, 
 where Mr. Wurley called for some buckwheat and In- 
 dian corn, and began feeding the young pheasants, which
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 163 
 
 were running about almost like barn-door fowls close to 
 them. 
 
 " We've bad a good season for the young birds," he 
 said ; " my fellow knows that part of his business, d n 
 him, and don't lose many. You had better bring your 
 gun over in October ; we shall have a week in the covers 
 early in the month." 
 
 " Thank you, I shall be very glad," said Tom ; " but you 
 don't shoot these birds ? " 
 
 " Shoot 'em ! what the devil should I do with them ? " 
 
 " Why, they're so tame I thought you just kept them 
 about the house for breeding. I don't care so much for 
 pheasant shooting ; I like a good walk after a snipe, or 
 creeping along to get a wild duck, much better. There's 
 some sport in it, or even in partridge shooting with a 
 couple of good dogs, now " 
 
 " You're quite wrong. There's nothing like a good 
 dry ride in a cover with lots of game, and a fellow behind 
 to load for you." 
 
 " Well, I must say, I prefer the open." 
 
 " You've no covers over your way, have you ? " 
 
 " Not many." 
 
 " I thought so. You wait till you've had a good day in 
 my covers, and you wont care a d n for quartering all 
 day over wet turnips. Besides, this sort of thing pays. 
 They talk about pheasants costing a guinea a head on 
 one's table. It's d d stuff; at any rate, mine don't cost 
 me much. In fact, I say it pays, and I can prove it." 
 
 " But you feed your pheasants ? " 
 
 " Yes, just round the house for a few weeks, and I sow 
 a little buckwheat in the covers. But they have to keep 
 themselves pretty much, I can tell you." 
 
 " Don't the farmers object? " 
 
 " Yes, d n them ; they're never satisfied. But they
 
 164 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 don't grumble to me ; they know better. There are a 
 dozen fellows ready to take any farm that's given up, and 
 they know it. Just get a beggar to put a hundred or two 
 into the ground, and he wont quit hold in a hurry. Will 
 you play a game at billiards ? " 
 
 The turn which their conversation had taken hitherto 
 had offered no opening to Tom for introducing the object 
 of his visit, and he felt less and less inclined to come to the 
 point. He looked his host over and over again, and the 
 more he looked the less he fancied asking any thing like a 
 favor of him. However, as it had to be done, he thought he 
 couldn't do better than fall into his ways for a few hours, 
 and watch for a chance. The man seemed good-natured 
 in his way ; and all his belongings the fine park and 
 house, and gardens and stables were not without their 
 effect on his young guest. It is not given to many men 
 of twice his age to separate a man from his possessions, 
 and look at him apart from them. So he yielded easily 
 enough, and they went to billiards in a fine room opening 
 out of the hall ; and Tom, who was very fond of the 
 game, soon forgot every thing in the pleasure of playing 
 on such a table. 
 
 It was not a bad match. Mr. "Wurley understood the 
 game far better than his guest, and could give him advice 
 as to what side to put on and how to play for cannons. 
 This he did in a patronizing way, but his hand was un- 
 steady and his nerve bad. Tom's good eye and steady 
 hand, and the practice he had had at the St. Ambrose 
 pool-table, gave him considerable advantage in the haz- 
 ards. And so they played on, Mr. Wurley condescending 
 to bet only half a crown a game, at first giving ten points, 
 and then five, at which latter odds Tom managed to be 
 two games ahead when the butler announced lunch at two 
 o'clock.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 1G5 
 
 " I think I must order my horse," said Tom, putting on 
 his coat. 
 
 "No, d n it, you must give me my revenge. I'm al- 
 ways five points better after lunch, and after dinner I 
 could give you fifteen points. Why shouldn't you stop 
 and dine and sleep ? I expect some men to dinner." 
 
 " Thank you, I must get home to-day." 
 
 " I should like you to taste my mutton ; I never kill it 
 under five years old. You don't get that every day." 
 
 Tom, however, was proof against the mutton ; but con- 
 sented to stay till towards the hour when the other guests 
 were expected, finding that his host had a decided objec- 
 tion to being left alone. So after lunch, at which Mr. 
 Wurley drank the better part of a bottle of old sherry to 
 steady his nerves, they returned again to billiards and 
 Hudson's Regalias. 
 
 They played on for another hour; and though Mr. 
 Wurley's hand was certainly steadier, the luck remained 
 with Tom. He was now getting rather tired of playing, 
 and wanted to be leaving, and he began to remember the 
 object of his visit again. But Mr. "Wurley was nettled 
 at being beaten by a boy, as he counted his opponent, and 
 wouldn't hear of leaving off. So Tom played on care- 
 lessly game after game, and was soon again only two 
 games ahead. Mr. Wurley's temper was recovering, and 
 now Tom protested that he must go. Just one game more 
 his host urged, and Tom consented. Wouldn't he play 
 for a sovereign ? ISo. So they played double or quits ; 
 and after a sharp struggle Mr. Wurley won the game, at 
 which he was highly elated, and talked again grandly of 
 the odds he could give after dinner. 
 
 Tom felt that it was now or never, and so as he put on 
 his coat, he said,
 
 166 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Well, I'm much obliged to you for a very pleasant 
 day, Mr. Wurley." 
 
 " I hope you'll come over again, and stay and sleep. I 
 shall always be glad to see you. It is so cursed hard to 
 keep somebody always going in the country." 
 
 " Thank you ; I should like to come again. But now 
 I want to ask a favor of you before I go." 
 
 " Eh, well, what is it ? " said Mr. Wurley, whose face 
 and manner became suddenly any thing but encouraging. 
 
 " There's that cottage of yours, the one at the corner 
 of Englebourn Copse, next the village." 
 
 " The woodman's house, I know," said Mr. Wurley. 
 
 " The tenant is dead, and I want you to let it to a friend 
 of mine ; I'll take care the rent is paid." 
 
 Mr. Wurley pricked up his ears at this announcement. 
 He gave a sharp look at Tom ; and then bent over the 
 table, made a stroke, and said, " Ah, I heard the old wo- 
 man was dead. Who's your friend, then ? " 
 
 " Well, I mean her son," said Tom, a little embar- 
 rassed ; " he's an active young fellow, and will make a 
 good tenant, I'm sure." 
 
 " I dare say," said Mr. Wurley, with a leer ; " and I 
 suppose there's a sister to keep house for him, eh ? " 
 
 " No, but he wants to get married." 
 
 " Wants to get married, eh ? " said Mr. Wurley, with 
 another leer and oath. " You're right ; that's a deal safer 
 kind of thing for you." 
 
 " Yes," said Tom, resolutely disregarding the insinua- 
 tion which he could not help feeling was intended ; " it 
 will keep him steady, and if he can get the cottage it 
 might make all the difference. There wouldn't be much 
 trouble about the marriage then, I dare say." 
 
 " You'll find it a devilish long way. You're quite right,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 167 
 
 mind you, not to get them settled close at home ; but En- 
 glebourn is too far, I should say." 
 
 " What does it matter to me ? " 
 
 " Oh, you're tired of her ! I see. Perhaps it wont be 
 too far, then." 
 
 " Tired of her ! who do you mean ? " 
 
 " Ha, ha ! " said Mr. Wurley, looking up from the table 
 over which he was leaning, for he went on knocking the 
 balls about ; " devilish well acted. But you needn't try 
 to come the old soldier over me. D n it, I'm not such a 
 fool as that." 
 
 " I don't know what you mean by coming the old sol- 
 dier. I only asked you to let the cottage, and I will be 
 responsible for the rent. I'll pay in advance if you 
 like." 
 
 " Yes, you want me to let the cottage for you to put in 
 this girl." 
 
 " I beg your pardon," said Tom, interrupting him, and 
 scarcely able to keep his temper, " I told you it was for 
 this young Winburn." 
 
 " Of course you told me so. Ha, ha ! " 
 
 " And you don't believe me ? " 
 
 " Come now, all's fair in love and war. But, d n it, 
 you needn't be mealy-mouthed with me. You don't mind 
 his living there; he's away at work all day, eh? and his 
 wife stays at home." 
 
 " Mr. Wurley, I give you my honor I never saw the 
 girl in my life that I know of, and I don't know that she 
 will marry him." 
 
 " What did you talk about your friend for, then ? " said 
 Mr. Wurley, stopping and staring at Tom, curiosity begin- 
 ning to mingle with his look of cunning unbelief. 
 
 " Because I meant just what I said." 
 
 " And the friend, then ? "
 
 1G8 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I have told you several times that this young Win- 
 burn is the man." 
 
 " What, your friend? " 
 
 " Yes, my friend," said Tom ; and he felt himself get- 
 ting red at having to call Harry his friend in such com- 
 pany. Mr. Wurley looked at him for a few moments, and 
 then took his leg off the billiard table, and came round to 
 Tom with the sort of patronizing air with which he had 
 lectured him on billiards. 
 
 " I say, Brown, I'll give you a piece of advice," he said. 
 " You're a young fellow, and haven't seen any thing of the 
 world. Oxford's all very well, but it isn't the world. 
 Now I tell you, a young fellow can't do himself greater 
 harm than getting into low company and talking as you 
 have been talking. D n it, man, it might ruin you in 
 the county ! That sort of radical stuff wont do, you know, 
 calling a farm laborer your friend." 
 
 Tom chafed at this advice from a man who he well 
 knew was notoriously in the habit of entertaining at his 
 house, and living familiarly with, betting men, and train- 
 ers, and all the riff-raff of the turf. But he restrained 
 himself by a considerable effort, and instead of retorting, 
 as he felt inclined to do, said, with an attempt to laugh it 
 off, "Thank you, I don't think there's much fear of my 
 turning radical. But will you let me the cottage?" 
 
 " My agent manages all that. We talked about pulling 
 it down. The cottage is in my preserves, and I don't mean 
 to have some poaching fellow there to be sneaking out at 
 night after my pheasants." 
 
 " But his grandfather and great-grandfather lived there." 
 
 " I dare say, but it's my cottage." 
 
 " But surely, that gives him a claim to it." 
 
 " D n it ! it's my cottage. You're not going to tell 
 me I mayn't do what I like with it, I suppose ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 1G9 
 
 " I only said that his family, having lived there so long, 
 gives him a claim." 
 
 " A claim to what ? These are some more of your 
 cursed radical notions. I think they might teach you 
 something better at Oxford." 
 
 Tom was now perfectly cool, but withal in such a tre- 
 mendous fury of excitement that he forgot the interests of 
 his client altogether. 
 
 " I came here, sir," he said, very quietly and slowly, 
 " not to request your advice on my own account, or your 
 opinion on the studies of Oxford, valuable as no doubt 
 they are : I came to ask you to let this cottage to me, and 
 I wish to have your answer." 
 
 " I'll be d d if I do ; there's my answer." 
 
 " Very well," said Tom ; " then I have only to wish 
 you good-morning. I am sorry to have wasted a day in 
 the company of a man who sets up for a country gentle- 
 man with the tongue of a Thames bargee, and the heart 
 of a Jew pawnbroker." 
 
 Mr. Wurley rushed to the bell and rang it furiously. 
 " By ! " he almost screamed, shaking his fist at Tom, 
 " I'll have you horsewhipped out of my house ; " and then 
 poured forth a flood of uncomplimentary slang, ending in 
 another pull at the bell, and " By I'll have you horse- 
 whipped out of my house." 
 
 "You had better try it on you and your flunkies 
 together," said Tom, taking a cigar-case out of his pocket 
 and lighting up, the most defiant and exasperating action 
 he could think of on the spur of the moment. " Here's 
 one of them, so I'll leave you to give him his orders, and 
 wait five minutes in the hall, where there's more room." 
 And so, leaving the footman gaping at his lord, he turned 
 on his heel, with the air of Bernardo del Carpio after ha 
 had bearded King Alphonso, and walked into the hall. 
 15
 
 170 TOM BKOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 He heard men running to and fro, and doors banging, 
 as he stood there looking at the old buff-coats, and rather 
 thirsting for a fight. Presently a door opened, and the 
 portly butler shuffled in, looking considerably embarrassed, 
 and said, 
 
 " Please, sir, to go out quiet, else he'll be having one 
 of his fits." 
 
 " Your master, you mean ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir," said the butler, nodding ; " D. T., sir. After 
 one of his rages the black dog comes, and it's hawful 
 work ; so I hope you'll go, sir." 
 
 " Very well ; of course I'll go. I don't want to give 
 him a fit." Saying which, Tom walked out of the 
 hall-door, and leisurely round to the stables, where he 
 found already signs of commotion. Without regarding 
 them, he got his horse saddled and bridled, and after look- 
 ing him over carefully, and patting him, and feeling his 
 girths, in the yard, in the presence of a cluster of retain- 
 ers of one sort or another, who were gathering from the 
 house and offices, and looking sorely puzzled whether to 
 commence hostilities or not, mounted and walked quietly 
 out. 
 
 After his anger had been a little cooled by the fresh 
 air of the wild country at the back of the Hawk's Lynch, 
 which he struck into on his way home soon after leaving 
 the park, it suddenly occurred to him that, however satis- 
 factory to himself the results of his encounter with this 
 unjust landlord might seem, they would probably prove 
 any thing but agreeable to the would-be tenant, Harry 
 Winburn. In fact, as he meditated on the matter, it be- 
 came clear to him that in the course of one morning he 
 had probably exasperated old Simon against his aspirant 
 son-in-law, and put a serious spoke in Harry's love-wheel 
 on the one hand ; while on the other, he had insured his
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 171 
 
 speedy expulsion from his cottage, if not the demolition of 
 that building. Whereupon he became somewhat low un- 
 der the conviction that his friendship, which was to work 
 such wonders for the said Harry, and deliver him out of 
 all his troubles, had as yet only made his whole look-out 
 in the world very much darker and more dusty. In short, 
 as yet he had managed to do considerably less than noth- 
 ing for his friend, and he felt very small before he got 
 home that evening. He was far, however, from being 
 prepared for the serious way in which his father looked 
 upon his day's proceedings. Mr. Brown was sitting by 
 himself after dinner when his son turned up, and , had 
 to drink several extra glasses of port to keep himself 
 decently composed, while Tom narrated the events of the 
 day in the intervals of his attacks on the dinner, which 
 was brought back for him. When the servant had cleared 
 away, Mr. Brown proceeded to comment on the history in 
 a most decided manner. 
 
 Tom was wrong to go to the Grange in the first in- 
 stance ; and this part of the homily was amplified by a 
 discourse on the corruption of the turf in general, and the 
 special curse of small country races in particular, which 
 such men as Wurley supported, and which, but for them, 
 would cease. Racing, which used to be the pastime of 
 great people, who could well afford to spend a few thou- 
 sands a year on their pleasure, had now mostly fallen into 
 the hands of the very worst and lowest men of all classes, 
 most of whom would not scruple, as Mr. Brown strongly 
 put it, to steal a copper out of a blind beggar's hat. If he 
 must go, at any rate he might have done his errand and 
 come away, instead of staying there all day accepting the 
 man's hospitality. Mr. Brown himself really should be 
 much embarrassed to know what to do if the man should 
 happen to attend the next sessions or assizes. But, abovo
 
 172 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 all, having accepted his hospitality, to turn round at the 
 end and insult the man in his own house ! This seemed 
 to Brown pere a monstrous and astounding performance. 
 
 This new way of putting matters took Tom entirely hy 
 surprise. He attempted a defence, but in vain. His fa- 
 ther admitted that it would be a hard case if Harry were 
 turned out of his cottage, but wholly refused to listen to 
 Tom's endeavors to prove that a tenant in such a case had 
 any claim or right as against his landlord. A weekly ten- 
 ant was a weekly tenant, and no succession of weeks' hold- 
 ing could make him any thing more. Tom found himself 
 rushing into a line of argument which astonished himself 
 and sounded wild, but in which he felt sure there was 
 some truth, and which, therefore, he would not abandon, 
 though his father was evidently annoyed, and called it 
 mere mischievous sentiment. Each was more moved than 
 he would have liked to own ; each in his own heart felt 
 aggrieved, and blamed the other for not understanding 
 him. But though obstinate on the general question, upon 
 the point of his conduct in leaving the Grange, Tom was 
 fairly brought to shame, and gave in at last, and ex- 
 pressed his sorrow, though he could not help maintaining 
 that if his father could have heard what took place, and 
 seen the man's manner, he would scarcely blame him for 
 what he had said and done. Having once owned himself 
 in the wrong, however, there was nothing for it but to 
 write an apology, the composition of which was as disa- 
 greeable a task as had ever fallen to his lot.
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 Mrjdsv uyav. 
 
 Has any person, of any nation or language, found out 
 and given to the world any occupation, work, diversion, 
 or pursuit, more subtlely dangerous to the susceptible 
 youth of both sexes than that of nutting in pairs ? If so, 
 who ? where ? what ? A few years later in life, perhaps 
 district-visiting, and attending schools together, may in 
 certain instances be more fatal ; but in the first bright days 
 of youth, a day's nutting against the world a day in 
 autumn, warm enough to make sitting in sheltered nooks 
 in the woods, where the sunshine can get very pleasant, 
 and yet not too warm to make exercise uncomfortable 
 two young people who have been thrown much together, 
 one of whom is conscious of the state of his feelings 
 towards the other, and is, moreover, aware that his hours 
 are numbered, that in a few days at furthest they will be 
 separated for many months, that persons in authority on 
 both sides are beginning to suspect something (as is ap- 
 parent from the difficulty they have had in getting away 
 together at all on this same afternoon) here is a conjunc- 
 tion of persons and circumstances, if ever there was one in 
 the world, which is surely likely to end in a catastrophe. 
 Indeed, so obvious to the meanest capacity is the danger 
 of the situation that, as Tom had, in his own mind, stated 
 his character for resolution with his private self on the 
 keeping of his secret till after he was of age, it is hard to 
 conceive how he can have been foolish enough to get 
 15*
 
 174 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 himself into a hazel copse alone with Miss Mary on the 
 earliest day he could manage it after the arrival of the 
 Porters, on their visit to Mr. and Mrs. Brown. That is 
 to say, it would be hard to conceive if it didn't just hap- 
 pen to be the most natural thing in the world. 
 
 For the first twenty-four hours after their meeting in 
 the home of his father, the two young people, and Tom in 
 particular, felt very uncomfortable. Mary, being a young 
 lady of very high spirits, and, as readers may probably 
 have discovered, much given to that kind of conversation 
 which borders as nearly upon what men commonly call 
 chaff as a well-bred girl can venture on, was annoyed to 
 find herself quite at fault in all her attempts to get her old 
 antagonist of Commemoration to show fight. She felt in 
 a moment how changed his manner was, and thought it 
 by no means changed for the better. As for Tom, he felt 
 foolish and shy at first to an extent which drove him half 
 wild ; his words stuck in his throat, and he took to blush- 
 ing again like a boy of fourteen. In fact, he got so angry 
 with himself that he rather avoided her actual presence, 
 though she was scarcely a moment out of his sight. Mr. 
 Brown made the most of his son's retreat, devoted himself 
 most gallantly to Mary, and was completely captivated by 
 the first night of their arrival, and triumphed over his wife 
 when they were alone at the groundlessness of her sus- 
 picions. But she was by no means so satisfied on the 
 subject as her husband. 
 
 In a day or two, however, he began to take heart of 
 grace, and to find himself oftener at Mary's side, with 
 something to say, and more to look. But now she, in her 
 turn, began to be embarrassed, for all attempts to re-es- 
 tablish their old footing failed ; and the difficulty of find- 
 ing a satisfactory new one remained to be solved so for 
 the present, though neither of them found it quite satis-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 175 
 
 factory, they took refuge in the presence of a third party, 
 and attached themselves to Katie, talking at one another 
 through her. Nothing could exceed Katie's judiciousness 
 as a medium of communication, and through her a better 
 understanding began to establish itself, and the visit which 
 both of them had been looking forward to so eagerly, 
 seemed likely, after all, to be as pleasant in fact as it had 
 been in anticipation. As they became more at ease, the 
 vigilance of Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Porter seemed likely 
 to revive. But in a country house there must be plenty 
 of chances for young folk who mean it to be together, and 
 so they found and made use of their opportunities, giving 
 at the same time as little cause to their natural guardians as 
 possible for any serious interference. The families got on, 
 on the whole, so well together that the visit was prolonged 
 from the original four or five days to a fortnight ; and this 
 time of grace was drawing to a close when the event hap- 
 pened which made the visit memorable to our hero. 
 
 On the morning in question, Mr. Brown arranged at 
 breakfast that he and his wife should drive Mr. and Mrs. 
 Porter to make calls on several of the neighbors. Tom 
 declared his intention of taking a long day after the part- 
 ridges, and the young ladies were to go and make a sketch 
 of the house from a point which Katie had chosen. Ac- 
 cordingly, directly after luncheon the carriage came round, 
 and the elders departed, and the young ladies started to- 
 gether, carrying their sketching apparatus with them. 
 
 It was probably a bad day for scent, for they had not 
 been gone a quarter of an hour when Tom came home, 
 deposited his gun, and followed on their steps. He found 
 them sitting under the lee of a high bank, sufficiently in- 
 tent on their drawings, but neither surprised nor sorry to 
 find that he had altered his mind and come back to inter- 
 rupt them. 80 he lay down near them, and talked of Ox-
 
 176 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ford and Englebourn, and so from one thing to another, 
 till he got upon the subject of nutting, and the sylvan 
 beauties of a neighboring wood. Mary was getting on 
 badly with her drawing, and jumped at the idea of a 
 ramble in the wood; but Katie was obdurate, and resisted 
 all their solicitations to move. She suggested, however, 
 that they might go, and as Tom declared that they should 
 not be out of call, and would be back in half an hour at 
 furthest, Mary consented, and they left the sketcher, and 
 strolled together out of the fields, and into the road, and 
 so through a gate into the wood. It was a pleasant oak 
 wood. The wild flowers were over, but the great masses 
 of ferns, four or five feet high, made a grand carpet round 
 the stems of the forest monarchs, and a fitting couch, for 
 here and there one of them, which had been lately felled, 
 and lay in fallen majesty, with bare shrouded trunk await- 
 ing the sawyers. Further on the hazel underwood stood 
 thickly on each side of the green rides, down which they 
 sauntered side by side. Tom talked of the beauty of the 
 wood in spring-time, and the glorious succession of color- 
 ing pale yellow, and deep blue and white, and purple, 
 which the primroses, and hyacinths, and starwert, and 
 fox-gloves gave each in their turn in the early year, and 
 mourned over their absence. But Mary preferred au- 
 tumn, and would not agree with him. She was enthusi- 
 astic for ferns and heather. He gathered some sprigs of 
 the latter for her, from a little sandy patch which they 
 passed, and some more for his own button-hole ; and then 
 they engaged in the absorbing pursuit of nutting, and the 
 talk almost ceased. He caught the higher branches, and 
 bent them down to her, and watched her as she gathered 
 them, and wondered at the ease and grace of all her 
 movements, and the unconscious beauty of her attitudes. 
 Soon she became more enterprising herself, and made
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 177 
 
 little excursions into the copse, surmounting briers, and 
 passing through tangled places like a Naiad, before he 
 could be there to help her. And so they went on, along 
 the rides and through the copse, forgetting Katie and 
 time, till they were brought up by the fence on the fur- 
 ther side of the wood. The ditch was on the outside, and 
 on the inside a bank with a hedge on the top, full of 
 tempting hazel bushes. She clapped her hands at the 
 sight, and declining his help, stepped lightly up the bank, 
 and began gathering. He turned away for a moment, 
 jumped up the bank himself, and followed her example. 
 
 He was standing up in the hedge, and reaching after a 
 tempting cluster of nuts, when he heard a short, sharp cry 
 of pain behind him, which made him spring backwards, 
 and nearly miss his footing as he came to the ground. 
 Recovering himself, and turning round, he saw Mary 
 lying at the foot of the bank, writhing in pain. 
 
 He was at her side in an instant, and dreadfully 
 alarmed. 
 
 " Good heavens ! what has happened ? " he said. 
 
 " My ankle ! " she cried ; and the effort of speaking 
 brought the sudden flush of pain to her brow. 
 
 " Oh ! what can I do ? " 
 
 " The boot ! the boot ! " she said, leaning forward to un- 
 lace it, and then sinking back against the bank. " It is so 
 painful ! I hope I sha'n't faint." 
 
 Poor Tom could only clasp his hands as he knelt by 
 her, and repeat, " Oh, what can I do what can I do ? " 
 
 His utter bewilderment presently roused Mary, and her 
 natural high courage was beginning to master the pain. 
 
 " Have you a knife ? " 
 
 " Yes here," he said, pulling one out of his pocket, 
 and opening it ; " here it is." 
 
 " Please cut the lace."
 
 178 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Tom with beating heart and trembling hand, cut the 
 lace, and then looked up at her. 
 
 " Oh, be quick cut it again ; don't be afraid." 
 
 He cut it again ; and without taking hold of the foot, 
 gently pulled out the ends of the lace. 
 
 She again leaned forward, and tried to take off the 
 boot. But the pain was too great, and she sank back, 
 and put her hand up to her flushed face. 
 
 " May I try ? perhaps I could do it." 
 
 " Yes, pray do. Oh, I can't bear the pain ! " she added, 
 next moment ; and Tom felt ready to hang himself for 
 having been the cause of it. 
 
 " You must cut the boot off", please." 
 
 " But perhaps I may cut you. Do you really mean 
 it?" 
 
 " Yes, really. There, take care. How your hand 
 shakes. You will never do for a doctor." 
 
 His hand did shake certainly. He had cut a little hole 
 in the stocking ; but, under the circumstances, we need not 
 wonder the situation was new and trying. Urged on 
 by her, he cut and cut away, and, at last, off came the 
 boot, and her beautiful little foot lay on the green turf. 
 She was much relieved at once, but still in great pain ; 
 and now he began to recover his head. 
 
 " The ankle should be bound up ; may I try ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes ; but what with ? " 
 
 Tom dived into his shooting-coat pocket, and produced 
 one of the large many-colored neck-wrappers which were 
 fashionable at Oxford in those days. 
 
 " How lucky," he said, as he tore it into strips. " I 
 think this will do. Now, you'll stop me, wont you, if I 
 hurt, or don't do it right ? " 
 
 " Don't be afraid ; I'm much better. Bind it tight 
 tighter than that."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 179 
 
 He wound the strips as tenderly as he could round her 
 foot and ankle, with hands all alive with nerves, and won- 
 dering more and more at her courage, as she kept urging 
 him to draw the bandage tighter yet. Then, still under 
 her direction, he fastened and pinned down the ends ; and 
 as he was rather neat with his fingers, from the practice 
 of tying flies and splicing rods and bats, produced, on the 
 whole, a creditable sort of bandage. Then be looked up 
 at her, the perspiration standing on his forehead, as if he 
 had been pulling a race, and said, 
 
 " Will that do ? I'm afraid it's very awkward." 
 
 " Oh, no ; thank you so much ! But I'm so sorry you 
 have torn your handkerchief." 
 
 Tom made no answer to this remark, except by a look. 
 What could he say, but that he would gladly have torn 
 his skin off for the same purpose, if it would have been of 
 any use ; but this speech did not seem quite the thing for 
 the moment. 
 
 " But how do you feel ? Is it very painful ? " he asked. 
 
 " Rather. But don't look so anxious. Indeed, it is 
 very bearable. But what are we to do now ? " 
 
 He thought for a moment, and said, with something like 
 a sigh, 
 
 " Shall I run home, and bring the servants and a sofa, 
 or something to carry you on ? " 
 
 " No, I shouldn't like to be left here alone." 
 
 His face brightened again. 
 
 " How near is the nearest cottage ? " she asked. 
 
 " There's none nearer than the one which we passed on 
 the road, on the other side of the wood, you know." 
 
 "Then I must try to get there. You must help me 
 up." 
 
 lie sprang to his feet and stooped over her, doubting
 
 180 TOM BROWN AT OXFOltD. 
 
 how to begin helping her. He had never felt so shy in 
 his life. He held out his hands. 
 
 " I think you must put your arm round me," she said, 
 after looking at him for a moment. Her woman's instinct 
 was satisfied with the look. He lifted her on to her 
 feet. 
 
 " Now, let me lean on your arm. There, I dare say I 
 shall manage to hobble along well enough ; " and she made 
 a brave attempt to walk. But the moment the injured 
 foot touched the ground, she stopped with a catch of her 
 breath, and a shiver, which went through Tom like a 
 knife ; and the flush came back into her face, and she 
 would have fallen had he not again put his arm round 
 her waist, and held her up. " I am better again now," 
 she said, after a second or two. 
 
 " But Mary, dear Mary, don't try to walk again, for my 
 sake. I can't bear it." 
 
 " But what am I to do ? " she said. " I must get back 
 somehow." 
 
 " Will you let me carry you ? " 
 
 She looked in his face again, and then dropped her 
 eyes, and hesitated. 
 
 " I wouldn't offer, dear, if there were any other way. 
 But you must n't walk; indeed, you must not; you may 
 lame yourself for life." 
 
 He spoke very quietly, with his eyes fixed on the 
 ground, though his heart was beating so that he feared 
 she would hear it. 
 
 " Very well," she said ; " but I'm very heavy." 
 
 So he lifted her gently, and stepped off down the ride, 
 carrying his whole world in his arms, in an indescribable 
 flutter of joy and triumph and feai\ He had gone some 
 forty yards or so, when he staggered, and stopped for a 
 moment.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 181 
 
 " Oh, pray put me down pray do ! You'll hurt your- 
 self. I'm too heavy." 
 
 For the credit of* muscular Christianity, one must say, 
 that it was not her weight, but the tumult in his own inner 
 man which made her bearer totter. Nevertheless, if one 
 is wholly unused to the exercise, the carrying a healthy 
 young English girl weighing hard on eight stone, is as 
 much as most men can conveniently manage. 
 
 " I'll just put you down for a moment," he said. " Now 
 take care of the foot ; " and he stooped, and placed her 
 tenderly against one of the oaks which bordered the ride, 
 standing by her side without looking at her. Neither of 
 them spoke for a minute. Then he asked, still looking 
 away down the ride, " How is the foot ? " 
 
 " Oh, pretty well," she answered, cheerfully. " Now, 
 leave me here, and go for help. It is absurd of me to 
 mind being left ; and you mustn't carry me any more." 
 
 He turned, and their eyes met for a moment, but that 
 was enough. 
 
 " Are you ready ? " he said. 
 
 " Yes ; but take care. Don't go far. Stop directly you 
 feel tired." 
 
 Then he lifted her again, and this time carried her with- 
 out faltering, till they came to a hillock covered with soft 
 grass. Here they rested again; and so by easy stages he 
 carried her through the wood, and out into the road, to the 
 nearest cottage, neither of them speaking. 
 
 An old woman came to the door in answer to his kick, 
 and went off into ejaculations of pity and wonder in the 
 broadest Berkshire, at seeing Master Tom and his burden. 
 But he pushed into the house and cut her short with, 
 
 " Now, Mrs. Pike, don't talk, that's a dear good woman, 
 but bustle about, and bring that arm-chair here, and the 
 1G
 
 182 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 other low one, with a pillow on it, for the young lady's 
 foot to rest on." 
 
 The old woman obeyed his injunctions, except as to 
 talking ; and while she placed the chairs and shook up the 
 pillow, descanted on the sovereign virtues of some green 
 oil and opodeldoc, which was as good as a charm for 
 sprains and bruises. 
 
 Mary gave him one grateful look as he lowered her 
 tenderly and reluctantly into the chair, and then spoke 
 cheerfully to Mrs. Pike, who was foraging in a cupboard, 
 to find if there was any of her famous specific in the bot- 
 tom of the bottle. As he stood up, and thought what to 
 do next, he heard the sound of distant wheels, and look- 
 ing through the window saw the carriage coming home- 
 wards. It was a sorrowful sight to him. 
 
 "Now, Mrs. Pike," he said, "never mind the oil. 
 Here's the carriage coming ; just step out and stop it." 
 
 The old dame scuttled out into the road. The carriage 
 was within one hundred yards. He leaned over the rough 
 arm-chair in which she was leaning back, looked once 
 more into her eyes ; and then, stooping forwards, kissed 
 her lips, and the next moment was by the side of Mrs. 
 Pike, signalling the coachman to stop. 
 
 In the bustle which followed he stood aside, and watched 
 Mary with his heart in his mouth. She never looked at 
 him, but there was no anger, but only a dreamy look in 
 her sweet face, which seemed to him a thousand times 
 more beautiful than ever before. Then to avoid inquiries 
 and to realize all that had passed in the last wonderful 
 three hours, he slipped away while they were getting her 
 into the carriage, and wandered back into the wood, paus- 
 ing at each of their halting-places. At last, he reached 
 the scene of the accident, and here his cup of happiness
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 183 
 
 was likely to brim over, for he found the mangled little 
 boot and the cut lace, and securing the precious prize, 
 hurried back home, to be in time for dinner. 
 
 Mary did not come down, but Katie, the only person 
 of whom he dared to inquire, assured him that she was 
 doing famously. The dinner was very embarrassing, and 
 he had the greatest difficulty in answering the searching 
 inquiries of his mother and Mrs. Porter, as to how, when, 
 where, and in whose presence the accident had happened. 
 As aoon as the ladies rose, he left his father and Mr. Por- 
 ter over their old port and politics, and went out in the 
 twilight into the garden, burdened with the weight of 
 sweet thought. He felt that he had something to do to 
 set himself quite right with Mary ; he must speak some- 
 how, that night, if possible, or he should not be comfort- 
 able or at peace with his conscience. There were lights 
 in her room. He guessed by the shadows that she was 
 lying on a couch by the open window, round which the 
 other ladies were flitting. Presently lights appeared in 
 the drawing-room, and as the shutters were being closed 
 he saw his mother and Mrs. Porter come in, and sit down 
 near the fire. Listening intently, he heard Katie talking 
 in a low voice in the room above, and saw her head 
 against the light as she sat down close to the window, 
 probably at the head of the couch where Mary was lying. 
 Should he call to her ? If he did how could he say what 
 he wanted to say through her? 
 
 A happy thought struck him. lie turned to the flower- 
 beds, hunted about, and gathered a bunch of heliotrope, 
 hurried up to his room, took the sprig of heather out of 
 his shooting-coat, tied them together, caught up a reel and 
 line from his table, and went into the room over Mary's. 
 Ho threw the window open, and leaning out said gently,
 
 184 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Katie." No answer. He repeated the name loudei. 
 No answer still, and leaning out yet further he saw that 
 the window had been shut. He lowered the bunch of 
 flowers, and swinging it backwards and forwards made 
 it strike the window below once, twice; at the third 
 stroke he heard the window open. 
 
 " Katie," he whispered again, " is that you ? " 
 
 " Yes, where are you ? What is this ? " 
 
 " For her," he said in the same whisper. Katie untied 
 the flowers, and he waited a few moments, and then again 
 called her name, and she answered. 
 
 " Has she the flowers ? " 
 
 " Yes, and she sends you her love, and says you are to 
 go down to the drawing-room ; " and with that the win- 
 dow closed, and he went down with a lightened conscience 
 into the drawing-room, and after joining in the talk by the 
 fire for a few minutes, took a book, and sat down at the 
 further side of the table. Whether he ever knew what 
 the book was may be fairly questioned, but to all appear- 
 ances he was deep in the perusal of it till the tea and 
 Katie arrived, and the gentlemen from the dining-room. 
 Then he tried to join in the conversation again, but, on 
 the whole, life was a burden to him that night till he could 
 get fairly away to his own room, and commune with him- 
 self, gazing at the yellow harvest moon with his elbows on 
 the window-sill. 
 
 The ankle got well very quickly, and Mary was soon 
 going about with a gold-headed stick which had belonged 
 to Mr. Brown's father, and a limp which Tom thought the 
 most beautiful movement he had ever seen. But though 
 she was about again, by no amount of patient vigilance 
 could he now get the chance of speaking to her alone. 
 But he consoled himself with the thought that she must
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 185 
 
 understand him ; if he had spoken, he couldn't have made 
 himself cleai'er. 
 
 And now the Porters' visit was all but over, and Katie 
 and her father left for Englebourn. The Porters were to 
 follow the next day, and promised to drive round and stop 
 at the Rectory for lunch. Tom petitioned for a seat in 
 their carnage to Englebourn. He had been devoting 
 himself to Mrs. Porter ever since the accident, and had 
 told her a good deal about his own early life. His account 
 of his early friendship for Betty and her son, and the re- 
 newal of it on the day he left Barton Manor, had inter- 
 ested her, and she was moreover not insensible to his as- 
 siduous and respectful attentions to herself, which had of 
 late been quite marked : she was touched, too, at his 
 anxiety to hear all about her boys, and how they were 
 going on at school. So on the whole Tom was in high 
 favor with her, and she most graciously assented to his 
 occupying the fourth seat in their barouche. She was not 
 without her suspicions of the real state of the cabe with 
 him, but his behavior had been so discreet that she had 
 no immediate fears, and after all, if any thing should come 
 of it some years hence, her daughter might do worse. In 
 the mean time she would see plenty of society in London ; 
 where Mr. Porter's vocations kept him during the greater 
 part of the year. 
 
 They reached Englebourn after a pleasant long morn- 
 ing's drive ; and Tom stole a glance at Mary, and felt that 
 she understood him, as he pointed out the Hawk's Lynch 
 and the clump of Scotch firs to her mother ; and told how 
 you might see Barton from the top of it, and how he loved 
 the place, and the old trees, and the view. 
 
 Katie was at the door ready to receive them, and car- 
 ried off Mary and Mrs. Porter to her own room. Tom 
 16*
 
 186 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 walked round the garden with Mr. Porter, and then sat in 
 the drawing-room, and felt melancholy. He roused him- 
 self, however, when the ladies came down and luncheon 
 was announced. Mary was full of her reminiscences of the 
 Englebourn people, and especially of poor Mrs. Winbura 
 and her son, in whom she had begun to take a deep inter- 
 est, perhaps from overhearing some of Tom's talk to her 
 mother. So Harry's story was canvassed again, and 
 Katie told them how he had been turned out of his cot- 
 tage, and how anxious she was as to what would come of 
 it. 
 
 " And is he going to marry your gardener's daughter 
 after all ? " asked Mrs. Porter. 
 
 "I am afraid there is not much chance of it," said 
 Katie ; " I cannot make Martha out." 
 
 " Is she at home, Katie ? " asked Mary ; " I should like 
 to see her again. I took a great fancy to see her when I 
 was here." 
 
 " Yes, she is at the lodge. We will walk there after 
 luncheon." 
 
 So it was settled that the carriage should pick them up 
 at the lodge ; and soon after luncheon, while the horses 
 were being put to, the whole party started for the lodge 
 after saying good-by to Mr. Winter, who retired to his 
 room much fatigued by his unwonted hospitality. 
 
 Old Simon's wife answered their knock at the lodge 
 door, and they all entered, and Mrs. Porter paid her com- 
 pliments on the cleanliness of the room. 
 
 Then Mary said, " Is your daughter at home, Mrs. Gib- 
 bons ? " 
 
 " Ees, miss, someweres handy," replied Mrs. Gibbons ; 
 " her hav'n't been gone out not dree minutes." 
 
 " I should like so much to say good-by to her," said
 
 TOM BEOWN AT OXFORD. 187 
 
 Mary. " We shall be leaving Barton soon, and I shall 
 not see her again till next summer." 
 
 " Lor bless'ee, miss, 'tis werry good ov ee," said the old 
 dame very proud ; " do'ee set down then while I gives her 
 a call." And with that she hurried out of the door which 
 led through the back kitchen into the little yard behind 
 the lodge, and the next moment they heard her calling 
 out, 
 
 " Patty, Patty, whar bist got to ? Come in, and see the 
 gentle-folk." 
 
 The name which the old woman was calling out made 
 Tom start. 
 
 " I thought you said her name was Martha," said Mrs. 
 Porter. 
 
 " Patty is short for Martha in Berkshire," said Katie, 
 laughing. 
 
 " And Patty is such a pretty name, I wonder you don't 
 call her Patty," said Mary. 
 
 " "We had a housemaid of the same name a year or two 
 ago, and it made such a confusion and when one once 
 gets used to a name it is so hard to change so she has 
 always been called Martha." 
 
 " Well, I'm all for Tatty; don't you think so?" said 
 Mary, turning to Tom. 
 
 The sudden introduction of a name which he had such 
 reasons for remembering, the memories and fears which it 
 called up, above all, the bewilderment which he felt at 
 hearing it tossed about and canvassed by Mary in his 
 presence, as if there were nothing more in it than in any 
 other name, confused him so that he floundered and blun- 
 dered in his attempt to answer, and at last gave it up al- 
 together. She was surprised, and looked at him inquir- 
 ingly. His eyes fell before hers, and he turned away to
 
 188 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 the window, and looked at the carriage, which had just 
 drawn up at the lodge door. He had scarcely time to 
 think how foolish he was to be so moved, when he 
 heard the back-kitchen door opened again, and the old wo- 
 man and her daughter come in. He turned round sharply, 
 and there on the floor of the room, courtesying to the 
 ladies, stood the ex-barmaid of the Choughs. His first 
 impulse was to hurry away, she was looking down, and he 
 might not be recognized ; his next to stand his ground, 
 and take whatever might come. Mary went up to her 
 and took her hand, saying that she could not go away with- 
 out coming to see her. Patty looked up to answer, and 
 glancing round the room caught sight of him. 
 
 He stepped forward, and then stopped and tried to 
 speak, but no words would come. Patty looked at him, 
 dropped Mary's hand, blushed up to the roots of her hair 
 as she looked timidly round at the wondering spectators, 
 and, putting her hands to her face, ran out of the back- 
 door again. 
 
 " Lawk a massy ! what ever can ha' cum to our Patty?" 
 said Mrs. Gibbons, following her out. 
 
 " I think we had better go," said Mr. Porter, giving his 
 arm to his daughter, and leading her to the door. " Good- 
 by, Katie ; shall we see you again at Barton ? " 
 
 " I don't know, uncle," Katie answered, following with 
 Mrs. Porter, in a state of sad bewilderment. 
 
 Tom, with his brain swimming, got out a few stammer- 
 ing farewell words, which Mr. and Mrs. Porter received 
 with marked coldness as they stepped into their carriage. 
 Mary's face was flushed and uneasy, but at her he scarcely 
 dared to steal a look, and to her was quite unable to speak 
 a word. 
 
 Then the carriage drove off", and he turned, and found
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 18D 
 
 Katie standing at his side, her eyes full of serious wonder. 
 His fell before them. 
 
 " My dear Tom," she said, "what is all this ? I thought 
 you had never seen Martha ? " 
 
 " So I thought I didn't know I can't talk now 
 I'll explain all to you don't think very badly of me, 
 Katie God bless you ! " with which words he strode 
 away, while she looked after him with increasing wonder 
 and then turned and went into the lodge. 
 
 He hastened away from the Rectory and down the vil- 
 lage street, taking the road home mechanically, but other- 
 wise wholly unconscious of roads and men. David, who 
 was very anxious to speak to him about Harry, stood at 
 his door making signs to him to stop in vain, and then 
 gave chase, calling out after him, till he saw that all at- 
 tempts to attract his notice were useless, and so ambled 
 back to his shop-board much troubled in mind. 
 
 The first object which recalled Tom at all to himself 
 was the little white cottage looking out of Englebourn 
 Copse towards the village, in which he had sat by poor 
 Betty's death-bed. The garden was already getting wild 
 and tangled, and the house seemed to be uninhabited. He 
 stopped for a moment and looked at it with bitter search- 
 ings of heart. Here was the place where he had taken 
 such a good turn as he had fondly hoped, in connection 
 with the then inmates of which he had made the strongest 
 good resolutions he had ever made in his life perhaps. 
 What was the good of his trying to befriend anybody ; 
 his friendship turned to a blight ; whatever he had as yet 
 tried to do for Harry had only injured him, and now how 
 did they stand ? Could they ever be friends again after 
 that day's discovery ? To do him justice, the probable 
 ruin of all his own prospects, the sudden coldness of Mr.
 
 100 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 and Mrs. Porter's looks, and Mary's averted face, were 
 not the things he thought on first, and did not trouble him 
 most. He thought of Harry, and shuddered at the wrong 
 he had done him as he looked at his deserted home. The 
 door opened and a figure appeared. It was Mr. Wurley's 
 agent, the lawyer who had been employed by Farmer 
 Tester in his contest with Harry and his mates about the 
 pound. The man of law saluted him with a smirk of 
 scarcely concealed triumph, and then turned into the 
 house again and shut the door, as if he did not consider 
 further communication necessary or safe. Tom turned 
 with a muttered imprecation on him and his master, and 
 hurried away along the lane which led to the heath. The 
 Hawk's Lynch lay above him, and he climbed the side 
 mechanically and sat himself again on the old spot. 
 
 He sat for some time looking over the landscape, graven 
 on his mind as it was by his former visit, and bitterly, oh, 
 how bitterly ! did the remembrance of that visit, and of 
 the exultation and triumph which then filled him, and 
 carried him away over the heath with a shout towards his 
 home, come back on him. He could look out from his 
 watch-tower no longer, and lay down with his face be- 
 tween his hands on the turf, and groaned as he lay. 
 
 But his good angel seemed to haunt the place, and 
 soon the cold fit began to pass away, and better and 
 more hopeful thoughts to return. After all, what had 
 he done since his last visit to that place to be ashamed 
 of? Nothing. His attempts to do Harry service, un- 
 lucky as they had proved, had been honest. Had he 
 become less worthy of the love which had first con- 
 sciously mastered him there some four weeks ago ? 
 No; he felt, on the contrary, that it had already 
 raised him, and purified him, and made a man of him.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 191 
 
 But this last discovery, how could he ever get over 
 that ? "Well, after all, the facts were just the same be- 
 fore, only now they had come out. It was right that 
 they should have come out ; better for him and for every 
 one that they should be known and faced. He was 
 ready to face them, to abide any consequences that they 
 might now bring in their train. His heart was right 
 towards Mary, towards Patty, towards Harry, that he 
 felt sure of. And if so, why should he despair of either 
 his love or his friendship coming to a bad end ? 
 
 And so he sat up again, and looked out bravely towards 
 Barton, and began to consider what was to be done. His 
 eyes rested on the Rectory. That was the first place to 
 begin with. He must set himself right with Katie ; let 
 her know the whole story. Through her he could reach 
 all the rest, and do whatever must be done to clear the 
 ground and start fresh again. 
 
 At first he thought of returning to her at once, and rose 
 to go down to Englebourn. But any thing like retracing 
 his steps was utterly distasteful to him just then. Before 
 him he saw light, dim enough as yet, but still a dawning ; 
 towai'ds that he would press, leaving every thing behind 
 him to take care of itself. So he turned northwards, and 
 struck across the heath at his best pace. The violent ex- 
 ercise almost finished his cure, and his thoughts became 
 clearer and more hopeful as he neared home. He arrived 
 there as the household were going to bed, and found a 
 letter waiting for him. It was from Hardy, saying that 
 Blake had left him, and he was now thinking of return- 
 ing to Oxford, and would come for his long-talked-of visit 
 to Berkshire, if Tom was still at home and in the mind to 
 receive him. 
 
 Never was a letter more opportune. Here was the
 
 192 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 died friend on whom he could rely for help and advice 
 and sympathy. Who knew all the facts, too, from begin- 
 ning to end. His father and mother were delighted to 
 hear that they should now see the friend of whom he had 
 spoken so much ; so he went up-stairs, and wrote an an- 
 swer, which set Hardy to work packing his portmanteau 
 in the far west, and brought him speedily to the side of 
 his friend under the lee of the Berkshire hills.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 SECOND YEAR. 
 
 For some days after his return home in fact, until 
 his friend's arrival, he was thoroughly beaten down and 
 wretched, notwithstanding his efforts to look hopefully for- 
 ward, and keep up his spirits. His usual occupations were 
 utterly distasteful to him ; and, instead of occupying him- 
 self, he sat brooding over his late misfortune, and hope- 
 lessly puzzling his head as to what he could do to set mat- 
 ters right. The conviction in which he always landed 
 was that there was nothing to be done, and that he was a 
 desolate and blighted being, deserted of gods and men. 
 Hardy's presence and company soon shook him out of this 
 maudlin nightmare state, and he began to recover as soon 
 as he had his old sheet-anchor friend to hold on to and 
 consult with. Their consultations were held chiefly in the 
 intervals of woodcraft, in which they spent most of the 
 hours between breakfast and dinner. Hardy did not take 
 out a certificate, and wouldn't shoot without one ; so, as 
 the best autumn exercise, they selected a tough old pol- 
 lard elm, infinitely ugly, with knotted and twisted roots, 
 curiously difficult to get at and cut through, which had 
 been long marked as a blot by Mr. Brown, and con- 
 demned to be felled as soon as there was nothing more 
 pressing for his men to do. But there was always some- 
 thing of more importance ; so that the cross-grained old 
 tree might have remained until this day, had not Hardy 
 and Tom pitched on him as a foeman worthy of their 
 17
 
 194 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 axes. They shovelled and picked and hewed away with 
 great energy. The woodman who visited them occasion- 
 ally, and who, on examining their first efforts, had re- 
 marked that the severed roots looked a little " as tho' the 
 dogs had been a gnawin' at 'em," began to hold them in 
 respect, and to tender his advice with some deference. 
 By the time the tree was felled and shrouded, Tom was 
 in a convalescent state. 
 
 Their occupation had naturally led to discussions on the 
 advantages of emigration, the delights of clearing one's 
 own estate, building one's own house, and getting away 
 from conventional life with a few tried friends. Of course, 
 the pictures which were painted included foregrounds with 
 beautiful children playing about the clearing, and graceful 
 women, wives of the happy squatters, flitting in and out 
 of the log-houses and sheds, clothed and occupied after 
 the manner of our ideal grandmothers ; with the health 
 and strength of Amazons, the refinement of high-bred 
 xadies, and wondrous skill in all domestic works, confec- 
 tions, and contrivances. The log-houses would also con- 
 tain fascinating select libraries, continually reinforced from 
 home, sufficient to keep all dwellers in the happy clearing 
 in communion with all the highest minds of their own and 
 former generations. Wondrous games in the neighboring 
 forest, dear old home customs established and taking root 
 in the wilderness, with ultimate dainty flower-gardens, 
 conservatories, and piano-fortes a millennium on a small 
 scale, with universal education, competence, prosperity, 
 and equal rights ! Such castle-building, as an accompa- 
 niment to the hard exercise of woodcraft, worked winders 
 for Tom in the next week, and may be safely recom- 
 mended to parties in like evil case with him. 
 
 But more practical discussions were not neglected, and 
 it was agreed that they should make a day at Englebourn
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 195 
 
 together before their return to Oxford, Hardy undertak- 
 ing to invade the Rectory with the view of re-establishing 
 his friend's character there. 
 
 Tom wrote a letter to Katie to prepare her for a visit. 
 Tiie day after the ancient elm was fairly disposed of they 
 started early for Englebourn, and separated at the en- 
 trance to the village Hardy proceeding to the Rectory 
 to fulfil his mission, which he felt to be rather an embar- 
 rassing one, and Tom to look after the constable, or who- 
 ever else could give him information about Harry. 
 
 lie arrived at the Red Lion, their appointed trysting- 
 place, before Hardy, and spent a restless half-hour in the 
 porch and bar waiting for his return. At last Hardy 
 came, and Tom hurried him into the inn's best room, 
 where bread and cheese and ale awaited them, and, as soon 
 as the hostess could be got out of the room, began impa- 
 tiently, 
 
 " Well ; you have seen her ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I have come straight here from the Rectory." 
 
 " And is it all right, eh ? Had she got my letter ? " 
 
 " Yes, she had had your letter." 
 
 " And 3 r ou think she is satisfied ? " 
 
 " Satisfied? No, you can't expect her to be satisfied." 
 
 "I mean, is she satisfied that it isn't so bad after all as 
 it looked the other day ? What does Katie think of me ? " 
 
 "I think she is still very fond of you, but that she has 
 been puzzled and outraged by this discovery, and cannot 
 get over it all at once." 
 
 " Why didn't you tell her the whole story from begin- 
 ning to end ? " 
 
 " I tried to do so as well as I could." 
 
 " Oh, but I can see you haven't done it. She doesn't 
 really understand how it is." 
 
 " Perhaps not ; but you must remember it is an awk-
 
 19G TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ward subject to be talking about to a young woman. 1 
 would sooner stand another fellowship examination than 
 go through it again." 
 
 " Thank you, old fellow," said Tom, laying his hand on 
 Hardy's shoulder ; " I feel that I'm unreasonable and im- 
 patient ; but you can excuse it ; you know that I don't 
 mean it." 
 
 " Don't say another word ; I only wish I could have 
 done more for you." 
 
 " But what do you suppose Katie thinks of me ? " 
 
 " Why, you see, it sums itself up in this : she sees that 
 you have been making serious love to Patty, and have 
 turned the poor girl's head, more or less, and that now 
 you are in love with somebody else. Why, put it how 
 we will, we can't get out of that. There are the facts, 
 pure and simple, and she wouldn't be half a woman if she 
 didn't resent it." 
 
 " But it's hard lines, too, isn't it, old fellow ? No, I 
 wont say that ; I deserve it all, and much worse. But 
 you think I may come round all right ? " 
 
 " Yes, all in good time. I hope there's no danger in 
 any other quarter ? " 
 
 " Goodness knows ! There's the rub, you see. She 
 will go back to town disgusted with me ; I sha'n't see her 
 again, and she wont hear of me for I don't know how 
 long ; and she will be meeting heaps of men. Has Katie 
 been over to Barton ? " 
 
 " Yes ; she was there last week, just before they left." 
 
 " Well, what happened ? " 
 
 " She wouldn't say much ; but I gathered that they are 
 very well." 
 
 " Oh, yes, bother it, of course they are very well. But 
 didn't she talk to Katie about what happened last week ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 197 
 
 " Of course she did. "What else should they talk 
 about ? " 
 
 ' But you don't know what they said ? " 
 
 " No ; but you may depend on it that Miss Winter will 
 be your friend. My dear fellow, there is nothing for it 
 but time." 
 
 " Well, I suppose not," said Tom, with a groan. " Do 
 you think I should call and see Katie ? " 
 
 " No ; I think better not." 
 
 " Well, then, we may as well get back," said Tom, Avho 
 was not sorry for his friend's decision. So they paid their 
 bill, and started for home, taking Hawk's Lynch on the 
 way, that Hardy might see the view. 
 
 " And what did you find out about young "Winburn ? " 
 he said, as they passed down the street. 
 
 " Oh, no good," said Tom ; " he was turned out, as I 
 thought, and has gone to live with an old woman up on 
 the heath here, who is no better than she should be ; and 
 none of the farmers will employ him." 
 
 " You didn't see him, I suppose ? " 
 
 " No ; he is away with some of the heath people, hawk- 
 ing besoms and chairs about the country. They make 
 them when there is no harvest work, and loaf about into 
 Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, and other counties, 
 selling them." 
 
 " No good will come of that sort of life, I'm afraid." 
 
 " No ; but what is he to do ? " 
 
 " I called at the lodge as I came away, and saw Patty 
 and her mother. It's all right in that quarter. The old 
 woman doesn't seem to think any thing of it ; and Patty is 
 a good girl, and will make Harry Winburn, or anybody 
 else, a capital wife. Here's your locket and the letters ; 
 so now that's all over." 
 
 " Did she seem to mind giving them up 'i " 
 17*
 
 198 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Not very much. No, you are lucky there. She will 
 get over it." 
 
 " But you told her that I am her friend for life, and 
 that she is to let me know if I can ever do any thing for 
 her ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and now I hope this is the last job of the kind 
 I shall ever have to do for you." 
 
 " But what bad luck it has been ! If I had only seen 
 her before, or known who she was, nothing of all this 
 would have happened." 
 
 To which Hardy made no reply ; and the subject was 
 not alluded to again in their walk home. 
 
 A day or two afterwards they returned to Oxford 
 Hardy to begin his work as fellow and assistant-tutor of 
 the college, and Tom to see whether he could not make 
 a better hand of his second year than he had of his first. 
 He began with a much better chance of doing so, for he 
 was thoroughly humbled. The discovery that he was 
 not altogether such a hero as he had fancied himself, had 
 dawned upon him very distinctly by the end of his first 
 year, and the events of the long vacation had confirmed 
 the impression, and pretty well taken all the conceit out 
 of him for the time. The impotency of his own will, even 
 when he was bent on doing the right thing, his want of 
 insight and foresight in whatever matter he took in hand, 
 the unruliness of his tempers and passions just at the mo- 
 ments when it behoved him to have them most thoroughly 
 in hand and under control, were a set of disagreeable facts 
 which had been driven well home to him. The results, 
 being even such as we have seen, he did not much repine 
 at, for he felt he had deserved them ; and there was a sort 
 of grim satisfaction, dreary as the prospect was, in facing 
 them, and taking his punishment like a man. This was 
 what he had felt at the first blush on the Hawk's Lynch ;
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 199 
 
 and, as be thought over matters again by his fire, with 
 his oak sported, on the first evening of term, he was still 
 in the same mind. This was clearly what be had to do 
 now. How to do it was the only question. 
 
 At first he was inclined to try to set himself right with 
 the Porters and the Englebourn circle, by writing further 
 explanations and confessions to Katie. But, on trying his 
 hand at a letter, he found that he could not trust himself. 
 The temptation of putting every thing in the best point 
 of view for himself was too great ; so he gave up the at- 
 tempt, and merely wrote a few lines to David, to remind 
 him that he was always i % eady and anxious to do all he 
 could for his friend, Harry "YVinburn, and to beg that he 
 might have news of any thing which happened to him, 
 and how he was getting on. He did not allude to what 
 had lately happened, for he did not know whether the 
 facts had become known, and was in no hurry to open 
 the subject himself. 
 
 Having finished his letter, he turned again to his medi- 
 tations over the fire, and, considering that he had some 
 little right to reward resolution, took off the safety valve, 
 and allowed the thoughts to bubble up freely which were 
 always underlying all others that passed through his brain, 
 and making constant low, delicious, but just now somewhat 
 melancholy, music in his head and heart. He gave him- 
 self up to thinking of Mary, and their walk in the wood, 
 and the sprained ankle, and all the sayings and doings of 
 that eventful autumn day. And then he opened his desk 
 and examined certain treasures therein concealed, includ- 
 ing a withered rosebud, a sprig of heather, a cut boot-lace, 
 and a scrap or two of writing. Having gone through 
 some extravagant forms of worship, not necessary to be 
 specified, he put them away. Would it ever all come" 
 right ?
 
 200 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 He made his solitary tea, and sat down again to con- 
 sider the point. But the point would not be considered 
 alone. He began to feel more strongly what he had had 
 several hints of already, that there was a curiously close 
 connection between his own love story and that of Harry 
 Winburn and Patty that he couldn't separate them, 
 even in his thoughts. Old Simon's tumble, which had 
 recalled his daughter from Oxford at so critical a moment 
 for him ; Mary's visit to Englebourn at this veiy time ; 
 the curious yet natural series of little accidents which had 
 kept him in ignorance of Patty's identity until the final 
 catastrophe then again, the way in which Harry Win- 
 burn and his mother had come across him on the very 
 day of his leaving Barton ; the fellowship of a common 
 mourning which had seemed to bind them together so 
 closely, and this last discovery which he could not help 
 fearing must turn Harry into a bitter enemy, when he 
 heard the truth, as he must, sooner or later, as all these 
 things passed before him, he gave in to a sort of super- 
 stitious feeling that his own fate hung in some way or an- 
 other upon that of Harry Winburn. If he helped on his 
 suit, he was helping on his own ; but whether he helped 
 on his own or not, was, after all, not that which was up- 
 permost in his thoughts. He was much changed in this 
 respect since he last sat in those rooms, just after his first 
 days with her. Since then an angel had met him, and 
 had " touched the chord of self, which, trembling," was 
 passing " in music out of sight." 
 
 The thought of Harry and his trials enabled him to in- 
 dulge in some good honest indignation, for which there 
 was no room in his own case. That the prospects in life 
 of such a man should be in the power, to a great extent, 
 of such people as Squire Wurley and Farmer Tester ; 
 that, because he happened to be poor, he should be turned
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 201 
 
 out of the cottage where his family had lived for a hundred 
 years, at a week's notice, through the caprice of a drunken 
 gambler ; that, because he had stood up for his rights, and 
 had thereby offended the worst farmer in the parish, he 
 should be a marked man, and unable to get work these 
 things appeared so monstrous to him, and made him so 
 angry, that he was obliged to get up and stamp about the 
 room. And from the particular case he very soon got to 
 generalizations. 
 
 Questions which had before now puzzled him gained a 
 new significance every minute, and became real to him. 
 Why a few men should be rich, and all the rest poor ; 
 above all, why he should be one of the few ? Why the 
 mere possession of property should give a man power 
 over all his neighbors ? Why poor men who were ready 
 and willing to work should only be allowed to work, as a 
 sort of favor, and should after all get the merest tithe of 
 what their labor produced, and be tossed aside as soon as 
 their work was done, or no longer required ? These, 
 and other such problems, rose up before him, crude and 
 sharp, asking to be solved. Feeling himself quite unable 
 to give any but one answer to them, that he was getting 
 out of his depth, and that the whole business was in a 
 muddle, he had recourse to his old method when in dif- 
 ficulties, and, putting on his cap, started off to Hardy's 
 rooms to talk the matter over, and see whether he could 
 not get some light on it from that quarter. 
 
 He returned in an hour or so, somewhat less troubled 
 in his mind, inasmuch as he had found his friend in pretty 
 much the same state as himself. But one step he had 
 gained. Under his arm he carried certain books from 
 Hardy's scanty library, the perusal of which he hoped, at 
 least, might enable him, sooner or later, to feel that he had 
 got on to some sort of firm ground. At any rate, Hardy
 
 202 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 had advised him to read them ; so, without more ado, he 
 drew his chair to the table and began to look into them. 
 
 This glimpse of the manner in Avhich Tom spent the 
 first evening of his second year at Oxford, will enable in- 
 telligent readers to understand why, though he took to 
 reading far more kindly and earnestly than he had ever 
 done before, he made no great advance in the proper 
 studies of the place. Not that he wholly neglected these, 
 for Hardy kept him pretty well up to the collar, and he 
 passed his little-go creditably, and was fairly placed at 
 the college examinations. In some of the books which 
 he had to get up for lectures he was really interested. 
 The politics of Athens, the struggle between the Roman 
 plebs and patricians, Mons Sacer, and the Agrarian Laws 
 these began to have a new meaning to him, but chiefly 
 because they bore more or less on the great Harry Win- 
 burn problem ; which problem, indeed, for him had now 
 fairly swelled into the condition-of-England problem, and 
 was becoming every day more and more urgent and im- 
 portunate, shaking many old beliefs, and leading him 
 whither he knew not. 
 
 This very matter of leading was a sore trial to him. 
 The further he got on his new road the more he felt the 
 want of guidance the guidance of some man ; for that 
 of books he soon found to be bewildering. His college 
 tutor, whom he consulted, only deprecated the waste of 
 time ; but, on finding it impossible to dissuade him, at last 
 recommended the economic works of that day as the proper 
 well-springs of truth on such matters. To them Tom ac- 
 cordingly went, and read with the docility and faith of 
 youth, bent on learning, and feeling itself in the presence 
 of men who had, or assumed, the right of speaking with 
 authority. 
 
 And they spoke to him with authority, and he read on,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 203 
 
 believing much and hoping more ; but somehow they did 
 not really satisfy him, though they silenced him for the 
 time. It was not the fault of the books, most of which 
 laid down clearly enough that what they professed to teach 
 was the science of man's material interests, and the laws 
 of the making and employment of capital. But this es- 
 caped him in his eagerness, and he wandered up and down 
 their pages in search of quite another science, and of laws 
 with which they did not meddle. Nevertheless, here and 
 there they seemed to touch upon Avhat he was in search 
 of. He was much fascinated, for instance, by the doctrine 
 of " the greatest happiness of the greatest number," and 
 for its sake swallowed for a time, though not without wry 
 faces the dogmas, that self-interest is the true pivot of all 
 social action, that population has a perpetual tendency to 
 outstrip the means of living, and that to establish a pre- 
 ventive check on population is the duty of all good citi- 
 zens. And so he lived on for some time in a dreary, un- 
 comfortable state, fearing for the future of his country, 
 and with little hope about his own. But, when he came 
 to take stock of his newly acquired knowledge, to weigh 
 it and measure it, and found it to consist of a sort of hazy 
 conviction that society would be all right and ready for 
 the millennium, when every man could do what he liked, 
 and nobody could interfere with him, and there should be 
 a law against marriage, the result was more than he could 
 stand. He roused himself, and shook himself, and began 
 to think, " Well, these my present teachers are very clever 
 men, and well-meaning men, too. I see all that ; but, if 
 their teaching is only to land me here, why it was scarcely 
 worth while going through so much to get so little." 
 
 Casting about still for guidance, Grey occurred to him. 
 Grey was in residence as a bachelor, attending divinity 
 lectures, and preparing for ordination. He was still
 
 204 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 working hard at the night-school, and Tom had been there 
 once or twice to help him when the curate was away. In 
 short, he was in very good books with Grey, who had got 
 the better of his shyness with him. He saw that Tom 
 was changed and sobered, and in his heart hoped some 
 day to wean him from the pursuits of the body, to which 
 he was still fearfully addicted, and to bring him into the 
 fold. This hope was not altogether unfounded ; for, not- 
 withstanding the strong bias against them which Tom had 
 brought with him from school, he was now at times much 
 attracted by many of the high church doctrines, and the 
 men who professed them. Such men as Grey he saw did 
 really believe something, and were in earnest about car- 
 rying their beliefs into action. The party might and did 
 comprise many others of the weakest sort, who believed 
 and were in earnest about nothing, but who liked to be 
 peculiar. Nevertheless, while he saw it laying hold of 
 many of the best men of his time, it is not to be wondered 
 at that he was drawn towards it. Some help might lie in 
 these men if he could only get at it ! 
 
 So he propounded his doubts and studies, and their re- 
 sults, to Grey. But it was a failure. Grey felt no diffi- 
 culty, or very little, in the whole matter ; but Tom found 
 that it was because he believed the world to belong to the 
 devil. " Laissez faire" " buying cheap and selling dear," 
 Grey held might be good enough laws for the world 
 very probably were. The laws of the Church were 
 " self-sacrifice," and " bearing one another's burdens ; " 
 her children should come out from the regions where the 
 other's laws were acknowledged. 
 
 Tom listened, was dazzled at first, and thought he was 
 getting on the right track ; but very soon he found that 
 Grey's specific was not of the least use to him ! It was 
 no good to tell him of the rules of a society to which he
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 205 
 
 felt that he neither belonged, nor wished to belong, for 
 clearly it could not be the Church of England. He was 
 an outsider ! Grey would probably admit it to be so, if 
 he asked him. lie had no longing to be any thing else, 
 if the Church meant an exclusive body, which took no 
 care of any but its own people, and had nothing to say to 
 the great world in which he and most people had to live, 
 and buying and selling, and hiring and working, had to 
 go on. The close corporation might have very good laws, 
 but they were nothing to him. What he wanted to know 
 about was the law which this great world the devil's 
 world, as Grey called it was ruled by, or rather ought 
 to be ruled by. Perhaps, after all, Bentham and the 
 others, whose books he had been reading, might be right ! 
 At any rate, it was clear that they had in their thoughts 
 the same world that he had the world which included 
 himself and Harry Winburn, and all laborers and squires 
 and farmers. So he turned to them again, not hopefully, 
 but more inclined to listen to them than he had been be- 
 fore he had spoken to Grey. 
 
 Hardy was so fully occupied with college lectures and 
 private pupils, that Tom had scruples about taking up 
 much of his spare time in the evenings. Nevertheless, 
 as Grey had broken down, and there was nobody else on 
 whose judgment he could rely who would listen to him, 
 whenever he had a chance he would propound some of 
 his puzzles to his old friend. In some respects he got 
 little help, for Hardy was almost as much at sea as he 
 himself on such subjects as " value," and "wages," and 
 the " laws of supply and demand." But there was an 
 indomitable belief in him that all men's intercourse with 
 one another, and not merely that of Churchmen, must be 
 founded on the principle of " doing as they would be done 
 by," and not on " buying cheap and selling dear," and 
 18
 
 206 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 that these never could or would be reconciled with one 
 another, or mean the same thing, twist them how you 
 would. This faith of his friend's comforted Tom greatly, 
 and he was never tired of bringing it out ; but at times 
 he had his doubts whether Grey might not be right 
 whether, after all, that and the like maxims and principles 
 were meant to be the laws of the kingdoms of this world. 
 He wanted some corroborative evidence on the subject 
 from an impartial and competent witness, and at last hit 
 upon what he wanted. For, one evening, on entering 
 Hardy's rooms, he found him on the last pages of a book, 
 which he shut with an air of triumph on recognizing his 
 visitor. Taking it up, he thrust it into Tom's hands, and 
 slapping him on the shoulder, said, " There, my boy, that's 
 what we want, or pretty near it at any rate. Now, don't 
 say a word, but go back to your rooms, and swallow it 
 whole and digest it, and then come back and tell me what 
 you think of it." 
 
 " But I want to talk to you." 
 
 " I can't talk ; I have spent the better part of two days 
 over that book, and have no end of papers to look over. 
 There ; get back to your rooms, and do what I tell you, 
 or sit down here and hold your tongue." 
 
 So Tom sat down and held his tongue, and was soon 
 deep in Carlyle's Past and Present. How he did revel 
 in it in the humor, the power, the pathos, but above all 
 in the root and branch denunciations of many of the doc- 
 trines in which he had been so lately voluntarily and 
 wearily chaining himself! The chains went snapping off 
 one after another, and in his exultation he kept spouting 
 out passage after passage in a song of triumph, " Enlight- 
 ened egoism never so luminous is not the rule by which 
 man's life can be led laissez faire, supply and demand, 
 cash payment for the sole nexus, and so forth, were not,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 207 
 
 are not, and never will be, a practical law of union for a 
 society of men," etc., etc., until Hardy fairly got up and 
 turned him out, and be retired with his new-found treasure 
 to his own rooms. 
 
 He had scarcely ever in his life been so moved by a 
 book before. Pie laughed over it, and cried over it, and 
 began half a dozen letters to the author to thank him 
 which he fortunately tore up. He almost forgot Mary fo* 
 several hours during his first enthusiasm. He had n^ 
 notion how he had been mastered and oppressed before 
 He felt as the crew of a small fishing-smack, who are 
 being towed away by an enemy's cruiser, might feel on 
 seeing a frigate with the Union Jack flying, bearing down 
 and opening fire on their captor ; or as a small boy at 
 school, who is being fagged against rules by the right of 
 the strongest, feels when he sees his big brother coming 
 round the corner. The help which he had found was just 
 what he wanted. There was no narrowing of the ground 
 here, no appeal to men as members of any exclusive body 
 whatever to separate themselves and come out of the 
 devil's world ; but to men as men, to every man as a man, 
 to the weakest and meanest as well as to the strongest 
 and most noble, telling them that the world is God's 
 world, that every one of them has a work in it, and bid- 
 ding them find their work and set about it. 
 
 The strong tinge of sadness which ran through the 
 whole book, and its unsparing denunciations of the estab- 
 lished order of things, suited his own unsettled and rest- 
 less frame of mind. So he gave himself up to his new 
 bondage, and rejoiced in it as though he had found at last 
 what he was seeking for ; and, by the time that long 
 vacation came round again, to which we are compelled to 
 hurry him, he was filled full of a set of contradictory 
 notions and beliefs which were destined to astonish and
 
 208 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 perplex the mind of that worthy J. P. for the county of 
 Berks, Brown the elder, whatever other effect they might 
 have on society at large. 
 
 Readers must not suppose, however, that our hero had 
 given up his old pursuits ; on the contrary, he continued 
 to boat and cricket and spar with as much vigor as ever. 
 His perplexities also made him a little more silent at his 
 pastimes than he used to be. But, as we have already 
 seen him thus employed, and know the ways of the 
 animal in such matters, it is needless to repeat. What 
 we want to do is to follow him into new fields of thought 
 and action, and mark, if it may be, how he develops, and 
 gets himself educated in one way and another; and this 
 plunge into the great sea of social, political, and econom- 
 ical questions is the noticeable fact (so far as any is notice- 
 able) of his second year's residence. 
 
 During the year he had only very meagre accounts of 
 matters at Englebourn. Katie, indeed, had come round 
 sufficiently to write to him, but she scarcely alluded to 
 her cousin. He only knew that Mary had come out in 
 London, and was much admired, and that the Porters had 
 not taken Barton again, but were going abroad for the 
 autumn and winter. The accounts of Harry were bad ; 
 he was still living at Daddy Collins', nobody knew how, 
 and working gang-work occasionally with the outlaws of 
 the heath. 
 
 The only fact of importance in the neighborhood had 
 been the death of Squire Wurley, which happened sud- 
 denly in the spring. A distant cousin had succeeded him, 
 a young man of Tom's own age. 
 
 He was also in residence at Oxford, and Tom knew 
 him. They were not very congenial ; so he was much 
 astonished when young Wurley, on his return to college 
 after his relative's funeral, rather sought him out, and
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 209 
 
 seemed to wish to know more of him. The end of it was 
 an invitation to Tom to come to the Grange, and spend a 
 week or so at the beginning of the long vacation. There 
 was to be a party of Oxford men, and nobody else there ; 
 and they meant to enjoy themselves thoroughly, Wurley 
 said. 
 
 Tom felt much embarrassed how to act, and, after some 
 hesitation, told his inviter of his last visit to the mansion 
 in question, thinking that a knowledge of the circum- 
 stances might change his mind. But he found that young 
 Wurley knew the facts already ; and in fact, he couldn't 
 help suspecting that his quarrel with the late owner had 
 something to say to his present invitation. However, it 
 did not lie in his mouth to be curious on the subject ; and 
 so he accepted the invitation gladly, much delighted at the 
 notion of beginning his vacation so near Englebourn, and 
 having the run of the Grange fishing, which was justly 
 celebrated. 
 
 18*
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE RIVER SIDE. 
 
 So, from Henley, Tom went home just to see his father 
 and mother, and pick up his fishing gear, and then started 
 for the Grange. On his road thither, he more than once 
 almost made up his mind to go round by Englebourn, get 
 his first interview with Katie over, and find out how the 
 world was really going with Harry and his sweetheart, of 
 whom he had had such meagre intelligence of late. But, for 
 some i*eason or another, when it came to taking the turn 
 to Englebourn, he passed it by, and, contenting himself 
 for the time with a distant view of the village and the 
 Hawk's Lynch, drove straight to the Grange. 
 
 He had not expected to feel very comfortable at first in 
 the house which he had left the previous autumn in so 
 strange a manner, and he was not disappointed. The 
 rooms reminded him unpleasantly of his passage of arms 
 with the late master, and the grave and portly butler was 
 somewhat embarrassed in his reception of him ; while the 
 footman, who carried off his portmanteau, did it with a 
 grin which put him out. The set of men whom he found 
 there were not of his sort. They were young Londoners, 
 and he a thorough countryman. But the sight of the 
 stream, by which he took a hasty stroll before dinner, 
 made up for every thing, and filled him with pleasurable 
 anticipations. He thought he had never seen a sweeter 
 bit of water. 
 
 The dinner to which the party of young gentlemen sat
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 211 
 
 down was most undeniable. The host talked a little too 
 much, perhaps, under all the circumstances, of my wine, 
 my plate, my mutton, etc., provoking the thought of how 
 long they had been his. But he was bent on hospitality 
 after his fashion, and his guests were not disposed to crit- 
 icise much. 
 
 The old butler did not condescend to wait, but brought 
 in a magnum of claret after dinner, carefully nursing it as 
 if it were a baby, and placing it patronizingly before his 
 young master. Before they adjourned to the billiard- 
 room, which they did direct, they had disposed of several 
 of the same ; but the followers were brought in by a foot- 
 man, the butler being employed in discussing a bottle of 
 an older vintage with the steward in the still-room. Then 
 came pool, pool, pool, soda-water and brandy, and cigars, 
 into the short hours ; but Tom stole away early, having 
 an eye to his morning's fishing, and not feeling much at 
 home with his companions. 
 
 lie was out soon after sunrise the next morning. lie 
 never wanted to be called when there was a trout-stream 
 within reach ; and his fishing instinct told him that, in 
 these sultry dog-days, there would be little chance of sport 
 when the sun was well up. So he let himself gently out 
 of the hall-door paused a moment on the steps to fill 
 his chest with the fresh morning air, as he glanced at the 
 weather-cock over the stables and then set to work to 
 put his tackle together on the lawn, humming a tune to 
 himself as he selected an insinuating red hackle and alder 
 fly from his well-worn book, and tied them on to his cast. 
 Then he slung his creel over his shoulder, picked up his 
 rod, and started for the water. 
 
 As he passed the gates of the stable-yard, the keeper 
 came out a sturdy, bullet-headed fellow, in a velveteen
 
 212 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 coat, and cord breeches and gaiters and touched his hat. 
 Tom returned the salute, and wished him good-morning. 
 
 " Mornin', sir ; you be about early." 
 
 " Yes ; I reckon it's the best time for sport at the end 
 of June." 
 
 " 'Tis so, sir. Shall I fetch a net and come along ? " 
 
 " No, thank you, I'll manage the ladle myself. But 
 which do you call the best water ? " 
 
 " They be both middling good. There aint much odds 
 atwixt 'em. But I sees most fish movin' o' mornins in the 
 deep water down below." 
 
 " I don't know ; the night was too hot," said Tom, who 
 had examined the water the day before, and made up his 
 mind where he was going. " I'm for deep water on cold 
 days ; I shall begin with the stickles up above. There's 
 good head of water on, I suppose ? " 
 
 " Plenty down the last week, sir." 
 
 " Come along, then ; we'll walk together, if you're go- 
 ing that way." So Tom stepped off", brushing through the 
 steaming long grass, gemmed with wild flowers, followed 
 by the keeper ; and, as the grasshoppers bounded chirrup- 
 ping out of his way, and the insect life hummed and mur- 
 mured, and the lark rose and sang above his head, he felt 
 happier than he had done for many a long month. So 
 his heart opened towards his companion who kept a little 
 behind him. 
 
 " What size do you take 'em out, keeper ? " 
 
 " Any thing over nine inches, sir. But there's a smart- 
 ish few fish of three pounds, for them as can catch 'em." 
 
 " Well, that's good ; but they aint easy caught, eh ? " 
 
 " I don't rightly know, sir ; but there's gents comes as 
 stands close by the water, and flogs down stream with the 
 sun in their backs, and uses all manner o' vlies, wi' long
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 21tf 
 
 names ; and then they gwoes away, and says, 'taint no use 
 flying here, 'cos there's so much cadis hait and that like." 
 
 " Ah, very likely," said Tom, with a chuckle. 
 
 " The chaps as catches the big fishes, sir," went on the 
 keeper, getting confidential, " is thay cussed night-line 
 poachers. There's one o' thay as has come here this last 
 spring-tide the artfullest chap as ever I come across, 
 and down to every move on the board. He don't use no 
 shove nets nor such like tackle, not he ; I s'pose he don't 
 call that sport. Besides, I got master to stake the whole 
 water, and set old knives and razors about in the holes, 
 so that don't answer ; and this joker alius goes alone 
 which, in course, he couldn't do with nets. Now, I knows 
 within five or six yards where that chap sets his lines, and 
 I finds 'em, now and again, set the artfullest you ever see. 
 But 'twould take a man's life to look arter him, and I 
 knows he gets maybe a dozen big fish a week, do all as I 
 knows." 
 
 " How is it you can't catch him, keeper ? " said Tom, 
 much amused. 
 
 " Why, you see, sir, he don't come at any hours. Drat 
 un ! " said the keeper, getting hot ; " blessed if I don't think 
 he sometimes comes down among the haymakers and folk 
 at noon, and up lines and off, while thay chaps does noth- 
 ing but snigger at un all I knows is, as I've watched 
 till midnight, and then on again at dawn for'n, and no 
 good come on it but once." 
 
 " How was that ? " 
 
 " "Well, one mornin', sir, about last Lady-day, I comes 
 quite quiet up stream about dawn. "When I gets to Farmer 
 Giles' piece (that little rough bit, sir, as you sees t'other 
 side the stream, two fields from our outside bounds), I sees 
 un a stooping down and hauling in's line. ' Now's your 
 time, Billy,' says I, and up the hedge I cuts hotfoot, to get
 
 214 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 betwixt he and our bounds. "Wether he seen me or not, I 
 can't mind ; least ways, when I up's head t'other side the 
 hedge, vorrights where I seen him last, there was he a- 
 trotting up stream quite-cool, a-pocketing a two-pounder. 
 Then he seen me, and away we goes side by side for the 
 bounds he this side the hedge and I t'other ; he takin' 
 the fences like our old greyhound-bitch, Clara. "We takes 
 the last fence on to that fuzzy field as you sees there, sir 
 (parson's glebe, and out of our liberty), neck and neck, 
 and I turns short to the left, 'cos there warn't no fence 
 now betwixt he and I. Well, I thought he'd a dodged on 
 about the fuz. Not he; he slouches his hat over's eyes, 
 and stands quite cool by fust fuz bush I minded then 
 as we was out o' our beat. Ilows'ever, my blood was up; 
 so I at's him then and there, no words lost, and fetches a 
 crack at's head wi' my stick. He fends wi' his'n ; and 
 then, as I rushes in to collar'n, dashed if 'e didn't meet I 
 full, and catch I by the thigh and collar, and send I slap 
 over's head into a fuz bush. Then he chuckles fit to 
 bust hisself, and cuts his stick, while I creeps out full o' 
 prickles, and wi' my breeches tore shameful. Dang un ! " 
 cried the keeper, while Tom roared, " he's a lissum wos- 
 bird, that I 'ool say, but I'll be upsides wi' he next time I 
 sees un. "Whorson fool as I was not to stop and look at 
 'n and speak to un ! Then I should ha' know'd 'n again ; 
 and now he med be our parish clerk for all as I knows." 
 
 " And you've never met him since ? " 
 
 " Never sot eye on un, sir, arly or late wishes I 
 had." 
 
 " "Well, keeper, here's half a crown to go towards 
 mending the hole in your breeches, and better luck at the 
 return match. I shall begin fishing here." 
 
 " Thank'ee, sir ; you keep your cast pretty nigh that 
 there off bank, and you med have a rare good un ther'.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 215 
 
 I seen a fish suck there just now as warn't spawned this 
 year nor last nether." 
 
 And away went the keeper. 
 
 " Stanch fellow, the keeper," said Tom to himself, as he 
 reeled out yard after yard of his tapered line, and with a 
 gentle sweep dropped his collar of flies lightly on the wa- 
 ter, each cast covering another five feet of the dimpling 
 surface. " Good fellow, the keeper don't mind telling 
 a story against himself can stand being laughed at 
 more than his master can. Ah, there's the fish he saw 
 sucking, I'll be bound. Now, you beauties, over his nose, 
 and fall light don't disgrace your bringing up ! " and 
 away went the flies quivering through the air and lighting 
 close to the opposite bank, under a bunch of rushes. A 
 slight round eddy followed below the rushes, as the cast 
 came gently back across the current. 
 
 "Ah, you see them, do you, old boy?" thought Tom. 
 " Say your prayers, then, and get shrived ! " and away 
 went the flies again, this time a little below. No move- 
 ment. The third throw, a great lunge and splash, and 
 the next moment the lithe rod bent double, and the gut 
 collar spun along, cutting through the water like mad. 
 Up goes the great fish twice into the air, Tom giving him 
 the point, then up stream again, Tom giving him the butt 
 and beginning to reel up gently. Down goes the great 
 fish into the swaying weeds, working with his tail like a 
 twelve-horse screw. " If I can only get my nose to 
 ground," thinks he. So thinks Tom, and trusts to his 
 tackle, keeping a steady strain on trouty, and creeping 
 gently down stream. " No go," says the fish, as he feels 
 his nose steadily hauled round, and turns with a swirl 
 down stream. Away goes Tom, reeling in, and away 
 goes the fish in hopes of a slack away, for twenty or 
 thirty yards the fish coming to the top lazily, now and
 
 216 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 again, and holding on to get his second wind. Now a 
 <;art track crossed the stream, no weeds, and shallow wa- 
 ter at the side. " Here we must have it out," thinks Tom, 
 and turns fish's nose up stream again. The big fish gets 
 sulky, twice drifts towards the shallow, and twice plunges 
 away at the sight of his enemy into the deep water. The 
 third time he comes swaying in, his yellow side gleaming 
 and his mouth open ; and the next moment Tom scoops 
 him out on to the grass, with a " whoop " that might have 
 been heard at the house. 
 
 " Two-pounder, if he's an ounce," says Tom, as he gives 
 him the coup de grace, and lays him out lovingly on the 
 fresh green sward. 
 
 Who amongst you, dear readers, can appreciate the in- 
 tense delight of grassing your first big fish after a nine 
 months' fast? All first sensations have their special pleas- 
 ure, but none can be named, in a small way, to beat this 
 of the first fish of the season. The first clean leg-hit for 
 four in your first match at Lords the grating of the bows 
 of your racing boat against the stern of the boat ahead in 
 your first race the first half-mile of a burst from the 
 cover side in November when the hounds in the field 
 ahead may be covered with a tablecloth, and no one but 
 the huntsman and a top sawyer or two lies between you 
 and them the first brief after your call to the bar, if it 
 comes within the year the sensations produced by these 
 are the same in kind ; but cricket, boating, getting briefs, 
 even hunting, lose their edge as time goes on. As to lady 
 readers, it is impossible, probably, to give them an idea 
 of the sensation in question. Perhaps some may have 
 experienced something of the kind at their first balls, 
 when they heard whispers, and saw all eyes turning their 
 way, and knew that their dresses and gloves fitted per- 
 fectly. But this joy can be felt but once in a life, and
 
 TOM I5ROWN AT OXFORD. 217 
 
 the first fish comes back as fresh as ever, or ought to come, 
 if all men had their rights, once in a season. So, good 
 luck to the gentle craft, and its professors, and may the 
 Fates send us much into their company! The trout- 
 fisher, like the landscape painter, haunts the loveliest 
 places of the earth, and haunts them alone. Solitude, na- 
 ture, and his own thoughts he must be on the best terms 
 with all of these ; and he who can take kindly the largest 
 allowance of these, is likely to be the kindliest and truest 
 with his fellow-men. 
 
 Tom had splendid sport that summer morning. As the 
 great sun rose higher, the light morning breeze which had 
 curled the water, died away ; the light mist drew up into 
 light cloud, and the light cloud vanished into cloudland, 
 for any thing I know ; and still the fish rose, strange to 
 say, though Tom felt it was an affair of minutes, and 
 acted accordingly. At eight o'clock he was about a quar- 
 ter of a mile from the house, at a point in the stream of 
 rare charms both for the angler and the lover of gentle- 
 river beauty. The main stream was crossed by a lock, 
 formed of a solid brick bridge with no parapets, under 
 which the water rushed through four small arches, each 
 of which could be closed in tin instant by letting down a 
 heavy wooden lock gate, fitted in grooves on the upper 
 side of the bridge. Such locks are frequent in the west- 
 country streams, even at long distances from mills and 
 millers, for whose behoof they were made in old days, 
 that the supply of water to the mill might be easily regu- 
 lated. All pious anglers should bless the memories of the 
 old builders of them, for they are the very paradises of the 
 great trout, who frequent the old brickwork and timber 
 foundations. The water, in its rush through the arches, 
 had of course worked for itself a deep hole, and then, 
 some twenty yards below, spread itself out in wanton 
 19
 
 218 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 joyous ripples and eddies over a broad surface some fifty 
 yards across, and dashed away towards a little island some 
 two hundred yards below, or rolled itself slowly back tow- 
 ards the bridge again, up the backwater by the side of 
 the bank, as if longing for another merry rush through 
 one of those narrow arches. The island below was 
 crowned with splendid alders, willows forty feet high, 
 which wept into the water, and two or three poplars ; a 
 rich mile of water meadow, with an occasional willow or 
 aider lay gleaming beyond ; and the view was bounded 
 by a glorious wood, which crowned the gentle slope, at the 
 foot of which the river ran. Another considerable body 
 of water, which had been carried off above from the main 
 stream to flush the water meadows, rejoined its parent at 
 this point ; it came slowly down a broad artificial ditch, 
 running parallel with the main stream ; and the narrow 
 strip of land which divided the two streams ended ab- 
 ruptly just below the lock, forming a splendid point for 
 bather or angler. Tom had fixed on this pool as his 
 bonne bouche, as a child keeps its plums till the last, and 
 stole over the bridge, stooping low, to gain the point above 
 indicated. Having gained it, he glanced round to be 
 aware of the dwarf ash-trees and willows which were 
 scattered along the strip and might catch heedless collars 
 and spoil sport, when, lying lazily almost on the surface 
 where the backwater met the stream from the meadows, 
 he beheld the great-grandfather of all trout, a fellow two 
 feet long and a foot in girth at the shoulders, just moving 
 fin enough to keep him from turning over on to his back. 
 He threw himself flat on the ground and crept away to 
 the other side of the strip ; the king-fish had not seen 
 him ; and the next moment my uncle saw him suck in a 
 bee laden with his morning's load of honey, who touched 
 the water unwarily close to his nose. With a trembling
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 219 
 
 hand Tom took off his tail fly, and, on his knees, substi- 
 tuted a governor; then, shortening his line after wetting 
 his mimic bee in the pool behind him, tossed him gently 
 into the monster's very jaws. For a moment the fish 
 seemed scared, but the next, conscious in his strength, 
 lifted his nose slowly to the surface and sucked in the 
 bait. My uncle struck gently, and then sprang to his feet. 
 But the Heavens had other work for the king-fish, who 
 dived swiftly under the bank ; a slight jar followed, and 
 Tom's rod was straight over his head, the line and scarce 
 a yard of his trusty gut collar dangling about his face. 
 He seized this remnant with horror and unsatisfied long- 
 ing, and examined it with care. Could he have over- 
 looked any fraying which the gut might have got in the 
 morning's work ? No ; he had gone over every inch of it 
 not five minutes before, as he neared the pool. Besides, 
 it was cut clean through, not a trace of bruise or fray 
 about it. How could it have happened ? Pie went to the 
 spot and looked into the water; it was slightly discolored, 
 and he could not see the bottom. He threw his fishing 
 coat off, rolled up the sleeve of his flannel shirt, and, lying 
 on his side, felt about the bank and tried to reach the 
 bottom, but couldn't. So, hearing the half-hour bell ring, 
 he deferred further inquiry, and stripped in silent disgust 
 for a plunge in the pool. Three times he hurled himself 
 into the delicious rush of the cold chalk stream, with that 
 utter abandon in which man, whose bones are brittle, can 
 only indulge when there are six or seven feet of water 
 between him and mother earth; and, letting the stream 
 bear him away at its own sweet will to the shallows be- 
 low, struck up again through the rush and the roar to his 
 plunging place. Then slowly and luxuriously dressing, 
 ho lit his short pipe, companion of meditation, and be- 
 gan to ruminate on the escape of his king-fish. What
 
 220 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 could have cut his collar ? The more he thought, the less 
 he could make it out. When suddenly he was aware of 
 the keeper on his way hack to the house for orders and 
 breakfast. 
 
 " What sport, sir ? " 
 
 " Pretty fair," said Tom, carelessly ; lugging five plump 
 speckled fellows, weighing some seven and a half pounds, 
 out of his creel, and laying them out for the keeper's in- 
 spection. 
 
 " Well, they be in prime order, sir, surely," says the 
 keeper, handling them ; " they alius gets mortal thick 
 across the shoulders while the May fly be on. Lose any, 
 sir?" 
 
 " I put in some little ones up above, and lost one 
 screamer just up the back ditch there. He must have 
 been a four pounder, and went off, and be hanged to him, 
 with two yards of my collar and a couple of firstrate flies. 
 How on earth he got off I can't tell !" and he went on to 
 unfold the particulars of the short struggle. 
 
 The keeper could hardly keep down a grin. " Ah, 
 sir," said he, "I thinks I knows what spwiled your sport. 
 You owes it all to that chap as I was a-telling you of, or 
 my name's not Willum Goddard ; " and then, fishing the 
 lock-pole with a hook at the end of it out of the rushes, he 
 began groping under the bank, and presently hauled up a 
 sort of infernal machine, consisting of a heavy lump of 
 wood, a yard or so long, in which were carefully inserted 
 the blades of four or five old knives and razors, while a 
 crop of rusty, jagged nails filled up the spare space. 
 
 Tom looked at it in wonder. " What devil's work have 
 you got hold of there ? " he said at last. 
 
 " Bless you, sir," said the keeper, " 'tis only our shove- 
 net traps as I wur a-telling you of. I keeps hard upon a 
 dozen on 'em, and shifts 'em about in the likeliest holes ;
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 221 
 
 and I takes care to let the men as is about the water 
 meadows see me a-sharpening on 'em up a bit, wi' a file, 
 now and again. And, since master gev me orders to put 
 'em in, I don't think they tries that game on not once a 
 month." 
 
 " Well, but where do you and your master expect to go 
 to if you set such things as those about ? " said Tom, look- 
 ing serious. " Why, you'll be cutting some fellow's hand 
 or foot half off one of these days. Suppose I'd waded up 
 the bank to see what had become of my cast ? " 
 
 " Lor, sir, I never thought o' that," said the keeper, 
 looking sheepish, and lifting the back of his short hat off 
 his head to make room for a scratch ; " but," added he, 
 turning the subject, " if you wants to keep thay artful 
 wosbirds off the water, you must frighten 'em wi' summat 
 out o' the way. Drattle 'em, I knows they puts me to my 
 wits' end ; but you'd never 'a' had five such fish as them 
 afore breakfast, sir, if we didn't stake the waters unmus- 
 siful." 
 
 " Well, and I don't want 'em, if I can't get 'em without. 
 I'll toll you what it is, keeper, this razor business is going 
 a bit too far ; men aint to be maimed for liking a bit of 
 sport. You set spring-guns in the woods, and you know 
 what that came to. Why don't you, or one of your 
 watchers, stop out here at night, and catch the fellows, 
 like men ? " 
 
 " Why, you see, sir, master don't allow me but one 
 watcher, and he's mortal feared o' the water he be, spe- 
 cially o' nights. He'd sooner by half stop up in the 
 woods. Daddy Collins (that's an old woman as lives on 
 the heath, sir, and a bad sort she be, too), well, she told 
 he once, when he wouldn't gee her some bacchy as he'd 
 got, and she'd a mind to, as he'd fall twice into the water 
 fur once as he'd get out ; and th' poor chap ever since 
 1!)*
 
 222 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 can't think but what he'll be drownded. And there's 
 queer sights and sounds by the river o' nights, too, I ool 
 say, sir, let alone the white mist, as makes every thing 
 look unket, and gives a chap the rheumatics." 
 
 "Well, but you aint afraid of ghosts and rheumatism?" 
 " No ; I don't know as I be, sir. But then, there's the 
 pheasants a breedin', and there's four brood of flappers in 
 the withey bed, and a sight o' young hares in the spin- 
 neys. I be hard put to to mind it all." 
 
 " I dare say you are," said Tom, putting on his coat, and 
 shouldering his rod ; " I've a good mind to take a turn at 
 it myself, to help you, if you'll only drop those razors." 
 
 " I wishes you would, sir," said the keeper, from be- 
 hind ; " if gen'l'men'd sometimes take a watch, at nights, 
 they'd find out as keepers hadn't all fair-weather work, 
 I'll warrant, if they're to keep a good head o' game about 
 a place ; 'taint all popping off guns, and lunching under 
 hayricks, I can tell 'em no, nor half on it." 
 
 " Where do you think, now, this fellow we were talk- 
 ing of sells his fish ? " said Tom, after a minute's thought. 
 " Mostly at Reading Market, I hears tell, sir. There's 
 the guard of the mail, as goes by the cross-roads three 
 days a week, he wur a rare poaching chap hisself down in 
 the west afore he got his place along of his bugle-playing. 
 They do say as he's open to any game, he is, from a buck 
 to a snipe, and drives a trade all down the road with the 
 country chaps." 
 
 " What day is Reading Market ? " 
 u Tuesdays and Saturdays, sir." 
 " And what time does the mail go by ? " 
 " Six o'clock in the morning, sir, at the cross-roads." 
 " And they're three miles off, across the fields ? " 
 " Thereabouts, sir ; I reckons it about a forty minutes' 
 stretch, and no time lost."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 223 
 
 " There'll be no more big fish caught on the fly to-day," 
 said Tom, after a minute's silence, as they neared the 
 house. 
 
 The wind had fallen dead, and not a spot of cloud in 
 the sky. 
 
 " Not afore nightfall, I think, sir;" and the keeper dis- 
 appeared towards the offices.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE NIGHT-WATCH. 
 
 " You may do as you please, but I'm going to see it 
 out." 
 
 " No ; but I say, do come along ; that's a good fellow." 
 
 " Not I ; why, we've only just come out. Didn't you 
 hear ? Wurley dared me to do a night's watching and I 
 said I meant to do it." 
 
 " Yes ; so did I. But we can change our minds. 
 What's the good of having a mind if you can't change it ! 
 &i SevTepai nug (ppovndsc aotyuTepai ; isn't that good Greek and 
 good sense ? " 
 
 " I don't see it. They'll only laugh and sneer if we go 
 back now." 
 
 " They'll laugh at us twice as much if we don't. 
 Fancy ! they're just beginning pool now on that stunning 
 table. Come along, Brown ; don't miss your chance. 
 We shall be sure to divide the pools, as we've missed the 
 claret. Cool hands and cool heads, you know ! Green 
 on brown, pink your player in hand ! That's a good deal 
 pleasanter than squatting here all night on the damp 
 grass." 
 
 " Very likely." 
 
 " But you wont ? Now, do be reasonable. Will you 
 come if I stop with you another half-hour ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " An hour then ? Say till ten o'clock ? " 
 
 " If I went at all, I would go at once."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 225 
 
 " Then you wont come ? " 
 
 No." 
 
 " I'll bet you a sovereign you never see a poacher, and 
 then how sold you will be in the morning ! It will be 
 much worse coming in to breakfast with empty hands and 
 a cold in the head, than going in now. They will chaff 
 then, I grant you." 
 
 " Well, then, they may chaff and be hanged, for I 
 sha'n't go in now." 
 
 Tom's interlocutor put his hands in the pockets of his 
 heather mixture shooting-coat, and took a turn or two of 
 some dozen yards, backwards and forwards above the 
 place where our hero was sitting. He didn't like going 
 in and facing the pool-players by himself; so he stopped 
 once more and re-opened the conversation. 
 
 "What do you want to do by watching all night, 
 Brown ? " 
 
 " To show the keeper, and those fellows in-doors, that 
 I mean what I say. I said I'd do it, and I will." 
 
 " You don't want to catch a poacher, then ? " 
 
 " I don't much care : I'll catch one if he comes in my 
 way or try it on, at any rate." 
 
 " I say, Brown, 1 like that ; as if you don't poach your- 
 self. Why, I remember when the Whiteham keeper 
 spent the best part of a week outside the college gates, on 
 the look-out for you and Drysdale, and some other fel- 
 lows." 
 
 " What has that to do with it ? " 
 
 " Why, you ought to have more fellow-feeling. I sup- 
 pose you go on the principle of set a thief to catch a 
 thief." 
 
 Tom made no answer, and his companion went on, 
 
 " Come along now, like a good fellow. If you'll come
 
 226 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 in now, we can come out again all fresh, when the rest go 
 to bed." 
 
 " Not we. I sha'n't go in. But you can come out 
 again, if you like ; you'll find me hereabouts." 
 
 The man in the heather mixture had now shot his last 
 bolt, and took himself off to the house, leaving Tom by 
 the river side. How they got there may be told in a few 
 words. After his morning's fishing, and conversation with 
 the keeper, he had gone in full of his subject, and pro- 
 pounded it at the breakfast-table. His strictures on the 
 knife and razor business produced a rather wai*m discus- 
 sion, which merged in the question whether a keeper's 
 life was a hard one, till something was said implying that 
 Wurley's men were overworked. The master took this 
 in high dudgeon, and words ran high. In the discussion, 
 Tom remarked {apropos of night-work) that he would 
 never ask another man to do what he would not do him- 
 self; which sentiment was endorsed by, amongst others, 
 the man in the heather mixture. The host had l-etorted, 
 that they had better in that case try it themselves ; which 
 remark had the effect of making Tom resolve to cut short 
 his visit, and in the mean time had brought him and his 
 ally to the river side on the night in question. 
 
 The first hour, as we have seen, had been enough for 
 the ally, and so Tom was left in company with a plaid, a 
 stick, and a pipe, to spend the night by himself. 
 
 It was by no means the first night he had spent in the 
 open air, and promised to be a pleasant one for camping 
 out. It was almost the longest day in the year, and the 
 weather was magnificent. There was yet an hour of day- 
 light, and the place he had chosen was just the right one 
 for enjoying the evening. 
 
 He was sitting under one of a clump of huge old 
 alders, growing on the thin strip of land already noticed,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 227 
 
 which divided the main stream from the deep artificial 
 ditch which fed the water-meadows. On his left the 
 emerald-green meadows stretched away till they met the 
 enclosed corn land. On his right ran the main stream, 
 some fifty feet in breadth at this point ; on the opposite 
 side of which was a rough piece of ground, half withey 
 bed, half copse, with a rank growth of rushes at the 
 water's edge. These were the chosen haunts of moor-hen 
 and water-rat, whose tracks could be seen by dozens, like 
 small open doorways, looking out on to the river, through 
 which ran mysterious little paths into the rush-wilderness 
 beyond. 
 
 The sun was now going down behind the copse, through 
 which his beams came aslant, chequered and mellow. 
 The stream ran dimpling down by him, sleepily swaying 
 the masses of weed, under the surface and on the surface ; 
 and the trout rose under the banks, as some moth or gnat 
 or gleaming beetle fell into the stream ; here and there 
 one more frolicsome than his brethren would throw him- 
 self joyously into the air. The swifts rushed close by 
 him, in companies of five or six, and wheeled, and 
 screamed, and dashed away again, skimming along the 
 water, baffling his eye as he tried to follow their flight. 
 Two kingfishers shot suddenly up on to their supper 
 station, on a stunted willow stump, some twenty yards 
 below him, and sat there in the glory of their blue backs 
 and cloudy red waistcoats, watching with long, sagacious 
 beaks pointed to the water beneath, and every now and 
 then dropping like flashes of light into the stream, and 
 rising again with what seemed one motion, to their 
 perches. A heron or two were fishing about the mead- 
 ows ; and he watched them stalking about in their sober 
 quaker coats, or rising on slow heavy wing, and lumber- 
 ing away home with a weird cry. He heard the strong
 
 228 TOM BKOWN AT OXFOIID. 
 
 pinions of the wood pigeon in the air, and then from the 
 trees above his head came the soft call, " Take-two-cow- 
 Taffy, take-two-cow-Taffy," with which that fair and false 
 bird is said to have beguiled the hapless Welchman to the 
 gallows. Presently, as he lay motionless, the timid and 
 graceful little water-hens peered out from their doors in 
 the rushes opposite, and, seeing no cause for fear, stepped 
 daintily into the water, and were suddenly surrounded 
 by little bundles of black soft down, which went paddling 
 about in and out of the weeds, encouraged by the occa- 
 sional sharp, clear, parental " keck keck," and merry 
 little dabchicks popped up in mid-stream, and looked 
 round, and nodded at him, pert and voiceless, and dived 
 again ; even old cunning water-rats sat up on the bank 
 with round black noses and gleaming eyes, or took solemn 
 swims out, and turned up their tails and disappeared for 
 his amusement. A comfortable low came at intervals 
 from the cattle, revelling in the abundant herbage. All 
 living things seemed to be disporting themselves, and 
 enjoying, after their kind, the last gleams of the sunset, 
 which were making the whole vault of heaven glow and 
 shimmer ; and, as he watched them, Tom blessed his stars 
 as he contrasted the river side with the glare of lamps 
 and the click of balls in the noisy pool-room. 
 
 Before it got dark he bethought him of making sure of 
 his position once more; matters might have changed since 
 he chose it .before dinnex-. With all that he could extract 
 from the keeper, and his own experience in such matters, 
 it had taken him several hours hunting up and down the 
 river that afternoon before he had hit on a night-line. 
 But he had persevered, knowing that this was the only 
 safe evidence to start from, and at last had found several, 
 so cunningly set that it was clear that it was a firstrate 
 artist in the poaching line against whom he had pitted
 
 TOM BKOWN AT OXFORD. 229 
 
 himself. These lines must have been laid almost under 
 his nose on that very day, as the freshness of the baits 
 proved. The one which he had selected to watch by was 
 under the bank, within a few yards of the clump of alders 
 where he was now sitting. There was no satisfactory 
 cover near the others ; so he had chosen this one, where 
 he would be pefectly concealed behind the nearest trunk 
 from any person who might come in due time to take up 
 the line. With this view, then, he got up, and, stepping 
 carefully on the thickest grass where his foot would leave 
 no mark, went to the bank, and felt with the hook of his 
 stick after the line. It was all right, and he returned to 
 his old seat. 
 
 And then the summer twilight came on, and the birds 
 disappeared, and the hush of night settled down on river 
 and copse and meadow cool and gentle summer twilight 
 after the hot, bright day. He welcomed it too, as it folded 
 up the landscape, and the trees lost their outline, and set- 
 tled into soft black masses rising here and there out of the 
 white mist, which seemed to have crept up to within a few 
 yards all around him unawares. There was no sound 
 now but the gentle murmur of the water, and an occasional 
 rustle of reeds, or of the leaves over his head, as a stray 
 wandering puff of air passed through them on its way 
 home to bed. Nothing to listen to, and nothing to look 
 at ; for the moon had not risen, and the light mist hid 
 every tiling except a star or two right up above him. So, 
 the outside world having left him for the present, he was 
 turned inwards on himself. 
 
 This was all very well at first ; and he wrapped the 
 plaid round his shoulders and leant against his tree, and 
 indulged in a little self-gratulation. There was something 
 of strangeness and adventure in his solitary night-watch, 
 which had its charm for a youngster of twenty-one ; and 
 20
 
 230 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 the consciousness of not running word, of doing what he 
 had said he would do, while others shirked and broke 
 down, was decidedly pleasant. 
 
 But this satisfaction did not last very long, and the night 
 began to get a little wearisome, and too cool to be quite 
 comfortable. By degrees doubts as to the wisdom of his 
 self-imposed task crept into his head. Undismissed them 
 for a time by turning his thoughts to other matters. The 
 neighborhood of Englebourn, some two miles up above 
 him, reminded him of the previous summer; and he won- 
 dered how he should get on with his cousin when they 
 met. He should probably see her the next day, for he 
 would lose no time in calling. Would she receive him 
 well ? Would she have much to tell him about Mary ? 
 
 He had been more hopeful on this subject of late, but 
 the loneliness, the utter solitude and silence of his posi- 
 tion, as he sat there in the misty night, away from all hu- 
 man habitations, was not favorable somehow to hopeful- 
 ness. He found himself getting dreary and sombre in 
 heart, more and more so as the minutes rolled on, and the 
 silence and loneliness pressed on him more and more 
 heavily. He was surprised at his own down-heartedness, 
 and tried to remember how he had spent former nights so 
 pleasantly out of doors. Ah, he had always had a com- 
 panion within call, and something to do cray fishing, 
 bat fowling, or something of the kind ? Sitting there, do- 
 ing nothing, he fancied, must make it so heavy to-night. 
 By a strong effort of will he shook off the oppression. He 
 moved, and hummed a tune to break the silence ; he got 
 up and walked up and down, lest it should again master 
 him. If wind, storm, pouring rain, any thing to make 
 sound or movement, would but come ! 
 
 But neither of them came, and there was little help in 
 sound or movement made by himself. Besides, it occurred
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 231 
 
 to him that much walking up and down might defeat the 
 object of his watch. No one would come near while he 
 was on the move ; and he was probably making marks al- 
 ready which might catch the eye of the setter of the night- 
 lines at some distance, if that cunning party waited for the 
 morning light, and might keep him away from the place 
 altogether. 
 
 So he sat down again on his old seat, and leant hard 
 against the alder trunk, as though to steady himself, and 
 keep all troublesome thoughts well in front of him. In 
 this attitude of defence, he reasoned with himself on the 
 absurdity of allowing himself to be depressed by the mere 
 accidents of place and darkness and silence ; but all the 
 reasoning at his command didn't alter the fact. He felt 
 the enemy advancing again, and, casting about for help, 
 fell back on the thought that he was going through a task, 
 holding to his word, doing what he had said he would do ; 
 and this brought him some relief for the moment. He 
 fixed his mind steadily on this task of his ; but alas, here 
 again, in his very last stronghold the enemy began to turn 
 his flank, and the position every minute became more and 
 more untenable. 
 
 He had of late fallen into a pestilent habit of cross- 
 questioning himself on any thing which he was about 
 setting up himself like a cock at Shrove-tide, and pelting 
 himself with inexorable " whys ? " and " wherefores ? " 
 A pestilent habit truly he had found it, and one which 
 left a man no peace of his life a relentless, sleepless 
 habit, always ready to take advantage of him, but never 
 so viciously alert, that he remembered, as on this night. 
 
 And so this questioning self, which would never be de- 
 nied for long, began to examine him as to his proposed 
 night's work. This precious task, which he was so proud 
 of going through with, on the score of which he had been
 
 232 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 in his heart crowing over others, because they had not 
 taken it on them, or had let it drop, what then was the 
 meaning of it ? 
 
 " What was he out there for? What had he come out 
 to do ? " They were awkward questions. He tried sev- 
 eral answers, and was driven from one to another till he 
 was bound to admit that he was out there that night, partly 
 out of pique, and partly out of pride : and that his object 
 (next to earning the pleasure of thinking himself a better 
 man than his neighbors) was, if so be, to catch a poacher. 
 " To catch a poacher ? What business had he to be catch- 
 ing poachers? If all poachers were to be caught, he 
 would have to be caught himself." He had just had an 
 unpleasant reminder of this fact from him of the heather 
 mixtures a Parthian remark which he had thrown over 
 his shoulder as he went off, and which had stuck. " But 
 then," Tom argued, "it was a very different thing, his 
 poaching going out for a day's lark after game, which 
 he didn't care a straw for, but only for the sport and that 
 of men making a trade of it, like the man the keeper spoke 
 of. Why? How different? If there were any differ- 
 ence, was it one in his favor ? " Avoiding this suggestion, 
 he took up new ground. " Poachers were always the great- 
 est blackguards in their neighborhoods, pests of society, 
 and ought to be put down. Possibly at any rate he had 
 been one of the fraternity in his time, and was scarcely 
 the man to be casting stones at them. Bat his poaching 
 had always been done thoughtlessly. How did he know 
 that others had worse motives ? " 
 
 And so he went on, tossing the matter backwards and 
 forwards in his mind, and getting more and more uncom- 
 fortable, and unable to answer to his own satisfaction the 
 simple question, " What right have you to be out here on 
 this errand ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 233 
 
 He got up a second time and walked up and down, but 
 with no better success than before. The change of posi- 
 tion and exercise did not help him out of his difficulties. 
 And now he got a step further. If he had no right to be 
 there, hadn't he better go up to the house and say so, and 
 go to bed like the rest ? No, his pride couldn't stand that. 
 But if he couldn't go in, he might turn into a barn or out- 
 house ; nobody would be any the wiser then, and after all 
 he was not pledged to stop on one spot all night ? It was 
 a tempting suggestion, and he was very near yielding to 
 it at once. While he wavered, a new set of thoughts 
 came up to back it. How, if he stayed there, and a gang 
 of night poachers came ? He knew that many of them 
 were desperate men. He had no arms ; what could he 
 do against them ? Nothing ; but he might be maimed lor 
 life in a night row which he had no business to be in 
 murdered, perhaps. He stood still and listened, long and 
 painfully. 
 
 Every moment, as he listened, the silence mastered him 
 more and more, and his reason became more and more 
 powerless. It was such a silence a great, illimitable, 
 vague silence ! The silence of a deserted house, where 
 he could at least have felt that he was bounded some- 
 where, by wall and floor and roof where men must 
 have lived and worked once, though they might be there 
 no longer would have been nothing ; but this silence of 
 the huge, wide, out-of-doors world, where there was noth- 
 ing but air and space around and above him and the ground 
 beneath, it was getting irksome, intolerable, awful ! The 
 great silence seemed to be saying to him, " You are alone, 
 alone, alone ! " and he had never known before what hor- 
 ror lurked in that thought. 
 
 Every moment that he stood, still the spell grew on him, 
 and yet he dared not move; and a strange, wild feeling 
 of fear unmistakable physical fear, which made his heart 
 20*
 
 234 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 beat and his limbs tremble seized on him. He was ready 
 to cry out, to fall down, to run, and yet there he stood 
 listening, still and motionless. 
 
 The critical moment in all panics must come at last. 
 A wild and grewsome hissing and snoring, which seemed 
 to come from the air just over his head, made him start 
 and spring forward, and gave him the use of his limbs 
 again, at any rate, though they would not have been worth 
 much to him had the ghost or hobgoblin appeared whom 
 he half expected to see the next moment. Then came a 
 screech, which seemed to flit along the rough meadow op- 
 posite, and come towards him. He drew a long breath, 
 for he knew that sound well enough ; it was nothing after 
 all but the owls. 
 
 The mere realized consciousness of the presence of some 
 living creatures, were they only owls, brought him to his 
 senses. And now the moon was well up, and the way- 
 ward mist had cleared away, and he could catch glimpses 
 of the solemn birds every now and then, beating over the 
 rough meadow backwards and forwards and over the shal- 
 low water, as regularly as trained pointers. 
 
 He threw himself down again under his tree, and now 
 bethought himself of his pipe. Here was a companion 
 which, wonderful to say, he had not thought of before 
 since the night set in. He pulled it out, but paused be- 
 fore lighting. Nothing was so likely to betray his where- 
 abouts as tobacco. True, but any thing was better than 
 such another fright as he had had, " so here goes," he 
 thought ; "if I keep off all the poachers in Berkshire ; " 
 and he accordingly lighted up, and, with the help of his 
 pipe, once more debated with himself the question of beat- 
 ing a retreat. 
 
 After a sharp inward struggle, he concluded to stay and 
 see it out. He should despise himself, more than he cared 
 to face, if he gave in now. If he left that spot before
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 2oO 
 
 morning, the motive would be sheer cowardice. There 
 might be fifty other good reasons for going ; but if he 
 went, his reason would be fear and nothing else. It might 
 have been wrong and foolish to come out ; it must be to 
 go in now. " Fear never made a man do a right action," 
 he summed up to himself; "so here I stop, come what 
 may of it. I think I've seen the worst of it now. I was 
 in a real blue funk, and no mistake. Let's see, wasn't I 
 laughing this morning at the watcher who didn't like pass- 
 ing a night by the river ? Well, he has got the laugh of 
 me now, if he only knew it. I've learnt one lesson to- 
 night at any rate ; I don't think I shall ever be very hard 
 on cowards again." 
 
 By the time he had finished his pipe, he was a man 
 again, and, moreover, notwithstanding the damp, began to 
 feel sleepy, now that his mind was thoroughly made up, 
 and his nerves were quiet. So he made the best of his 
 plaid, and picked a softish place, and went off soon into a 
 sort of dog sleep, which lasted at intervals through the 
 rest of the short summer night. A poor thin sort of sleep 
 it was, in which he never altogether lost his consciousness, 
 and broken by short intervals of actual wakefulness, but a 
 blessed release from the self-questionings and panics of the 
 early night. 
 
 lie woke at last with a shiver. It was colder than he 
 had yet felt it, and it seemed lighter. He stretched his 
 half-torpid limbs, and sat up. Yes, it was certainly getting 
 light, for he could just make out the figures on the face 
 of his watch which he pulled out. The dawn was almost 
 upon him, and his night-watch was over. Nothing had 
 conn; of it as yet, except his fright, at which he could now 
 laugh comfortably enough ; probably nothing more might 
 come of it after all, but he had done the task he had set 
 himself without flinching, and that was a satisfaction. He
 
 236 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 wound up his watch, which he had forgotten to do the 
 night before, and then stood up, and threw his damp plaid 
 aside, and swung his arms across his chest to restore cir- 
 culation. The crescent moon was high up in the sky, 
 faint and white, and he could scarcely now make out the 
 stars, which were fading out as the glow in the north-east 
 got stronger and broader. 
 
 Forgetting for a moment the purpose of his vigil, he 
 was thinking of a long morning's fishing, and had turned 
 to pick up his plaid and go off to the house for his fishing- 
 rod, when he thought he heard the sound of dry wood 
 snapping. He listened intently ; and the next moment it 
 came again, some way off, but plainly to be heard in the 
 intense stillness of the morning. Some living thing was 
 moving down the stream. Another moment's listening, 
 and he was convinced that the sound came from a hedge 
 some hundred yards below. 
 
 He had noticed the hedge before ; the keeper had 
 stopp>ed up a gap in it the day before, at the place where 
 it came down to the water, with some old hurdles and dry 
 thorns. He drew himself up behind his alder, looking 
 out from behind it cautiously towards the point from 
 which the sound came. He could just make out the 
 hedge through the mist, but saw nothing. 
 
 But now the crackling began again, and he was sure 
 that a man was forcing his way over the keeper's barri- 
 cade. A moment afterwards he saw a figure drop from 
 the hedge into the slip in which he stood. He drew back 
 his head hastily, and his heart beat like a hammer as he 
 waited the approach of the stranger. In a few seconds 
 the suspense was too much for him, for again there was 
 perfect silence. Pie peered out a second time cautiously 
 round the tree, and now he could make out the figure of 
 a man stooping by the water-side just above the hedge, 
 and drawing in a line. This was enough, and he drew
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 237 
 
 back again, and made himself small behind the tree ; now 
 he was sure that the keeper's enemy, the man he had come 
 out to take, was here. His next halt would be at the 
 line which was set within a few yards of the place where 
 he stood. So the struggle which he had courted was 
 come ! All his doubts of the night wrestled in his mind 
 for a minute ; but, forcing them down, he strung himself 
 up for the encounter, his whole frame trembling with the 
 excitement, and his blood tingling through his veins as 
 though it would burst them. The next minute was as se- 
 vere a trial of nerve as he had ever been put to, and the 
 sound of a stealthy tread on the grass just below came to 
 him as a relief. It stopped, and he heard the man stoop, 
 then came a stir in the water, and the flapping as of a fish 
 being landed. 
 
 Now was his time ! He sprang from behind the tree, 
 and, the next moment, was over the stooping figure of the 
 poacher. Before he could seize him, the man sprang up, 
 and grappled with him. They had come to a tight lock 
 at once, for the poacher had risen so close under him that 
 he could not catch his collar and hold him off. Too close 
 to strike, it was a desperate trial of strength and bottom. 
 
 Tom knew in a moment that lie had his work cut out 
 for him. He felt the nervous power of the frame he had 
 got hold of as he drove his chin into the poacher's shoul- 
 der, and arched his back, and strained every muscle in 
 his body to force him backwards, but in vain. It was all 
 he could do to hold his own ; but he felt that he might 
 hold it yet, as they staggered on the brink of the back 
 ditch, stamping the grass and marsh marigolds into the 
 ground, and drawing deep breath through their set teeth. 
 A slip, a false foothold, a failing muscle, and it would be 
 over; down they must go who w r ould be uppermost? 
 
 The poacher trod on a soft place, and Tom felt it, and, 
 throwing himself forward, was reckoning on victory, but
 
 238 
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 reckoning without his host ; for, recovering himself with a 
 twist of the hody which brought them still closer together, 
 the poacher locked his leg behind Tom's in a crook which 
 brought the wrestlings of his boyhood into his head with 
 a flash, as they tottered for another moment, and then los- 
 ing balance, went headlong over with a heavy plunge and 
 splash into the deep back ditch, locked tight in each other's 
 arms. 
 
 The cold water closed over them, and for a moment 
 Tom held as tight as ever. Under or above the surface, 
 it was all the same, he couldn't give in first. But a gulp 
 of water, and the singing in his ears, and a feeling of 
 choking, brought him to his senses, helped too by the 
 thought of his mother and Mary, and love of the pleasant 
 world up above. The folly and uselessness of being 
 drowned in a ditch on a point of honor stood out before 
 him as clearly as if he had been thinking of nothing else 
 all his life ; and he let go his hold much relieved to 
 find that his companion of the bath seemed equally willing 
 to be quit of him and struggled to the surface, and 
 seized the bank, gasping and exhausted. 
 
 His first thought was to turn round and look for his 
 adversary. The poacher was by the bank too, a few feet 
 from him. His cap had fallen off in the struggle, and, 
 all chance of concealment being over, he too had turned 
 to face the matter out, and their eyes met. 
 
 " Good God ! Harry ! is it you ? " 
 
 Harry Winburn answered nothing ; and the two dragged 
 their feet out of the soft, muddy bottom, and scrambled on 
 to the bank, and then with a sort of common instinct sat 
 down, dripping and foolish, each on the place he had 
 reached, and looked at one another. Probably two more 
 thoroughly bewildered lieges of her majesty were not at 
 that moment facing one another in any corner of the 
 United Kingdom.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 MART IN MAYFAIR. 
 
 Ox the night which our hero spent by the side of the 
 river, with the results detailed in the last chapter, there 
 was a great ball in Brook Street, Mayfair. It was the 
 height of the season ; and, of course, balls, concerts, and 
 parties of all kinds were going on in all parts of the Great 
 Babylon, but the entertainment in question was the event 
 of that evening. Persons behind the scenes would have 
 told you at once, had you happened to meet them, and 
 inquire on the subject during the previous ten days, that 
 Brook Street was the place in which everybody who 
 went anywhere ought to spend some hours between 
 eleven and three on this particular evening. If you did 
 not happen to be going there, you had better stay quietly 
 at your club, or elsewhere, and not speak of your engage- 
 ments for that night. 
 
 A great awning had sprung up in the course of the 
 day over the pavement in front of the door, and as the 
 evening closed in, tired lawyers and merchants, on their 
 return from the city, and the riders and drivers on their 
 way home from the park, might have seen Holland's men 
 laying red drugget over the pavement, and Gunter's carts 
 coming and going, and the police " moving on" the street 
 boys and servant-maids, and other curious members of 
 tli'' masses, who paused to stare at the preparations. 
 
 Then came the lighting up of the rooms, and the blaze
 
 210 TOM BROWN AT OXFOUD. 
 
 of pure white light from the uncurtained bull-room win- 
 dows spread into the street, and the musicians passed in 
 with their instruments. Then, after a short pause, the 
 carriages of a few intimate friends, who came early at the 
 hostess' express desire, began to drive up, and the Han- 
 som cabs of the contemporaries of the eldest son, from 
 which issued guardsmen and foreign-office men, and other 
 dancing-youth of the most approved description. Then 
 the crowd collected again round the door a sadder 
 crowd now to the eye of any one who has time to look at 
 it ; with sallow, haggard-looking men here and there on 
 the skirts of it, and tawdry women joking and pushing to 
 the front, through the powdered footmen, and linkmen in 
 red waistcoats, already clamorous and redolent of gin and 
 beer, and scarcely kept back by the half-dozen constables 
 of the A division, told off for the special duty of attending 
 and keeping order on so important an occasion. 
 
 Then comes a rush of carriages, and by eleven o'clock 
 the line stretches away half round Grosvenor Square, 
 and moves at a foot's-pace towards the lights and the 
 music and the shouting street. In the middle of the line 
 is the comfortable chariot of our friend, Mr. Porter the 
 corners occupied by himself and his wife, while Miss 
 Mary sits well forward between them, her white muslin 
 dress, looped up with sprigs of heather, spread delicately 
 on either side over their knees, and herself in a pleasant 
 tremor of impatience and excitement. 
 
 " How very slow Robert is to-day, mamma ! we shall 
 never get to the house.*' 
 
 " He cannot get on faster, my dear. The carriages in 
 front of us must set down, you know." 
 
 " But I wish they would be quicker. I wonder whether 
 we shall know many people ? Do you think I shall get 
 partners ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 241 
 
 Not waiting for her mother's reply, she went on to 
 name some of her acquaintance, whom she knew would 
 he there, and bewailing the hard fate which was keeping 
 her out of the first dances. Mary's excitement and im- 
 patience were natural enough. The ball was not like 
 most balls. It was a great battle in the midst of the 
 skirmishes of the season, and she felt the greatness of the 
 occasion. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Porter had for years past dropped into a 
 quiet sort of dinner-giving life, in which they saw few but 
 their own friends and contemporaries. They generally 
 left London before the season was at its height, and had 
 altogether fallen out of the ball-giving and party-going 
 world. Mary's coming out had changed their way of 
 life. For her sake they had spent the winter at Rome, 
 and, now that they were at home again, were picking up 
 the threads of old acquaintance, and encountering the dis- 
 agreeables of a return into habits long disused and al- 
 most forgotten. The giver of the ball was a stirring man 
 in political life, rich, clever, well connected, and much 
 sought after. He was an old schoolfellow of Mr. Por- 
 ter, and their intimacy had never been wholly laid aside, 
 notwithstanding the severance of their paths in life. Now 
 that Mary must be taken out, the Brook Street house 
 was one of the first to which the Porters turned, and the 
 invitation to this ball was one of the first consequences. 
 
 If the truth must be told, neither her father nor mother 
 were in sympathy with Mary as they gradually neared 
 the place of setting down, and would far rather have been 
 going to a much less imposing place, where they could 
 have driven up at once to the door, and would not have 
 been made uncomfortable by the shoutings of the*" names 
 from servant to servant. However, after the first plunge, 
 when they had made their bows to their kind and smiling 
 21
 
 242 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 hostess, and had passed on into the already well-filled 
 rooms, their shyness began to wear off", and they could in 
 some sort enjoy the beauty of the sight from a quiet cor- 
 ner. They were not long troubled with Miss Mary. 
 She had not been in the ball-room two minutes before the 
 eldest son of the house had found her out and engaged 
 her for the next waltz. They had met several times al- 
 ready, and were on the best terms ; and the freshness and 
 brightness of her look and manner, and the evident enjoy- 
 ment of her partner, as they laughed and talked together 
 in the intervals of the dance, soon attracted the attention 
 of other young men, who began to ask one another " Who 
 is Norman dancing with ? " and to ejaculate with various 
 strength, according to their several temperaments, as to 
 her face and figure and dress. 
 
 As they were returning towards Mrs. Porter, Norman 
 was pulled by the sleeve more than once, and begged to 
 be allowed to introduce first one and then another of his 
 friends. 
 
 Mary gave herself up to the fascination of the scene. 
 She had never been in rooms so perfectly lighted, with 
 such a floor, such exquisite music, and so many pretty 
 and well-bred looking people, and she gave herself up to 
 enjoy it with all her heart and soul, and danced and 
 laughed and talked herself into the good graces of part- 
 ner after partner, till she began to attract the notice of 
 some of the ill-natured people who are to be found in 
 every room, and who cannot pardon the pure and buoy- 
 ant and unsuspecting mirth which carries away all but 
 themselves in its bright stream. So Mary passed on 
 from one partner to another, with whom we have no con- 
 cern, nntil at last a young lieutenant in the guards, who 
 had just finished his second dance with her, led up a 
 friend whom he begged to introduce. " Miss Porter
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 243 
 
 Mr. St. Cloud ; " and then, after the usual preliminaries, 
 Mary left her mother's side again and stood up by the 
 side of her new partner. 
 
 " It is your first season, I believe, Miss Porter ? " 
 
 " Yes ; my first in London." 
 
 " I thought so ; and you have only just come to town ? " 
 
 " We came back from Rome six weeks ago, and have 
 been in town ever since." 
 
 " But I am sure I have not seen you anywhere this 
 season until to-night. You have not been out much 
 yet ? " 
 
 " Yes, indeed ; papa and mamma are very good-na- 
 tured, and go wherever we are asked to a ball, as I am 
 fond of dancing." 
 
 " How very odd ! and yet I am quite sure I should 
 have remembered it if we had met before in town this 
 year." 
 
 " Is it so very odd ? " asked Mary, laughing. " Lon- 
 don is a very large place. It seems very natural that 
 two people should be able to live in it for a long time 
 without meeting." 
 
 " Indeed, you are quite mistaken. You will find out 
 very soon how small London is at least, how small 
 society is ; and you will get to know every face quite 
 well I mean the face of every one in society." 
 
 " You must have a wonderful memory ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I have a good memory for faces, and, by the 
 way, I am sure I have seen you before ; but not in town, 
 and I cannot remember where. But it is not at all neces- 
 sary to have a memory to know everybody in society by 
 sight ; you meet every night almost ; and altogether there 
 are only two or three hundred faces to remember. And 
 then there is something in the look of people, and the 
 way they come into a room or stand about, which tells
 
 244 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 you at once whether they are amongst those whom you 
 need trouble yourself about." 
 
 " Well, I cannot understand it. I seem to be in a 
 whirl of faces, and can hardly ever remember any of 
 them." 
 
 " You will soon get used to it. By the end of the sea- 
 son you will see that I am right. And you ought to 
 make a study of it, or you will never feel at home in 
 London." 
 
 " I must make good use of my time then. I suppose I 
 ought to know everybody here, for instance ? " 
 
 " Almost-*everybody." 
 
 "And I really do not know the names of a dozen peo- 
 ple." 
 
 " "Will you let me give you a lesson ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes ; I shall be much obliged." 
 
 " Then let us stand here, and we will take them as they 
 pass to the supper-room." 
 
 So they stood near the door-way of the ball-room, and 
 he ran on, exchanging constant nods and remarks with the 
 passers-by, as the stream flowed to and from the ices and 
 cup, and then rattling on to his partner with the names 
 and short sketches of the characters and peculiarities of 
 his large acquaintance. Mary was very much amused, 
 and had no time to notice the ill-nature of most of his re- 
 marks ; and he had the wit to keep within what he con- 
 sidered the most innocent bounds. 
 
 " There, you know him, of course," he said, as an el- 
 derly soldier-like looking man with a star, passed them. 
 
 " Yes ; at least, I mean I know him by sight. I saw 
 him at the Commemoration at Oxford last year. They 
 gave him an honorary degree on his return from India." 
 
 " At Oxford ! Were you at the Grand Commemora- 
 tion then?"
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 245 
 
 " Yes. The Commemoration Ball was the first public 
 ball I was ever at." 
 
 " Ah ! that explains it all. I must have seen you there. 
 I told you we had met before. I was perfectly sure of 
 it." 
 
 " What ! were you there, then ! " 
 
 " Yes. I had the honor of being present at your first 
 ball, you see." 
 
 " But how curious that you should remember me ! " 
 
 " Do you really think so ? Surely, there are some faces 
 which, once seen, one can never forget." 
 
 " I am so glad that you know dear Oxford." 
 
 " I know it too well, perhaps, to share your enthusi- 
 asm." 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 " I spent nearly three years there." 
 
 " What, were you at Oxford last year ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I left before Commemoration : but I went up 
 for the gayeties, and I am glad of it, as I shall have one 
 pleasant memory of the place now." 
 
 " Oh, I wonder you don't love it ! But what college 
 were you of?" 
 
 " Why, you talk like a graduate. I was of St. Am- 
 brose." 
 
 " St. Ambrose ! That is my college ! " 
 
 " Indeed ! I wish we had been in residence at the 
 same time." 
 
 " I mean that we almost lived there at the Commemo- 
 ration." 
 
 " Have you any relation there, then ? " 
 
 " No, not a relation, only a distant connection." 
 
 " Ma) r I ask his name ? " 
 
 " Brown. Did you know him ? " 
 21*
 
 246 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Yes. "We were not in the same set. He was a boat- 
 ing man, I think ? " 
 
 She felt that he was watching her narrowly now, and 
 had great difficulty in keeping herself reasonably com- 
 posed. As it was she could not help showing a little that 
 she felt embarrassed, and looked down ; and changed color 
 slightly, busying herself with her bouquet. She longed to 
 continue the conversation, but somehow the manner of her 
 partner kept her from doing so. She resolved to recur to 
 the subject carelessly, if they met again, when she knew 
 him better. The fact of his having been at St. Ambrose 
 made her wish to know him better, and gave him a good 
 start in her favor. But for the moment she felt that she 
 must change the subject ; so, looking up, she fixed on the 
 first people who happened to be passing, and asked who 
 they were. 
 
 " Oh, nobody. Constituents, probably, or something of 
 that sort." 
 
 " I don't understand." 
 
 " Why, you see, we are in a political house to-night. 
 So you may set down the people whom nobody knows, as 
 troublesome ten-pounders, or that kind of thing, who would 
 be disagreeable at the next election, if they were not 
 asked." 
 
 " Then you do not include them in society ? " 
 
 " By no manner of means." 
 
 " And I need not take the trouble to remember their 
 faces ? " 
 
 " Of course not. There is a sediment of rubbish at al 
 most every house. At the parties here it is political rub- 
 bish. To-morrow night, at Lady Aubrey's you will be 
 there, I hope ? " 
 
 " No, I think not."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 247 
 
 " I am sorry for that. Well, there we shall have the 
 scientific rubbish ; and at other houses you see queer art- 
 ists, and writing people. In fact, it is the rarest thing in 
 the world to get a party where there is nothing of the 
 kind, and, after all, it is rather amusing to watch the 
 habits of the different species." 
 
 " Well, to me the rubbish, as you call it, seems much 
 like the rest. I am sure those people were ladies and 
 gentlemen." 
 
 " Very likely," he said, lifting his eyebrows ; " but you 
 may see at a glance that they have not the air of society. 
 Here again, look yourself. You can see that these are 
 constituents." 
 
 To the horror of St. Cloud, the advancing constituents 
 made straight for his partner. 
 
 " Mary, my dear ! " exclaimed the lady, " where have 
 you been ? We have lost you ever since the last dance." 
 
 " I have been standing here, mamma," she said ; and 
 then, slipping from her late partner's arm, she made a de- 
 mure little bow, and passed into the ball-room with her 
 father and mother. 
 
 St. Cloud bit his lip, and swore at himself, under his 
 breath, as he looked after them. " What an infernal idiot 
 I must have been not to know that her people would be 
 sure to turn out something of that sort ! " thought he. 
 " By Jove, I'll go after them, and set myself right, before 
 the little minx has time to think it over ! " He took a step 
 or two towards the ball-room, but then thought better of 
 it, or his courage failed him. At any rate, he turned 
 round again, and sought the refreshment-room, where he 
 joined a knot of young gentlemen indulging in delicate 
 little raised pies and salads, and liberal potations of iced 
 claret or champagne cup. Amongst them was the guards-
 
 248 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 man, who had introduced him to Mary, and who received 
 him, as he came up, with, 
 
 " Well, St. Cloud, I hope you're alive to your obliga- 
 tions to me." 
 
 " For shunting your late partner on to me ? Yes, 
 quite." 
 
 " You be hanged ! " replied the guardsman ; " you may 
 pretend what you please now, but you wouldn't let me 
 alone till I had introduced you." 
 
 " Are you talking about the girl in white muslin with 
 fern leaves in her hair ? " asked another. 
 
 " Yes ; what do you think of her ? " 
 
 " Devilish taking, I think. I say, can't you introduce 
 me ? They say she has tin." 
 
 " I can't say I think much of her looks," said St. Cloud, 
 acting up to his principle of telling a lie sooner than let 
 his real thoughts be seen. 
 
 " Don't you ? " said the guardsman. " "Well, I like her 
 form better than any thing out tins year. Such a clean 
 stepper ! You should just dance with her." 
 
 And so they went on, criticising Mary and others of 
 their partners, exactly as they would have a stud of rac- 
 ers, till they found themselves sufficiently refreshed to en- 
 counter new labors, and broke up, returning in twos and 
 threes towards the ball-room. 
 
 St. Cloud attached himself to the guardsman, and re- 
 turned to the charge. 
 
 " You seem hit by that girl," he began. " Have you 
 known her long?" 
 
 " About a week I met her once before to-night." 
 
 " Do you know her people ? Who is her father ? " 
 
 " A plain-headed old party you wouldn't think it to 
 look at her but I hear he is very solvent." 
 
 " Any sons ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 249 
 
 " Don't know. I like your talking of my being hit, St. 
 Cloud. There she is ; I shall go and try for another 
 waltz." 
 
 The guardsman was successful, and carried off Mary 
 from her father and mother, who were standing together 
 watching the dancing. St. Cloud, after looking them well 
 over, sought out the hostess, and begged to be introduced 
 to Mr. and Mrs. Porter, gleaning, at the same time, some 
 particulars of who they were. The introduction was af- 
 fected in a minute, the lady of the house being glad to get 
 any one to talk to the Porters, who were almost sti'angers 
 amongst her other guests. She managed, before leaving 
 them, to whisper to Mrs. Porter that he was a young man 
 of excellent connections. 
 
 St. Cloud made the most of his time. He exerted 
 himself to the utmost to please, and, being fluent of 
 speech, and thoroughly satisfied with himself, had no 
 shyness or awkwardness to get over, and jumped at once 
 into the good graces of Mary's parents. When she re- 
 turned after the waltz, she found him, to her no small 
 astonishment, deep in conversation with her mother, who 
 was listening with a pleased expression to his small talk. 
 He pretended not to see her at first, and then begged 
 Mrs. Porter to introduce him formally to her daughter, 
 though he had already had the honor of dancing with 
 her. 
 
 Mary put on her shortest and coldest manner, and 
 thought she had never heard of such impertinence. That 
 he should be there talking so familiarly to her mother 
 after the slip he had made to her was almost too much 
 even for her temper. But she went off for another 
 dance, and again returned and found him still there ; this 
 time entertaining Mr. Porter with political gossip. The 
 unfavorable impression began to wear off, and she soon
 
 250 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 resolved not to make up her mind about him without 
 some further knowledge. 
 
 In due course he asked her to dance again, and they 
 stood up in a quadrille. She stood by him looking 
 straight before her, and perfectly silent, wondering how 
 he would open the conversation. He did not leave her 
 long in suspense. 
 
 " What charming people your father and mother are, 
 Miss Porter ! " he said ; " I am so glad to have been in- 
 troduced to them." 
 
 " Indeed ! You are very kind. "We ought to be flat- 
 tered by your study of us, and I am sure I hope you will 
 find it amusing." 
 
 St. Cloud was a little embarrassed by the rejoinder, 
 and was not sorry at the moment to find himself called 
 upon to perform the second figure. By the time he was 
 at her side again he had recovered himself. 
 
 " You can't understand what a pleasure it is to meet 
 some one with a little freshness " he paused to think 
 how he should end his sentence. 
 
 " Who has not the air of society," she suggested. "Yes, 
 I quite understand." 
 
 " Indeed, you quite mistake me. Surely, you have not 
 taken seriously the nonsense I was talking just now ? " 
 
 " I am a constituent, you know I don't understand 
 how to take the talk of society." 
 
 " Oh, I see, then, that you are angry at my joke, and 
 will not believe that I knew your father perfectly by 
 sight. You really cannot seriously fancy that I was 
 alluding to any one connected with you ; " and then he 
 proceeded to retail the particulars he had picked up from 
 the lady of the house, as if they had been familiar to 
 him for years, and to launch out again into praises of her 
 father and mother. Mary looked straight up in his face,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 251 
 
 and, though he did not meet her eye, his manner was so 
 composed, that she began to doubt her own senses, and 
 then he suddenly changed the subject to Oxford and the 
 Commemoration, and by the end of the set could flatter 
 himself that he had quite dispelled the cloud which had 
 looked so threatening. 
 
 Mary had a great success that evening. She danced 
 every dance, and might have had two or three partners at 
 once, if they would have been of any use to her. When, 
 at last, Mr. Porter insisted that he would keep his horses 
 no longer, St. Cloud and the guardsman accompanied her 
 to the door, and were assiduous in the cloak-room. 
 Young men are pretty much like a drove of sheep ; any 
 one who takes a decided line on certain matters, is sure 
 to lead all the rest. The guardsman left the ball in the 
 firm belief, as he himself expressed it, that Mary " had 
 done his business for life ; " and, being quite above con- 
 cealment, persisted in singing her praises over his cigar 
 at the club, to which many of the dancers adjourned ; and 
 from that night she became the fashion with the set in 
 which St. Cloud lived. The more enterprising of them 
 he amongst the foremost, were soon intimate in Mr. Por- 
 ter's house, and spoke well of his dinners. Mr. Porter 
 changed his hour of riding in the park at their suggestion, 
 and now he and his daughter were always sure of com- 
 panions. Invitations multiplied, for Mary's success was 
 so decided, that she floated her astonished parents into a 
 whirl of balls and breakfasts. Mr. Porter and his wife 
 were flattered themselves, and pleased to see their 
 daughter admired and enjoying herself; and in the next 
 six weeks Mary had the opportunity of getting all the 
 good and the bad which a girl of eighteen can extract 
 from a London season. 
 
 The test was a severe one. Two months of constant
 
 252 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 excitement, of pleasure-seeking pure and simple, will not 
 leave people just as they found them; and Mary's habits, 
 and thoughts, and ways of looking at and judging of 
 people and things, were much changed by the time that 
 the gay world melted away from Mayfair and Belgravia, 
 and it was time for all respectable people to pull down 
 the blinds and shut the shutters of their town houses.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 WHAT CAME OF THE NIGHT-WATCH. 
 
 The last knot of the dancers came out of the club, and 
 were strolling up St. James' Street, and stopping to chaff 
 the itinerant coffee vendor, who was preparing his stand 
 at the corner of Piccadilly for his early customers, just 
 about the time that Tom was beginning to rouse himself 
 under the alder tree, and stretch his stiffened limbs, and 
 sniff the morning air. By the time the guardsman had 
 let himself into his lodgings in Mount Street, our hero 
 had undergone his unlooked-for bath, and was sitting in a 
 state of utter bewilderment as to what was next to be 
 said or done, dripping and disconcerted, opposite to the 
 equally dripping, and, to all appearance, equally discon- 
 certed, poacher. 
 
 At first he did not look higher than his antagonist's 
 boots and gaiters, and spent a few seconds by the way in 
 considering whether the arrangement of nails on the 
 bottom of Harry's boots was better than his own. He 
 settled that it must be better for wading on slippery 
 stones, and that he would adopt it, and then passed on to 
 wonder whether Harry's boots were as full of water as 
 his own, and whether corduroys, wet through, must not 
 be very uncomfortable so early in the morning, and con- 
 gratulated himself on being in flannels. 
 
 And so lie hung back for second after second, playing 
 with any absurd little thought that would come into his 
 head and give him ever so brief a respite from the effort 
 22
 
 254 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 of facing the situation, and hoping that Harry might do 
 or say something to open the ball. This did not happen. 
 He felt that the longer he waited the harder it would be. 
 He must begin himself. So he raised his head gently, 
 and took a sidelong look at Harry's face, to see whether 
 he could not get some hint for starting, from it. But 
 scarcely had he brought his eyes to bear, when they met 
 Harry's, peering dolefully up from under his eyebrows, 
 on which the water was standing unwiped, while a piece 
 of green weed, which he did not seem to have presence 
 of mind enough to remove, trailed over his dripping locks. 
 There was something in the sight which tickled Tom's 
 sense of humor. He had been prepared for sullen black 
 looks and fierce words ; instead of which he was irresist- 
 ibly reminded of schoolboys caught by their master using 
 a crib, or in other like flagrant delict. 
 
 Harry lowered his eyes at once, but lifted them the 
 next moment with a look of surprise, as he heard Tom 
 burst into a hearty fit of laughter. After a short struggle 
 to keep serious, he joined in it himself. 
 
 "By Jove, though, Harry, it's no laughing matter," 
 Tom said at last, getting on to his legs, and giving him- 
 self a shake. 
 
 Harry only replied by looking most doleful again, and 
 picking the weed out of his hair, as he, too, got up. 
 
 " What in the world's to be done ? " 
 
 " I'm sure I don't know, Master Tom." 
 
 " I'm very much surprised to find you at this work, 
 Harry." 
 
 " I'm sure, so be I, to find you, Master Tom." 
 
 Tom was not prepared for this line of rejoinder. It 
 seemed to be made with perfect innocence, and yet it put 
 him in a corner at once. He did not care to inquire into
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 255 
 
 the reason of Harry's surprise, or to what work he 
 alluded ; so he went off on another tack. 
 
 " Let us walk up and down a bit to dry ourselves. 
 Now, Harry, you'll speak to me openly, man to man, as 
 an old friend should wont you ? " 
 
 " Ay, Master Tom, and glad to do it." 
 
 " How long have you taken to poaching ? " 
 
 " Since last Michaelmas, when they turned me out o' 
 our cottage, and tuk away my bit o' land, and did all as 
 they could to break me down." 
 
 " Who do you mean ? " 
 
 " Why, Squire Wurley as was then not this one, but 
 the last and his lawyer, and Farmer Tester." 
 
 " Then it was through spite to them that you took to 
 it?" 
 
 "Nay, 'twarn't altogether spite, tho' I wont say but 
 what I might ha' thought o' bein' upsides wi' them." 
 
 " What was it then besides spite ? " 
 
 " Want o' work. I haven't had no more 'n a matter o' 
 six weeks' reg'lar work ever since last fall." 
 
 " How's that ? Have you tried for it ? " 
 
 " Well, Master Tom, I wont tell a lie about it. I 
 don't see as I wur bound to go round wi' my cap in my 
 hand a beggin' for a day's work to the likes o' them. 
 They knowed well enough as I wur there, ready and 
 willing to work, and they knowed as I wur able to do as 
 good a day's work as e'er a man in the parish ; and ther's 
 been plenty o' work goin', but they thought as I should 
 starve, and have to come and beg for't from one or t'other 
 on 'em. They would ha' liked to ha' seen me clean 
 broke down, that's wut they would, and in the house," 
 and he paused as if his thoughts were getting a little un- 
 manageable.
 
 256 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " But you might have gone to look for work else- 
 where." 
 
 " I can't see as I had any call to leave the place where 
 I wur bred up, Master Tom. That wur just wut they 
 wanted. Why should I let 'em drive m'out ? " 
 
 " "Well, Harry, I'm not going to blame you. I only 
 want to know more about what has been happening to 
 you, that I may be able to advise and help you. Did 
 you ever try for work, or go and tell your story, at the 
 Rectory?" 
 
 " Try for work there ! No, I never went arter work 
 there." 
 
 Tom went on without noticing the change in Harry's 
 tone and manner, 
 
 " Then I think you ought to have gone. I know my 
 cousin, Miss "Winter, is so anxious to help any man out 
 of work, and particularly you ; for " The whole story 
 of Patty flashed into his mind, and made him stop short, 
 and stammer, and look anywhere except at Harry. How 
 he could have forgotten it for a moment in that company 
 was the wonder. All his questioning and patronizing 
 powers went out of him, and he felt that their positions 
 were changed, and that he was the culprit. It was clear 
 that Harry knew nothing yet of his own relations with 
 Patty. Did he even suspect them ? It must all come 
 out now at any rate, for both their sakes, however it 
 might end. So he turned again, and met Harry's eye, 
 which was now cold and keen, and suspicious. 
 
 " You knows all about it, then ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I know that you have been attached to Simon's 
 daughter for a long time, and that he is against it. I 
 wish I could help you with all my heart. In fact, I did 
 feel my way towards speaking to him about it last year,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 257 
 
 when I was in hopes of getting you the gardener's place 
 there. But I could see that I should do no good." 
 
 " I've heard say as you was acquainted with her when 
 she was away ? " 
 
 " Yes, I was, when she was with her aunt in Oxford. 
 What then?" 
 
 " 'Twas there as she larnt her bad ways." 
 
 " Bad ways ! What do you mean ? " 
 
 " I means as she larnt to dress fine, and to gee herself 
 airs to them as she'd known from a child, and as'd ha' 
 gone through fire to please her." 
 
 " I never saw any thing of the kind in her. She was 
 a pleasant, lively girl, and dressed neatly, but never 
 above her station. And I'm sure she has too good a 
 heart to hurt an old friend." 
 
 " Wut made her keep shut up in the house when she 
 cum back ? ah, for weeks and weeks ; and arter that, 
 wut made her so flighty and fickle ? carry in' of herself as 
 proud as a lady, a mincin' and a trapesin' along, wi' all 
 the young farmers a follerin' hex*, like a fine gentleman's 
 miss ? " 
 
 " Come, Harry, I wont listen to that. You don't be- 
 lieve what you're saying, you know her better." 
 
 " You knows her well enough by all seemin'." 
 
 " I know her too well to believe any harm of her." 
 
 " What call have you and the likes o' you wi' her ? 
 'Tis no good comes o' such company keepin'." 
 
 " I tell you again, no harm has come of it to her." 
 
 " Whose hair does she carry about then in that gold 
 thing as she hangs round her neck ? " 
 
 Tom blushed scarlet, and lowered his eyes without an- 
 swering. 
 
 " Dost know ? 'Tis thine, by ." The words came 
 hissing out between his set teeth. Tom put his hands 
 22*
 
 258 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 behind him, expecting to be struck, as he lifted his eyes, 
 and said, 
 
 " Yes, it is mine ; and I tell you again, no harm has 
 come of it." 
 
 " 'Tis a lie. I knowed how 'twas, and 'tis thou hast 
 done it." 
 
 Tom's blood tingled in his veins and wild words 
 rushed to his tongue, as he stood opposite the man 
 who had just given him the lie, and who waited his 
 reply with clenched hands and laboring breast and fierce 
 eye. But the discipline of the last year stood him in 
 good stead. He stood for a moment or two crushing 
 his hands together behind his back, drew a long breath, 
 and answered, 
 
 " Will you believe my oath, then ? I stood by your side 
 at your mother's grave. A man who did that wont lie to 
 you, Harry. I swear to you there's no wrong between 
 me and her. There never was fault on her side. I 
 sought her. She never cared for me ; she doesn't care 
 for me. As for that locket, I forced it on her. I own I 
 have wronged her, and wronged you. I have repented 
 it bitterly. I ask your forgiveness, Harry ; for the sake 
 of old times, for the sake of your mother ! " He spoke 
 from the heart, and saw that his words went home. 
 " Come, Harry," he went on, "you wont turn from an 
 old playfellow, who owns the wrong he has done, and 
 will do all he can to make up for it. You'll shake hands, 
 and say you forgive me." 
 
 Tom paused, and held out his hand. 
 
 The poacher's face worked violently for a moment or 
 two, and he seemed to struggle once or twice to get his 
 hand out in vain. At last he struck it suddenly into 
 Tom's, turning his head away at the same time. " 'Tis
 
 TOM BllOWN AT OXFORD. 259 
 
 what mother would ha' done," he said, " thou cassn't say 
 more. There 'tis then, though I never thought to do't." 
 
 The curious and unexpected explanation brought thus 
 to a happy issue, put Tom into high spirits, and at once 
 roused the castle-building power within him, which was 
 always ready enough to wake up. 
 
 His first care was to persuade Harry that he had bet- 
 ter give up poaching, and in this he had much less diffi- 
 culty than he expected. Harry owned himself sick of 
 the life he was leading already. He admitted that some 
 of the men with whom he had been associating more or 
 less for the last year were the greatest blackguards in 
 the neighborhood. He asked nothing better than to get 
 out of it. But how ? 
 
 This was all Tom wanted. He could see to that ; noth- 
 ing could be easier. 
 
 " I shall go with you back to Englebourn this morning. 
 I'll just leave a note for Wurley to say that I'll be back 
 some time in the day to explain matters to him, and then 
 we will be off at once. We shall be at the Rectory by 
 breakfast-time. Ah, I forgot; well, you can stop at 
 David's while I go and speak to my uncle and to Miss 
 Winter." 
 
 Harry didn't seem to see what would be the good of 
 this ; and David, he said, was not so friendly to him as he 
 had been. 
 
 " Then you must wait at the Red Lion. Don't see the 
 good of it ! Why, of course, the good of it is that you 
 must be set right with the Englebourn people that's the 
 first thing to do. I shall explain how the case stands to 
 my uncle, and I know I can get him to let you have your 
 land again if you stay in the parish, even if he can't give 
 you work himself. But what he must do is, to take you 
 up, to show people that he is your friend, Harry. Well
 
 260 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 then, if you can get good work mind it must be real, 
 good, regular work at Farmer Grove's, or one of the 
 best fanners, stop here by all means, and I will take my- 
 self the first cottage which falls vacant and let you have 
 it, and meantime you must lodge with old David. Oh, 
 I'll go and talk him round, never fear. But if you can't 
 get regular work here, why you go off with flying colors ; 
 no sneaking off under a cloud and leaving no address. 
 You'll go off with me, as my servant, if you like. But 
 just as you please about that. At any rate, you'll go with 
 me, and I'll take care that it shall be known that I con- 
 sider you as an old friend. My father has always got 
 plenty of work and will take you on. And then, Harry, 
 after a bit you may be sure all will go right, and I shall 
 be your best man, and dance at your wedding before a 
 year's out." 
 
 There is something in this kind of thing which is con- 
 tagious and irresistible. Tom thoroughly believed all that 
 he was saying ; and faith, even of such a poor kind as be- 
 lieving in one's own castles, has its reward. Common 
 sense in vain suggested to Harry that all the clouds which 
 had been gathering round him for a year were not likely 
 to melt away in a morning. Prudence suggested that the 
 sooner he got away the better ; which suggestion, indeed, 
 he handed on for what it was worth. But Tom treated 
 prudence with sublime contempt. They would go to- 
 gether, he said, as soon as any one was up at the house, 
 just to let him in to change his things and write a note. 
 Harry needn't fear any unpleasant consequences. Wur- 
 ley wasn't an ill-natured fellow at bottom, and wouldn't 
 mind a few fish. Talking of fish, where was the one he 
 had heard kicking just now as Harry hauled in the line ? 
 They went to the place, and, looking in the long grass, 
 soon found the dead trout, still on the night line, of which
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 261 
 
 the other end remained in the water. Tom seized hold 
 of it, and pulling it carefully in, landed another fine trout, 
 while Harry stood by, looking rather sheepish. Tom in- 
 spected the method of the lines, which was simple but 
 awfully destructive. The line was long enough to reach 
 across the stream. At one end was a heavy stone, at the 
 other a short stake cut sharp, and driven into the bank 
 well under the water. At intervals of four feet along the 
 line short pieces of fine gimp were fastened, ending in 
 hooks baited alternately with lobworms and gudgeon. 
 Tom complimented his companion on the killing nature 
 of his cross-line. 
 
 " Where are your other lines, Harry ? " he asked ; " we 
 may as well go and take them up." 
 
 " A bit higher up stream, Master Tom ; " and so they 
 walked up stream and took up the other lines. 
 
 " They'll have the finest dish of fish they've seen this 
 long time at the house to-day," said Tom, as each line 
 came out with two or three fine thick-shouldered fish on 
 it; "I'll tell you what, Harry, they're deuced well set, 
 these lines of yours, and do you credit. They do ; I'm 
 not complimenting you." 
 
 " I should rather like to be off, Master Tom, if you 
 don't object. The mornin's gettin' on, and the men'll be 
 about. 'T would be unked for I to be caught." 
 
 u Well, Harry, if you're so set on it off with you, 
 but" 
 
 " 'Tis too late now ; here's keper." 
 
 Tom turned sharp round, and, sure enough, there was 
 the keeper coming down the bank towards them, and not 
 a couple of hundred yards off. 
 
 " So it is," said Tom ; " well, only hold your tongue, 
 and do just what I tell you." 
 
 The keeper came up quickly, and touching his hat to
 
 2G2 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Tom, looked inquiringly at him, and then at Harry. Tom 
 nodded to him, as if every thing were just as it should be. 
 He was taking a two-pound fish off the last line ; having 
 finished which feat, he threw it on the ground by the 
 rest. " There, keeper," he said, " there's a fine dish of 
 fish. Now pick 'em up and come along." 
 
 Never was keeper more puzzled. He looked from one 
 to the other, lifting the little short hat from the back of 
 his head, and scratching that somewhat thick skull of his, 
 as his habit was when engaged in what he called think- 
 ing, conscious that somebody ought to be tackled, and that 
 he, the keeper, was being mystified, but quite at sea as to 
 how he was to set himself straight. 
 
 " Wet, bain't 'ee, sir ? " he said at last, nodding at Tom's 
 clothes. 
 
 " Dampish, keeper," answered Tom ; " I may as well 
 go and change, the servants will be up at the house by 
 this time. Pick up the fish and come along. You do up 
 the lines, Harry." 
 
 The keeper and Harry performed their tasks, looking at 
 one another out of the corners of their eyes, like the ter- 
 riers of rival butchers when the carts happen to stop sud- 
 denly in the street close to one another. Tom watched 
 them, mischievously delighted with the fun, and then led 
 the way up to the house. When they came to the stable- 
 yard he turned to Harry, and said, " Stop here ; I sha'n't 
 be ten minutes ; " adding in an undertone, " Hold your 
 tongue now ; " and then vanished through the back-door, 
 and, hurrying up to his room, changed as quickly as he 
 could. 
 
 He was within the ten minutes, but as he descended 
 the back stairs in his dry things, became aware that his 
 stay had been too long. Noise and laughter came up 
 from the stable-yard, and shouts of " Go it keper,"
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 263 
 
 u Keper's down," " No lie bain't," greeted his astonished 
 ears. He sprang down the last steps and rushed into the 
 stable-yard, where he found Harry at his second wrestling 
 match for the day, while two or three stablemen, and a 
 footman, and the gardener, looked on and cheered the 
 combatants with the remarks he had heard on his way 
 down. 
 
 Tom made straight to them, and tapping Harry on the 
 shoulder, said, 
 
 " Now then, come along ; I'm ready." 
 
 Whereupon the keeper and Harry disengaged, and the 
 latter picked up his cap. 
 
 " You bain't goin', sir ? " said the keeper. 
 
 " Yes, keeper." 
 
 " Not along wi' he ? " 
 
 " Yes, keeper." 
 
 " What, bain't I to take un ? " 
 
 " Take him ! No, what for ? " 
 
 " For night poachin', look at all them fish," said the 
 keeper indignantly, pointing to the shining heap. 
 
 " No, no, keeper ; you've nothing to do with it. You 
 may give him the lines though, Harry. I've left a note 
 for your master on my dressing-table," Tom said, turning 
 to the footman, " let him have it at breakfast. I'm re- 
 sponsible for him," nodding at Harry. " I shall be back 
 in a few hours, and now come along." 
 
 And, to the keeper's astonishment, Tom left the stable- 
 yard, accompanied by Harry. 
 
 They were scarcely out of hearing before the stable- 
 yard broke out into uproarious laughter at the keeper's 
 expense, and much rude banter was inflicted on him for 
 letting the poacher go. But the keeper's mind for the 
 moment was full of other things. Disregarding their re-
 
 2G4 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 marks, he went on scratching his head, and burst out at 
 last with, 
 
 " Dang un ; I knows I should ha' drowed un." 
 
 " Drovv your grandmother," politely remarked one of 
 the stablemen, an acquaintance of Harry Winburn, who 
 knew his repute as a wrestler. 
 
 " I should, I tell 'ee," said the keeper, as he stooped to 
 gather up the fish ; " and to think as he should ha' gone 
 off. Master'll be like any wild beast when he hears on't. 
 Ilows'mever, 'tis Mr. Brown's doin's. 'Tis a queer start 
 for a gen'l'man like he to be goin' off wi' a poacher chap, 
 and callin' of un Harry. 'Tis past me altogether. But 
 I s'pose he baint right in's 'ead ; " and, so soliloquizing, 
 he carried off the fish to the kitchen. 
 
 Meantime, on their walk to Englebourn, Harry, in an- 
 swer to Tom's inquiries, explained that in his absence the 
 stableman, his acquaintance, had come up and begun to 
 talk. The keeper had joined in and accused him point- 
 blank of being the man who had thrown him into the 
 furze bush. The story of the keeper's discomfiture on 
 that occasion being well known, a laugh had been raised 
 in which Harry had joined. This brought on a challenge 
 to try a fall then and there, which Harry had accepted, 
 notwithstanding his long morning's work and the ducking 
 he had had. They laughed over the story, though Harry 
 could not help expressing his fears as to how it might all 
 end. They reached Englebourn in time for breakfast. 
 Tom appeared at the Rectory, and soon he and Katie 
 were on their old terms. She was delighted to find that 
 he had had an explanation with Harry Winburn, and 
 that there was some chance of bringing that sturdy of- 
 fender once more back into decent ways ;- more de- 
 lighted perhaps to hear the way in which he spoke of
 
 T03I BROWN AT OXFORD. 2G5 
 
 Patty, to whom after breakfast she paid a visit, and re- 
 turned in due time with the unfortunate locket. 
 
 Tom felt as if another coil of the chain he had tied 
 about himself had fallen off. He went out into the vil- 
 lage, consulted again with Harry, and returned to the 
 Rectory to consider what steps were to be taken to get 
 him work. Katie entered into the matter heartily, 
 though foreseeing the difficulties of the case. At lun- 
 cheon the rector was to be sounded on the subject of the 
 allotments. But in the middle of their plans they were 
 startled by the news that a magistrate's warrant had ar- 
 rived in the village for the arrest of Harry as a night 
 poacher. 
 
 Tom returned to the Grange furious, and before night 
 luul had a worse quarrel with young "Wurley than with 
 his uncle before him. Had duelling been in fashion still 
 in England they would probably have fought in a quiet 
 corner of the park before night. As it was they only 
 said bitter things, and parted, agreeing not to know one 
 another in future. 
 
 Three days afterwards, at petty sessions, where Tom 
 brought upon himself the severe censure of the bench for 
 his conduct on the trial, Harry Winburn was committed 
 to Reading gaol for three months. 
 
 Readers who will take the trouble to remember the 
 picture of our hero's mental growth during the past year, 
 attempted to be given in a late chapter, and the state of 
 restless dissatisfaction into which his experiences and 
 thoughts and readings had thrown him by the time long 
 vacation had come round again, will perhaps be prepared 
 for the catastrophe which ensued on the conviction and 
 sentence of Harry "Winburn at petty sessions. 
 
 Hitherto, notwithstanding the strength of the new and 
 revolutionary forces which were mustering round it, there 
 23
 
 266 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 had always been a citadel holding out in his mind, gar- 
 risoned by all that was best in the Toryism in which ho 
 had been brought up by loyalty, reverence for estab- 
 lished order and established institutions ; by family tra- 
 ditions, and the pride of an inherited good name. But 
 now the walls of that citadel went down with a crash, the 
 garrison being put to the sword, or making a way to hide 
 in out-of-the-way corners, and wait for a reaction. 
 
 It was much easier for a youngster, whose attention 
 was once turned to such subjects as had been occupying 
 Tom, to get hold of wild and violent beliefs and notions 
 in those days than now. The state of Europe generally 
 was far more dead and hopeless. There were no wars, 
 certainly, and no expectations of wars. But there was a 
 dull, beaten-down, pent-up feeling abroad, as if the lid 
 were screwed down on the nations, and the thing which 
 had been, however cruel and heavy and mean, was that 
 which was to remain to the end. England was better off 
 than her neighbors, but yet in bad case. In the south 
 and west particularly, several causes had combined to 
 spread a very bitter feeling abroad amongst the agricul- 
 tural poor. First amongst these stood the new poor law, 
 the provisions of which were rigorously carried out in 
 most districts. The poor had as yet felt the harshness 
 only of the new system. Then the land was in many 
 places in the hands of men on their last legs, the old 
 sporting farmers, who had begun business as young men 
 while the great war was going on, had made money hand 
 over hand for a few years out of the war prices, and had 
 tried to go on living with greyhounds and yeomanry uni- 
 forms horse to ride and weapon to wear through the 
 hard years which had followed. These were bad masters 
 in every way, unthrifty, profligate, needy, and narrow- 
 minded. The younger men who were supplanting them
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 267 
 
 were introducing machinery, threshing-machines, and 
 winnowing-machines, to take the little bread which a poor 
 man was still able to earn out of the mouths of his wife 
 and children so at least the poor thought and muttered 
 to one another ; and the mutterings broke out every now 
 and then in the long nights of the winter months in blaz- 
 ing ricks and broken machines. Game preserving was 
 on the increase. Australia and America had not yet be- 
 come familiar words in every English village, and the 
 labor market was everywhere overstocked ; and last, but 
 not least, the corn laws were still in force, and the bittei 
 and exasperating strife in which they went out was at its 
 height. And while Swing and his myrmidons were 
 abroad in the counties, and could scarcely be kept down 
 by yeomanry and poor law guardians, the great towns 
 were in almost worst case. Here, too, emigration had not 
 yet set in to thin the labor market ; wages were falling, 
 and prices rising ; the corn-law struggle was better un- 
 derstood and far keener than in the country ; and Chart- 
 ism was gaining force every day, and rising into a huge 
 threatening giant, waiting to put forth his strength, and 
 eager for the occasion which seemed at hand. 
 
 You generation of young Englishmen, who were too 
 young then to be troubled with such matters, and have 
 grown into manhood since, you little know may you 
 never know ! what it is to be living the citizens of a 
 divided and distracted nation. For the time that danger 
 is past. In a happy hour, and so far as man can judge, 
 in time, and only just in time, came the repeal of the corn 
 laws, and the great cause of strife, and the sense of injus- 
 tice passed away out of men's minds. The nation was 
 roused by the Irish famine, and the fearful distress in 
 other parts of the country, to begin looking steadily and 
 seriously at some of the sores which were festering in its
 
 268 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 body, and undermining health and life. And so the tide 
 had turned, and England had already passed the critical 
 point, when 1848 came upon Christendom, and the whole 
 of Europe leapt up into a wild blaze of revolution. 
 
 Is any one still inclined to make light of the danger 
 that threatened England in that year, to sneer at the 10th 
 of April, and the monster petition, and the monster meet- 
 ings on Kennington and other commons ? Well, if there 
 be such persons amongst my readers, I can only say that 
 they can have known nothing of what was going on 
 around them and below them, at that time, and I ear- 
 nestly hope that their vision has become clearer since then, 
 and that they are not looking with the same eyes that see 
 nothing, at the signs of to-day. For that there are ques- 
 tions still to be solved by us in England, in this current 
 half-century, quite as likely to tear the nation in pieces 
 as the corn laws, no man with half an eye in his head can 
 doubt. They may seem little clouds like a man's hand 
 on the horizon just now, but they will darken the whole 
 heaven before long unless we can find wisdom enough 
 amongst us to take the little clouds in hand in time, and 
 make them descend in soft rain. 
 
 But such matters need not be spoken of here. All I 
 want to do is to put my young readers in a position to 
 understand how it was that our hero fell away into beliefs 
 and notions, at which Mrs. Grundy and all decent people 
 could only lift up eyes and hands in pious and respectable 
 horror, and became, soon after the incarceration of his 
 friend for night poaching, little better than a physical 
 force Chartist at the age of twenty-one. In which un- 
 happy condition we shall now have to take a look or two 
 at him in future numbers.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HUE AND CRT. 
 
 At the end of a gusty, wild October afternoon a man 
 leading two horses was marching up and down the little 
 plot of short turf at the top of the Hawk's Lynch. Every 
 now and then he would stop on the brow of the hill to 
 look over the village, and seemed to be waiting for some- 
 body from that quarter. After being well blown he 
 would turn to his promenade again, or go in under the 
 clump of firs, through which the rising south-west wind, 
 rushing up from the vale below, was beginning to make a 
 moan; and, hitching the horses to some stump or bush, 
 and patting and coaxing them to induce them, if so might 
 be, to stand quiet for awhile, would try to settle himself 
 to leeward of one of the larger trees. 
 
 But the fates were against all attempts at repose. He 
 had scarcely time to produce a cheroot from his case and 
 light it under many difficulties, when the horses would 
 begin fidgeting, and pulling at their bridles, and shifting 
 round to get their tails to the wind. They clearly did 
 not understand the necessity of the position, and were in- 
 clined to be moving stablewards. So he had to get up 
 again, sling the bridles over his arm, and take to his 
 march up and down the plot of turf; now stopping for a 
 moment or two to try to get his cheroot to burn straight, 
 and pishing and pshawing over its perverseness ; now 
 going again and again to the brow, and looking along the 
 road which led to the village, holding his hat on tight 
 23*
 
 270 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 with one hand for by this time it was blowing half a 
 gale of wind. 
 
 Though it was not yet quite the hour for his setting, 
 the sun had disappeared behind a heavy bank of wicked 
 slate-colored cloud, which looked as though it were rising 
 straight up into the western heavens, while the wind 
 whirled along and twisted into quaint shapes a ragged rift 
 of light vapor, which went hurrying by, almost touching 
 the tops of the moaning firs. Altogether an uncanny 
 evening to be keeping tryst at the top of a wild knoll ; 
 and so thought our friend with the horses, and showed it, 
 too, clearly enough, had any one been there to put a con- 
 struction on his impatient movements. 
 
 There was no one nearer than the village, half a mile 
 and more away ; so, by way of passing the time, we must 
 exercise our privilege of putting into words what he is 
 half thinking, half muttering to himself, 
 
 " A pleasant night I call this, to be out on a wild goose 
 chase. If ever I saw a screaming storm brewing, there 
 it comes. I'll be hanged if I stop up here to be caught 
 in it for all the crack-brained friends I ever had in the 
 world ; and I seem to have a faculty for picking up none 
 but cracked-brained ones. I wonder what the plague can 
 keep him so long: he must have been gone an hour. 
 There steady, steady, old horse. Confound this weed! 
 What rascals tobacconists are! You never can get a 
 cheroot now worth smoking. Every one of them goes 
 spluttering up the side, or charring up the middle, and 
 tasting like tow soaked in saltpetre and tobacco juice. 
 Well, I suppose I shall get the real thing in India. 
 
 " India ! In a month from to-day we shall be off. To 
 hear our senior major talk, one might as well be going to 
 the bottomless pit at once. Well, he'll sell out, that's a 
 comfort. Gives us a step, and gets rid of an old ruffian.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 271 
 
 I don't seem to care much what the place is like if we 
 only get some work ; and there will be some work there 
 before long, by all accounts. No more garrison town life, 
 at any rate. And if I have any luck a man may get a 
 chance there. 
 
 " What the deuce can he be about ? This all comes 
 of sentiment, now. Why couldn't I go quietly off to 
 India without bothering up to Oxford to see him ? Not 
 but what it's a pleasant place enough. I've enjoyed my 
 three days there uncommonly. Food and drink all that 
 can be wished, and plenty of good fellows and good fun. 
 The look of the place, too, makes one feel respectable. 
 But, by George, if their divinity is at all like their 
 politics, they must turn out a queer set of parsons at 
 least, if Brown picked up his precious notions at Oxford, 
 lie always was a headstrong beggar. What was it he 
 was holding forth about last night ? Let's see. ' The 
 sacred right of insurrection.' Yes, that was it, and he 
 talked as if he believed it all too ; and, if there should be 
 a row, which don't seem unlikely, by Jove I think he'd 
 act on it in the sort of temper he's in. How about the 
 sacred right of getting hung or transported ? I shouldn't 
 wonder to hear of that some day. Gad ! suppose he 
 should be in for an instalment of his sacred right to-night. 
 He's capable of it, and of lugging me in with him. What 
 did he say we were come here for ? To get some fellow 
 out of a scrape, he said some sort of poaching radical 
 foster-brother of his, who had been in gaol, and deserved 
 it, too, I'll be bound. And we couldn't go down quietly 
 into the village and put up at the public, where I might 
 have sat in the tap, and not run the chance of having my 
 skin blown over my ears, and my teeth down my throat, 
 on this cursed look-out place, because he's too well known 
 there. What does that mean ? Upon my soul it looks
 
 272 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 bad. They may be lynching a J. P. down there, or 
 making a spread eagle of the parish-constable at this 
 minute, for any thing I know, and as sure as fate if they 
 are I shall get my foot in it. 
 
 "It will read sweetly in the Army News: 'A court- 
 martial was held this day at Chatham, president, Colonel 
 Smith, of Her Majesty's 101st Regiment, to try Henry 
 East, a lieutenant in the same distinguished corps, who 
 has been under arrest since the 10th ult., for aiding and 
 abetting the escape of a convict, and taking part in a riot 
 in the village of Englebourn, in the county of Berks. 
 The defence of the accused was that he had a sentimental 
 friendship for a certain Thomas Brown, an undergraduate 
 of St. Ambrose College, Oxford, etc., etc. ; and the sen- 
 tence of the court ' 
 
 " Hang it ! It's no laughing matter. Many a fellow 
 has been broken for not making half such a fool of him- 
 self as I have done, coming out here on this errand. I'll 
 tell T. B. a bit of my mind as sure as 
 
 " Hullo ! didn't I hear a shout ? Only the wind, I be- 
 lieve. How it does blow ! One of these firs will be 
 down, I expect, just now. The storm will burst in a 
 quarter of an hour. Here goes ! I shall ride down into 
 the village, let what will come of it. Steady now, steady. 
 Stand still, you old fool ; can't you ? 
 
 " There, now I'm all right. Solomon said something 
 about a beggar on horseback. Was it Solomon, though ? 
 Never mind. He couldn't ride. Never had a horse till 
 he was grown up. But he said some uncommon wise 
 things about having nothing to do with such friends as 
 T. B. So, Harry East, if you please, no more tomfoolery 
 after to-day. You've got a whole skin, and a lieutenant's 
 commission to make your way in the world with, and are 
 troubled with no particular crotchets yourself that need
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 273 
 
 ever get you into trouble. So just you keep clear of other 
 people's. And if your friends must be mending the world, 
 and poor man's plastering, and running their heads against 
 stone walls, why, just you let go of their coat tails." 
 
 So muttering and meditating, Harry East paused a mo- 
 ment after mounting, to turn up the collar of the rough 
 shooting coat which he was wearing, and button it up to 
 the chin, before riding down the hill, when, in the hurly- 
 burly of the wind, a shout came spinning past his ears, 
 plain enough this time ; he heard the gate at the end of 
 Englebourn Lane down below him shut with a clang, and 
 saw two men running at full speed towards him, straight 
 up the hill. 
 
 " Oh ! here you are at last," he said, as he watched 
 them. " Well, you don't lose your time now. Somebody 
 must be after them. What's he shouting and waving his 
 hand for? I'm to bring the cavalry supports down the 
 slope, I suppose. Well, here goes : he has brought off his 
 pal the convict, I see 
 
 " ' Says he, you've 'scaped from transportation 
 All upon the briny main, 
 So never give way to no temptation, 
 And don't get drunk nor prig again ! ' 
 
 There goes the gate again. By Jove, what's that ? Dra- 
 goons, as I'm a sinner ! There's going to be the d st 
 
 bear-fight." 
 
 Saying which, Harry East dug his heels into his horse's 
 sides, holding him up sharply with the curb at the same 
 time, and in another moment was at the bottom of the sol- 
 itary mound on which he had been perched for the last 
 hour, and on the brow of the line of hill out of which it 
 rose so abruptly, just at the point for which the two run- 
 ners were making. He had only time to glance at the
 
 274 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 pursuers, and saw that one or two rode straight on the 
 track of the fugitives, while the rest skirted away along a 
 parish road which led up the hill-side by an easier ascent, 
 when Tom and his companion were by his side. Torn 
 seized the bridle of the led horse, and was in the saddle 
 with one spring. 
 
 " Jump up behind," he shouted ; " now then come along." 
 
 "Who are they?" roared East in that wind nothing 
 but a shout could be heard pointing over his shoulder 
 with his thumb as they turned to the heath. 
 
 " Yeomanry 1" 
 
 "After you?" 
 
 Tom nodded, as they broke into a gallop, making 
 straight across the heath towards the Oxford road. They 
 were some quarter of a mile in advance before any of 
 their pursuers showed over the brow of the hill behind 
 them. It was already getting dusk, and the great bank 
 of cloud was by this time all but upon them, making the 
 atmosphere denser and darker every second. Then, first 
 one of the men appeared who had ridden straight up the 
 hill under the Hawk's Lynch, and, pulling up for a mo- 
 ment, caught sight of them and gave chase. Half a min- 
 ute later, and several of those who had kept to the road 
 were also in sight, some distance away on the left, but 
 still near enough to be unpleasant ; and they, too, after a 
 moment's pause, were in full pursuit. At first the fugi- 
 tives held their own, and the distance between them and 
 their pursuers was not lessened, but it was clear that this 
 could not last. Any thing that horseflesh is capable of, 
 a real good Oxford hack, such as they rode, will do ; but 
 to carry two full-grown men at the end of a pretty long 
 day, away from fresh horses and moderate weights, is too 
 much to expect even of Oxford horse-flesh ; and the gal- 
 lant beast which Tom rode was becrinninsr to show signs
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD 275 
 
 of distress when they struck into the road. There was a 
 slight dip in the ground at this place, and a little further 
 on the heath rose suddenly again, and the road ran be- 
 tween high banks for a short distance. 
 
 As they reached this point they disappeared for the 
 moment from the yeomanry, and the force of the wind 
 was broken by the banks, so that they could breath more 
 easily, and hear one another's voices. 
 
 Tom looked anxiously round at the lieutenant, who 
 shrugged his shoulders in answer to the look, as he bent 
 forward to ease his own horse, and said, 
 
 " Can't last another mile." 
 
 " What's to be done ? " 
 
 East again shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing. 
 
 " I know, Master Tom," said Harry Winburn. 
 
 " What ? " 
 
 " Pull up a bit, sir." 
 
 Tom pulled up, and his horse fell into a walk will- 
 ingly enough, while East passed on a few strides ahead. 
 Harry Winburn sprang off. 
 
 " You ride on, now, Master Tom," he said, " I knows 
 the heath well ; you let me bide." 
 
 " No, no, Harry, not I. I wont leave you now ; so let 
 them come, and be hanged." 
 
 East had pulled up, and listened to their talk. 
 
 " Look here, now," he said to Harry ; " put your arm 
 over the hind part of his saddle, and run by the side ; 
 you'll find you can go as fast as the horse. Now, you two 
 push on, and strike across the heath. I'll keep the road, 
 and take off this joker behind, who is the only dangerous 
 customer." 
 
 " That's like you, old boy," said Tom, " then we'll meet 
 at the first public beyond the heath ? " and they passed
 
 276 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ahead in their turn, and turned on to the heath, Harry 
 running by the side, as the lieutenant had advised. 
 
 East looked after them, and then put his horse into a 
 steady trot, muttering, 
 
 " Like me ! yes, devilish like me : I know that well 
 enough. Didn't I always play cat's-paw to his monkey at 
 school ? but that convict don't seem such a bad lot, after 
 all." 
 
 Meantime Tom and Harry struck away over the heath, 
 as the darkness closed in, and the storm drove down. 
 They stumbled on over the charred furze roots, and 
 splashed through the sloppy peat cuttings, casting anxious, 
 hasty looks over their shoulders as they fled, straining 
 every nerve to get on, and longing for night and the 
 storm. 
 
 " Hark, wasn't that a pistol-shot ? " said Tom, as they 
 floundered on. The sound came from the road they had 
 left. 
 
 " Look ! here's some on 'em, then," said Harry ; and 
 Tom was aware of two horsemen coming over the brow 
 of the hill on their left, some three hundred yards to the 
 rear. At the same instant his horse stumbled, and came 
 down on his nose and knees. Tom went off over his 
 shoulder, tumbling against Harry, and sending him head- 
 long to the ground, but keeping hold of the bridle ; they 
 were up again in a moment. 
 
 " Are you hurt ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Come along, then," and Tom was in the saddle again, 
 when the pursuers raised a shout. They had caught sight 
 of them now, and spurred down the slope towards them. 
 Tom was turning his horse's head straight away, but Harry 
 6houted, 
 
 " Keep to the left, Master Tom, to the left, right on."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 277 
 
 It seemed like running into the lion's jaws, but he 
 yielded, and they pushed on down the slope on which 
 they were. Another shout of triumph rose on the howl- 
 ing wind ; Tom's heart sank within him. The enemy was 
 closing on them every moment ; another hundred yards, 
 and they must meet at the bottom of the slope. What 
 could Harry be dreaming of? The thought had scarcely 
 time to cross his brain, when down went the two yeomen, 
 horse and man, floundering in a bog above their horses' 
 girths. At the same moment the storm burst on them, 
 with driving mist and pelting rain. The chase was over. 
 They could not have seen a regiment of men at fifty yards' 
 distance. 
 
 " You let me lead the horse, Master Tom," shouted 
 Harry Winburn ; " I knowed where they was going ; 
 'twill take they the best part o' the night to get out o' that, 
 I knows." 
 
 " All right, let's get back to the road, then, as soon as 
 we can," said Tom, surrendering his horse's head to 
 Harry, and turning up his collar to meet the pitiless 
 deluge which was driving on their flanks. They were 
 drenched to the skin in two minutes ; Tom jumped off, and 
 plodded along on the opposite side of his horse to Harry. 
 They did not speak ; there was very little to be said un- 
 der the circumstances, and a great deal to be thought 
 about. 
 
 Harry Winburn probably knew the heath as well as 
 any man living, but even he had much difficulty in find- 
 ing his way back to the road through that storm. How- 
 ever, after some half-hour spent in beating about, they 
 reached it, and turned their faces northwards towards Ox- 
 ford. By this time night had come on ; but the fury of 
 the storm had passed over them, and the moon began to 
 show every now and then through the driving clouds. At 
 24
 
 278 TOM BKOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 last Tom roused himself out of the brown study in which 
 he had been hitherto plodding along, and turned down his 
 coat collar, and shook himself, and looked up at the sky, 
 and across at his companion, who was still leading the 
 horse along mechanically. It was too dark to see his face, 
 but his walk and general look was listless and dogged ; 
 at last Tom broke silence. 
 
 " You promised not to do any thing, after you came out. 
 without speaking to me." Harry made no reply ; so pres- 
 ently he went on, 
 
 " I didn't think you'd have gone in for such a business 
 as that to-night. I shouldn't have minded so much if it 
 had only been machine-breaking ; but robbing the cellar 
 and staving in ale casks and maiming cattle " 
 
 " I'd no hand in that," interrupted Harry. 
 
 "I'm glad to hear it. You were certainly leaning 
 against the gate when I came up, and taking no part in 
 it ; but you were one of the leaders of the riot." 
 
 " He brought it on hisself," said Harry, doggedly. 
 
 " Tester is a bad man, I know that ; and the people 
 have much to complain of: but nothing can justify what 
 was done to-night." Harry made no answer. 
 
 " You're known, and they'll be after you the first fhing 
 in the morning. I don't know what's to be done." 
 
 " 'Tis very little odds what happens to me." 
 
 " You've no right to say that, Harry. Your frienoV " 
 
 " I hain't got no friends." 
 
 " Well, Harry, I don't think you ought to say that after 
 what has happened to-night. I don't mean to say that my 
 friendship has done you much good yet ; but I've done 
 what I could, and " 
 
 " So you hev', Master Tom, so you hev'." 
 
 " And I'll stick by you through thick and thin, Harry. 
 But you must take heart and stick by yourself, or we
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 279 
 
 shall never pull you through." Harry groaned, and then, 
 turning at once to what was always uppermost in his 
 mind, said, 
 
 " 'Tis no good, now I've been in gaol. Her father wur 
 alius agin me. And now, how be I ever to hold up my 
 head at whoam ? I seen her once arter I came out." 
 
 " "Well, and what happened ? " said Tom, after waiting 
 a moment or two. 
 
 " She just turned red and pale, and was all flustered 
 like, and made as though she'd have held out her hand : 
 and then tuk and hurried off like a frighted hai"e, as 
 though she heerd somebody a comin'. Ah ! 'tis no good ! 
 'tis no good ! " 
 
 " I don't see any thing very hopeless in that," said 
 Tom. 
 
 " I've knowed her since she wur that high," went on 
 Harry, holding out his hand about as high as the bottom 
 of his waistcoat, without noticing the interruption, " when 
 her and I went a-gleanin' together. 'Tis what I've 
 thought on, and lived for, and 'tis four year since she and 
 I broke a sixpence auver't. And at times it sim'd as tho' 
 'twould all cum right, when my poor mother wur livin', 
 tho' her never tuk to it kindly, mother didn't. But 'tis 
 all gone now ! and I be that mad wi' myself, and mam- 
 mered, and down, I be ready to hang myself, Master 
 Tom; and if they just teks and transpworts me " 
 
 " Oh, nonsense, Harry ! You must keep out of that. 
 We shall think of some way to get you out of that before 
 morning. And you must get clear away, and go to work 
 on the railways or somewhere. There's nothing to be 
 down-hearted about so far as Patty is concerned." 
 
 " Ah ! 'tis they as wears it as knows where the shoe 
 pinches. You'd say different if 'twas you, Master Torn." 
 
 " Should I ? " said Tom ; and, after pausing a moment
 
 280 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 or two, he went on. " What I'm going to say is in confi- 
 dence. I've never told it to any man yet, and only one 
 has found it out. Now, Harry, I'm much worse off than 
 you at this minute. Don't I know where the shoe 
 pinches ? Why, I haven't seen I've scarcely heard of 
 of well, of my sweetheart there, you'll understand 
 that for this year and more. I don't know when I may 
 see her again. I don't know that she hasn't clean for- 
 gotten me. I don't know that she ever cared a straw for 
 me. Now, you know quite well that you're better off than 
 that." 
 
 " I bean't so sure o' that, Master Tom. But I be ter- 
 rible vexed to hear about you." 
 
 " Never mind about me. You say you're not sure, 
 Harry. Come, now, you said, not two minutes ago, that 
 you two had broken a sixpence over it. What does that 
 mean, now ? " 
 
 " Ah ! but 'tis four years gone. Her's bin a leadin' o' 
 me up and down, and a dancin' o' me round and round, 
 purty nigh ever since, let alone the time as she wur at 
 Oxford, when " 
 
 " Well, we wont talk of that, Harry. Come, will 
 yesterday do for you ? If you thought she was all right 
 yesterday, would that satisfy you ? " 
 
 " Ees ; and summat to spare." 
 
 " You don't believe it, I see. Well, why do you think 
 I came after you to-night ? How did I know what was 
 going on?" 
 
 " That's just what I've been a axin' o' myself as we 
 cum along." 
 
 " Well, then, I'll tell you. I came because I got a 
 note from her yesterday at Oxford." Tom paused, for he 
 heard a muttered growl from the other side of the horse's 
 head, and could see, even in the fitful moonlight, the
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 281 
 
 angry toss of the head with which his news was received. 
 " I didn't expect this, HaiTy," he went on presently, 
 " after what I told you just now about myself. It Avas a 
 hard matter to tell it at all ; but, after telling you, I didn't 
 think you'd suspect me any more. However, perhaps 
 I've deserved it. So, to go on with what I was saying, 
 two years ago, when I came to my senses about her, and 
 before I cared for any one else, I told her to write if ever 
 I could do her a service. Any thing that a man could do 
 for his sister I was bound to do for her, and I told her so. 
 She never answered till yesterday, when I got this note," 
 and he dived into the inner breast pocket of his shooting- 
 coat. " If it isn't soaked to pulp, it's in my pocket now. 
 Yes, here it is," and he produced a dirty piece of paper, 
 and handed it across to his companion. " When there's 
 light enough to read it, you'll see plain enough what she 
 means, though your name is not mentioned." 
 
 Having finished his statement, Tom retired into him- 
 self, and walked along watching the hurrying clouds. 
 After they had gone some hundred yards, Harry cleared 
 his throat once or twice, and at last brought out, 
 
 " Master Tom." 
 
 " Well." 
 
 " You bean't offended wi' me, sir, I hopes ? " 
 
 " No, why should I be offended ? " 
 
 " 'Cause I knows I be so all-fired jealous, I can't abear 
 to hear o' her talkin', let alone writin' to " 
 
 " Out with it. To me, you were going to say." 
 
 " Nay, 'tis mwore nor that." 
 
 " All right, Harry, if you only lump me with the rest 
 of mankind, I don't care. But you needn't be jealous of 
 me, and you musn't be jealous of me, or I sha'n't be able 
 to help you as I want to do. I'll give you hand and 
 word on it, as man to man, there's no thought in my heart 
 24*
 
 282 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 towards her that you mightn't see this minute. Do you 
 believe me ? " 
 
 " Ees, and you'll forgie " 
 
 " There's nothing to forgive, Harry. But now you'll 
 allow your case isn't such a bad one. She must keep a 
 good look-out after you to know what you were likely to 
 be about to-day. And if she didn't care for you she 
 wouldn't have written to me. That's good sense, I 
 think." 
 
 Harry assented, and then Tom went into a considera- 
 tion of what was to be done, and, as usual, fair castles 
 began to rise in the air. Harry was to start down the 
 line at once, and take work on the railway. In a few 
 weeks he would be captain of a gang, and then what was 
 to hinder his becoming a contractor, and making his for- 
 tune, and buying a farm of his own at Englebourn ? To 
 all which Harry listened with open ears till they got off' 
 the heath, and came upon a small hamlet of some half- 
 dozen cottages scattered along the road. 
 
 " There's a public here, I suppose," said Tom, returning 
 to the damp realities of life. Harry indicated the humble 
 place of entertainment for man and horse. 
 
 " That's all right. I hope we shall find my friend 
 here ; " and they went towards the light which was 
 shining temptingly through the latticed window of the 
 road-side inn.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE LIEUTENANT'S SENTIMENTS AND PROBLEMS. 
 
 " Stop ! It looks so bright that there must be some- 
 thing going on. Surely, they can never have come on 
 here already ? " 
 
 Tom laid his hand on the bridle, and they halted on the 
 road opposite the jiublic-house, which lay a little back, 
 with an open space of ground before it. The sign-post, 
 and a long water-trough for the horses of guests to drink 
 at, were pushed forward to the side of the road to intimate 
 the whereabouts of the house, and the hack which Harry 
 led was already drinking eagerly. 
 
 " Stay here for a minute, and I'll go to the window, 
 and see what's up inside. It's very unlucky, but it will 
 never do for us to go in if there are any people there." 
 
 Tom stole softly up to the window out of which the 
 light came. A little scrap of a curtain was drawn across 
 a portion of it, but he could see easily into the room on 
 either side of the curtain. The first glance comforted 
 him, for he saw at once that there was only one person 
 in the kitchen ; but who and what he might be was a 
 puzzle. The only thing which was clear at a first glance 
 was, that he was making himself at home. 
 
 The room was a moderate-sized kitchen, with a sanded 
 floor, and a large fireplace ; a high wooden screen, with 
 a narrow seat in front of it, ran along the side on which 
 the door from the entrance-passage opened. In the mid-
 
 284 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 die there was a long, rough, walnut table, on which stood 
 a large loaf, some cold bacon and cheese, and a yellow 
 jug ; a few heavy rush-bottomed chairs and a settle com- 
 posed the rest of the furniture. On the walls were a few 
 samplers, a warming pan, and shelves with some common 
 delf plates, and cups and saucers. But though the furni- 
 ture was meagre enough, the kitchen had a look of won- 
 drous comfort for a drenched mortal outside. Tom felt 
 this keenly, and, after a glance round, fixed his attention 
 on the happy occupant, with the view of ascertaining 
 whether he would be a safe person to intrude on under 
 the circumstances. He was seated on a low, three-cor- 
 nered oak seat, with his back to the window, steadying a 
 furze faggot on the fire with the poker. The faggot blazed 
 and crackled, and roared up the chimney, sending out the 
 bright, flickering light which had attracted them, and form- 
 ing a glorious top to the glowing clear fire of wood em- 
 bers beneath, into which was inserted a long, funnel- 
 shaped tin, out of which the figure helped himself to some 
 warm compound, when he had settled the faggot to his 
 satisfaction. He was enveloped as to his shoulders in a 
 heavy, dirty-white coat, with huge cape and high collar, 
 which hid the back of his head, such as was then in use 
 by country carriers ; but the garment was much too short 
 for him, and his bare arms came out a foot beyond the end 
 of the sleeves. The rest of his costume was even more 
 eccentric, being nothing more or less than a coarse flannel 
 petticoat ; and his bare feet rested on a mat in front of 
 the fire. 
 
 Tom felt a sudden doubt as to his sanity, which doubt 
 was apparently shared by the widow woman, who kept the 
 house, and her maid-of-all-work, one or other of whom 
 might be seen constantly keeping an eye on their guest 
 from behind the end of the wooden screen. However, it
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 285 
 
 was no time to be over particular ; they must rest before 
 going further, and, after all, it was only one man. So 
 Tom thought, and was just on the point of calling Harry 
 to come on, when the figure turned round towards the 
 window, and the face of the lieutenant disclosed itself be- 
 tween the highpeaked gills of the carrier's coat. Tom 
 burst into a loud laugh, and called out, 
 
 " It's all right, come along." 
 
 "I'll just look to the bosses, Master Tom." 
 
 "Very well, and then come into the kitchen ;" saying 
 which, he hurried into the house, and after tumbling 
 against the maid-of-all-work in the passage, emerged from 
 behind the screen. 
 
 " Well, here we are at last, old fellow," he said, slap 
 ping East on the shoulder. 
 
 " Oh, it's you, is it ? I thought you were in the lock-up 
 by this time." 
 
 East's costume, as he sat looking up, with a hand on 
 each knee, was even more ridiculous on a close inspection, 
 and Tom roared with laughter again. 
 
 " I don't see the joke," said East, without moving a 
 muscle. 
 
 " You would, though, if you could see yourself. You 
 wonderful old Guy, where did you pick up that toggery ? " 
 
 " The late lamented husband of the Widow Higgs, our 
 landlady, was the owner of the coat. He also bequeathed 
 to her several pairs of breeches, which I have vainly en- 
 deavored to get into. The late lamented Higgs was an 
 abominably small man. He must have been very much 
 her worse half. So, in default of other clothing, the widow 
 has kindly obliged me by the loan of one of her own gar- 
 ments." 
 
 " Where are your own clothes ? " 
 
 " There," said East, pointing to a clothes' horse, which
 
 286 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Tom had not hitherto remarked, which stood well into the 
 chimney corner ; " and they are dry, too," he went on, 
 feeling them ; " at least the flannel shirt and trousers are, 
 so I'll get into them again." 
 
 " I say, ma'am," he called out, addressing the screen, 
 " I'm going to change my things. So you had better not 
 look in just now. In fact, we can call now if we want 
 any thing." 
 
 At this strong hint the Widow Higgs was heard bus- 
 tling away behind the screen, and after her departure 
 East got into some of his own clothes again, offering the 
 cast-off garments of the Higgs family to Tom, who, how- 
 ever declined, contenting himself with taking off his coat 
 and waistcoat, and hanging them up on the horse. He 
 had been blown comparatively dry in the last half-hour of 
 his walk. 
 
 "While East was making his toilet, Tom turned to the 
 table, and made an assault on the bread and bacon, and 
 then poured himself out a glass of beer and began to drink 
 it, but was pulled up half way, and put it down with a face 
 all drawn up into puckers by its sharpness. 
 
 " I thought you wouldn't appreciate the widow's tap," 
 said East, watching him, with a grin. " Regular whistle- 
 belly vengeance, and no mistake ! Here, I don't mind 
 giving you some of my compound, though you don't de- 
 serve it." 
 
 So Tom drew his chair to the fire, and smacked his 
 lips over the long-necked glass, which East handed to him. 
 
 " Ah ! that's not bad tipple after such a ducking as we've 
 had. Dog's nose, isn't it ? " 
 
 East nodded. 
 
 " "Well, old fellow, I will say you're the best hand I 
 know at making the most of your opportunities. I don't
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 287 
 
 know any one else who could have made such a good brew 
 out of that stuff and a drop of gin." 
 
 East was not to be mollified by any such compliment. 
 
 " Have you got any more such jobs as to-day's on hand? 
 I should think they must interfere with reading." 
 
 " No. But I call to-day's a real good job." 
 
 " Do you ? I don't agree. Of course it's a matter of 
 taste. I have the honor of holding her majesty's commis- 
 sion ; so I may be prejudiced perhaps." 
 
 " What difference does it make whose commission you 
 hold? You wouldn't hold any commission, I know, which 
 would bind you to be a tyrant and oppress the weak and 
 the poor." 
 
 " Humbug about your oppressing ! Who's the tyrant, 
 I should like to know, the farmer, or the mob that destroys 
 his property ? I don't call Swing's mob the weak and the 
 poor." 
 
 " That's all very well ; but I should like to know how 
 you'd feel if you had no work and a starving family. You 
 don't know what the people have to suffer. The only 
 wonder is that all the country isn't in a blaze ; and it will 
 be, if things last as they are much longer. It must be a 
 bad time which makes such men as Harry Winburn into 
 rioters." 
 
 " I don't know any thing about Harry Winburn. But 
 I know there's a good deal to be said on the yeomanry 
 side of the question." 
 
 "Well, now, East, just consider this " 
 
 " No, I'm not in the humor for considering. I don't 
 want to argue with you." 
 
 " Yes, that's always the way. You wont hear what a 
 fellow's got to say, and then set him down for a mischiev- 
 ous fool, because he wont give up beliefs founded on the 
 evidence of his own eyes and cars and reason."
 
 288 tom imowN at oxford. 
 
 "I don't quarrel with any of your beliefs. You've got 
 'em I haven't that's just the difference between us. 
 You've got some sort of faith to fall back upon, in equal- 
 ity and brotherhood and a lot of cursed nonsense of that 
 kind. So, I dare say, you could drop down into a navi- 
 gator, or a shoe black, or something in that way to-mor- 
 row, and think it pleasant. You might rather enjoy a 
 trip across the water at the expense of your country, like 
 your friend the convict here." 
 
 " Don't talk such rot, man. In the first place, he isn't 
 a convict you know that, well enough." 
 
 " He is just out of prison, at any rate. However, this 
 sort of thing isn't my line of country at all. So the next 
 time you want to do a bit of gaol-delivery on your own 
 hook, don't ask me to help you." 
 
 " Well, if I had known all that was going to happen, I 
 wouldn't have asked you to come, old fellow. Come, 
 give us another glass of your dog's-nose, and no more of 
 your sermon, which isn't edifying." 
 
 The lieutenant filled the long-necked glass which Tom 
 held out with the creaming mixture, which he was nursing 
 in the funnel-shaped tin. But he was not prepared to 
 waive his right to lecture, and so continued, while Tom 
 sipped his liquor with much relish, and looked comically 
 across at his old schoolfellow. 
 
 " Some fellows have a call to set the world right I 
 haven't. My gracious sovereign pays me seven and six- 
 pence a day ; for which sum I undertake to be shot at on 
 certain occasions and by proper persons, and I hope when 
 the time comes I shall take it as well as another. But 
 that doesn't include turning out to be potted at like a 
 woodcock on your confounded Berkshire wilds by a 
 turnip-headed yeoman. It isn't to be done at the figure." 
 
 " What in the world do you mean ? "
 
 TOM BKOWN AT OXFORD. 289 
 
 " I moan just what I say." 
 
 " That one of those blessed yeomanry has been shoot- 
 ing at you ? " 
 
 " Just so." 
 
 " No, you don't really mean it ? "Wh-e-e-w ! Then 
 that shot we heard was fired at you. 'Pon my honor, 
 I'm very sorry." 
 
 " Much good your sorrow would have done me if your 
 precious countryman had held straight." 
 
 " "Well, what can I say more, East ? If there's any 
 thing I can do to show you that I really am very sorry, 
 and ashamed at having brought you into such a scrape, 
 only tell me what it is." 
 
 " I don't suppose your word would go for much at the 
 Horse Guards, or I'd ask you to give me a character for 
 coolness under fire." 
 
 " Come, I see you're joking now, old fellow. Do tell 
 us how it happened." 
 
 " Well, when you turned off across the common I pulled 
 up for half a minute, and then held on at a steady, slow 
 trot. If I had pushed on ahead, my friends behind would 
 have been just as likely to turn after you as after me. 
 Presently I heard Number One coining tearing along be- 
 hind ; and as soon as he got from between the banks, he 
 saw me, and came straight after me down the road. You 
 were well away to the left, so now I just clapped on a bit, 
 to lead him further away from the right scent, and on he 
 came whooping and hallooing to me to pull up. I didn't 
 see why I hadn't just as good a right to ride along the 
 road at my own pace as he ; so the more he shouted, the 
 more I didn't stop. But the beggar had the legs of me. 
 lie was mounted on something deuced like a thorough- 
 bred, and gained on me hand over hand. At last when 
 I judged he must be about twenty yards behind, I thought 
 25
 
 290 TOM BKOWN AT OXFOKD. 
 
 I might as well have a look at him so I just turned for 
 a moment, and, by Jove, there was my lord, lugging a 
 pistol out of his right holster. He shouted again to me 
 to stop. I turned, ducked my head, and the next mo- 
 ment he pulled trigger and missed me." 
 
 " And what happened then ? " said Tom, drawing a long 
 breath. 
 
 " Why, I flatter myself I showed considerable general- 
 ship. If I had given him time to get at his other pistol, 
 or his toasting-fork, it was all up. I dived into my 
 pocket, where by good luck there was some loose powder, 
 and copper caps, and a snuff-box ; upset the snuff, grabbed 
 a handful of the mixture, and pulled hard at my horse. 
 Next moment he was by my side, lifting his pistol to 
 knock me over. So I gave him the mixture right in his 
 face, and let him go by. Up went both his hands, and 
 away went he and his horse, somewhere over the com- 
 mon out of sight. I just turned round, and walked quietly 
 back. I didn't see the fun of accepting any more attacks 
 in rear. Then up rides Number Two, a broad-faced 
 young farmer on a big gray horse, blowing like a gram- 
 pus. He pulled up short when we met, and stared, and 
 I walked past him. You never saw a fellow look more 
 puzzled, I had regularly stale-mated him. However, he 
 took heart, and shouted, had I met the captain ? I said, 
 a gentleman had ridden by on a bright bay. ' That was 
 he : which way had he gone ? ' So I pointed generally 
 over the common, and Number Two departed ; and then 
 down came the storm, and I turned again and came on 
 here." 
 
 " The captain ! It must have been "Wurley, then, who 
 fired at you." 
 
 " I don't know who it was. I only hope he wont be 
 blinded."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 291 
 
 "It's a strange business altogether," said Tom, looking 
 into the fire, " I scarcely know what to think of it. TVe 
 should never have pulled through but for you, that's cer- 
 tain." 
 
 " I know what to think of it well enough," said East. 
 " But now let's hear what happened to you. They didn't 
 catch you, of course ? " 
 
 " No, but it was touch and go. I thought it was all up 
 at one time, for Harry would turn right across their line. 
 But he knew what he was about ; there was a bog be- 
 tween us, and they came on right into it, and we left 
 them floundering." 
 
 " The convict seems to have his head about him, then. 
 Where is he, by the way ? I'm curious to have a look at 
 him." 
 
 " Looking after the horses. I'll call him in. He 
 ought to have something to drink." 
 
 Tom went to the door, and called Harry, who came 
 out from the rough shed which served as a stable in his 
 shirt, with a whisp of hay in his hand. He had stripped 
 off coat and waistcoat, and braces, and had been warming 
 himself by giving the horses a good dressing. 
 
 " Why, Harry, you haven't had any thing," said Tom ; 
 " come across, and have a glass of something hot." 
 
 Harry followed into the kitchen, and stood by the end 
 of the screen, looking rather uncomfortable, while Tom 
 poured him out a glass of the hot mixture, and the lieu- 
 tenant looked him over with keen eyes. 
 
 " There, take that off. How are the horses ? " 
 
 " Pretty fresh, Master Tom. But they'd be the better 
 of a bran mash or somethin' cumfable. I've spoken to 
 the missus about it, and 'tis ready to put on the fire." 
 
 " That's right, then ; let them have it as quick as you 
 can."
 
 292 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Then I med fetch it and warm it up here, sir ? " said 
 Harry. 
 
 " To be sure ; the sooner the better." 
 
 Harry took off his glass, making a shy sort of duck 
 with his head, accompanied by " Your health, sir," to each 
 of his entertainers, and then disappeared into the back 
 kitchen, returned with the mash, which he put on the fire, 
 and went off to the stable again. 
 
 " What do you think of him ? " said Tom. 
 
 " I like to see a fellow let his braces down when he 
 goes to work," said East. 
 
 " It's not every fellow who would be strapping away at 
 those horses, instead of making himself at home in the 
 back kitchen." 
 
 " No, it isn't," said East. 
 
 " Don't you like his looks now ? " 
 
 " He's not a bad sort, your convict." 
 
 " I say, I wish you wouldn't call him names." 
 
 " Very good ; your unfortunate friend, then. What 
 are you going to do with him ? " 
 
 " That's just what I've been puzzling about all the way 
 here : what do you think ? " and then they drew to the 
 fire again, and began to talk over Harry's prospects. 
 In some ten minutes he returned to the kitchen for the 
 mash, and this time drew a complimentary remark from 
 the lieutenant. 
 
 Harry was passionately fond of animals, and especially 
 of horses, and they found it out quickly enough, as they 
 always do. The two hacks were by this time almost fresh 
 again, with dry coats, and feet well washed and cleansed ; 
 and, while working at them, Harry had been thinking 
 over all he had heard that evening, and found himself 
 getting more hopeful every minute. No one who had 
 seen his face an hour before on the heath would have be-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 293 
 
 lieved it was the same man who was now patting and fon- 
 dling the two hacks as they slowly ate up the mash he 
 had prepared for them. "When they had finished he leant 
 back against the manger, rubbing the ears of Tom's hack 
 
 the one which had carried double so well in their first 
 flight gently with his two hands, while the delighted 
 beast bent down its head, and pressed it against him, and 
 stretched its neck, expressing in all manner of silent ways 
 its equine astonishment and satisfaction. By the light of 
 the single dip Harry's face grew shorter and shorter, unti' 
 the old merry look began to creep back into it. 
 
 As we have already taken the liberty of putting the 
 thoughts of his betters into words, we must now do so for 
 him ; and, if he had expressed his thoughts as he rubbed 
 the hack's ears in the stable, his speech would have been 
 much as follows : 
 
 " How cums it as I be all changed like, as tho' sum un 
 had tuk and rubbed all the down-heartcdness out o' me ? 
 Here I be, two days out o' gaol, wi' nothin' in the 
 world but the things I stands in for in course I med 
 just give up the bits o' things as is left at Daddy Collins' 
 
 and they all draggled wi' the wet and I med be tuk 
 in the mornin' and sent across the water and yet I 
 feels sumhow as peert as a yukkel. So fur as I can see, 
 'tis jest nothin' but talkin' wi' our Master Tom. "What a 
 fine thing 'tis to be schollard, and yet seemin'ly 'tis nothin' 
 but talk arter all's said and done. But 'tis alius the same ; 
 whenever I gets talkin' wi' he, it all cums out as smooth 
 as crame. Fust time as ever I seen him since we wur 
 bwys he talked just as a do now ; and then my poor 
 mother died. Then he cum in arter the tuneral, and 
 talked me up again, till I thought as I wur to hev our 
 cottage and all the land as I could do good by; but our 
 cottage wur tuk away, and my 'lotment besides. Then 
 
 25*
 
 294 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 cum last summer, and 'twur jest the same agen arter his 
 talk, but I got dree months auver that job. And now 
 here I be wi' un agen, a runnin' from the constable, and 
 like to be tuk up and transpworted, and 'tis just the same 
 and I s'pose 'twill be just the same if ever I gets back, 
 and sees un, and talks wi' un, if I be gwine to be hung. 
 'Tis a wunnerful thing to be a schollard, to be able to make 
 things look all straight when they be ever so akkered and 
 unked." 
 
 And then Harry left off rubbing the horse's ears ; and, 
 pulling the damp piece of paper which Tom had given 
 him out of his breeches pocket, proceeded to flatten it out 
 tenderly on the palm of his hand, and read it by the light 
 of the dip, when the landlady came to inform him that the 
 gentlefolk wanted him in the kitchen. So he folded his 
 treasure up again, and went off to the kitchen. He found 
 Tom standing with his back to the fire, while the lieuten- 
 ant was sitting at the table writing on a scrap of paper, 
 which the landlady had produced after much hunting over 
 of drawers. Tom began, with some little hesitation : 
 
 " O Harry, I've been talking your matters over with 
 my friend here, and I've changed my mind. It wont do 
 after all for you to stay about at railway work, or any 
 thing of that sort. You see you wouldn't be safe. They'd 
 be sure to trace you, and you'd get into trouble about this 
 day's work. And then, after all, it's a very poor opening 
 for a young fellow like you. Now, why shouldn't you en- 
 list into Mr. East's regiment ? You'll be in his company, 
 and it's a splendid profession. What do you say now ? " 
 
 East looked up at poor Harry, who was quite taken 
 aback at this change in his prospects, and could only mut- 
 ter he had never turned his mind to " sodgerin." 
 
 "It's just the thing for you," Tom went on. "You 
 can write and keep accounts, and you'll get on famously.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 295 
 
 Ask Mr. East if you wont. And don't you fear about 
 matters at home. You'll see that'll all come right. I'll 
 pledge you my word it will, and I'll take care that you 
 shall hear every thing that goes on there, and depend 
 upon it, it's your best chance. You'll be back at Engle- 
 bourn as a sergeant in no time, and be able to snap your 
 fingers at them all. You'll come with us to Steventon 
 station, and take the night train to London, and then in 
 the morning go to Whitehall, and find Mr. East's ser- 
 geant. He'll give you a note to him, and they'll send 
 you on to Chatham, where the regiment is. You think 
 it's the best thing for him, don't you ? " said Tom, turning 
 to East. 
 
 " Yes ; I think you'll do very well if you only keep 
 steady. Here's a note to the sergeant, and I shall be back 
 at Chatham in a day or two myself." 
 
 Harry took the note mechanically ; he was quite unable 
 yet to make any resistance. 
 
 " And now get something to eat as quick as you can, 
 for we ought to be off. The horses are all right, I sup- 
 pose ? " 
 
 " Yes, Master Tom," said Harry, with an appealing 
 look. 
 
 " Where are your coat and waistcoat, Harry ? " 
 
 " They be in the stable, sir." 
 
 " In the stable ! Why, they're all wet then still ? " 
 
 " Oh, 'tis no odds about that, Master Tom." 
 
 " No odds ! Get them in directly, and put them to dry 
 here." 
 
 So Harry Winburn went off to the stable to fetch his 
 clothes. 
 
 " lie's a fine fellow," said East, getting up and coming 
 to the fire ; " I've taken a fancy to him, but he doesn't 
 fancy enlisting."
 
 296 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Poor fellow ! he has to leave his sweetheart. It's a 
 sad business, hut it's the hest thing for him, and you'll see 
 he'll go." 
 
 Tom was right. Poor Harry came in and dried his 
 clothes, and got his supper, and while he was eating it, 
 and all along the road afterwards, till they reached the 
 station at about eleven o'clock, pleaded in his plain way 
 with Tom against leaving his own country side. And 
 East listened silently, and liked him better and better. 
 
 Tom argued with him gently, and turned the matter 
 round on all sides, putting the most hopeful face upon it ; 
 and, in the end, talked first himself, and then Harry, into 
 the belief that it was the very best thing that could have 
 happened to him, and more likely than any other course 
 of action to bring every thing right between him and all 
 folk at Englebourn. 
 
 So Harry got into the train at Steventon in pretty good 
 heart, with his fare paid, and half a sovereign in his 
 pocket, more and more impressed in his mind with what 
 a wonderful thing it was to be a " schollard." 
 
 The two friends rode back to Oxford at a good pace. 
 They had both of them quite enough to think about, and 
 were not in the humor for talk, had place and time served, 
 so that scarce a word passed between them, till they had 
 left their horses at the livery stables, and were walking 
 through the silent streets a few minutes before midnight. 
 Then East broke silence. 
 
 " I can't make out how you do it. I'd give half a 
 year's pay to get the way of it." 
 
 " The way of what ? What are you talking about ? " 
 
 " Why, your way of shutting your eyes, and going in 
 blind." 
 
 " Well, that's a queer wish for a fighting man," said 
 Tom, laughing. " We always thought a rusher no good
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 297 
 
 at school, and that the thing to learn was to go in with 
 your own eyes open, and shut up other people's." 
 
 " Ah, but we hadn't cut our eyeteeth then. I look at 
 these things from a professional point of view. My busi- 
 ness is to get fellows to shut their eyes tight, and I begin 
 to think, you can't do it as it should be done, without 
 shutting your own first." 
 
 " I don't take." 
 
 " Why, look at the way you talked your convict I 
 beg your pardon your unfortunate friend into enlist- 
 ing to-night. You talked as if you believed every word 
 you were saying to him." 
 
 " So I did." 
 
 " Well, I should like to have you for a recruiting ser- 
 geant, if you could only drop that radical bosh. If I had 
 had to do it, instead of enlisting, he would have gone 
 straight off and hung himself in the stable." 
 
 " I'm glad you didn't try your hand at it, then." 
 
 " Look again at me. Do you think any one but such a 
 
 well, I don't want to say any thing uncivil a head- 
 long dog like you could have got me into such a business 
 as to-day's ? Now I want to be able to get other fellows 
 to make just such fools of themselves as I've made of my- 
 self to-day. How do you do it ? " 
 
 " I don't know, unless it is that I can't help always 
 looking at the best side of things myself, and so " 
 
 " Most things haven't got a best side." 
 
 " Well a better, then." 
 
 " Nor a better." 
 
 " If they haven't got a better, of course, it don't mat- 
 ter." 
 
 " No, I don't believe it does much. Still, I should 
 like to be able to make a fool of myself, too, when I want 
 
 with the view of getting others to do ditto, of course."
 
 298 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I wish I could help you, old fellow ; but I don't see 
 my way to it." 
 
 u I shall talk to our regimental doctor about it, and get 
 put through a course of fool's-diet before we start for In- 
 dia." 
 
 " Flap-doodle, they call it, what fools are fed on. But 
 it's odd that you should have broken out in this place, 
 when all the way home I've been doing nothing but en- 
 vying your special talent." 
 
 "What's that?" 
 
 "Just the opposite one the art of falling on your 
 feet. I should like to exchange with you." 
 
 You'd make a precious bad bargain of it, then." 
 
 "There's twelve striking. I must knock in. Good- 
 night. You'll be round to breakfast at nine ? " 
 
 " All right. I believe in your breakfasts, rather," said 
 East, as they shook hands at the gate of St. Ambrose, into 
 which Tom disappeared, while the lieutenant strolled back 
 to the Mitre.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 TRIED TEAR. 
 
 East returned to his regiment in a few days, and at 
 the end of the month the gallant 101st embarked for 
 India. Tom wrote several letters to the lieutenant, in- 
 closing notes to Harry with gleanings of news from 
 Englebourn, where his escape on the night of the riot 
 had been a nine-days' wonder, and, now that he was 
 fairly " listed " and out of the way, public opinion was 
 beginning to turn in his favor. In due course a letter 
 arrived from the lieutenant, dated Cape Town, giving a 
 prosperous account of the voyage so far. East did not 
 say much about " your convict," as he still insisted on 
 calling Harry ; but the little he did say was very satis- 
 factory, and Tom sent off this part of the letter to Katie, 
 to whom he had confided the whole story, entreating her 
 to make the best use of it in the interests of the young 
 soldier. And, after this out-of-the-way beginning, he 
 settled down into the usual routine of his Oxford life. 
 
 The change in his opinions and objects of interest 
 brought him now into more intimate relations with a set 
 of whom he had as yet seen little. For want of a better 
 name, we may call them "the party of progress." At 
 their parties, instead of practical jokes and boisterous 
 mirth and talk of boats and bats and guns and horses, the 
 highest and deepest questions of morals and politics and 
 metaphysics were discussed, and discussed with a fresh-
 
 300 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ness and enthusiasm which is apt to wear off when doing 
 has to take the place of talking, but has a strange charm 
 of its own while it lasts, and is looked back to with loving 
 regret by those for whom it is no longer a possibility. 
 
 With this set Tom soon fraternized, and drank in many 
 new ideas, and took to himself also many new crotchets 
 besides those with which he was already weighted. Al- 
 most all his new acquaintance were Liberal in politics, 
 but a few only were ready to go all lengths with him. 
 They were all Union men, and Tom, of course, followed 
 the fashion, and soon propounded theories in that institu- 
 tion which gained him the name of Chartist Brown. 
 
 There was a strong mixture of self-conceit in it all. 
 He had a kind of idea that he had discovered something 
 which it was creditable to have discovered, and that it 
 was a very fine thing to have all these feelings for, and 
 sympathies with, the masses, and to believe in democracy 
 and glorious humanity and a good time coming, and I 
 know not what other big matters. And, although it 
 startled and pained him at first to hear himself called 
 ugly names, which he had hated and despised from his 
 youth up, and to know that many of his old acquaintance 
 looked upon him, not simply as a madman, but as a mad- 
 man with snobbish proclivities ; yet, when the first plunge 
 was over, there was a good deal on the other hand which 
 tickled his vanity, and was far from being unpleasant. 
 
 To do him justice, however, the disagreeables were 
 such that, had there not been some genuine belief at the 
 bottom, he would certainly have been headed back very 
 speedily into the fold of political and social orthodoxy. 
 As it was, amidst the cloud of sophisms and platitudes 
 and big one-sided ideas half mastered, which filled his 
 thoughts and overflowed in his talk, there was growing in 
 him and taking firmer hold on him daily a true and broad
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 301 
 
 sympathy for men as men, and especially for poor men as 
 poor men, and a righteous and burning hatred against all 
 laws, customs, or notions, which, according to his light, 
 either were or seemed to be setting aside, or putting any 
 thing else in the place of, or above the man. It was with 
 him the natural outgrowth of the child's and boy's train- 
 ing (though his father would have been much astonished 
 to be told so), and the instincts of those early days were 
 now getting rapidly set into habits and faiths, and becom- 
 ing a part of himself. 
 
 In this stage of his life, as in so many former ones, 
 Tom got great help from his intercourse with Hardy, now 
 the rising tutor of the college. Hardy was travelling 
 much the same road himself as our hero, but was some- 
 what further on, and had come into it from a different 
 country, and through quite other obstacles. Their early 
 lives had heen so different ; and, both by nature and from 
 long and severe self-restraint and discipline, Hardy was 
 much the less impetuous and demonstrative of the two. 
 He did not rush out, therefore (as Tom was too much in- 
 clined to do), the moment he had seized hold of the end 
 of a new idea which he felt to be good for him and what 
 he wanted, and brandish it in the face of all comers, and 
 think himself a traitor to the truth if he wasn't trying to 
 make everybody he met with eat it. Hardy, on the con- 
 trary, would test his new idea, and turn it over, and 
 prove it as far as he could, and try to get hold of the 
 whole of it, and ruthlessly strip off any tinsel or rose-pink 
 sentiment with which it might happen to be connected. 
 
 Often and often did Tom suffer under this severe 
 method, and rebel against it, and accuse his friend, both 
 to his face and in his own secret thoughts, of coldness and 
 want of faith, and all manner of other sins of omission 
 and commission. In the end, however, he generally 
 26
 
 302 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 came round, with more or less of rebellion, according to 
 the severity of the treatment, and acknowledged that, 
 when Hardy brought him down from riding the high 
 horse, it was not without good reason, and that the dust 
 in which he was rolled was always most wholesome 
 dust. 
 
 For instance, there was no phrase more frequently in 
 the mouths of the party of progress than " the good 
 cause." It was a fine, big-sounding phrase, which could 
 be used with great effect in perorations of speeches at the 
 Union, and was sufficiently indefinite to be easily de- 
 fended from ordinary attacks, while it saved him who 
 used it the trouble of ascertaining accurately for himself 
 or settling for his hearers what it really did mean. But, 
 however satisfactory it might be before promiscuous audi- 
 ences, and so long as vehement assertion or declaration 
 was all that was required to uphold it, this same " good 
 cause " was liable to come to much grief when it had to 
 get itself defined. Hardy was particularly given to per- 
 secution on this subject, when he could get Tom, and, 
 perhaps, one or two others, in a quiet room by them- 
 selves. While professing the utmost sympathy for " the 
 good cause," and a hope as strong as theirs that all its 
 enemies might find themselves suspended to lamp-posts as 
 soon as possible, he would pursue it into corners from 
 which escape was most difficult, asking it and its support- 
 ers what it exactly was, and driving them from one cloud- 
 land to another, and from " the good cause " to the 
 " people's cause," " the cause of labor," and other like 
 troublesome definitions, until the great idea seemed to 
 have no shape or existence any longer even in their own 
 brains. 
 
 But Hardy's persecution, provoking as it was for the 
 time, never went to the undermining of any real convic-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 303 
 
 tion in the minds of his juniors, or the shaking of an> 
 thing which did not need shaking, but only helped them 
 to clear their ideas and brains as to what they were talk- 
 ing and thinking about, and gave them glimpses soon 
 clouded over again, but most useful, nevertheless of the 
 truth, that there were a good many knotty questions to be 
 solved before a man could be quite sure that he had found 
 out the way to set the world thoroughly to rights, and 
 heal all the ills that flesh is heir to. 
 
 Hardy treated another of his friend's most favorite no- 
 tions even with less respect than this one of " the good 
 cause." Democracy, that " universal democracy," which 
 their favorite author had recently declared to be " an in- 
 evitable fact of the days in which we live," was, perhaps, 
 on the whole the pet idea of the small section of liberal 
 young Oxford, with whom Tom was now hand and 
 glove. They lost no opportunity of worshipping it, and 
 doing battle for it ; and, indeed, did most of them very 
 truly believe that that state of the world which this uni- 
 versal democracy was to bring about, and which was com- 
 ing no man could say how soon, was to be in fact that age 
 of peace and good-will which men had dreamed of in all 
 times, when the lion should lie down with the kid, and na- 
 tion should not vex nation any more. 
 
 After hearing something to this effect from Tom on 
 several occasions, Hardy cunningly lured him to his 
 rooms on the pretence of talking over the prospects of the 
 boat club, and then, having seated him by the fire, which 
 he himself proceeded to assault gently with the poker, pro- 
 pounded suddenly to him the question, 
 
 " Brown, I should like to know what you mean by ' de- 
 mocracy ' ? " 
 
 Tom at once saw the trap into which he had fallen, and 
 made several efforts to break away, but unsuccessfully ;
 
 304 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 and, being seated to a cup of tea, and allowed to smoke, 
 was then and there grievously oppressed and mangled 
 and sat upon, by his oldest and best friend. He took his 
 ground carefully, and propounded only what he felt sure 
 that Hardy himself would at once accept, what no man 
 of any worth could possibly take exception to. He meant 
 much more, he said, than this, but for the present purpose 
 it would be enough for him to say that, whatever else it 
 might mean, democracy in his mouth always meant that 
 every man should have a share in the government of his 
 country. 
 
 Hardy, seeming to acquiesce, and making a sudden 
 change in the subject of their talk, decoyed his innocent 
 guest away from the thought of democracy for a few min- 
 utes, by holding up to him the flag of hero-worship, in 
 which worship Tom was, of course, a sedulous believer. 
 Then, having involved him in most difficult country, his 
 persecutor opened fire upon him from masked batteries of 
 the most deadly kind, the guns being all from the ar- 
 mory of his own prophets. 
 
 " You long for the rule of the ablest man, everywhere, 
 at all times ? To find your ablest man, and then give 
 him power, and obey him that you hold to be about the 
 highest act of wisdom which a nation can be capable of? " 
 
 " Yes ; and you know you believe that too, Hardy, just 
 as firmly as I do." 
 
 " I hope so. But then, how about our universal de- 
 mocracy, and every man having a share in the govern- 
 ment of his country ? " 
 
 Tom felt that his flank was turned ; in fact, the contrast 
 of his two beliefs had never struck him vividly before, and 
 he was consequently much confused. But Hardy went on 
 tapping a big coal gently with the poker, and gave him 
 time to recover himself and collect his thoughts.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 30b 
 
 " I don't mean, of course, that every man is to have ac 
 actual share in the government," he said, at last. 
 
 " But every man is somehow to have a share ; and, if 
 not an actual one, I can't see what the proposition cornea 
 to." 
 
 "I call it having a share in the government when a man 
 has a share in saying who shall govern him." 
 
 " Well, you'll own that's a very different thing. But, 
 let's see ; will that find our wisest governor for us let- 
 ting all the foolishest men in the nation have a say as to 
 who he is to be ? " 
 
 " Come now, Hardy ; I've heard you say that you are 
 for manhood suffrage." 
 
 " That's another question ; you let in another idea 
 there ; at present we are considering whether the vox 
 populi is the best test for finding your best man. I'm 
 afraid all history is against you." 
 
 " That's a good joke. Now, there I defy you, Hardy." 
 
 " Begin at the beginning, then, and let us see." 
 
 " I suppose you'll say, then, that the Egyptian and 
 Babylonian empires were better than the little Jewish re- 
 public." m 
 
 " Republic ! well, let that pass. But I never heard 
 that the Jews elected Moses, or any of the judges." 
 
 " "Well, never mind the Jews ; they're an exceptional 
 case : you can't argue from them." 
 
 " I don't admit that. I believe just the contrary. But 
 go on." 
 
 ""Well, then, what do j r ou say to the glorious Greek re- 
 publics, with Athens at the head of them ? " 
 
 " I say that no nation ever treated their best men so 
 
 badly. I see I must put on a lecture in Aristophanes for 
 
 your special benefit. Vain, irritable, shallow, suspicious 
 
 old Demus, with his two oboli in his cheek, and doubting 
 
 20*
 
 306 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 only between Cleon and the sausage-seller, which he shall 
 choose for his wisest man not to govern, but to serve 
 his whims and caprices. You must call another witness, 
 I think." 
 
 " But that's a caricature." 
 
 " Take the picture, then, out of Thucydides, Plato, 
 Xenophon, how you will, and where you will you wont 
 mend the matter much. You shouldn't go so fast, Brown; 
 you wont mind my saying so, I know. You don't get 
 clear in your own mind before you pitch into every one 
 who comes across you, and so do your own side (which I 
 admit is often the right one) more harm than good." 
 
 Tom couldn't stand being put down so summarily, and 
 fought over the ground from one country to another, from 
 Rome to the United States, with all the arguments he 
 could master, but with little success. That unfortunate 
 first admission of his, he felt it throughout like a mill- 
 stone round his neck, and could not help admitting to him- 
 self, when he left, that there was a good deal in Hardy's 
 concluding remark, " You'll find it rather a tough busi- 
 ness to get your ' universal democracy,' and ' government 
 Iff the wisest,' to pull together in one coach." 
 
 Notwithstanding all such occasional reverses and cold 
 baths, however, Tom went on strengthening himself in his 
 new opinions, and maintaining them with all the zeal of a 
 convert. The shelves of his bookcase, and the walls of 
 his rooms, soon began to show signs of the change which 
 was taking place in his ways of looking at men and things. 
 Hitherto a framed engraving of George III. had hung 
 over his mantelpiece ; but early in this, his third year, 
 the frame had disappeared for a few days, and when it 
 re-appeared, the solemn face of John Milton looked out 
 from it, while the honest monarch had retired into a port- 
 folio. A fac-siinile of Magna Charta soon displaced a
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 307 
 
 large colored print of " A Day with the Pycheley ; " and 
 soon afterwards the death-warrant of Charles I. with its 
 grim and resolute rows of signatures and seals, appeared 
 on the wall in a place of honor, in the neighborhood of 
 Milton. 
 
 Squire Brown was passing through Oxford, and paid 
 his son a visit soon after this last arrangement had been 
 completed. He dined in hall, at the high table, being 
 still a member of the college, and afterwards came with 
 Hardy to Tom's rooms to have a quiet glass of wine, and 
 spend the evening with his son and a few of his friends, 
 who had been asked to meet "the governor." 
 
 Tom had a struggle with himself whether he should 
 not remove the death-warrant into his bedroom for the 
 evening, and had actually taken it down with this view ; 
 but in the end he could not stomach such a backsliding, 
 and so restored it to its place. " I have never concealed 
 my opinions from my father," he thought, " though I don't 
 think he quite knows what they are. But if he doesn't, he 
 ought, and the sooner the better. I should be a sneak to 
 try to hide them. I know he wont like it, but he is al- 
 ways just and fair, and will make allowances. At any 
 rate, up it goes again." 
 
 And so he rehung the death-warrant, but with the de- 
 vout secret hope that his father might not see it. 
 
 The wine-party went off admirably. The men were 
 nice, gentlemanly, intelligent fellows ; and the squire, who 
 had been carefully planted by Tom with his back to the 
 death-warrant, enjoyed himself very much. At last they 
 all went, except Hardy ; and now the nervous time ap- 
 proached. For a short time longer the three sat at the 
 wine-table, while the squire enlarged upon the great im- 
 provement in young men, and the habits of the university, 
 especially in the matter of drinking. Tom had only
 
 308 TOM BROWN AT OXFOKD. 
 
 opened three bottles of port. In his time the men would 
 have drunk certainly not less than a bottle a man; and 
 other like remarks he made, as he sipped his coffee, and 
 then, pushing back his chair, said, " "Well, Tom, hadn't 
 your servant better clear away ? and then we can draw 
 round the fire, and have a talk." 
 
 " "Wouldn't you like to take a turn while he is clearing ? 
 There's the Martyr's Memorial you haven't seen." 
 
 " No, thank you. I know the place well enough. I 
 don't come to walk about in the dark. "We sha'n't be in 
 jour man's way." 
 
 And so Tom's scout came in to clear away, took out the 
 extra leaves of his table, put on the cloth, and laid tea. 
 During these operations Mr. Brown was standing with his 
 back to the fire, looking about him as he talked: when 
 there was more space to move in, he began to walk up 
 and down, and very soon took to remarking the furniture 
 and arrangements of the room. One after another the 
 pictures came under his notice, most of them escaped 
 without comment, the squire simply pausing a moment, 
 and then taking up his walk again. Magna Charta drew 
 forth his hearty approval. It was a capital notion to hang 
 such things on your walls, instead of bad prints of steeple- 
 chases, or trash of that sort. " Ah, here's something else 
 of the same kind. Why, Tom, what's this?" said the 
 squire, as he paused before the death-warrant. There 
 was a moment or two of dead silence, while the squire's 
 eye ran down the names, from Jo. Bradshaw to Miles 
 Corbet ; and then he turned, and came and sat down op- 
 posite to his son. Tom expected his father to be vexed, 
 but was not the least prepared for the tone of pain and 
 sorrow and anger, in which he first inquired, and then 
 remonstrated. 
 
 For some time past the squire and his son had not felt
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 309 
 
 so comfortable together as of old. Mr. Brown had been 
 annoyed by much that Tom had done in the case of Harry 
 Winburn, though he did not know all. There had sprung 
 up a barrier somehow or other between them, neither of 
 them knew how. They had often felt embarrassed at be- 
 ing left alone together during the last year, and found that 
 there were certain topics which they could not talk upon, 
 which they avoided by mutual consent. Every now and 
 then the constraint and embarrassment fell off for a short 
 time, for at bottom they loved and appreciated one another 
 heartily ; but the divergences in their thoughts and habits 
 had become very serious, and seemed likely to increase 
 rather than not. They felt keenly the chasm between the 
 two generations ; as they looked at one another from the 
 opposite banks, each in his secret heart blamed the other 
 in great measure for that which was the fault of neither. 
 Mixed with the longings which each felt for a better un- 
 derstanding was enough of reserve and indignation to pre- 
 vent them from coming to it. The discovery of their dif- 
 ferences was too recent, and they were too much alike in 
 character and temper for either to make large enough al- 
 lowances for, or to be really tolerant of, the other. 
 
 This was the first occasion on which they had come to 
 outspoken and serious difference, and, though the collision 
 had been exceedingly painful to both, yet, when they 
 parted for the night, it was with a feeling of relief that the 
 ijje had been thoroughly broken. Before his father left 
 the room, Tom had torn the fac-simile of the death-war- 
 rant out of its frame, and put it in the fire, protesting, 
 however, at the same time, that, though " he did this out 
 of deference to his father, and was deeply grieved at hav- 
 ing given him pain, he could not and would not give up 
 his honest convictions, or pretend that they were changed, 
 or even shaken." 
 
 The squire walked back to his hotel deeply moved.
 
 310 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Who can wonder? He was a man full of living and ve- 
 hement convictions. One of his early recollections had 
 been the arrival in England of the news of the beheading 
 of Louis XVI., and the doings of the reign of terror. He 
 had been bred in the times when it was held impossible 
 for a gentleman or a Christian to hold such views as his 
 son had been maintaining, and, like many of the noblest 
 Englishmen of his time, had gone with and accepted the 
 creed of the day. 
 
 Tom remained behind, dejected and melancholy ; now 
 accusing his father of injustice and bigotry, now longing to 
 go after him, and give up every thing. What were all 
 his opinions and convictions compared with his father's 
 confidence and love ? At breakfast the next morning, 
 however, after each of them had had time for thinking 
 over what had passed, they met with a cordiality which 
 was as pleasant to each as it was unlooked for ; and from 
 this visit of his father to him at Oxford Tom dated a new 
 and more satisfactory epoch in their intercourse. 
 
 The fact had begun to dawn on the squire that the 
 world had changed a good deal since his time. He saw 
 that young men were much improved in some ways, and 
 acknowledged the fact heartily ; on the other hand, they 
 had taken up with a lot of new notions which he could 
 not understand, and thought mischievous and bad. Per- 
 haps Tom might get over them as he got to be older and 
 wiser, and in the mean time he must take the evil with tjje 
 good. At any rate, he was too fair a man to try to dra- 
 goon his son out of any thing which he really believed. 
 Tom on his part gratefully accepted the change in his 
 father's manner, and took all means of showing his grat- 
 itude by consulting and talking freely to him on such sub- 
 jects as they could agree upon, which were numerous, 
 keeping in the background the questions which had pro-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 311 
 
 voked painful discussions between them. By degrees these 
 even could be tenderly approached ; and, now, that they 
 were approached in a different spirit, the honest beliefs of 
 the father and son no longer looked so monstrous to one 
 another, the hard and sharp outlines began to wear off, 
 and the views of each of them to be modified. Thus, bit 
 by bit, by a slow but sure process, a better understanding 
 than ever was re-established between them. 
 
 This beginning of a better state of things in his rela- 
 tions with his father consoled Tom for many other matters 
 that seemed to go wrong with him, and was a constant bit 
 of bright sky to turn to when the rest of his horizon looked 
 dark and dreary, as it did often enough. 
 
 For it proved a very trying year to him, this his third 
 and last year at the university ; a year full of large dreams 
 and small performances, of unfulfilled hopes, and struggles 
 to set himself right, ending ever more surely in failure 
 and disappointment. The common pursuits of the place 
 had lost their freshness, and with it much of their charm. 
 He was beginning to feel himself in a cage, and to beat 
 against the bars of it. 
 
 Often, in spite of all his natural hopefulness, his heart 
 seemed to sicken and turn cold, without any apparent 
 reason ; his old pursuits palled on him, and he scarcely 
 cared to turn to new ones. What was it that made life 
 so blank to him at these times ? How was it that he 
 could not keep the spirit within him alive and warm ? 
 
 It was easier to ask such questions than to get an 
 answer. Was it not this place he was living in, and the 
 ways of it ? No, for the place and its ways were the 
 same as ever, and his own way of life in it better than 
 ever before. Was it the want of sight or tidings of Mary ? 
 Sometimes he thought so, and then cast the thought away 
 as treason. His love for her was ever sinking deeper
 
 312 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 into him, and raising and purifying him. Light and 
 strength and life came from that source ; craven weari- 
 ness and coldness of heart, come from whence they might, 
 were not from that quarter. But, precious as his love 
 was to him, and deeply as it affected his whole life, he 
 felt that there must be something beyond it that its full 
 satisfaction would not be enough for him. The bed was 
 too narrow for a man to stretch himself on. What he 
 was in search of must underlie and embrace his human 
 love, and support it. Beyond and above all private and 
 personal desires and hopes and longings he was conscious 
 of a restless craving and feeling about after something 
 which he could not grasp, and yet which was not avoiding 
 him, which seemed to be mysteriously laying hold of him 
 and surrounding him. 
 
 The routine of chapels and lectures and reading for 
 degree, boating, cricketing, Union debating all well 
 enough in their way left this vacuum unfilled. There 
 was a great outer visible world, the problems and puzzles 
 of which were rising before him and haunting him more 
 and more ; and a great inner and invisible world opening 
 round him in awful depth. He seemed to be standing on 
 the brink of each now, shivering and helpless, feeling 
 like an atom, about to be whirled into the great flood and 
 carried he knew not where now, ready to plunge in 
 and take his part, full of hope and belief that he was 
 meant to buffet in the strength of a man with the seen 
 and the unseen, and to be subdued by neither. 
 
 In such a year as this a bit of steady, bright, blue sky 
 was a boon beyond all price, and so he felt it to be. And 
 it was not only with his father that Tom regained lost 
 ground in this year. He was in a state of mind in which 
 he could not bear to neglect or lose any particle of human 
 sympathy, and so he turned to old friendships, and re-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 313 
 
 vived the correspondence with several of his old school- 
 fellows, and particularly with Arthur, to the great delight 
 of the latter, who had mourned bitterly over the few half- 
 yearly lines, all he had got from Tom of late, in answer 
 to his own letters, which had themselves, under the weight 
 of neglect, gradually dwindled down to mere formal mat- 
 ters. A specimen of the later correspondence may fitly 
 close the chapter, 
 
 "St. Ambrose. 
 
 " Dear Geordie, I can hardly pardon you for hav- 
 ing gone to Cambridge, though you have got a Trinity 
 scholarship which I suppose is, on the whole, quite as 
 good a thing as any thing of the sort you could have got 
 up here. I had so looked forward to having you here 
 though, and now I feel that we shall probably scarcely 
 ever meet. You will go your way and I mine ; and one 
 alters so quickly, and gets into such strange new grooves, 
 that, unless one sees a man about once a week at least, 
 you may be just like strangers when you are thrown to- 
 gether again. If you had come up here it would have 
 been all right, and we should have gone on all through 
 life as we were when I left school, and as I know we 
 should be again in no time if you had come here. But 
 now who can tell? 
 
 " What makes me think so much of this is a visit of a 
 few days that East paid me just before his regiment went 
 to India. I feel that if he hadn't done it, and we had not 
 met till he came back, years hence perhaps, we 
 should never have been to one another what we shall be 
 now. The break would have been too great. Now it's 
 all right. You would have so liked to see the old fellow 
 grown into a- man, but not a bit altered just the quiet, 
 old way, pooh poohing you, and pretending to care for 
 27
 
 314 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 nothing, but ready to cut the nose off his face, or go 
 through fire and water for you at a pinch if you'll only 
 let him go his own way about it, and have his grumble, 
 and say that he does it all from the worst possible mo- 
 tives. 
 
 "But we must try not to lose hold of one another, 
 Geordie. It would be a bitter day to me if I thought 
 any thing of the kind could ever happen again. We 
 must write more to one another. I've been awfully lazy, 
 I know, about it for this last year and more ; but then I 
 always thought you would be coming up here, and so that 
 it didn't matter much. But now I will turn over a new 
 leaf, and write to you about ' my secret thoughts, my 
 works, and ways ; ' and you must do it too. If we can 
 only tide over the next year or two we shall get into 
 plain sailing, and I suppose it will all go right then. At 
 least, I can't believe that one is likely to have many such 
 up-and-down years in one's life as the last two. If one is, 
 goodness knows where I shall end. You know the out- 
 line of what has happened to me from my letters, and the 
 talks we have had in my flying visits to the old school ; 
 but you haven't a notion of the troubles of mind I've been 
 in, and the changes I've gone through. I can hardly be- 
 lieve it myself when I look back. However, I'm quite 
 sure I have got on ; that's my great comfort. It is a 
 strange blind sort of world, that's a fact, with lots of blind 
 alleys, down which you go blundering in the fog after 
 some seedy gaslight, which you take for the sun till you 
 run against the wall at the end, and find out that the light 
 is a gaslight, and that there's no thoroughfare. But for 
 all that one does get on. You get to know the sun's light 
 better and better, and to keep out of the blind alleys ; 
 and I am surer and surer every day, that there's always 
 sunlight enough for every honest fellow, though I didn't
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 315 
 
 think so a few months back, and a good uound road 
 under his feet, if he will only step out on it. 
 
 " Talking of blind alleys puts me in mind of your last. 
 Aren't you going down a blind alley, or something worse ? 
 There's no wall to bring you up, that I can see, down the 
 turn you've taken ; and then, what's the practical use of 
 it all ? What good would you do to yourself, or any one 
 else, if you could get to the end of it ? I can't for the 
 life of me fancy, I confess, what you think will come of 
 speculating about necessity and free will. I only know 
 that I can hold out my hand before me, and can move it 
 to the right or left, despite of all powers in heaven or 
 earth. As I sit here writing to you I can let into my 
 heart, and give the reins to, all sorts of devils' passions, 
 or to the spirit of God. Well, that's enough for me. I 
 know it of myself, and I believe you know it of yourself, 
 and everybody knows it of themselves or himself; and 
 why you can't be satisfied with that, passes my compre- 
 hension. As if one hasn't got puzzles enough, and both- 
 ers enough, under one's nose, without going a-field after a 
 lot of metaphysical quibbles. No, I'm wrong, not 
 going a-field, any thing one has to go a-field for is all 
 right. What a fellow meets outside himself he isn't re- 
 sponsible for, and must do the best he can with. But to 
 go ou forever looking inside of one's self, and groping 
 about amongst one's own sensations and ideas and whim- 
 sies of one kind and another, I can't conceive a poorer line 
 of business than that. Don't you get into it now, that's a 
 dear boy. 
 
 " Very likely you'll tell me you can't help it ; that 
 every one has his own difficulties, and must fight them 
 out, and that mine are one sort, and yours another. Well, 
 perhaps you may be right. I hope I'm getting to know 
 that my plummet isn't to measure all the world. But it
 
 316 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 does seem a pity that men shouldn't be thinking about 
 how to cure some of the wrongs which poor dear old 
 England is pretty near dying of, instead of taking the 
 edge off their brains, and spending all their steam in 
 speculating about all kinds of things, which wouldn't 
 make any poor man in the world or rich one either, 
 for that matter a bit better off, if they were all found 
 out, and settled to-morrow. But here I am at the end of 
 my paper. Don't be angry at my jobation ; but write me 
 a long answer of your own free will, and believe me ever 
 affectionately yours, T. B."
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 AFTERNOON VISITORS. 
 
 Miss Mart Porter was sitting alone in the front 
 drawing-room of her father's house, in Belgravia, on the 
 afternoon of a summer's day in this same year. Two 
 years and more have passed over her head since we first 
 met her, and she may be a thought more sedate and bet- 
 ter dressed, but there is no other change to he noticed in 
 her. The room was for the most part much like other 
 rooms in that quarter of the world. There were few lux- 
 uries in the way of furniture which fallen man can desire 
 which were not to be found there ; but, over and above 
 this, there was an elegance in the arrangement of all the 
 knick-knacks and ornaments, and an appropriateness and 
 good taste in the placing of every piece of furniture and 
 vase of flowers, which showed that a higher order of mind 
 than the upholsterer's or housemaid's was constantly over- 
 looking and working there. Every thing seemed to be in 
 its exact place, in the best place which could have been 
 thought of for it, and to be the best thing which could 
 have been thought of for the place ; and yet this perfec- 
 tion did not strike you particularly at first, or surprise 
 you in any way, but sank into you gradually, so that, 
 until you forced yourself to consider the matter, you 
 could not in the least say why the room had such a very 
 pleasant effect on you. 
 
 The young lady to whom this charm was chiefly owing 
 was sitting by a buhl work-table, on which lay her em- 
 27*
 
 t 
 
 318 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 broidery and a book. She was reading a letter, which 
 seemed deeply to interest her ; for she did not hear the 
 voice of the butler, who had just opened the door and dis- 
 turbed her solitude, until he had repeated for the second 
 time, "Mr. Smith." Then Mary jumped up, and, hastily 
 folding her letter, put it into her pocket. She was rather 
 provoked at having allowed herself to be caught there 
 alone by afternoon visitors, and with the servants for hav- 
 ing let any one in ; nevertheless, she welcomed Mr. 
 Smith with a cordiality of manner which perhaps ratber 
 more than represented her real feelings, and, with a " let 
 mamma know," to the butler, set to work to entertain her 
 visitor. She would have had no difficulty in doing this 
 under ordinary circumstances, as all that Mr. Smith 
 wanted was a good hstener. He was a somewhat heavy 
 and garrulous old gentleman, with many imaginary, and 
 a few real, troubles, the constant contemplation of which 
 served to occupy the whole of his own time, and as much 
 of his friends' as he could get them to give him. But 
 scarcely had he settled himself comfortably in an easy- 
 chair opposite to his victim, when the butler entered 
 again, and announced " Mr. St. Cloud." 
 
 Mary was now no longer at her ease. Her manner of 
 receiving her new visitor was constrained ; and yet it was 
 clear that he was on easy terms in the house. She asked 
 the butler where his mistress was, and heard with vexa- 
 tion that she had gone out, but was expected home almost 
 immediately. Charging him to let her mother know the 
 moment she returned, Mary turned to her unwelcome 
 task, and sat herself down again with such resignation as 
 she was capable of at the moment. The conduct of her 
 visitors was by no means calculated to restore her com- 
 posure, or make her comfortable between them. She 
 was sure that they knew one another ; but neither of them
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 319 
 
 would speak to the other. There the two sat on, each 
 resolutely bent on tiring the other out; the elder crooning 
 on to her in an undertone, and ignoring the younger, who 
 in his turn put on an air of serene unconsciousness of the 
 presence of his senior, and gazed about the room, and 
 watched Mary, making occasional remarks to her as if no 
 one else were present. On and on they sat, her only 
 comfort being the hope that neither of them would have 
 the conscience to stay on after the departure of the other. 
 
 Between them Mary was driven to her wits' end, and 
 looked for her mother or for some new visitor to come to 
 her help, as Wellington looked for the Prussians on the 
 afternoon of June 18th. At last youth and insolence pre- 
 vailed, and Mr. Smith rose to go. Mary got up too, and 
 after his departure remained standing, in hopes that her 
 other visitor would take the hint and follow the good ex- 
 ample. But St. Cloud had not the least intention of 
 moving. 
 
 " Really, your good-nature is quite astonishing, Miss 
 Porter," he said, leaning forwards with his elbows on his 
 knees, and following the pattern of one of the flowers on 
 the carpet with his cane, which gave him the opportunity 
 of showing his delicately gloved hand to advantage. 
 
 " Indeed, why do you think so ? " she asked ; taking up 
 her embroidery, and pretending to begin working. 
 
 " Have I not got good reason, after sitting this half- 
 hour and seeing you enduring old Smith the greatest 
 bore in London? I don't believe there are three houses 
 where the servants dare let him in. It would be as much 
 as their places were worth. No porter could hope for a 
 character who let him in twice in the season." 
 
 ' Poor Mr. Smith," said Mary, smiling. " But you 
 know we have no porter, and," she suddenly checked her-
 
 S20 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 self, and added, gravely, " he is an old friend, and papa 
 and mamma like him." 
 
 " But the wearisomeness of his grievances ! those three 
 sons in the Plungers, and their eternal scrapes ! How 
 you could manage to keep a civil face ! It was a master- 
 piece of polite patience." 
 
 " Indeed, I am very sorry for his troubles. I wonder 
 where mamma can be ? We are going to drive. Shall 
 you be in the Park ? I think it must be time for me to 
 dress." 
 
 " I hope not. It is so seldom that I see you, except in 
 crowded rooms. Can you wonder that I should value 
 such a chance as this ? " 
 
 " Were you at the new opera last night ? " asked Mary, 
 carefully avoiding his eye, and sticking to her work, but 
 scarcely able to conceal her nervousness and discomfort. 
 
 " Yes, I was there ; but " 
 
 " Oh, do tell me about it, then ; I hear it was a great 
 success." 
 
 " Another time. We can talk of the opera anywhere. 
 Let me speak now of something else. You must have 
 seen, Miss Porter " 
 
 " How can you think I will talk of any thing till you 
 have told me about the opera ? " interrupted Mary, 
 rapidly and nervously. "Was Grisi very fine? The 
 chief part was composed for her, was it not ? and dear 
 old Lablache " 
 
 " I will tell you all about it presently if you will let me, 
 in five minutes' time I only ask for five minutes " 
 
 "Five minutes! Oh, no, not five seconds. I must 
 hear about the new opera before I will listen to a word 
 of any thing else." 
 
 " Indeed, Miss Porter, you must pardon me for diso-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 321 
 
 beying. But I may not have such a chance as this again 
 for months." 
 
 With which prelude he drew his chair towards he?s, 
 and Mary was just trying to make up her mind to jump 
 up and run right out of the room, when the door opened, 
 and the butler walked in with a card on a waiter. Mary 
 bad never felt so relieved in her life, and could bave 
 hugged tbe solemn old domestic when he said, presenting 
 the card to her, 
 
 " Tbe gentleman asked if Mrs. or you were in, Miss, 
 and told me to bring it up, and find whether you would 
 see him on business. A clergyman, I think, Miss. He's 
 waiting in the hall." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I know. Of course. Yes, say I will see him 
 directly. I mean, ask him to come up now." 
 
 " Sball I show him into tbe library, Miss ? " 
 
 " No, no ; in here ; do you understand ? " 
 
 " Yes, Miss," replied the butler, with a deprecatory 
 look at St. Cloud, as much as to say, " You see I can't 
 help it," in answer to his impatient telegraphic signals. 
 St. Cloud had been very liberal to the Porters' servants. 
 
 Mary's confidence had all come back. Relief was at 
 band. She could trust herself to hold St. Cloud at bay 
 now, as it could not be for more than a few minutes. When 
 she turned to him the nervousness had quite gone out of 
 her manner, and she spoke in her old tone again, as she 
 laid her embroidery aside. 
 
 " How lucky that you should be here. Look ; I think 
 you must be acquainted," she said, holding out the card 
 which the butler had given her to St. Cloud. 
 
 He took it mechanically, and looked at it, and then 
 crushed it in his hand, and was going to speak. She pre- 
 vented him. 
 
 " I was right, I'm sure. You do know him ? "
 
 322 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I didn't see the name," he said, almost fiercely. 
 
 " The name on the card which I gave you just now ? * 
 Mr. Grey. He is curate in one of the poor Westminster 
 districts. You must remember him, for he was of your 
 college. He was at Oxford with you. I made his ac- 
 quaintance at the Commemoration. He will be so glad to 
 meet an old friend." 
 
 St. Cloud was too much provoked to answer ; and the 
 next moment the door opened, and the butler announced 
 Mr. Grey. 
 
 Grey came into the room timidly, carrying his head a 
 little down as usual, and glancing uncomfortably about in 
 the manner which used to make Drysdale say that he al- 
 ways looked as though he had just been robbing a hen- 
 roost. Mary went forward to meet him, holding out her 
 hand cordially. 
 
 " I am so glad to see you," she said. " How kind of 
 you to call when you are so busy ! Mamma will be here 
 directly. I think you must remember Mr. St. Cloud, Mr. 
 Grey?" 
 
 St. Cloud's patience was now quite gone. He drew 
 himself up, making the slightest possible inclination tow- 
 ards Grey, and then, without taking any further notice of 
 him, turned to Mary, with a look which he meant to be 
 full of pitying admiration for her, and contempt of her 
 visitor ; but, as she would not look at him, it was thrown 
 away. So he made his bow and stalked out of the room, 
 angrily debating with himself, as he went down the stairs, 
 whether she could have understood him. He was so fully 
 convinced of the sacrifice which a man in his position was 
 making in paying serious attentions to a girl with little 
 fortune and no connection, that he soon consoled himself 
 in the belief that her embarrassment only arose from shy- 
 ness, and that the moment he could explain himself she
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 323 
 
 would be his obedient and grateful servant. Meantime, 
 Mary sat down opposite to the curate, and listened to him 
 as he unfolded his errand awkwardly enough. An execu- 
 tion was threatened in the house of a poor struggling 
 widow, whom Mrs. Porter had employed to do needle- 
 work occasionally, and who was behind with her rent 
 through sickness. He was afraid that her things would 
 be taken and sold in the morning, unless she should bor- 
 row two sovereigns. He had so many claims on him that 
 he could not lend her the money himself, and so had come 
 out to see what he could do amongst those who knew her. 
 
 By the time Grey had arrived at the end of his story, 
 Mary had made up her mind not without a little strug- 
 gle to sacrifice the greater part of what was left of her 
 quarter's allowance. After all, it would only be wearing 
 cleaned gloves instead of new ones, and giving up her new 
 riding-hat till next quarter. So she jumped up, and said 
 gayly, " Is that all, Mr. Grey ? I have the money, and I 
 will lend it her with pleasure. I will fetch it directly." 
 She tripped off to her room, and soon came back with the 
 money ; and just then the butler came in with tea, and 
 Mary asked Mr. Grey to take some. He looked tired, 
 she said, and if he would wait a little time, he would see 
 her mother, who would be sure to do something more for 
 the poor woman. 
 
 Grey had got up to leave, and was standing, hat in 
 hand, ready to go. He was in the habit of reckoning with 
 himself strictly for every minute of his day, and was never 
 quite satisfied with himself unless he was doing the most 
 disagreeable thing which circumstances for the time being 
 allowed him to do. But greater and stronger men than 
 Grey, from Adam downwards, have yielded to the temp- 
 tation before which he now succumbed. He looked out 
 of the corners of his eyes ; and there was something so
 
 ?24 TOM BROWN AT OXFOKD. 
 
 fresh and bright in the picture of the dainty little tea-ser- 
 vice and the young lady behind it, the tea which she was 
 beginning to pour out smelt so refreshing, and her hand 
 stnd figure looked so pretty in the operation, that, with a 
 sigh to departing resolution, he gave in, put his hat on the 
 floor, and sat down opposite to the tempter. 
 
 Grey took a cup of tea, and then another. He thought 
 he had never tasted any thing so good. The delicious 
 rich cream, and the tempting plate of bread and butter, 
 were too much for him. He fairly gave way, and re- 
 signed himself to physical enjoyment, and sipped his tea, 
 and looked over his cup at Mary, sitting there bright and 
 kind, and ready to go on pouring out for him to any ex- 
 tent. It seemed to him as if an atmosphere of light and 
 joy surrounded her, within the circle of which he was sit- 
 ting and absorbing. Tea was the only stimulant that Grey 
 ever took, and he had more need of it than usual, for he 
 had given away the chop, which was his ordinary dinner, 
 to a starving woman. He was faint with fasting and the 
 bad air of the hovels in which he had been spending his 
 morning. The elegance of the room, the smell of the 
 flowers, the charm of companionship with a young woman 
 of his own rank, and the contrast of the whole to his com- 
 mon way of life, carried him away, and hopes and thoughts 
 began to creep into his head to which he had long been a 
 stranger. Mary did her very best to make his visit pleas- 
 ant to him. She had a great respect for the self-denying 
 life which she knew he was leading ; and the nervousness 
 and shyness of his manners were of a kind, which, instead 
 of infecting her, gave her confidence, and made her feel 
 quite at her ease with him. She was so grateful to him 
 for having delivered her out of her recent embarrassment, 
 that she was more than usually kind in her manner. 
 
 She saw how he was enjoying himself, and thought
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 325 
 
 what good it must do him to forget his usual occupations 
 for a short time. So she talked positive gossip to him, 
 asked his opinion on riding-habits, and very soon was tell- 
 ing him the plot of a new novel which she had just been 
 reading, with an animation and playfulness which would 
 have warmed the heart of an anchorite. For a short 
 quarter of an hour Grey resigned himself; but at the end 
 of that time he became suddenly and painfully conscious 
 of what he was doing, and stopped himself short in the 
 middle of an altogether worldly compliment, which he de- 
 tected himself in the act of paying to his too fascinating 
 young hostess. He felt that retreat was his only chance, 
 and so grasped his hat again, and rose with a deep sigh, 
 and a sudden change of manner which alarmed Mary. 
 
 " My dear Mr. Grey," she said, anxiously, " I hope you 
 are not ill ? " 
 
 "No, not the least, thank you. But but in short, 
 I must go to my work. I ought to apologize, indeed, for 
 having stayed so long." 
 
 " Oh, you have not been here more than twenty min- 
 utes. Pray stay, and see mamma ; she must be in di- 
 rectly." 
 
 " Thank you ; you are very kind. I should like it very 
 much, but indeed, I cannot." 
 
 Mary felt that it would be no kindness to press it fur- 
 ther, and so rose herself, and held out her hand. Grey 
 took it, and it is not quite certain to this day whether he 
 did not press it in that farewell shake more than was ab- 
 solutely necessary. If he did, we may be quite sure that he 
 administered exemplary punishment to himself afterwards 
 for so doing. He would gladly have left now, but his 
 over-sensitive conscience forbade it. He had forgotten 
 his office, he thought, hitherto, but there was time yet not 
 28
 
 326 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 to be altogether false to it. So he looked grave and shy 
 again, and said, 
 
 " You will not be offended with me, Miss Porter, if I 
 speak to you as a clergyman ? " 
 
 Mary was a little disconcerted, but answered almost 
 immediately, 
 
 " Oh, no. Pray say any thing which you think you 
 ought to say." 
 
 " I am afraid there must be a great temptation in liv- 
 ing always in beautiful rooms like this, with no one but 
 prosperous people. Do you not think so ?" 
 
 " But one cannot help it. Surely, Mr. Grey, you do 
 not think it can be wrong? " 
 
 " No, not wrong. But it must be very trying. It 
 must be very necessary to do something to lessen the 
 temptation of such a life." 
 
 " I do not understand you. What could one do ? " 
 
 " Might you not take up some work which would not 
 be pleasant, such as visiting the poor ? " 
 
 " I should be very glad ; but we do not know any 
 poor people in London." 
 
 " There are very miserable districts near here." 
 
 " Yes, and papa and mamma are very kind, I know, in 
 helping whenever they can hear of a proper case. But 
 it is so different from the country. There it is so easy 
 and pleasant to go into the cottages where every one 
 knows you, and most of the people work for papa, and 
 one is sure of being welcomed, and that nobody will be 
 rude. But here I should be afraid. It would seem so 
 impertinent to go to people's houses of whom one knows 
 nothing. I should never know what to say." 
 
 " It is not easy or pleasant duty which is the best for 
 us. Great cities could never be evangelized, Miss Por- 
 ter, if all ladies thought as you do."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 827 
 
 " I think, Mr. Grey," said Mary, rather nettled, " that 
 every one has not the gift of lecturing the poor, and set- 
 ting them right ; and, if they have not, they had better 
 not try to do it. And as for. all the rest, there is plenty 
 of the same kind of work to be done, I believe, amongst 
 the people of one's own class." 
 
 "You are joking, Miss Porter." 
 
 " No, I am not joking at all. I believe that rich peo- 
 ple are quite as unhappy as poor. Their troubles are 
 not the same, of course, and are generally of their own 
 making. But troubles of the mind are worse, surely, 
 than troubles of the body ? " 
 
 " Certainly ; and it is the highest work of the ministry 
 to deal with spiritual trials. But, you will pardon me for 
 saying that I cannot think this is the proper work for 
 for " 
 
 " For me, you would say. We must be speaking of 
 quite different things, I am sure. I only mean that I can 
 listen to the troubles and grievances of any one who likes 
 to talk of them to me, and try to comfort them a little, 
 and to make things look brighter, and to keep cheerful. 
 It is not easy always even to do this." 
 
 " It is not, indeed. But would it not be easier if you 
 could do as I suggest ? Going out of one's own class, and 
 trying to care for and to help the poor, braces the mind 
 more than any thing else." 
 
 " You ought to know my Cousin Katie," said Mary, 
 glad to make a diversion ; " that is just what she would 
 say. Indeed, I think you must have seen her at Oxford ; 
 did you not ? " 
 
 " I believe I had the honor of meeting her at the rooms 
 of a friend. I think he said she was also a cousin of his." 
 
 " Mr. Brown, you mean ? Yes ; did you know him ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes. You will think it strange, as we are so
 
 328 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 very unlike ; but I knew him better than I knew almost 
 any one." 
 
 " Poor Katie is very anxious about him. I hcpe you 
 thought well of him. You do not think he is likely to go 
 very wrong ? " 
 
 " No, indeed. I could wish he were sounder on 
 Church questions, but that may come. Do you know 
 that he is in London ? " 
 
 " I had heard so." 
 
 " He has been several times to my schools. He used 
 to help me at Oxford, and has a capital way with the 
 boys." 
 
 At this moment the clock on the mantelpiece struck a 
 quarter. The sound touched some chord in Grey which 
 made him grasp his hat again, and prepare for another 
 attempt to get away. 
 
 " I hope you will pardon " He pulled himself up 
 short, in the fear lest he were going again to be false (as 
 he deemed it) to his calling, and stood the picture of ner- 
 vous discomfort. 
 
 Mary came to his relief. " I am sorry you must go, 
 Mr. Grey," she said ; " I should so like to have talked to 
 you more about Oxford. You will call again soon, I 
 hope ? " 
 
 At which last speech Grey, casting an imploring glance 
 at her, muttered something which she could not catch, 
 and fled from the room. 
 
 Mary stood looking dreamily out of the window for a 
 few minutes, till the entrance of her mother roused her, 
 and she turned to pour out a cup of tea for her. 
 
 " It is cold, mamma dear ; do let me make some 
 fresh." 
 
 " No, thank you, dear ; this will do very well," said 
 Mrs. Porter ; and she took off her bonnet and sipped the
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 329 
 
 cold tea. Mary watched her silently for a minute, and 
 then, taking the letter she had been reading, out of her 
 pocket, said, 
 
 " I have a letter from Katie, mamma." 
 
 Mrs. Porter took the letter and read it ; and, as Mary 
 still watched, she saw a puzzled look coming over her 
 mother's face. Mrs. Porter finished the letter, and then 
 looked stealthily at Mary, who on her side was now 
 busily engaged in putting up the tea-things. 
 
 " It is very embarrassing," said Mrs. Porter. 
 
 " What, mamma ? " 
 
 " Oh, of course, my dear, I mean of Katie's telling us 
 of her cousin's being in London, and sending us his ad- 
 dress " and then she paused. 
 
 " Why, mamma ? " 
 
 " Your papa will have to make up his mind whether he 
 will ask him to the house. Katie would surely never 
 have told him that she has written." 
 
 " Mr. and Mrs. Brown were so very kind. It would 
 seem so strange, so ungrateful, not even to ask him." 
 
 " I am afraid he is not the sort of young man in 
 short, I must speak to your papa." 
 
 Mrs. Porter looked hard at her daughter, who was still 
 busied with the tea-things. She had risen, bonnet in 
 hand, to leave the room ; but now changed her mind, 
 and, crossing to her daughter, put her arm round her 
 neck. Mary looked up steadily into her eyes, then 
 blushed slightly, and said, quietly, 
 
 " No, mamma ; indeed it is not as you think." 
 
 Her mother stooped and kissed her, and left the room, 
 telling her to get dressed, as the carriage would be round 
 in a few minutes. 
 
 Her trials for the day were not over. She could see 
 by their manner at dinner that her father and mother had 
 28*
 
 330 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 been talking about ber. Her father took her to a ball in 
 the evening, where they met St. Cloud, who fastened him- 
 self to them. She was dancing a quadrille, and her father 
 stood near her, talking confidentially to St. Cloud. In the 
 intervals of the dance scraps of their conversation reached 
 her. 
 
 " You knew him, then, at Oxford ? " 
 
 " Yes, very slightly." 
 
 " I should like to ask you now, as a friend " Here 
 Mary's partner reminded her that she ought to be danc- 
 ing. When she had returned to her place again she 
 heard 
 
 " You think, then, that it was a bad business ? " 
 
 " It was notorious in the college. We never had any 
 doubt on the subject." 
 
 " My niece has told Mrs. Porter that there really was 
 nothing wrong in it." 
 
 " Indeed ? I am happy to hear it." 
 
 " I should like to think well of him, as he is a connec- 
 tion of my wife. In other respects now " Here again 
 she was carried away by the dance, and, when she re- 
 turned, caught the end of a sentence of St. Cloud's, " You 
 will consider what I have said in confidence." 
 
 " Certainly," answered Mr. Porter ; " and I am exceed- 
 ingly obliged to you ; " and then the dance was over, and 
 Mary returned to her father's side. She had never en- 
 joyed a ball less than this, and persuaded her father to 
 leave early, which he was delighted to do. 
 
 When she reached her own room Mary took off her 
 wreath and ornaments, and then sat down and fell into a 
 brown study, which lasted for some time. At last she 
 roused herself with a sigh, and thought she had never had 
 so tiring a day, though she could hardly tell why, and felt 
 half inclined to have a good cry, if she could only have
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 331 
 
 made up her mind what about. However, being a sen- 
 sible young woman, she resisted the temptation, and, 
 hardly taking the trouble to roll up her hair, went to bed 
 and slept soundly. 
 
 Mr. Porter found his wife sitting up for him ; they were 
 evidently both full of the same subject. 
 
 " Well, dear ? " she said, as he entered the room. 
 
 Mr. Porter put down his candle, and shook his head. 
 
 " You don't think Katie can be right, then ? She must 
 have capital opportunities of judging, you know, dear." 
 
 " But she is no judge. What can a girl like Katie 
 know about such things ? " 
 
 " Well, dear, do you know I really cannot think there 
 was any thing very wrong, though I did think so at first, 
 I own." 
 
 " But I find that his character was bad decidedly bad 
 always. Young St. Cloud didn't like to say much to 
 me ; which was natural, of course. Young men never 
 like to betray one another ; but I could see what he 
 thought. He is a right-minded young man, and very 
 agreeable." 
 
 " I do not take to him very much." 
 
 " His connections and prospects, too, are capital. I 
 sometimes think he has a fancy for Mary. Haven't you 
 remarked it ? " 
 
 " Yes, dear. But as to the other matter ? Shall you 
 ask him here? " 
 
 " Well, dear, I do not think there is any need. He is 
 only in town, I suppose, for a short time, and it is not at 
 all likely that we should know where he is, you see." 
 
 "But if he should call?" 
 
 "Of course then we must be civil. We can consider 
 then what is to be done."
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 
 THE INTERCEPTED LETTER-BAG. 
 
 "Dear Katie, At home, you see, without having 
 answered your last kind letter of counsel and sympathy. 
 But I couldn't write in town, I was in such a queer state 
 all the time. I enjoyed nothing, not even the match at 
 Lords, or the race ; only walking at night in the square, 
 and watching her window, and seeing her at a distance 
 in Rotten Row. 
 
 u I followed your advice at last, though it went against 
 the grain uncommonly. It did seem so unlike what I had 
 a right to expect from them after all the kindness my 
 father and mother had shown them when they came into 
 our neighborhood, and after I had been so intimate there, 
 running in and out just like a son of their own that 
 they shouldn't take the slightest notice of me all the 
 time I was in London. I shouldn't have wondered if you 
 hadn't explained ; but after that, and after you had told 
 them my direction, and when they knew that I was within 
 five minutes' walk of their house constantly (for they knew 
 all about Grey's schools, and that I was there three or 
 four times a week), I do think it was too bad. However, 
 as I was going to tell you, I went at last, for I couldn't 
 leave town without trying to see her ; and I believe I 
 have finished it all off. I don't know. I'm very low 
 about it, at any rate, and want to tell you all that passed, 
 and to hear what you think. I have no one to consult 
 but you, Katie. What should I do without you ? But
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 333 
 
 you were born to help and comfort all the world. I sha'n't 
 rest till I know what you think about this last crisis in my 
 history. 
 
 " I put off going till my last day in town, and then 
 called twice. The first time, ' not at home.' But I was 
 determined now to see somebody, and make out something ; 
 so I left my card, and a message that, as I was leaving 
 town next day, I would call again. When I called again 
 at about six o'clock, I was shown into the library, and 
 presently your uncle came in. I felt very uncomfortable, 
 and I think he did too ; but he shook hands cordially 
 enough, asked why I had not called before, and said he 
 was sorry to hear I was going out of town so soon. Do 
 you believe he meant it ? I didn't. But it put me out, 
 because it made it look as if it had been my fault that I 
 hadn't been there before. I said I didn't know that he 
 would have liked me to call, but I felt that he had got 
 the best of the start. 
 
 " Then he asked after all at home, and talked of his 
 boys, and how they were getting on at school. By this 
 time I had got my head again ; so I went back to my call- 
 ing, and said that I had felt I could never come to their 
 house as a common acquaintance, and, as I did not know 
 whether they would ever let me come in any other capac- 
 ity, I had kept away till now. 
 
 " Your uncle didn't like it, I know ; for he got up and 
 walked about, and then said he didn't understand me. 
 Well, I had got quite reckless by this time. It was my 
 last chance I felt ; so I looked hard into my hat, and said 
 that I had been over head and ears in love with Mary for 
 two years. Of course there was no getting out of the 
 business after that. I kept on staring into my hat ; so I 
 don't know how he took it ; but the first thing he said was 
 that ho had had some suspicions of this, and now my con-
 
 334 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 fession gave him a right to ask me several questions. In 
 the first place, Had I ever spoken to her? No; nevei 
 directly. What did I mean by directly ? I meant that I 
 had never either spoken or written to her on the subject, 
 in fact, I hadn't seen her, except at a distance, for the 
 last two years, but I could not say that she might not 
 have found it out from my manner. Had I ever told any 
 one else ? No ; and this was quite true, Katie, for both 
 you and Hardy found it out. 
 
 " He took a good many more turns before speaking 
 again. Then he said I had acted as a gentleman hitherto, 
 and he should be very plain with me. Of course, I must 
 see that, looking at my prospects and his daughter's, it 
 could not be an engagement which he could look on with 
 much favor from a worldly point of view. Nevertheless, 
 he had the highest respect and regard for my family, so 
 that, if in some years' time I was in a position to marry, 
 he should not object on this score ; but there were other 
 matters which were in his eyes of more importance. He 
 had heard (who could have told him ?) that I had taken 
 up very violent opinions opinions which, to say nothing 
 more of them, would very much damage my prospects of 
 success in life ; and that I was in the habit of associating 
 with the advocates of such opinions, persons who, he 
 must say, were not fit companions for a gentleman, and 
 of writing violent articles in low revolutionary newspa- 
 pers, such as the Wessex Freeman. Yes, I confessed I 
 had written. Would I give up these things ? I had a 
 great mind to say flat, No, and I believe I ought to have ; 
 but as his tone was kind I couldn't help trying to meet 
 him. So I said I would give up writing or speaking pub- 
 licly about such matters, but I couldn't pretend not to 
 believe what I did believe. Perhaps, as my opinions had 
 altered so much already, very likely they might again.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 335 
 
 " lie seemed to be rather amused at that, and said he 
 sincerely hoped they might. But now came the most 
 serious point : he had heard very bad stories of me at 
 Oxford, but he would not press me with them. There 
 were too few young men whose lives would bear looking 
 into for him to insist much on such matters, and he was 
 ready to let bygones be bygones. But I must remember 
 that he had himself seen me in one very awkward po- 
 sition. I broke in, and said I had hoped that had been 
 explained to him. I could not defend my Oxford life ; I 
 could not defend myself as to this particular case at one 
 time ; but there had been nothing in it that I was ashamed 
 of since before the time I knew his daughter. 
 
 " On my honor had I absolutely and entirely broken off 
 all relations with her? He had been told that I still 
 kept up a correspondence with her. 
 
 " Yes, I still wrote to her, and saw her occasionally ; 
 but it was only to give her news of a young man from her 
 village, who was now serving in India. He had no other 
 way of communicating with her. 
 
 " It was a most curious arrangement ; did I mean that 
 this young man was going to be married to her ? 
 
 " I hoped so. 
 
 " Why should he not write to her at once if they were 
 engaged to be married ? 
 
 " They were not exactly engaged ; it was rather hard 
 to explain. Here your uncle seemed to lose patience, for 
 he interrupted me and said, Really, it must be clear to 
 me, as a reasonable man, that, if this connection were not 
 absolutely broken off, there must be an end of every thing, 
 so far as his daughter was concerned. Would I give my 
 word of honor to break it off at once, and completely ? 
 I tried to explain again ; but he would have nothing but 
 yes or no. Dear Katie, what could I do ? I have writ-
 
 336 TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 ten to Patty that, till I die, she may always reckon on me 
 as on a brother ; and I have promised Harry never to 
 lose sight of her, and to let her know every thing that 
 happens to him. Your uncle would not hear me ; so I 
 said, No. And he said, ' Then our interview had better 
 end,' and rang the bell. Somebody, I'm sure, has been 
 slandering me to him ; who can it be ? 
 
 " I didn't say another word, or offer to shake hands, 
 but got up and walked out of the room, as it was no good 
 waiting for the servant to come. "When I got into the 
 hall the front door was open, and I heard her voice. I 
 stopped dead short. She was saying something to some 
 people who had been riding with her. The next moment 
 the door shut, and she tripped in in her riding-habit, and 
 gray gloves, and hat, with the dearest little gray plume in 
 it. She went humming along, and up six or eight steps, 
 without seeing me. Then I moved a step, and she 
 stopped and looked, and gave a start. I don't know 
 whether my face was awfully miserable, but, when our 
 eyes met, hers seemed to fill with pity and* uneasiness 
 and inquiry, and the bright look to melt away altogether ; 
 and then she blushed, and ran down-stairs again, and held 
 out her hand, saying, ' I am so glad to see you, after all 
 this long time.' I pressed it, but I don't think I said any 
 tiling. I forget ; the butler came into the hall, and stood 
 by the door. She paused another moment, looked con- 
 fused, and then, as the library door opened, went away 
 up-stairs, with a kind ' good-by.' She dropped a little 
 bunch of violets, which she had worn in the breast of her 
 habit, as she went away. I went and picked them up, 
 although your uncle had now come out of the library, 
 and then made the best of my way into the street. 
 
 " There, Katie, I have told you every thing, exactly as 
 it happened. Do write to me, dear, and tell me, now,
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 337 
 
 what ) r ou think. Is it all over ? What can I do ? Can 
 you do any thing for me ? I feel it is better in one respect. 
 Her father can never say now that I didn't tell him all 
 about it. But what is to happen ? I am so restless. I 
 can settle to nothing, and do nothing, but fish. I moon 
 away all my time by the water-side, dreaming. But I 
 don't mean to let it beat me much longer. Here's the 
 fourth day since I saw her. I came away the next morn- 
 ing. I shall give myself a week ; and, dear, do write me 
 a long letter at once, and interpret it all to me. A woman 
 knows so wonderfully what things mean. But don't make 
 it out better than you really think. Nobody can stop my 
 going on loving her, that's a comfort ; and while I can do 
 that, and don't know that she loves anybody else, I ought 
 to be happier than any other man in the world. Yes, I 
 ought to be, but I aint. I will be, though ; see if I wont. 
 Heigho ! Do write directly, my dear counsellor, to your 
 affectionate cousin, 
 
 "T. B. 
 
 " P.S. I had almost forgotten my usual budget. I 
 enclose my last from India. You will see by it that 
 Harry is getting on famously. I am more glad than I 
 can tell you that my friend East has taken him as his 
 servant. He couldn't be under a better master. Poor 
 Harry ! I sometimes think his case is more hopeless than 
 my own. How is it to come right ? or mine ? " 
 
 " Englebourn. 
 "Dear Cousin, You will believe howl devoured 
 your letter ; though, when I had read the first faw lines, 
 and saw what was coming, it made me stop and tremble. 
 At first I could have cried over it for vexation ; but, now 
 I have thought about it a little, I really do not see any 
 reason to be discouraged, At any rate, Uncle Robert now 
 29
 
 338 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 knows all about it, and will get used to the idea, and Mary 
 seems to have received you just as you ought to have 
 wished that she should. I am thankful that you have left 
 off pressing me to write to her about you, for I am sure 
 that would not be honorable ; and, to reward you, I en- 
 close a letter of hers, which came yesterday. You will 
 see that she speaks with such pleasure of having just 
 caught a glimpse of you, that you need not regret the 
 shortness of the interview. You could not expect her to 
 say more, because, after all, she can only guess ; and I 
 cannot do more than answer as if I were quite innocent 
 too. I am sure you will be very thankful to me some day 
 for not having been your mouthpiece, as I was so very 
 near being. You need not return the letter. I suppose 
 I am getting more hopeful as I grow older indeed, I am 
 sure I am ; for three or four years ago I should have been 
 in despair about you, and now I am nearly sure that all 
 will come right. 
 
 " But, indeed, Cousin Tom, you cannot, or ought not, to 
 wonder at Uncle Robert's objecting to your opinions. And 
 then I am so surprised to find you saying that you think 
 you may very likely change them. Because, if that is the 
 case, it would be so much better if you would not write and 
 talk about them. Unless you are quite convinced of such 
 things as you write in that dreadful paper, you really 
 ought not to go on writing them so very much as if you 
 believed them. 
 
 " And now I am speaking to you about this, which I 
 have often had on my mind to speak to you about, I must 
 ask you not to send me that Wessex Freeman any more. 
 I am always delighted to hear what you think ; and there is 
 a great deal in the articles you mark for me which seems 
 very fine ; and I dare say you quite believe it all when 
 you write it. Only I am quite afraid lest papa or any
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 339 
 
 of the servants should open the papers, or get hold cf them 
 after I have opened them ; for I am sure there are a great 
 many wicked things in the other parts of the paper. So, 
 please do not send it me, but write and tell me yourself 
 any thing that you wish me to know of what you are think- 
 ing about and doing. As I did not like to burn the pa- 
 pers, and was afraid to keep them here, I have generally 
 sent them on to your friend, Mr. Hardy. He does not 
 know who sends them ; and now you might send them 
 yourself straight to him, as I do not know his address in 
 the country. As you are going up again to keep a term, 
 I wish you would talk them over with him, and see what 
 he thinks about them. You will think this very odd of 
 me, but you know you have always said how much you 
 rely on his judgment, and that you have learned so much 
 from him. So I am sure you would wish to consult him ; 
 and, if he thinks you ought to go on writing, it will be a 
 great help to you to know it. 
 
 " I am so very glad to be able to tell you how well 
 Martha is going on. I have always read to her the ex- 
 tracts from your letters from India which you have sent 
 me, and she is very much obliged to you for sending them. 
 I think there is no doubt that she is, and always has been, 
 attached to poor Widow Winburn's son, and, now that he 
 is behaving so well, I can see that it gives her great pleas- 
 ure to hear about him. Only, I hope, he will be able to 
 come back before very long, because she is very much 
 admired, and is likely to have so many chances of settling 
 in life, that it is a great chance whether her attachment 
 to him will be strong enough to keep her single if he 
 should be absent for many years. 
 
 " Do you know I have a sort of superstition, that your 
 fate hangs upon theirs in some curious manner, the two 
 stories have been so interwoven, aud that they will both
 
 340 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 be settled happily much sooner than we dare to hope even 
 just now ? 
 
 " Don't think, my dear cousin, that this letter is cold, or 
 that I do not take the very deepest interest in all that 
 concerns you. You and Mary are always in my thoughts, 
 and there is nothing in the world I would not do for you 
 both which I thought would help you. I am sure it would 
 do you harm to be only a go-between. Papa is much as 
 usual. He gets out a good deal in his chair in the sun 
 this fine weather. He desires me to say how glad he 
 should be if you will come over soon and pay us a visit. 
 I hope you will come very soon. 
 
 " Ever believe me, dear Tom, 
 
 " Your affectionate cousin, 
 
 " Katie." 
 
 " November. 
 
 " Dear Tom, I hear that what you in England call 
 a mail is to leave camp this evening ; so, that you may 
 have no excuse for not writing to me constantly, I am 
 setting to spin you such a yarn as I can under the disad- 
 vantageous circumstances in which this will leave me. 
 
 " This time last year, or somewhere thereabouts, I was 
 enjoying academic life with you at Oxford ; and now here 
 I am, encamped at some unpronounceable place beyond 
 Umbala. You wont be much the wiser for that. What 
 do you know about Umbala ? I didn't myself know that 
 there was such a place till a month ago, when we were 
 ordered to march up here. But one lives and learns. 
 Marching over India has its disagreeables, of which dys- 
 entery and dust are about the worst. A lot of our fel- 
 lows are down with the former ; amongst others my cap- 
 tain ; so I'm in command of the company. If it were not 
 for the glorious privilege of grumbling, I think we should
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 341 
 
 all own that we liked the life. Moving about, though one 
 does get frozen and broiled regularly once in ;he twenty- 
 four hours, suits me ; besides, they talk of matters coming 
 to a crisis, and no end of fighting to be done directly. 
 You'll know more about what's going on from the papers 
 than we do, but here they say the ball may begin any day ; 
 so we are making forced marches to be up in time. I 
 wonder how I shall like it. Perhaps, in my next, I may 
 tell you how a bullet sounds when it comes at you. If 
 there is any fighting, I expect our regiment will make 
 their mark. We are in tip-top order ; the colonel is a 
 grand fellow, and the regiment feels his hand, down to the 
 youngest drummer boy. What a deal of good I will do 
 when I'm a colonel. 
 
 " I duly delivered the enclosure in your last to your 
 convict, who is rapidly ascending the ladder of promotion. 
 I am disgusted at this myself, for I have had to give him 
 up, and there never was such a jewel of a servant ; but, 
 of course, it's a great thing for him. He is covering ser- 
 geant of my company, and the smartest coverer we have 
 too. I have got a regular broth of a boy, an Irishman, in 
 his place, who leads me a dog of a life. I took him chiefly 
 because he very nearly beat me in a foot-race. Our senior 
 major is a Pat himself, and, it seems, knew something of 
 Larry's powers. So, one day at mess, he offered to back 
 him against any one in the regiment for two hundred 
 yards. My captain took him and named me, and it came 
 off next day ; and a precious narrow thing it was, but I 
 managed to win by a neck for the honor of the old school. 
 He is a lazy scatter-brained creature, utterly indifferent to 
 fact, and I am obliged to keep the brandy flask under lock 
 and key ; but the humor and absolute good temper of the 
 animal impose upon me, and I really think he is attached 
 to me. So I keep him on, grumbling horribly at the 
 29*
 
 342 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 change from that orderly, punctual, clean, accurate con- 
 vict. Depend upon it, that fellow will do. He makes his 
 way everywhere, with officers and men. He is a gentle- 
 man at heart, and, by the way, you would be surprised 
 at the improvement in his manners and speech. There 
 is hardly a taste of Berkshire left in his deealect. He 
 has read all the books I could lend him, or borrow for 
 him, and is fast picking up Hindustanee. So you see, 
 after all, I am come round to your opinion that we did a 
 good afternoon's work on that precious stormy common, 
 when we carried off the convict from the authorities of his 
 native land, and I was first under fire. As you are a per- 
 former in that line, couldn't you carry off his sweetheart, 
 and send her out here ? After the sea voyage there isn't 
 much above one thousand miles to come by dauk ; and 
 tell her, with my compliments, he is well worth coming 
 twice the distance for. Poor fellow, it is a bad look-out 
 for him I'm afraid, as he may not get home this ten years ; 
 and, though he isn't a kind to be easily killed, there are 
 serious odds against . him, even if he keeps all right. I 
 almost wish you had never told me his story. 
 
 " We are going into cantonments as soon as this expedi- 
 tion is over in a splendid pig district, and I look forward to 
 some real sport. All the men who have had any tell me 
 it beats the best fox-hunt all to fits for excitement. I have 
 got my eye on a famous Arab, who is to be had cheap. 
 The brute is in the habit of kneeling on his masters, and 
 tearing them with his teeth when he gets them off, but 
 nothing can touch him while you keep on his back. How- 
 sumdever, as your countrymen say, I shall have a shy at 
 him, if I can get him at my price. I've nothing more to 
 say. There's nobody you know here, except the convict 
 sergeant, and it's awfully hard to fill a letter home unless 
 you'v-3 somebody to talk about. Yes, by the way, there
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 343 
 
 is one little fellow, an ensign, just joined, who says he re- 
 members us at school. He can't be more than eighteen 
 or nineteen, and was an urchin in the lower school, I sup- 
 pose, when we were leaving. I don't remember his face, 
 but it's a very good one, and he is a bright, gentlemanly 
 youngster as you would wish to see. His name is Jones. 
 Do you remember him ? He will be a godsend to me. 
 I have him to chum with me on this march. 
 
 " Keep up your letters as you love me. You at home 
 little know what it is to enjoy a letter. Never mind what 
 you put in it; any thing will do from home, and I've no- 
 body else much to write to me. 
 
 " There goes the ' assembly.' Why, I can't think, see- 
 ing we have done our day's march. However, I must 
 turn out and see what's up. 
 
 ******** 
 
 " December. 
 " I have just fallen on this letter, which I had quite for- 
 gotten, or, rather, had fancied I had sent off to you three 
 weeks and more ago. My baggage has just come to hand, 
 and the scrawl turned up in my paper case. Well, I have 
 plenty to tell you now, at any rate, if I had time to tell it. 
 That ' assembly ' which stopped me short sounded in con- 
 sequence of the arrival of one of the commander-in-chiefs 
 aides in our camp, with the news that the enemy was 
 over the Sutlej. We were to march at once, with two 
 six-pounders and a squadron of cavalry, on a fort occupied 
 by an outlying lot of them, which commanded a ford, and 
 was to be taken and destroyed, and the rascals who held 
 it dispersed; after which we were to join the main army. 
 Our colonel had the command ; so we were on the route 
 within an hour, leaving a company and the baggage to 
 follow as it could ; and from that time to this, forced
 
 344 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 marching and hard fighting have been the order of tho 
 day. 
 
 " We drew first blood next morning. The enemy were 
 in some force outside the fort, and showed fight in very 
 rough ground covered with bushes ; out of which we had 
 to drive them which we did after a sharp struggle, and 
 the main body drew off altogether. Then the fort had to 
 be taken. Our two guns worked away at it till dark. In 
 the night two of the gunners, who volunteered for the ser- 
 vice, crept close up to the place, and reported that there 
 was nothing to hinder our running right into it. Accord- 
 ingly, the colonel resolved to rush it at daybreak, and my 
 company was told off to lead. The captain being absent, I 
 had to command. I was with the dear old chief the last 
 thing at night, getting his instructions : ten minutes with 
 him before going into action would make a hare fight. 
 
 " There was cover to within one hundred and fifty yards 
 of the place ; and there I, and poor little Jones, and the 
 men, spent the night in a dry ditch. An hour before day- 
 break we were on the alert, and served out rations, and 
 then they began playing tricks on one another as if we 
 were out for a junketing. I sat with my watch in my 
 hand, feeling queer, and wondering whether I was a 
 greater coward than the rest. Then came a streak of 
 light. I put up my watch, formed the men ; up went a 
 rocket, my signal, and out into the open we went at the 
 double. We hadn't got over a third of the ground when 
 bang went the fort guns, and the grape-shot were whistling 
 about our ears ; so I shouted ' Forward ! ' and away we 
 went as hard as we could go. I was obliged to go ahead, 
 you see, because every man of them knew I had beaten 
 Larry, their best runner, when he had no gun to carry ; 
 but I didn't half like it, and should have blessed any hole 
 or bramble which would have sent me over and <nven them
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 345 
 
 tii-ie to catch me. But the ground was provokingly level ; 
 and so I was at the first mound and over it several lengths 
 in front of the men, and among a lot of black fellows serv- 
 ing the guns. They came at me like wild-cats, and how 
 I got off is a mystery. I parried a cut from one fellow, 
 and dodged a second ; a third rushed at my left side. I 
 just caught the flash of his tulwar, and thought it was all 
 up, when he jumped into the air, shot through the heart by 
 Sergeant Winburn ; and the next moment Master Larry 
 rushed by me and plunged his bayonet into my friend in 
 front. It turned me as sick as a dog. I can't fancy any 
 thing more disagreeable than seeing the operation for the 
 first time, except being stuck one's self. The supporting 
 companies were in in another minute, with the dear old 
 chief himself, who came up and shook hands with me, and 
 said I had done credit to the regiment. Then I began to 
 look about, and missed poor little Jones. We found him 
 about twenty yards from the place, with two grape-shot 
 through him, stone dead, and smiling like a child asleep. 
 "We buried him in the fort. I cut off some of his hair, 
 and sent it home to his mother. Her last letter was in 
 his breast pocket, and a lock of bright brown hair of some 
 one's. I sent them back, too, and his sword. 
 
 " Since then we have been with the army, and had 
 three or four general actions ; about which I can tell you 
 nothing, except that we have lost about a third of the 
 regiment, and have always been told we have won. Steps 
 go fast enough ; my captain died of wounds and dysentery 
 a week ago ; so I have the company in earnest. How long 
 I shall hold it is another question; for, though there's a 
 slack, we haven't done with sharp work yet, I can see. 
 
 " How often we've talked, years ago, of what it must 
 feel like going into battle ! Well, the chief thing I felt 
 when the grape came down pretty thick for the first time,
 
 346 TOiM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 as we were advancing, was a sort of gripes in the stomach 
 which made me want to go forward stooping. But I 
 didn't give in to it ; the chief was riding close behind us, 
 joking the youngsters who were ducking their heads, and 
 so cheery and cool, that he made old soldiers of us at 
 once. What with smoke and dust and excitement, you 
 know scarcely any thing of what is going on. The finest 
 sight I have seen is the artillery going into action. Noth- 
 ing stops those fellows. Places you would crane at out 
 hunting they go right over, guns, carriages, men, and all, 
 leaving any cavalry we've got out here well behind. 
 Do you know what a nullah is ? Well, it's a great gap, 
 like a huge dry canal, fifteen or twenty feet deep. We 
 were halted behind one in the last great fight, waiting the 
 order to advance, when a battery came up at full gallop. 
 We all made sure they must be pulled up by the nullah. 
 They never pulled bridle. ' Leading gun, right turn ! ' 
 sang out the subaltern, and down they went sideways into 
 the nullah. Then, ' Left turn ; ' up the other bank, one 
 gun after another, the horses scrambling like cats up and 
 down places that my men had to use their hands to 
 scramble up, and away the other side to within two hun- 
 dred yards of the enemy ; and then, round like lightning, 
 and look out in front. 
 
 " Altogether it's sickening work, though there's a grand 
 sort of feeling of carrying your life in your hand. They 
 say the Sepoy regiments have behaved shamefully. There 
 is no sign of any thing like funk amongst our fellows that 
 I have seen. Sergeant Winburn has distinguished him- 
 self everywhere. He is like my shadow, and I can see 
 tries to watch over my precious carcase, and get between 
 me and danger. He would be a deal more missed in the 
 world than I. Except you, old friend, I don't know who 
 would care much if I were knocked over to-morrow.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 347 
 
 Aunts and cousins are my nearest relations. Yoa know 
 I never was a snuffler ; but this sort of life makes one 
 serious, if one has any reverence at all in one. You'll 
 be glad to have this line, if you don't hear from me again. 
 I've often thought in the last month that we shall never 
 see one another again in this world. But, whether in 
 this world or any other, you know I am and always shall 
 be your affectionate friend, 
 
 "H. East." 
 
 " Camp on the Sutlej, 
 
 " January. 
 
 " Dear Master Tom, The captain's last words 
 was, if any thing happened I was to be sure to write and 
 tell you. And so I take up my pen, though you will 
 know as I am not used to writing, to tell you the misfor- 
 tune as has happened to our regiment. Because, if you 
 was to ask any man in our regiment, let it be who it 
 would, he would say as the captain was the best officer 
 as ever led men. Not but what there's a many of them 
 as will go to the front as brave as lions, and don't value 
 shot no more than if it was rotten apples ; and men as is 
 men will go after such. But 'tis the captain's manners 
 and ways, with a kind word for any poor fellow as is hurt, 
 or sick and tired, and making no account of hisself, and, 
 as you may say, no bounce with him ; that 's what makes 
 the difference. 
 
 " As it might be last Saturday, we came upon the 
 enemy where he was posted very strong, with guns all 
 along his front, and served till we got right up to them, 
 the gunners being cut down and bayoneted when we got 
 right up amongst them, and no quarter given ; and there 
 was great banks of earth, too, to clamber over, and mora
 
 348 TOM BROWN AT OXFOKD. 
 
 guns behind ; so, with the marching up in front and 
 losing so many officers and men, our regiment was that 
 wild when we got amongst them 'twas awful to see, and, 
 if there was any prisoners taken, it was more by mistake 
 than not. 
 
 " Me and three or four more settled, when the word 
 came to prepare for action, to keep with the captain, be- 
 cause 'twas known to every one as no odds would stop 
 him, and he would never mind hisself. The dust and 
 smoke and noise was that thick you couldn't see nor hear 
 any thing after our regiment was in action ; but, so far as 
 I seen, when we was wheeled into line, and got the word 
 to advance, there was as it might be as far as from our 
 old cottage to the Hawk's Lynch to go over before we 
 got to the guns, which was playing into us all the way. 
 Our line went up very steady, only where men was 
 knocked down ; and, when we come to within a matter 
 of sixty yards, the officers jumped out and waved their 
 swords, for 'twas no use to give words, and the ranks 
 was broken by reason of the running up to take the guns 
 from the enemy. Me and the rest went after the cap- 
 tain ; but he, being so light of foot, was first, by maybe 
 ten yards or so, at the mound, and so up before we was 
 by him. But, though they was all round him like bees 
 when we got to him, 'twas not then as he was hit. There 
 was more guns further on, and we and they drove on 
 altogether; and, though they was beaten, being fine tall 
 men and desperate, there was many of them fighting hard, 
 and, as you might say, a man scarcely knowed how he 
 got hit. I kept to the captain as close as ever I could, 
 but there was times when I had to mind myself. Just as 
 we come to the last guns, Larry, that's the captain's ser- 
 vant, was trying by hisself to turn one of them round, so
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 349 
 
 as to fire on the enemy as they took the river to the back 
 of their lines all in a huddle. So I turned to lend him a 
 hand ; and, when I looked round next moment, there was 
 the captain a staggering like a drunken man, and he so 
 strong and lissom up to then, and never had a scratch 
 since the war begun, and this the last minute of it pretty 
 nigh, for the enemy was all cut to pieces and drowned 
 that day. I got to him before he fell, and we laid him 
 down gently, and did the best we could for him. But 
 he was bleeding dreadful with a great gash in his side, 
 and his arm broke, and two gunshot Avounds. Our sur- 
 geon was killed, and 'twas hours before his wounds was 
 dressed, and 'twill be God's mercy if ever he gets round ; 
 though they do say, if the fever and dysentery keeps off, 
 and he can get out of this country and home, there's no 
 knowing but he may get the better of it all, but not to 
 serve with the regiment again for years to come. 
 
 " I hope, Master Tom, as I've told you all the captain 
 would like as you should know ; only, not being much 
 used to writing, I hope you will excuse mistakes. And, 
 if so be that it wont be too much troubling of you, and 
 the captain should go home, and you could write to say 
 how things was going on at home as before, which the 
 captain always gave me to read when the mail come in, 
 it would be a great help towards keeping up of a good 
 heart in a foreign land, which is hard at times to do. 
 There is some things which I make bold to send by a 
 comrade going home sick. I don't know as they will 
 seem much, but I hope as you will accept of the sword, 
 which belonged to one of their officers, and the rest to her. 
 Also, on account of what was in the last piece as you for- 
 warded, I send a letter to go along with the things, if 
 Miss Winter, who have been so kind, or you, would 
 30
 
 350 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 deliver the same. To whom I make bold to send my 
 respects as well as to yourself, and hoping this will find 
 you well and all friends, and 
 
 " From your respectful, 
 
 " Henry Winburn, 
 " Color-Sergeant 101st Regiment." 
 
 " March. 
 " My dear Tom, I begin to think I may see you 
 again yet, but it has been a near shave. I hope Ser- 
 geant Winburn's letter, and the returns, in which I see I 
 was put down ' dangerously wounded,' will not have 
 frightened you very much. The war is over ; and, if I 
 live to get down to Calcutta you will see me in the sum- 
 mer, please God. The end was like the beginning 
 going right up to guns. Our regiment is frightfully cut 
 up ; there are only three hundred men left under arms 
 the rest dead or in hospital. I am sick at heart at it, 
 and weak in body, and can only write a few lines at a 
 time, but will go on with this as I can, in time for next 
 mail. 
 
 " Since beginning this letter I have had another relapse. 
 So, in case I should never finish it, I will say at once 
 what I most want to say. "Winburn has saved my life 
 more than once, and is besides one of the noblest and 
 bravest fellows in the world ; so I mean to provide for 
 him in case any thing should happen to me. I have 
 made a will, and appointed you my executor, and left 
 him a legacy. You must buy his discharge, and get him 
 home and married to the Englebourn beauty as soon as 
 possible. But what I want you to understand is that, if 
 the legacy isn't enough to do this, and make all straight
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 351 
 
 with her old curmudgeon of a father, it is my first wish 
 that whatever will do it should be made up to him. He 
 has been in hospital with a bad flesh wound, and has let 
 out to me the whole of his story, of which you had only 
 given me the heads. If that young woman does not 
 wait for him, and book him, I shall give up all faith in 
 petticoats. Now that's done I feel more at ease. 
 
 " Let me see. I haven't written for six weeks and 
 more, just before our last great fight. You'll know all 
 about it from the papers long before you get this a 
 bloody business I am loth to think of it. I was knocked 
 over in the last of their entrenchments, and should then 
 and there have bled to death had it not been for Winburn. 
 He never left me, though the killing and plundering and 
 roystering afterwards was going on all round, and strong 
 temptation to a fellow when his blood is up, and he sees 
 his comrades at it, after such work as we had had. What's 
 more, he caught my Irish fellow and made him stay by 
 me, too, and between them they managed to prop me up 
 and stop the bleeding, though it was touch and go. I 
 never thought they would manage it. You can't think 
 what a curious feeling it is, the life going out of you. I 
 was perfectly conscious, and knew all they were doing 
 and saying, and thought quite clearly, though in a sort of 
 dreamy way, about you, and a whole jumble of people 
 and things at home. It was the most curious painless 
 mixture of dream and life, getting more dreamy every 
 minute. I don't suppose I could have opened my eyes or 
 spoken ; at any rate I had no wish to do so, and didn't 
 try. Several times the thought of death came close to 
 me ; and, whether it was the odd state I was in, or what 
 else I don't know, but the only feeling I had was one of 
 intense curiosity. I should think I must have lain there, 
 with Winburn supporting my head, and moistening my
 
 352 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 lips with rum and water, for four or five hours, before a 
 doctor could be got. He had managed to drive Larry 
 about till he had found, or borrowed, or stolen the drink, 
 and then kept him making short cruises in search of help 
 in the shape of hospital-stuff, ambulances, or doctors, from 
 which Master Larry always came back without the 
 slightest success. My belief is, he employed those pre- 
 cious minutes, when he was from under his sergeant's eye, 
 in looting. At last Winburn got impatient, and I heard 
 him telling Larry what he was to do while he was gone 
 himself to find a doctor ; and then I was moved as gently 
 as if I had been a sick girl. I heard him go off with a 
 limp, but did not know till long after of his wound. 
 
 " Larry had made such a wailing and to-do when they 
 first found me, that a natui - al reaction now set in, and he 
 began gently and tenderly to run over in his mind what 
 could be made out of ' the captin,' and what would become 
 of his things. I found out this, partly through his habit 
 of talking to himself, and partly from the precaution which 
 he took of ascertaining where my watch and purse were, 
 and what else I had upon me. It tickled me immensely 
 to hear him. Presently I found he was examining my 
 boots, which he pronounced 'iligant entirely,' and won- 
 dered whether he could get them on. The 'serjint' would 
 never want them. And he then pi-oceeded to assert, while 
 he actually began unlacing them, that the captin would 
 never have ' bet him ' but for the boots, which < was worth 
 ten feet in a furlong to any man.' ' Shure 'tis too late 
 now ; but wouldn't I like to run him agin with the bare 
 feet?' I couldn't stand that, and just opened my eyes a 
 little, and moved my hand, and said, ' Done.' I wanted 
 to add, 'you rascal,' but that was too much for me. 
 Larry's face of horror, which I just caught through my 
 half-opened eyes, would have made me roar, if I had had
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 353 
 
 strength for it. I believe the resolution I made that he 
 should never go about in my boots helped me to pull 
 through ; but, as soon as "Winburn came back with the 
 doctor, Master Larry departed, and I much doubt whether 
 I shall ever set eyes on him again in the flesh ; not if he 
 can help it, certainly. The regiment, what's left of it, is 
 away in the Punjaub, and he with it. Winburn, as I told 
 you, is hard hit, but no danger. I have great hopes that 
 lie will be invalided. You may depend upon it he will 
 escort me home, if any interest of mine can manage it ; 
 and the dear old chief is so kind to me that I think he 
 will arrange it somehow. 
 
 " I must be wonderfully better to have spun such a 
 yarn. Writing those first ten lines nearly finished me, a 
 week ago, and now I am scarcely tired after all this 
 scrawl. If that rascal, Larry, escapes hanging another 
 year, and comes back home, I will run him yet, and thrash 
 his head off". 
 
 " There is something marvellously life-giving in the 
 idea of sailing for old England again ; and I mean to make 
 a- strong fight for seeing you again, old boy. God bless 
 you. Write again for the chance, directing to my agents 
 at Calcutta, as before. Ever your half-alive, but whole* 
 hearted and affectionate friend, 
 
 30 * "II. East."
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 MASTER S TEEM. 
 
 One more look into the old college where we have 
 spent so much time already, not, I hope, altogether un- 
 pleasantly. Our hero is up in the summer term, keeping 
 his three weeks' residence, the necessary preliminary to 
 an M.A. degree. We find him sitting in Hardy's rooms ; 
 tea is over, scouts out of college, candles lighted, and 
 silence reigning, except when distant sounds of mirth 
 come from some undergraduates' rooms on the opposite 
 side of quad, through the open windows. 
 
 Hardy is deep in the budget of Indian letters, some of 
 which we have read in the last chapter ; and Tom reads 
 them over again as his friend finishes them, and then 
 carefully folds them up and puts them back in their places 
 in a large pocket-case. Except an occasional explanatory 
 remark, or exclamation of interest, no word passes until 
 Hardy finishes the last letter. Then he breaks out into 
 praises of the two Harrys, which gladdens Tom's heart as 
 he fastens the case, and puts it back in his pocket, saying, 
 " Yes, you wont find two finer fellows in a long summer's 
 day ; no, nor in twenty." 
 
 " And you expect them home, then, in a week or two ? " 
 
 " Yes, I think so. Just about the time I shall be going 
 down." 
 
 " Don't talk about going down. You haven't been here 
 a week."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. oOO 
 
 " Just a week. One out of three. Three weeks wasted 
 in keeping one's Master's term ! Why can't you give a 
 fellow his degree quietly, without making him come and 
 kick his heels here for three weeks ? " 
 
 " You ungrateful dog ! Do you mean to say you 
 haven't enjoyed coming back, and sitting in dignity in the 
 bachelors' seats in chapel, and at the bachelors' table in 
 hall, and thinking how much wiser you are than the 
 undergraduates ? Besides, your old friends want to see 
 you, and you ought to want to see them." 
 
 " Well, I'm very glad to see something of you again, 
 old fellow. I don't find that a year's absence has made 
 any change in you. But who else is there that I care to 
 see ? My old friends are gone, and the year has made a 
 great gap between me and the youngsters. They look on 
 me as a sort of don." 
 
 " Of course they do. Why, you are a sort of don. You 
 will be an M.A. in a fortnight, and a member of Convo- 
 cation." 
 
 " Very likely ; but I don't appreciate the dignity ; I can 
 tell you being up here now is any thing but enjoyable. 
 You have never broken with the place. And then, you 
 always did your duty, and have done the college credit* 
 You can't enter into the feelings of a fellow whose con- 
 nection with Oxford has been quite broken off, and who 
 wasted three parts of his time here, when he comes back 
 to keep his Master's." 
 
 " Come, come, Tom. You might have read more cer- 
 tainly, witli benefit to yourself and the college, and taken 
 a higher degree. But, after all, didn't the place do you a 
 great deal of good ? and you didn't do it much harm. I 
 don't like to see you in this sort of gloomy state ; it isn't 
 natural to you." 
 
 " It is becoming natural. You haven't seen much of
 
 356 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 me during the last year, or you would have remarked it. 
 And then, as I tell you, Oxford, when one has nothing to 
 do in it but to moon about, thinking over one's past tollies 
 and sins, isn't cheerful. It never was a very cheerful 
 place to me at the best of times." 
 
 " Not even at pulling times ? " 
 
 " Well, the river is the part I like best to think of. 
 But even the river makes me rather melancholy now. 
 One feels one has done with it." 
 
 " Why, Tom, I believe your melancholy comes from 
 their not having asked you to pull in the boat." 
 
 " Perhaps it does. Don't you call it degrading to be 
 pulling in the torpid in one's old age ? " 
 
 " Mortified vanity, man ! They have a capital boat. 
 I wonder how we should have liked to have been turned 
 out for some bachelor just because he had pulled a good 
 oar in his day ? " 
 
 " Not at all. I don't blame the young ones, and I hope 
 I do my duty in the torpid. By the way, they're an 
 uncommonly nice set of youngsters. Much better behaved 
 in every way than we were, unless it is that they put on 
 their best manners before me." 
 
 ' " No, I don't think they do. The fact is, they are 
 really fine young fellows." 
 
 " So I think. And I'll tell you what, Jack ; since we 
 are sitting and talking our minds to one another at last, 
 like old times, somebody has made the most wonderful 
 change in this college. I rather think it is seeing what 
 St. Ambrose's is now, and thinking what it was in my 
 time, and what an uncommon member of society I should 
 have turned out if I had had the luck to have been here 
 now instead of then, that makes me down in the mouth 
 more even than having to pull in the torpid instead of the 
 racing boat."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 357 
 
 " You do think it is improved, then ? " 
 
 " Think ! Why it is a different place altogether ; and, 
 as you are the only new tutor, it must have been your 
 doing. Now, I want to know your secret." 
 
 " I've no secret, except taking a real interest in all that 
 the men do, and living with them as much as I can. You 
 may fancy it isn't much of a trial to me to steer the boat 
 down, or run on the bank and coach the crew." 
 
 " Ah ! I remember ; you were beginning that before I 
 left, in your first year. I knew that would answer." 
 
 " Yes. The fact is, I find that just what I like best is 
 the very best thing for the men. With very few excep- 
 tions they are all glad to be stirred up, and meet me 
 nearly half-way in reading, and three-quarters in every 
 thing else. I believe they would make me captain to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " And why don't you let them, then ? " 
 
 " No ; there's a time for every thing. I go in in the 
 scratch fours for the pewters, and more by token my 
 crew won them two years running. Look at my trophies," 
 and he pointed to two pewter pots, engraved with the col- 
 lege arms, which stood on his sideboard. 
 
 " Well, I dare say you're right. But what does the 
 president say ? " 
 
 " 01), he is a convert. Didn't you see him on the bank 
 when you torpids made your bump the other night ? " 
 
 " No, you don't mean it ? Well, do you know, a sort 
 of vision of black tights, and a broad-brimmed hat, crossed 
 me, but I never gave it a second thought. And so the 
 president comes out to see the St. Ambrose boat row ? " 
 
 " Seldom misses two nights running." 
 
 " Then, carry me out, and bury me decently. Have 
 you seen old Tom walking round Packwater lately on
 
 858 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 his clapper, smoking a cigar with the Dean of Christ- 
 church ? Don't be afraid. I am ready for any thing you 
 like to tell me. Draw any amount you like on my faith ; 
 I shall honor the draft after that." 
 
 " The president isn't a bad judge of an oar, when he 
 sets his mind to it." 
 
 " Isn't he ? But, I say, Jack, no sell, how in the 
 world did it happen ? " 
 
 " I believe it happened chiefly through his talks with 
 me. When I was first made tutor he sent for me and . 
 told me he had heard I encouraged the young men in 
 boating, and he must positively forbid it. I didn't much 
 care about staying up ; so I was pretty plain with him, 
 and said if I was not allowed to take the line I thought 
 best in such matters I must resign at the end of term. lie 
 assented, but afterwards thought better of it, and sent for 
 me again, and we had several encounters. I took my 
 ground very civilly but firmly, and he had to give up one 
 objection after another. I think the turning-point was 
 when he quoted St. Paul on me, and said I was teaching 
 boys to worship physical strength, instead of teaching 
 them to keep under their bodies and bring them into sub- 
 jection. Of course I countered him there with tremen- 
 dous effect. The old boy took it very well, only saying 
 he feared it was no use to argue further in this matter 
 of boat-racing he had come to a conclusion, not without 
 serious thought, many years before. However, he came 
 round quietly. And so he has on other points. In fact, 
 he is a wonderfully open-minded man for his age, if you 
 only put things to him the right way." 
 
 " Has he come round about gentlemen-commoners ? I 
 see you've only two or three up."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 359 
 
 " Yes. We haven't given up taking them altogether. 
 I hope that may come soon. But I and another tutor 
 took to plucking them ruthlessly at matriculation, unless 
 they were quite up to the commoner standard. The con- 
 sequence was, a row in common room. We stood out, and 
 won. Luckily, as you know, it has always been given 
 out here that all undergraduates, gentlemen-commoners, 
 and commoners, have to pass the same college examina- 
 tions, and to attend the same courses of lectures. You 
 know also what a mere sham and pretence the rule had 
 become. Well, we simply made a reality of it, and in 
 answer to all objectors said, Is it our rule or not ? If it 
 is, we are bound to act on it. If you want to alter it, 
 there are the regular ways of doing so. After a little 
 grumbling they let us have our way, and the consequence 
 is, that velvet is getting scarce at St. Ambrose." 
 
 " What a blessing ! What other miracles have you 
 been performing ? " 
 
 " The best reform we have carried is throwing the 
 kitchen and cellar open to the undergraduates." 
 
 " W-h-e-w ! That's just the sort of reform Ave should 
 have appreciated. Fancy Drysdale's lot with the key of 
 the college cellars, at about ten o'clock on a shiny night." 
 
 " You don't quite understand the reform. You remem- 
 ber, when you were an undergraduate you couldn't give 
 a dinner in college, and you had to buy your wine any- 
 where ? " 
 
 " Yes, and awful firewater we used to get. The gov- 
 ernor supplied me, like a wise man." 
 
 " Well, we have placed the college in the relation of 
 benevolent father. Every undergraduate now can give 
 two dinners a term in his own room, from the kitchen ; or 
 m:>rc, if he comes and asks, and has any reason to give.
 
 SCO TOM BUOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 We take care that they have a good dinner at a reason- 
 able rate, and the men are delighted with the arrange- 
 ment. I don't believe there are three men in the college 
 now who have hotel bills. And we let them have all 
 their wine out of the college cellars." 
 
 " That's what I call good common-sense. Of course it 
 must answer in every way. And you find they all come 
 to you ? " 
 
 " Almost all. They can't get any thing like the wine 
 we give them at the price, and they know it." 
 
 " Do you make them pay ready money ? " 
 
 " The dinners and wine are charged in their battel 
 bills ; so they have to pay once a term, just as they do 
 for their ordinary commons." 
 
 " It must swell their battel bills awfully." 
 
 " Yes, but battel bills always come in at the beginning 
 of term, when they are flush of money. Besides, they all 
 know that battel bills must be paid. In a small way it is 
 the best thing that ever was done for St. Ambrose's. You 
 see it cuts so many ways. Keeps men in college, knocks 
 off" the most objectionable bills at inns and pastry-cooks, 
 keeps them from being poisoned, makes them pay their 
 bills regularly, shows them that we like them to be able 
 to live like gentlemen " 
 
 " And lets you dons know what they are all about, and 
 how much they spend in the way of entertaining." 
 
 " Yes ; and a very good thing for them too. They 
 know that we shall not interfere while they behave like 
 gentlemen." 
 
 " Oh, I'm not objecting. And was this your doing too ? " 
 
 " No ; a joint business. We hatched it in the common 
 room, and then the bursar spoke to the president, who was 
 furious, and said we were giving the sanction of the col-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 3G1 
 
 lege to disgraceful luxury and extravagance. Luckily, lie 
 had not the power of stopping us, and now is convinced." 
 
 " The goddess of common-sense seems to have alighted 
 again in the quad of St. Ambrose. You'll never leave 
 the place, Jack, now you're beginning to get every thing 
 your own way." 
 
 " On the contrary, I don't mean to stop up more than 
 another year at the outside. I have been tutor nearly 
 three years now ; that's about long enough." 
 
 " Do you think you're right ? You seem to have hit 
 on your line in life wonderfully. You like the work, and 
 the work likes you. You are doing a heap of good up 
 here. You'll be president in a year or two, depend on it. 
 I should say you had better stick to Oxford." 
 
 " No. I should be of no use in a year or two. "We 
 want a constant current of fresh blood here." 
 
 " In a general way. But you don't get a man every 
 day who can throw himself into the men's pursuits, and 
 can get hold of them in the right way. And then, after 
 all, when a fellow has got such work cut out for him as 
 you have, Oxford must be an uncommonly pleasant place 
 to live in." 
 
 " Pleasant enough in many ways. But you seem to 
 have forgotten how you used to rail against it." 
 
 " Yes. Because I never hit off the right ways of the 
 place. But, if I had taken a first and got a fellowship, I 
 should like it well enough, I dare say." 
 
 " Being a fellow, on the contrary, makes it worse. 
 While one was an undergraduate one could feel virtuous 
 and indignant at the vices of Oxford, at least at those 
 which one did not indulge in, particularly at the flunkey- 
 ism and money-worship which are our most prevalent and 
 disgraceful sins. But when one is a fellow, it is quite 
 31
 
 862 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 another affair. They become a sore burden then, enough 
 to break one's heart." 
 
 " Why, Jack, we're changing characters to-night. Fancy 
 your coming out in the abusive line ! Why, I never said 
 harder things of Alma Mater myself. However, there's 
 plenty of flunkey ism and money-worship everywhere 
 else." 
 
 " Yes ; but it is not so heart-breaking in other places. 
 When one thinks what a great centre of learning and 
 faith like Oxford ought to be that its highest educa- 
 tional work should just be the deliverance of us all from 
 flunkeyism and money-worship and then looks at mat- 
 ters here without rose-colored spectacles, it gives one 
 sometimes a sort of chilly leaden despondency, which is 
 very hard to struggle against." 
 
 " I am sorry to hear you talk like that, Jack, for one 
 can't help loving the place after all." 
 
 " So I do, God knows. If I didn't I shouldn't care for 
 its shortcomings." 
 
 " Well, the flunkeyism and money-worship were bad 
 enough, but I don't think they were the worst things at 
 least not in my day. Our neglects were almost worse 
 than our worships." 
 
 " You mean the want of all reverence for parents ? 
 Well, perhaps that lies at the root of the false worships. 
 They spring up on the vacant soil." 
 
 " And the want of reverence for women, Jack. The 
 worst of all, to my mind ! " 
 
 " Perhaps you are right. But we are not at the bottom 
 yet." 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 " I mean that we must worship God before we can 
 reverence parents or women, or rout out flunkeyism and 
 money -worship."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 363 
 
 " Yes. But after all, can we fairly lay that sin on Ox- 
 ford ? Surely, whatever may be growing up side by side 
 with it, there's more Christianity here than almost any- 
 where else." 
 
 " Plenty of common-room Christianity belief in a 
 dead God. There, I have never said it to any one but 
 you, but that is the slough we have to get out of. Don't 
 think that I despair for us. We shall do it yet ; but it 
 will be sore work, stripping off the comfortable wine-party 
 religion in which we are wrapped up work for our 
 strongest and our wisest." 
 
 " And yet you think of leaving ? " 
 
 " There are other reasons. I will tell you some day. 
 But now, to turn to other matters, how have you been 
 getting on this last year ? You write so seldom that I am 
 all behindhand." 
 
 " Oh, much the same as usual." 
 
 " Then you are still like one of those who went out to 
 David ? " 
 
 " No, I'm not in debt." 
 
 " But discontented ? " 
 
 " Pretty much like you there, Jack. However, content 
 is no virtue, that I can see, while there's any thing to 
 mend. Who is going to be contented with game-preserv- 
 ing, and corn-laws, and grinding the faces of the poor ? 
 David's camp was a better place than Saul's, any day?" 
 
 Hardy got up, opened a drawer, and took out a bundle 
 of papers, which Tom recognized as the Wesscx Freeman. 
 He felt rather uncomfortable, as his friend seated himself 
 again, and began looking them over. 
 
 " You see what I have here ?" he said. Tom nodded. 
 
 " Well, there are some of the articles I should like to 
 ask you about, if you don't object." 
 
 " No ; go on."
 
 36d TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Here is one, then, to begin with. I wont read it all. 
 Let me see ; here is what I was looking for," and he 
 began reading : " ' One would think, to hear these land- 
 lords, our rulers, talk, that the glorious green fields, the 
 deep woods, the everlasting hills, and the rivers that run 
 among them, were made for the sole purpose of minister- 
 ing to their greedy lusts and mean ambitions ; that they 
 may roll out amongst unrealities their pitiful mock lives, 
 from their silk and lace cradles to their spangled coffins, 
 studded with silver knobs, and lying coats of arms, reaping 
 where they have not sown, and gathering where they 
 have not strewed ; making the omer small and the ephah 
 great, that they may sell the refuse of the wheat ' " 
 
 " That'll do, Jack. But what's the date of that paper ? " 
 
 " July last. Is it yours, then ? " 
 
 " Yes. And I allow it's too strong and one-sided. I 
 have given up writing altogether ; will that satisfy you ? 
 I don't see my own way clear enough yet, but for all that, 
 I'm not ashamed of what I wrote in that paper." 
 
 " I have nothing more to say after that, except that 
 I'm heartily glad you have given up writing for the pres- 
 ent." 
 
 " But, I say, old fellow, how did you get these papers, 
 and know about my articles ? " 
 
 " They were sent me. Shall I burn them now, or 
 would you like to have them ? We needn't say any thing 
 more about them." 
 
 " Burn them, by all means. I suppose a friend sent 
 them to you ? " 
 
 " I suppose so." Hardy went on burning the papers in 
 silence ; and, as Tom watched him, a sudden light seemed 
 to break upon him. 
 
 " I say, Jack," he said, presently, " a little bird has 
 been whispering something to me about that friend."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 365 
 
 Hardy winced a little, and redoubled his diligence in 
 burning the papers. Tom. looked on smiling, and think- 
 ing how to go on now that he had so unexpectedly turned 
 the tables on his monitor, when the clock struck twelve. 
 
 " Hullo ! " he said, getting up ; " time for me to knock 
 out, or old Copas will be in bed. To go back to where 
 we started from to-night as soon as East and Harry 
 Winburn get back we shall have some jolly doings at 
 Englebourn. There'll be a wedding, I hope, and you'll 
 come over and do parson for us, wont you ? " 
 " You mean for Patty ? Of course I will." 
 " The little bird whispered to me that you wouldn't dis- 
 like visiting that part of the old county. Good-night, 
 Jack. I wish you success, old fellow, with all my heart, 
 and I hope after all that you may leave St. Ambrose'^ 
 within the year." 
 
 31*
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 FROM INDIA TO ENGLEBOURN. 
 
 If a knowledge of contemporary history must be 
 reckoned as an important element in the civilization of 
 any people, then I am afraid that the good folk of Engle- 
 bourn must have been content, in the days of our story, 
 with a very low place on the ladder. How, indeed, was 
 knowledge to percolate, so as to reach down to the foun- 
 dations of Englebournian society the stratum upon 
 which all others rest the common agricultural laborer, 
 producer of corn, and other grain, the careful and stolid 
 nurse and guardian of youthful oxen, sheep, and pigs, 
 many of them far better fed and housed than his own 
 children ? All-penetrating as she is, one cannot help 
 wondering that she did not give up Englebourn alto- 
 gether as a hopeless job. 
 
 So far as written periodical instruction is concerned 
 (with the exception of the Quarterly, which Dr. Winter 
 had taken in from its commencement, but rarely opened), 
 the supply was limited to at most half a dozen weekly 
 papers. A London journal, sound in church and state 
 principles, most respectable but not otherwise than heavy, 
 came every Saturday to the Rectory. The Conservative 
 county paper was taken in at the Red Lion ; and David 
 the constable, and the blacksmith, clubbed together to 
 purchase the Liberal paper, by help of which they 
 managed to wage unequal war with the knot of village 
 quidnuncs, who assembled almost nightly at the bar of
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 367 
 
 the Tory beast above referred to, that king of beasts, 
 red indeed in color, but of the truest blue in political 
 principle. Besides these, perhaps three or four more 
 papers were taken by the farmers. But, scanty as the 
 food was, it was quite enough for the mouths ; indeed, 
 when the papers once passed out of the parlors, they had 
 for the most part performed their mission. Few of the 
 farm-servants, male or female, had curiosity or scholar- 
 ship enough to spell through the dreary columns. 
 
 And oral teaching was not much more plentiful, as how 
 was it likely to be ? Englebourn was situated on no 
 trunk road, and the amount of intercourse between it and 
 the rest of the world was of the most limited kind. The 
 rector never left home ; the curate at rare intervals. 
 Most of the farmers went to market once a week, and 
 dined at their ordinary, discussing county politics after 
 their manner, but bringing home little, except as much 
 food and drink as they could cleverly carry. The carrier 
 went to and from Newbury once a week ; but he was a 
 silent man, chiefly bent on collecting and selling butter. 
 The postman, who was deaf, only went as far as the next 
 village. The wagoners drove their masters' produce to 
 market from time to time, and boozed away an hour or 
 two in the kitchen, or tap, or skittle-alley, of some small 
 public-house in the nearest town, while their horses 
 rested. With the above exceptions, probably not one of 
 the villagers strayed ten miles from home, from year's 
 end to year's end. As to visitors, an occasional pedler 
 or small commercial traveller turned up about once a 
 quarter. A few boy3 and girls, more enterprising than 
 their fellows, went out altogether into the world, of their 
 own accord, in the course of the year ; and an occasional 
 burly ploughboy, or carter's boy, was entrapped into 
 taking the queen's shilling by some subtle recruiting
 
 3G8 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 sergeant. But few of these were seen again, except at 
 long intervals. The yearly village feasts, harvest homes, 
 or a meet of the hounds on Englehourn Common, were 
 the most exciting events which in an ordinary way stirred 
 the surface of Englebourn life ; only faintest and most 
 distant murmurs of the din and strife of the great outer 
 world, of wars, and rumors of wars, the fall of govern- 
 ments and the throes of nations, reached that primitive, 
 out-of-the-way little village. 
 
 A change was already showing itself since Miss "Winter 
 had been old enough to look after the schools. The 
 waters were beginning to stir ; and by this time, no doubt, 
 the parish boasts a regular book-hawker and reading- 
 room ; but at that day Englebourn was like one of those 
 small ponds you may find in some nook of a hill-side, 
 the banks grown over with underwood, to which neither 
 man nor beast, scarcely the winds of heaven, have any 
 access. When you have found such a pond you may 
 create a great excitement amongst the easy-going newts 
 and frogs who inhabit it, by throwing in a pebble. The 
 splash in itself is a small splash enough, and the waves 
 which circle away from it are very tiny waves, but they 
 move over the whole face of the pond, and are of more 
 interest to the frogs than a nor-wester in the Atlantic. 
 
 So the approaching return of Harry Winburn, and 
 the story of his doings at the wars, and of the wonderful 
 things he had sent home, stirred Englebourn to its depths. 
 In that small corner of the earth the sergeant was of 
 far more importance than governor-general and com- 
 mander-in-chief. In fact, it was probably the common 
 belief that he was somehow the head of the whole busi- 
 ness ; and India, the war, and all that hung thereon, were 
 looked at and cared for only as they had served to bring 
 him out. So careless were the good folk about every
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 369 
 
 thing in the matter except their own hero, and so won- 
 derful were the romances which soon got abroad about 
 him, that Miss Winter, tired of explaining again and 
 again to the old women without the slightest effect on the 
 parochial faith, bethought her of having a lecture on the 
 subject of India and the war in the parish school-room. 
 
 Full of this idea, she wrote off to Tom, who was the 
 medium of communication on Indian matters, and pro- 
 pounded it to him. The difficulty was, that Mr. AValker 
 the curate, the only person competent to give it, was going 
 away directly for a three weeks' holiday, having arranged 
 with two neighboring curates to take his Sunday duty for 
 him. "What was to be done ? Harry might be back any 
 day, it seemed ; so there was no time to be lost. Could 
 Tom come himself, and help her ? 
 
 Tom could not; but he wrote back to say that his 
 friend Hardy was just getting away from Oxford for the 
 long vacation, and would gladly take Mr. Walker's duty 
 for the three weeks, if Dr. Winter approved, on his way 
 home ; by which arrangement Englebourn would not be 
 without an efficient parson on week days, and she would 
 have the man of all others to help her in utilizing the 
 sergeant's history for the instruction of the bucolic mind. 
 The arrangement, moreover, would be particularly happy, 
 because Hardy had already promised to perform the mar- 
 riage ceremony, which Tom and she had settled would 
 take place at the earliest possible moment after the return 
 of the Indian heroes. 
 
 Dr. Winter was very glad to accept the offer ; and so, 
 when they parted at Oxford, Hardy went to Englebourn, 
 where we must leave him for the present. Tom went 
 home whence, in a few days, he had to hurry down to 
 Southampton to meet the two Harrys. He was much 
 shocked at first to see the state of his old schoolfellow.
 
 370 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 East looked haggard and pale in the face, notwithstanding 
 the sea-voyage. His clothes hung on him as if they had 
 been made for a man of twice his size, and he walked 
 with difficulty by the help of a large stick. But he had 
 lost none of his indomitableness, laughed at Tom's long 
 face, and declared that he felt himself getting better and 
 stronger every day. 
 
 " If you had only seen me at Calcutta, you would sing 
 a different song, eh, Winburn ? " 
 
 Harry Winburn was much changed, and had acquired 
 all the composed and self-reliant look which is so remark- 
 able in a good non-commissioned officer. Readiness to 
 obey and command was stamped on every line of his 
 face ; but it required all his powers of self-restraint to 
 keep within bounds his delight at getting home again. 
 His wound was quite healed, and his health re-established 
 by the voyage ; and, when Tom saw how wonderfully his 
 manners and carriage were improved, and how easily his 
 uniform sat on him, he felt quite sure that all would be 
 soon right at Englebourn, and that Katie and he would 
 be justified in their prophecies and preparations. The 
 invalids had to report themselves in London, and thither 
 the three proceeded together. When this was done, 
 Harry Winburn was sent off at once. He resisted at 
 first, and begged to be allowed to stay with his captain 
 until the captain could go into Berkshire himself. But 
 he was by this time too much accustomed to discipline 
 not to obey a positive order, and was comforted by Tom's 
 assurance that he would not leave East, and would do 
 every thing for him which the sergeant had been ac- 
 customed to do. 
 
 Three days later, as East and Tom were sitting at 
 breakfast, a short note came from Miss Winter, telling of 
 Harry's arrival how the bells were set ringing to wel-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 371 
 
 come him ; how Mr. Hardy had preached the most won- 
 derful sermon on his story the next day ; above all, how 
 Patty had surrendered at discretion, and the banns had 
 been called for the first time. So the sooner they would 
 come down the better as it was very important that no 
 time should be lost, lest some of the old jealousies and 
 quarrels should break out again. Upon reading and con- 
 sidering which letter, East resolved to start for Engle- 
 bourn at once, and Tom to accompany him. 
 
 There was one person to whom Harry's return and 
 approaching wedding was a subject of unmixed joy and 
 triumph, and that was David the constable. He had 
 always been a sincere friend to Harry, and had stood up 
 for him when all the parish respectabilities had turned 
 against him, and had prophesied that he would live to be 
 a credit to the place. So now David felt himself an inch 
 higher as he saw Harry walking about in his uniform 
 with his sweetheart, the admiration of all Englebourn. 
 But, besides all the unselfish pleasure which David 
 enjoyed on his young friend's account, a little piece of 
 private and personal gratification came to him on his own. 
 Ever since Harry's courtship had begun David had felt 
 himself in a false position towards, and had suffered under, 
 old Simon, the rector's gardener. The necessity for 
 keeping the old man in good humor for Harry's sake had 
 always been present to the constable's mind ; and, for the 
 privilege of putting in a good word for his favorite every 
 now and then, he had allowed old Simon to assume an 
 air of superiority over him, and to trample upon him and 
 dogmatize to him, even in the matters of flowers and bees. 
 This had been the more galling to David on account of 
 old Simon's intolerant Toryism, which the constable's soul 
 rebelled against, except in the matter of church music. 
 On this one point they agreed, but even here Simon man-
 
 372 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 aged to be unpleasant. He would lay the whole blame 
 of the changes which had been effected upon David, 
 accusing him of having given in when there was no need. 
 As there was nothing but a wall between the Rectory 
 garden and David's little strip of ground, in which he 
 spent all his leisure time, until the shades of evening sum- 
 moned him to the bar of the Red Lion for his daily pint 
 and pipe, the two were constantly within hearing of one 
 another, and Simon, in times past, had seldom neglected 
 an opportunity of making himself disagreeable to his long- 
 suffering neighbor. 
 
 But now David was a free man again ; and he took 
 the earliest occasion of making the change in his manner 
 apparent to Simon, and of getting, as he called it, " up- 
 sides " with him. One would have thoughf, to look at him, 
 that the old gardener was as pachydermatous as a rhi- 
 noceros ; but somehow he seemed to feel that things had 
 changed between them, and did not appreciate an inter- 
 view with David now nearly so much as of old. So he 
 found very little to do in that part of the garden which 
 abutted on the constable's premises. When he could not 
 help working there, he chose the times at which David 
 was most likely to be engaged, or even took the trouble 
 to ascertain that he was not at home. 
 
 Early on Midsummer-day, old Simon reared his ladder 
 against the boundary wall, with the view of " doctorin' " 
 some of the fruit trees, relying on a parish meeting, at 
 which the constable's presence was required. But he had 
 not more than half finished his operations before David 
 returned from vestry, and, catching sight of the top of the 
 ladder and Simon's head above the wall, laid aside all 
 other business, and descended into the garden. 
 
 Simon kept on at his work, only replying by a jerk of 
 the head and one of his grunts to his neighbor's salu- 
 tation.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 373 
 
 David took his coat off, and his pruning-knife out, and, 
 establishing himself within easy shot of his old oppressor, 
 opened fire at once, 
 
 " Thou'st gi'en thy consent then ? " 
 
 " 'Tis no odds, consent or none her's old enough to 
 hev her own waay." 
 
 " But thou'st gi'en thy consent ? " 
 
 " Ees, then, if thou wilt hev't," said Simon, surlily ; 
 "wut then?" 
 
 " So I heerd," said David, indulging in an audible 
 chuckle. 
 
 " What bist a laughin' at ? " 
 
 " I be laughin' to think how folks changes. Do'st mind 
 the hard things as thou hast judged and said o' Harry ? 
 Not as ever I Known thy judgment to be o' much account, 
 'cept about roots. But thou saidst, times and times, as a 
 would come to the gallows." 
 
 " So a med yet so a med yet," answered Simon. 
 " Not but wut I wishes well to un, and bears no grudges ; 
 but others as hev got the law ov un medn't." 
 
 " 'Tis he as hev got grudges to bear. He don't need 
 none o' thy forgiveness." 
 
 " Pr'aps a medn't. But hev 'em got the law ov un, or 
 hevn't 'em ?" 
 
 " Wut do'st mean : got the law ov un ? " 
 
 " Thaay warrants as wur out agen un, along wi' the 
 rest as was transpworted auver Farmer Tester's job." 
 
 " 01), he've got no call to be afeard o' thaay now. Thou 
 know'^t I hears how 'tis laid down at Sessions and 'Sizes, 
 wher' I've a been this twenty year." 
 
 " Like enuff. Only, wut's to hinder thaay tryin' ov un, 
 if thaay be minded to't? That's wut I wants to know." 
 
 " 'Tis wut the counsellors calls the Statut o' Lamenta- 
 tions," said the constable, proudly. 
 32
 
 374 TOM BttOWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Wutever's Lamentations got to do wi't ? " 
 
 " A gurt deal, I tell 'ee. What do'st thou know o' 
 Lamentations ? " 
 
 " Lamentations cums afore Ezekiel in the Bible." 
 
 " That aint no kin to the Statu t o' Lamentations. But 
 there's summut like to't in the Bible," said the constable, 
 stopping his work to consider a moment. " Do'st mind 
 the year when the land wur all to be guv back to they 
 as owned it fust, and debts wur to be wiped out?" 
 
 " Ees, I minds summut o' that." 
 
 " Well, this here statut says, if so be as a man hev bin 
 to the wars, and sarved his country like, as nothin' sha'n't 
 be reckoned agen he, let alone murder : nothin' can't do 
 away wi' murder." 
 
 " No, nor oughtn't. Hows'mdever, you seems clear 
 about the law on't. There's miss a callin'." 
 
 And old Simon's head disappeared as he descended the 
 ladder to answer the summons of his young mistress, not 
 displeased at having his fears as to the safety of his future 
 son-in-law set at rest by so eminent a legal authority as 
 the constable. Fortunately for Harry, the constable's 
 law was not destined to be tried. Young Wurley was 
 away in London. Old Tester was bedridden with an 
 accumulation of diseases brought on by his bad life. His 
 illness made him more violent and tyrannical than ever; 
 but he could do little harm out of his own room, for no 
 one ever went to see him, and the wretched farm-servant 
 who attended him was much too frightened to tell him 
 any thing of what was going on in the parish. There was 
 no one else to revive proceedings against Harry. 
 
 David pottered on at his bees and his flowers till old 
 Simon returned, and ascended his ladder again. 
 
 " You be ther' still, be 'ee ? " he said, as soon as he saw 
 David.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 375 
 
 " Ees. Any news ? " 
 
 "Ah, news enuff. He as wur Harry's captain and 
 young Mr. Brown be comin' down to-morrow, and hev 
 tuk all the Red Lion to theirselves. And thaay beant 
 content to wait for banns not thaay and so ther's to be 
 a license got for Saturday. 'Tain't scarce decent, that 
 'tain't." 
 
 " 'Tis best to get drough wi't," said the constable. 
 
 " Then nothin'll sarve 'em but the church must be hung 
 wi' flowers, and wher' be thaay to cum from without strip- 
 ping and starving ov my beds ? 'Tis shameful to see 
 how folks acts wi' flowers now-a-days, a cuttin' on 'em 
 and puttin' on 'em about, as prodigal as though thaay 
 growed o' theirselves." 
 
 " So 'tis, shameful," said David, whose sympathies for 
 flowers were all with Simon. "I heers tell as young 
 Squire Wurley hevs 'em on table at dinner-time instead 
 o' the wittles." 
 
 " Do'ee though ! I calls it reg'lar papistry, and so I 
 tells miss ; but her only laughs." 
 
 The constable shook his head solemnly as he replied, 
 " Her've been led away wi' such doin's ever since Mr. 
 Walker cum, and look to organ-playin' and chantin'." 
 
 " And he aint no sich gurt things in the pulpit neether, 
 aint Mr. Walker," chimed in Simon (the two had not 
 been so in harmony for years). " I reckon as he aint 
 nothin' to speak ov alongside o' this here new un as hev 
 tuk his place. He've got a deal o' move in un, he hev." 
 
 " Ah, so a hev. A wunnerful sight o' things a telled 
 us t'other night about the Indians and the wars." 
 
 " Ah ! talking cums as nat'ral to he as buttermilk to a 
 litterin' sow." 
 
 " Thou should'st a heerd un, though, about the battles 
 I can't mind the names on 'em let me zee "
 
 376 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I dwun't vally the neames," interrupted Simon. 
 u They makes a deal o' fuse ouver't aall, but I dwunt tek 
 no account on't. 'Taint like the owld wars and fightin' o' 
 the French, this here fightin' wi' blackamooes, let 'em 
 talk as tbaay wool." 
 
 " No more 'tain't. But 'twur a 'mazin' fine talk as he 
 gi'n us. Hev'ee seed ought 'twixt he and young missus ?" 
 
 " Nothin' out o' th' common. I got plenty to do with- 
 out lookin' arter the women, and 'tain't no bisness o' mine, 
 nor o' thine neether." 
 
 David was preparing a stout rejoinder to this rebuke 
 of the old retainer of the Winter family on his curiosity, 
 but was summoned by his wife to the house to attend a 
 customer ; and by the time he could get out again Simon 
 had disappeared. 
 
 The next day East and Tom arrived, and took posses- 
 sion of the Red Lion ; and Englebourn was soon in a 
 ferment of preparation for the wedding. East was not 
 the man to do things by halves ; and, seconded as he was 
 by Miss Winter and Hardy and Tom, had soon made 
 arrangements for all sorts of merry-making. The school- 
 children were to have a whole holiday, and, after scatter- 
 ing flowers at church and marching in the bridal proces- 
 sion, were to be entertained in a tent pitched in the home 
 paddock of the Rectory, and to have an afternoon of 
 games and prizes, and tea and cake. The bell-ringers, 
 Harry's old comrades, were to have five shillings apiece, 
 and a cricket match, and a dinner afterwards at the 
 second public-house, to which any other of his old friends 
 whom Harry chose to ask were to be also invited. The 
 old men and women were to be fed in the village school- 
 room ; and East and Tom were to entertain a select party 
 of the farmers and tradesmen at the Red Lion, the tap of 
 which hostelry was to be thrown open to all comers at the
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 377 
 
 captain's expense. It was not without considerable 
 demur on the part of Miss Winter that some of these 
 indiscriminate festivities were allowed to pass. But after 
 consulting with Hardy she relented, on condition that the 
 issue of beer at the two public-houses should be put 
 under the control of David the constable, who, on his 
 part, promised that law and order should be well repre- 
 sented and maintained on the occasion. " Arter all, miss, 
 you sees 'tis only for once in a waay," he said, " and 
 'twill make 'em remember aal as hev bin said to 'em 
 about the Indians, and the rest on't." So the captain 
 and his abettors, having gained the constable as an ally, 
 prevailed ; and Englebourn, much wondering at itself, 
 made ready for a general holiday. 
 32*
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE WEDDING-DAT. 
 
 One more poor man un-done 
 One more poor man un-done. 
 
 The belfry-tower rocked and reeled, as that peal rang 
 out, now merry, now scornful, now plaintive, from those 
 narrow belfry windows, into the bosom of the soft south- 
 west wind, which was playing round the old gray tower 
 of Englebourn church. And the wind caught the peal 
 and played with it, and bore it away over Rectory and vil- 
 lage street, and many a homestead, and gently waving 
 field of ripening corn, and rich pasture and Avater-meadow, 
 and tall whispering woods of the Grange, and rolled 
 it against the hill-side, and up the slope past the clump of 
 firs on the Hawk's Lynch, till it died away on the wild 
 stretches of common beyond. 
 
 The ringers bent lustily to their work. There had 
 been no such ringing in Englebourn since the end of the 
 great war. Not content with the usual peal out of church, 
 they came back again and again in the afternoon, full of 
 the good cheer which had been provided for them ; and 
 again and again the wedding-peal rang out from the bel- 
 fry in honor of their old comrade 
 
 One more poor man un-done 
 One more poor man un-done. 
 
 Such was the ungallant speech which for many gen-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 379 
 
 erations had been attributed to the Englebourn weddinjr- 
 bells ; and when you had once caught the words as 
 you would be sure to do from some wide-mouthed, grin- 
 ning boy, lounging over the churchyard rails to see the 
 wedding pass it would be impossible to persuade your- 
 self that they did, in fact, say any thing else. Somehow, 
 Harry Winburn bore his undoing in the most heroic man- 
 ner, and did his duty throughout the trying day, as a non- 
 commissioned officer and bridegroom should. The only 
 part of the performance arranged by his captain which 
 he fairly resisted, was the proposed departure of himself 
 and Patty to the station in the solitary post-chaise of En- 
 glebourn a real old yellow with a pair of horses. 
 East, after hearing the sergeant's pleading on the subject 
 of vehicles, at last allowed them to drive off in a tax-cart, 
 taking a small boy with them behind, to bring it back. 
 
 As for the festivities, they went off without a hitch, as 
 such affairs will, where the leaders of the revels have 
 their hearts in them. The children had all played, and 
 romped, and eaten, and drunk themselves into a state of 
 torpor by an early hour of the evening. The farmers' 
 dinner was a decided success. East proposed the health 
 of the bride and bridegroom, and was followed by Farmer 
 Grove and the constable. David turned out in a new 
 blue swallow-tailed coat, with metal buttons, of his own 
 fabulous cut, in honor of the occasion. He and the 
 farmer spoke like the leader of the Government and the 
 Opposition in the House of Commons on an address to 
 the Crown. There was not a pin to choose between their 
 speeches, and a stranger hearing them would naturally 
 have concluded that Harry had never been any thing but 
 the model boy and young man of the parish. Fortu- 
 nately, the oratorical powers of Englebourn ended here ; 
 and East, and the majority of his guests, adjourned to the
 
 380 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 green where the cricket was in progress. Each game 
 lasted a very short time only, as the youth of Englebourn 
 were not experts in the noble science, and lost their 
 wickets one after another so fast, that Tom and Hardy 
 had time to play out two matches with them, and then to 
 retire on their laurels, while the afternoon was yet young. 
 
 The old folk in the village school-room enjoyed their 
 beef and pudding, under the special superintendence of 
 Miss Winter, and then toddled to their homes, and sat 
 about in the warmest nooks they could find, mumbling of 
 old times, and the doings at Dr. Winter's wedding. 
 
 David devoted himself to superintending the issue of 
 beer, swelling with importance, but so full of the milk of 
 human kindness from the great event of the day that no- 
 body minded his little airs. He did his duty so satisfac- 
 torily that, with the exception of one or two regular 
 confirmed soakers, who stuck steadily to the tap of the 
 Red Lion, and there managed successfully to fuddle them- 
 selves, there was nothing like drunkenness. In short, it 
 was one of those rare days when every thing goes right, 
 and everybody seems to be inclined to give and take, and 
 to make allowances for their neighbors. By degrees the 
 cricket flagged, and most of the men went off to sit over 
 their pipes, and finish the evening in their own way. 
 The boys and girls took to playing at kissing in the ring ; 
 and the children who had not already gone home sat in 
 groups watching them. 
 
 Miss Winter had already disappeared, and Tom, Hardy, 
 and the captain, began to feel that they might consider 
 their part finished. They strolled together off the green 
 towards Hardy's lodgings, the Red Lion being still in the 
 possession of East's guests. 
 
 " Well, how do you think it all went off? " asked he. 
 
 * Nothing could have been better," said Hardy ; " and
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 381 
 
 they all seem so inclined to be reasonable that I don't 
 think we shall even have a roaring song along the street 
 to-night when the Red Lion shuts up." 
 
 " And are you satisfied, Tom ? " 
 
 " I should think so. I have been hoping for this day 
 any time this four years, and now it has come and gone 
 off well, too, thanks to you, Harry." 
 
 "Thanks to me? Very good; I am open to any 
 amount of gratitude." 
 
 " I think you have every reason to be satisfied with 
 your second day's work at Englebourn, at any rate." 
 
 " So I am. I only hope it may turn out as well as the 
 first." 
 
 " Oh, there's no doubt about that." 
 
 " I don't know. I rather believe in the rule of con- 
 traries." 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 " Why, when you inveigled me over from Oxford, and 
 we carried off the sergeant from the authorities, and de- 
 feated the yeomanry in that tremendous thunder-storm, I 
 thought we were a couple of idiots, and deserved a week 
 each in the lock-up for our pains. That business turned 
 out well. This time we have started with flying colors, 
 and bells ringing, and so " 
 
 "This business will turn out better. Why not?" 
 
 " Then let us manage a third duy's work in these parts 
 as soon as possible. I should like to get to the third 
 degree of comparison, and perhaps the superlative .will 
 turn up trumps for me somehow. Are there many more 
 young women in the place as pretty as Mrs. Winburn ? 
 This marrying complaint is very catching, I find." 
 
 " There's my Cousin Katie," said Tom, looking stealth- 
 ily at Hardy ; " I wont allow that there's any face in 
 the country-side to match hers. What do you say, Jack ? "
 
 382 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Hardy was confused by this sudden appeal. 
 
 " I haven't been long enough here to judge," he said. 
 " I have always thought Miss Winter very beautiful. I 
 see it is nearly seven o'clock, and I have a call or two to 
 make in the village. I should think you ought to get 
 some rest after this tiring day, Captain East." 
 
 " What are you going to do, Tom ? " 
 
 " Well, I was thinking of just throwing a fly over the 
 mill tail. There's such a fine head of water on." 
 
 " Isn't it too bright ? " 
 
 " Well, perhaps it is a little : marrying weather and 
 fishing weather don't agree. Only what else is there to 
 do ? But if you are tired," he added, looking at East, 
 " I don't care a straw about it. I shall stay with you." 
 
 " Not a bit of it. I shall hobble down with you, and 
 lie on the bank and smoke a cheroot." 
 
 " No, you sha'n't walk, at any rate. I can borrow the 
 constable's pony, old Nibble, the quietest beast in the 
 world. He'll stand for a week if we like while I fish and 
 you lie and look on. I'll be off, and bring him round in 
 two minutes." 
 
 " Then we shall meet for a clumsy tea at nine at my 
 lodgings," said Hardy, as he went off to his pastoral 
 duties. 
 
 Tom and East, in due time, found themselves by the 
 side of the stream. There was only a small piece of fish- 
 able water in Englebourn. The fine stream, which, a 
 mile or so below, in the Grange grounds, might be called 
 a river, came into respectable existence only about two 
 hundred yards above Englebourn mill. Here two little 
 chalk brooks met, and former millers had judiciously 
 deepened the channel, and dammed the united waters 
 back so as to get a respectable reservoir. Above the 
 junction the little weedy, bright, creeping brooks, afforded
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 383 
 
 good sport for small truants groppling about with their 
 hands, or bobbing with lobworms under the hollow banks, 
 but were not available for the scientific angler. The 
 parish ended at the fence next below the mill garden, on 
 the other side of which the land was part of the Grange 
 estate. So there was just the piece of still water above 
 the mill, and the one field below it, over which Tom had 
 leave. On ordinary occasions this would have been 
 enough, with careful fishing, to last him till dark ; but his 
 nerves were probably somewhat excited by the events of 
 the day, and East sat near and kept talking ; so he got 
 over his water faster than usual. At any rate, he had 
 arrived for the second time at the envious fence before 
 the sun was down. The fish were wondrous wary in the 
 miller's bit of water as might be expected, for they led 
 a dog of a life there, between the miller and his men, and 
 their nets, and baits of all kinds always set. So Tom 
 thought himself lucky to get a couple of decent fish, the 
 only ones that were moving within his liberty ; but he 
 could not help looking with covetous eyes on the fine 
 stretch of water below, all dimpling with rises. 
 
 " Why don't you get over and fish below ? " said East, 
 from his seat on the bank ; " don't mind me. I can 
 watch you from here ; besides, lying on the turf on such 
 an evening is luxury enough by itself." 
 
 " I can't go. Both sides below belong to that fellow 
 Wurley." 
 
 " The sergeant's amiable landlord and prosecutor ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and the yeoman with whom you exchanged 
 shots on the common." 
 
 " Hang it, Tom, just jump over and catch a brace of 
 his trout. Look how they are rising." 
 
 " No. I don't know. I never was very particular
 
 384 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 about poaching, but somehow I shouldn't like to do it on 
 his land. I don't like him well enough." 
 
 " You're right, I believe. But, just look there. There's 
 a whopper rising not more than ten yards below the rail. 
 You migbt reach him, I think, without trespassing, from 
 where you stand." 
 
 " Shall I have a shy at him?" 
 
 " Yes ; it can't be poaching if you don't go on his 
 ground." 
 
 Tom could not resist the temptation, and threw over 
 the rails, which crossed the stream from hedge to hedge 
 to mark the boundaries of the parish, until he got well 
 over the place where the fish was rising. 
 
 " There, that was at your fly," said East, hobbling up 
 in great excitement. 
 
 " All right, I shall have him directly. There he is. 
 Hullo ! Harry, I say ! Splash with your stick. Drive 
 the brute back. Bad luck to him. Look at that ! " 
 
 The fish when hooked had come straight up-stream 
 towards his captor, and, notwithstanding East's attempts 
 to frighten him back, had rushed in under the before- 
 mentioned rails, which were adorned with jagged nails, 
 to make crossing on them unpleasant for the Englebourn 
 boys. Against one of these Tom's line severed, and the 
 waters closed over two beauteous flies, and some six feet 
 of lovely taper gut. 
 
 East laughed loud and merrily ; and Tom, crestfallen 
 as he was, was delighted to hear the old ring coming back 
 into his friend's voice. 
 
 " Harry, old fellow, you're picking up already in this 
 glorious air." 
 
 " Of course I am. Two or three more weddings and 
 fishings will set me up altogether. How could you be
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 385 
 
 so green as to throw over those rails ? It's a proper les- 
 son to you, Tom, for poaching." 
 
 " Well, that's cool. Didn't I throw down-stream to 
 please you ? " 
 
 " You ought to have resisted temptation. But, I say, 
 what are you at ? " 
 
 " Putting on another cast, of course." 
 
 " Why, you're not going on to Wurley's land ? " 
 
 " No ; I suppose not. I must try the mill tail again." 
 
 " It's no good. You've tried it over twice, and I'm 
 getting hored." 
 
 " Well, what shall we do, then ? " 
 
 " I've a mind to get up to the hill there to see the sun 
 set what's its name ? where I waited with the cavalry 
 that night, you know." 
 
 " Oh ! the Hawk's Lynch. Come along, then ; I'm 
 your man." 
 
 So Tom put up his rod, and caught the old pony, and 
 the two friends were soon on their way towards the com- 
 mon, through lanes at the back of the village. 
 
 The wind had sunk to sleep as the shadows lengthened. 
 There was no sound abroad except that of Nibble's hoofs 
 on the turf, not even the hum of insects; for the few 
 persevering gnats, who were still dancing about in the 
 slanting glints of sunshine that struck here and there 
 across the lanes, had left off humming. Nothing living 
 met them, except an occasional stag-beetle, steering clum- 
 sily down the lane, and seeming, like a heavy coaster, to 
 have as much as he could fairly manage in keeping clear 
 of them. They walked on in silence for some time, 
 which was broken at last by East. 
 
 " I haven't had time to tell you about my future pros- 
 pects." 
 
 " How do you mean ? lias any thing happened ?" 
 33
 
 386 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Yes. I got a letter two days ago from New Zealand, 
 where I find I am a considerable landowner. A cousin 
 of mine has died out there and left me his property." 
 
 " Well, you're not going to leave England, surely ?" 
 
 " Yes, I am. The doctors say the voyage will do me 
 good, and the climate is just the one to suit me. What's 
 the good of my staying here ? I sha'n't be fit for service 
 again for years. I shall go on half-pay, and become an 
 enterprising agriculturist at the Antipodes. I've spoken 
 to the sergeant, and arranged that he and his wife shall 
 go with me ; so, as soon as I can get his discharge, and 
 he has done honeymooning, we shall start. I wish you 
 would come with us." 
 
 Tom could scarcely believe his ears ; but soon found 
 that East was in earnest, and had an answer to all his re- 
 monstrances. Indeed, he had very little to say against 
 the plan, for it jumped with his own humor ; and he 
 could not help admitting that, under the circumstances, it 
 was a wise one, and that, with Harry Winburn for his 
 head man, East couldn't do better than carry it out. 
 
 " I knew you would soon come round to it," said the 
 captain ; " what could I do dawdling about at home, with 
 just enough money to keep me and get me into mischief? 
 There I shall have a position and an object ; and one 
 may be of some use, and make one's mark in a new coun- 
 try. And we'll get a snug berth ready for you by the 
 time you're starved out of the old country. England isn't 
 the place for poor men with any go in them." 
 
 " I believe you're right, Harry," said Tom, mournfully. 
 
 "I know I am. And in a few years, when we've 
 made our fortunes, we'll come back and have a look at the 
 old country, and perhaps buy up half Englebourn, and 
 lay our bones in the old churchyard."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 387 
 
 " And if we don't make our fortunes ? " 
 
 " Then we'll stay out there." 
 
 " Well, if I were my own master I think I should make 
 one with you. But I could never leave my father and 
 mother, or or " 
 
 " Oh, I understand. Of course, if matters go all right 
 iu that quarter, I have nothing more to say. But, from 
 what you have told me, I thought you might be glad of a 
 regular break in your life, a new start in a new world." 
 
 " Very likely I may. I should have said so myself 
 this morning. But somehow I feel to-night more hopeful 
 than I have for years." 
 
 " Those wedding-chimes are running in your head." 
 
 " Yes ; and they have lifted a load off my heart too. 
 Four years ago I was very near doing the greatest wrong 
 a man can do to that girl who was married to-day, and to 
 that fine fellow her husband, who was the first friend I 
 ever had. Ever since then I have been doing my best to 
 set matters straight, and have often made them crookeder. 
 But to-day they are all straight, thank God, and I feel as 
 if a chain were broken from off my neck. All has come 
 right for them, and perhaps my own turn will come before 
 long." 
 
 " To be sure it will. I must be introduced to a certain 
 young lady before we start. I shall tell her that I don't 
 mean to give up hopes of seeing her on the other side of 
 the world." 
 
 " Well, here we are on the common. What a glorious 
 sunset ! Come, stir up, Nibble. We shall be on the 
 Lynch just in time to see him dip if we push on." 
 
 Kibble, that ancient pony, finding that there was no 
 help for it, scrambled up the greater part of the ascent 
 successfully. But his wheezings and roarings during the 
 operation excited East's pity. So he dismounted when
 
 388 
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 they came to the foot of the Hawk's Lynch, and, tying 
 Nibble's bridle to a furze bush, a most unnecessary pre- 
 caution, set to work to scale the last and steepest bit of 
 the ascent with the help of his stick and Tom's strong 
 arm. 
 
 They paused every ten paces or so to rest and look at 
 the sunset. The broad vale below lay in purple shadow ; 
 the soft flocks of little clouds high up over their heads, 
 and stretching away to the eastern horizon, floated in a 
 sea of rosy light ; and the stems of the Scotch firs stood 
 out like columns of ruddy flame. 
 
 " Why, this beats India," said East, putting up his 
 hand to shade his eyes, which were fairly dazzled by the 
 blaze. " What a contrast to the last time I was up here ! 
 Do you remember that awful black-blue sky ? " 
 
 " Don't I ? Like a nightmare. Hullo ! who's here ? " 
 
 " Why, if it isn't the parson and Miss Winter ! " said 
 East, smiling. 
 
 True enough, there they were, standing together on the 
 very verge of the mound, beyond the firs, some ten yards 
 in front of the last comers, looking out into the sunset. 
 
 " I say, Tom, another good omen," whispered East ; 
 " hadn't we better beat a retreat ? " 
 
 Before Tom could answer, or make up his mind what 
 to do, Hardy turned his head and caught sight of them, 
 and then Katie turned too, blushing like the little clouds 
 overhead. It was an embarrassing moment. Tom stam- 
 mered out that they had come up quite by chance, and 
 then set to work, well seconded by East, to look des- 
 perately unconscious, and to expatiate on the beauties of 
 the view. The light began to fade, and the little clouds 
 to change again from soft pink to gray, and the evening 
 star shone out clear as they turned to descend the hill, 
 when the Englebourn clock chimed nine.
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 389 
 
 Katie attached herself to Tom, while Hardy helped the 
 captain down the steep pitch, and on to the back of Nib- 
 ble. They went a little ahead. Tom was longing to 
 speak to his cousin, but could not tell how to begin. ' At 
 last Katie broke silence, 
 
 " I am so vexed that this should have happened ! " 
 
 " Are you, dear ? So am not I," he said, pressing her 
 arm to his side. 
 
 "But I mean, it seems so forward as if I had met 
 Mr. Hardy here on purpose. What will your friend 
 think of me?" 
 
 " He will think no evil." 
 
 " But indeed, Tom, do tell him, pray. It was quite an 
 accident. You know how I and Mary used to go up the 
 Hawk's Lynch whenever we could, on fine evenings." 
 
 " Yes, dear, I know it well." 
 
 "And I thought of you both so much to-day, that I 
 couldn't help coming up here." 
 
 " And you found Hardy ? I don't wonder. I should 
 come up to see the sun set every night, if I lived at 
 Englebourn." 
 
 " No. He came up some time after me. Straight up 
 the hill. I did not see him till he was quite close. I 
 could not run away then. Indeed, it was not five minutes 
 before you came." 
 
 " Five minutes are as good as a year sometimes." 
 
 " And you will tell your friend, Tom, how it happened ?" 
 
 " Indeed I will, Katie. May I not tell him something 
 more ? " 
 
 He looked round for an answer, and there was just 
 light enough to read it in her eyes. 
 
 " My debt is deepening to the Hawk's Lynch," he said, 
 as they walked on through the twilight- " Blessed five 
 minutes ! Whatever else they may take with them, they 
 33*
 
 390 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 will cany my thank9 forever. Look how clear and 
 steady the light of that star is, just over the church tower. 
 I wonder whether Mary is at a great hot dinner. Shall 
 you write to her soon ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes. To-night." 
 
 " You may tell her that there is no better Englishman 
 walking the earth than my friend, John Hardy. Here 
 we are at his lodgings. East and I are going to tea with 
 him. Wish them good-night, and I will see you home."
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 A MEETING IN THE STREET. 
 
 From the Englebourn festivities Tom and East re- 
 turned to London. The captain was bent on starting for 
 his possessions in the South Pacific ; and, as he regained 
 strength, energized over all his preparations, and went 
 about in cabs purchasing agricultural implements, some- 
 times by the light of nature, and sometimes under the 
 guidance of Harry Winburn. He invested also in some- 
 thing of a library, and in large quantities of saddlery. 
 In short, packages of all kinds began to increase and 
 multiply upon him. Then there was the selecting a ves- 
 sel, and all the negotiations with the ship's husband as to 
 terms, and the business of getting introduced to, and con- 
 ferring with, people from the colony, or who were sup- 
 posed to know something about it. Altogether, East had 
 plenty of work on his hands ; and, the more he had to 
 do, the better and more cheery he became. 
 
 Tom, on the contrary, was rather lower than usual. 
 His half-formed hopes, that some good luck was going to 
 happen to him after Patty's marriage, were beginning to 
 grow faint, and the contrast of his friend's definite present 
 purpose in life with his own uncertainty, made him more 
 or less melancholy in spite of all his efforts. His father 
 had offered him a tour abroad, now that he had finished 
 with Oxford, urging that he seemed to want a change to 
 freshen him up before buckling to a profession, and that
 
 392 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 he would never, in all likelihood, have such another 
 chance. But he could not make up his mind to accept 
 the offer. The attraction to London was too strong for 
 him ; and, though he saw little hope of any thing happen- 
 ing to improve his prospects, he could not keep away 
 from it. He spent most of his time when not with East 
 in haunting the neighborhood of Mr. Porter's house in 
 Belgravia, and the places where he was likely to catch 
 distant glimpses of Mary, avoiding all chance of actual 
 meeting or recognition, from which he shrank in his 
 present frame of mind. 
 
 The nearest approach to the flame which he allowed 
 himself was a renewal of his old friendship with Grey, 
 who was still working on in his Westminster rookery. 
 He had become a great favorite with Mrs. Porter, who 
 was always trying to get him to her house to feed him 
 properly, and was much astonished, and sometimes almost 
 provoked, at the small success of her hospitable endeav- 
 ors. Grey was so taken up with his own pursuits that it 
 did not occur to him to be surprised that he never met 
 Tom at the house of his relations. He was innocent of 
 all knowledge or suspicion of the real state of things, so 
 that Tom could talk to him with perfect freedom about his 
 uncle's household, picking up all such scraps of informa- 
 tion as Grey possessed without compromising himself or 
 feeling shy. 
 
 Thus the two old schoolfellows lived on together after 
 their return from Englebourn, in a set of chambers in the 
 Temple, which one of Tom's college friends, who had 
 been beguiled from the perusal of Stephens' Commen- 
 taries, and aspirations after the woolsack, by the offer of 
 a place on board a yacht and a cruise to Norway, had for- 
 tunately lent him. 
 
 We join company with our hero again on a fine July
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 593 
 
 morning. Readers will begin to think that, at any rate, 
 lie is always blessed with fine weather whatever troubles 
 he may have to endure ; but, if we are not to have fine 
 weather in novels, when and where are we to have it? 
 It was a fine July morning, then, and the streets were 
 already beginning to feel sultry as he worked his way 
 westward. Grey, who had never given up hopes of 
 bringing Tom round to his own views, had not neglected 
 the opportunities which this residence in town offered, 
 and had enlisted Tom's services on more than one occasion. 
 He had found him specially useful in instructing the big 
 boys, whom he was trying to bring together and civilize 
 in a " Young Men's Club," in the rudiments of cricket 
 on Saturday evenings. But on the morning in question 
 an altogether different work was on hand. 
 
 A lady, living some eight or nine miles to the north- 
 west of London, who took great interest in Grey's doings, 
 had asked him to bring the children of his night-school 
 down to spend a day in her grounds, and this was the 
 happy occasion. It was before the days of cheap ex- 
 cursions by rail, so that vans had to be found for the 
 party ; and Grey had discovered a benevolent remover of 
 furniture in Paddington, who was ready to take them at 
 a reasonable figure. The two vans, with awnings and 
 curtains in the height of the fashion, and horses with 
 tasselled ear-caps, and every thing handsome about them, 
 were already drawn up in the midst of a group of excited 
 children, and scarcely less excited mothers, when Tom 
 arrived. Grey was arranging his forces, and laboring to 
 reduce the Irish children, who formed almost half of his 
 ragged little flock, into something like order before start- 
 ing. By degrees this was managed, and Tom was placed 
 in command of the rear van, while Grey reserved the 
 leading one to himself. The children were divided, and
 
 394 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 warned not to lean over the sides and tumble tut a 
 somewhat superfluous caution, as most of them, though 
 unused to riding in any legitimate manner, were pretty 
 well used to balancing themselves behind any vehicle 
 which offered as much as a spike to sit on, out of sight of 
 the driver. Then came the rush into the vans. Grey 
 and Tom took up their places next the doors as conduct- 
 ors, and the procession lumbered off with great success, 
 and much shouting from treble voices. 
 
 Tom soon found that he had plenty of work on his 
 hands to keep the peace amongst his flock. The Irish 
 element was in a state of wild effervescence, and he had 
 to draft them down to his own end, leaving the foremost 
 part of the van to the soberer English children. He was 
 much struck by the contrast of the whole set to the En- 
 glebourn school children, whom he had lately seen under 
 somewhat similar circumstances. The difficulty with 
 them had been to draw them out, and put any thing like 
 life into them ; here, all he had to do was to repress the 
 superabundant life. However, the vans held on their 
 way, and got safely into the suburbs, and so at last to an 
 occasional hedge, and a suspicion of trees, and green fields 
 beyond. 
 
 It became more and more difficult now to keep the boys 
 in ; and, when they came to a hill, where the horses had 
 to walk, he yielded to their entreaties, and, opening the 
 door, let them out, insisting only that the girls should re- 
 main seated. They scattered over the sides of the roads, 
 and up the banks ; now chasing pigs and fowls up to the 
 very doors of their owners ; now gathering the commonest 
 road-side weeds, and running up to show them to him, 
 and ask their names, as if they were rare treasures. The 
 ignorance of most of the children as to the commonest 
 country matters astonished him. One small boy par-
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFOUD. 39o 
 
 ticularly came back time after time to ask him, with 
 solemn face, "Please, sir, is this the country?" and, 
 when, at last he allowed that it was, rejoined, " Then, 
 please, where are the nuts ? " 
 
 The clothing of most of the Irish boys began to tumble 
 to pieces in an alarming manner. Grey had insisted on 
 their being made tidy for the occasion, but the tidiness 
 was of a superficial kind. The hasty stitching soon began 
 to give way, and they were rushing about with wild locks 
 the strips of what once might have been nether gar- 
 ments hanging about their legs; their feet and heads bare, 
 the shoes which their mothers had borrowed for the state 
 occasion having been deposited under the seat of the van. 
 So, when the procession arrived at the trim lodge-gates of 
 their hostess, and his charge descended and fell in on the 
 beautifully clipped turf at the side of the drive, Tom felt 
 some of the sensations of Falstaff when he had to lead 
 his ragged regiment through Coventry streets. 
 
 He was soon at his ease again, and enjoyed the day 
 thoroughly, and the drive home ; but, as they drew near 
 town again, a sense of discomfort and shyness came over 
 him, and he wished the journey to Westminster well over, 
 and hoped that the carmen would have the sense to go 
 through the quiet parts of the town. 
 
 He was much disconcerted, consequently, when the 
 vans came to a sudden stop, opposite one of the park 
 entrances, in the Bayswater road. " What in the world 
 is Grey about?" he thought, as he saw him get out, and 
 all the children after him. So he got out himself, and 
 went forward to get an explanation. 
 
 " Oh, I have told the man that he need not drive us 
 round to Westminster. He is close at home here ; and 
 his horses have had a hard day ; so we can just get out 
 and walk home."
 
 396 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " What, across the park ? " asked Tom. 
 
 " Yes, it will amuse the children, you know." 
 
 " But they're tired," persisted Tom ; " come now, it's 
 all nonsense letting the fellow off; he's bound to take us 
 back." 
 
 " I'm afraid I have promised him," said Grey ; " be- 
 sides, the children all think it a treat. Don't you all 
 want to walk across the park ? " he went on, turning to 
 them, and a general affirmative chorus was the answer. 
 So Tom had nothing for it but to shrug his shoulders, 
 empty his own van, and follow into the park with his con- 
 voy, not in the best humor with Grey for having arranged 
 this ending to their excursion. 
 
 They might have got over a third of the distance be- 
 tween the Bayswater road and the Serpentine, when he 
 was aware of a small thin voice addressing him. 
 
 " Oh, please, wont you carry me a bit ? I'm so tired," 
 said the voice. He turned in some trepidation to look 
 for the speaker, and found her to be a sickly undergrown 
 little girl of ten or thereabouts, with large pleading gray 
 eyes, very shabbily dressed, and a little lame. He had 
 remarked her several times in the course of the day, not 
 for any beauty or grace about her, for the poor child had 
 none, but for her transparent confidence and trustfulness. 
 After dinner, as they had been all sitting on the grass un- 
 der the shade of a great elm to hear Grey read a story, 
 and Tom had been sitting a little apart from the rest with 
 his back against the trunk, she had come up and sat 
 quietly down by him, leaning on his knee. Then he had 
 seen her go up and take the hand of the lady who had 
 entertained them, and walk along by her, talking without 
 the least shyness. Soon afterwards she had squeezed into 
 the swing by the side of the beautifully dressed little 
 daughter of the same lady, who, after looking for a minute
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 397 
 
 at her shabby little sister with large round eyes, had 
 jumped out and run off to her mother, evidently in a state 
 of childish bewilderment as to whether it was not wicked 
 for a child to wear such dirty old clothes. 
 
 Tom had chuckled to himself as he saw Cinderella set- 
 tling herself comfortably in the swing in the place of the 
 ousted princess, and had taken a fancy to the child, spec- 
 ulating to himself as to how she could have been brought 
 up, to be so utterly unconscious of differences of rank 
 and dress. " She seems really to treat her fellow-creatures 
 as if she had been studying the Sartor Resartus," he 
 thought. " She has cut down through all clothes philos- 
 ophy without knowing it. I wonder, if she had a chance, 
 whether she would go and sit down in the queen's lap ? " 
 
 He did not at the time anticipate that she would put his 
 own clothes philosophy to so severe a test before the day 
 was over. The child had been as merry and active as 
 any of the rest during the earlier part of the day ; but 
 now, as he looked down, in answer to her reiterated plea, 
 " Wont you carry me a bit ? I'm so tired ! " he saw that 
 she could scarcely drag one foot after the other. 
 
 What was to be done ? He was already keenly alive 
 to the discomfort of walking across Hyde Park in a pro- 
 cession of ragged children, with such a figure of fun as 
 Grey at their head, looking, in his long, rusty, straight- 
 cut black coat, as if he had come fresh out of Noah's ark. 
 He didn't care about it so much while they were on the 
 turf in the out-of-the-way parts, and would meet nobody 
 but guards, and nurse-maids, and trades-people, and me- 
 chanics out for an evening stroll. But the Drive and 
 Rotten Row lay before them, and must be crossed. It 
 was just the most crowded time of the day. lie had 
 almost made up his mind once or twice to stop Grey and 
 the procession, and propose to sit down for half an hour 
 34
 
 398 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 or so, and let the children play, by which time the world 
 would be going home to dinner. But there was no play 
 left in the children ; and he had resisted the temptation, 
 meaning, when they came to the most crowded part, to 
 look unconscious, as if it were by chance that he had got 
 into such company, and had in fact nothing to do with 
 them. But now, if he listened to the child's plea, and 
 carried her, all hope of concealment was over. If he did 
 not, he felt that there would be no greater flunkey in the 
 park that evening than Thomas Brown, the enlightened 
 radical and philosopher, amongst the young-gentlemen 
 riders in Rotten Row, or the powdered footmen lounging 
 behind the great blaring carriages in the Drive. 
 
 So he looked down at the child once or twice in a state 
 of puzzle. A third time she looked up with her great 
 eyes, and said, " Oh, please carry me a bit ! " and her 
 piteous, tired face turned the scale. " If she were Lady 
 Mary or Lady Blanche," thought he, " I should pick her 
 up at once, and be proud of the burden. Here goes ! " 
 And he took her up in his arms, and walked on, des- 
 perate and reckless. 
 
 Notwithstanding all his philosophy, he felt his ears 
 tingling and his face getting red, as they approached the 
 Drive. It was crowded. They were kept standing a 
 minute or two at the crossing. He made a desperate 
 effort to abstract himself wholly from the visible world, 
 and retire into a state of serene contemplation. But it 
 would not do ; and he was painfully conscious of the stare 
 of lack-lustre eyes of well-dressed men leaning over the 
 rails, and the amused look of delicate ladies, lounging in 
 open carriages, and surveying him and Grey and their 
 ragged rout through glasses. 
 
 At last they scrambled across, and he breathed freely 
 for a minute, as they struggled along the comparatively
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 399 
 
 quiet path leading to Albert Gate, and stopped to drink 
 at the fountain. Then came Rotten Row, and another 
 pause amongst the loungers, and a plunge into the ride, 
 where he was nearly run down by two men whom he had 
 known at Oxford. They shouted to him to get out of the 
 way ; and he felt the hot, defiant blood rushing through 
 his veins, as he strode across without heeding. They 
 passed on, one of them having to pull his horse out of his 
 stride to avoid him. Did they recognize him ? He felt 
 a strange mixture of utter indifference, and longing to 
 strangle them. 
 
 The worst was now over ; besides, he was getting used 
 to the situation, and his good sense was beginning to rally. 
 So he marched through Albert Gate, carrying his ragged 
 little charge, who prattled away to him without a pause, 
 and surrounded by the rest of the children, scarcely caring 
 who might see him, and who might not. They won safely 
 through the omnibuses and carriages on the Kensington 
 road, and so into Belgravia. At last he was quite at his 
 ease again, and began listening to what the child was say- 
 ing to him, and was strolling carelessly along, when once 
 more, at one of the crossings, he was startled by a shout 
 from some riders. There was straw laid down in the 
 street, so that he had not heard them as they cantered 
 round the corner, hurrying home to dress for dinner ; and 
 they were all but upon him, and had to rein up their 
 horses sharply. 
 
 The party consisted of a lady and two gentlemen, 
 one old, the other young ; the latter dressed in the height 
 of fashion, and with the supercilious air which Tom hated 
 from his soul. The shout came from the young man, and 
 drew Tom's attention to him first. All the devil rushed 
 up as he recognized St. Cloud. The lady's horse swerved 
 against his, and began to rear. He put his hand on its
 
 400 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 bridle, as if he had a right to protect her. Another glance 
 told Tom that the lady was Mary, and the old gentleman, 
 fussing up on his stout cob on the other side of her, Mr. 
 Porter. 
 
 They all knew him in another moment. He stared 
 from one to the other, was conscious that she turned her 
 horse's head sharply, so as to disengage the bridle from 
 St. Cloud's hand, and of his insolent stare, and of the em- 
 barrassment of Mr. Porter; and then, setting his face 
 straight before him, he passed on in a bewildered dream, 
 never looking back till they were out of sight. The 
 dream gave way to bitter and wild thoughts, upon. which 
 it will do none of us any good to dwell. He put down 
 the little girl outside the schools, turning abruptly from 
 the mother, a poor widow in scant well-preserved black 
 clothes, who was waiting for the child, and began thank- 
 ing him for his care of her ; refused Grey's pressing in- 
 vitation to tea, and set his face eastward. Bitterer and 
 more wild and more scornful grew his thoughts as he 
 strode along past the abbey, and up Whitehall, and away 
 down the Strand, holding on over the crossings without 
 paying the slightest heed to vehicle, or horse, or man. 
 Incensed coachmen had to pull up with a jerk to avoid 
 running over him, and more than one sturdy walker turned 
 round in indignation at a collision which they felt had 
 been intended, or at least there had been no effort to 
 avoid. As he passed under the window of the Banquet- 
 ing Hall, and by the place in Charing-cross where the 
 pillory used to stand, he growled to himself what a pity it 
 was that the times for cutting off heads and cropping ears 
 had gone by. The whole of the dense population from 
 either side of the Strand seemed to have crowded out into 
 that thoroughfare to impede his march and aggravate him. 
 The further eastward he got the thicker got the crowd ;
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 401 
 
 and the vans, the omnibuses, the cabs, seemed to multiply 
 and get noisier. Not an altogether pleasant sight to a 
 man in the most Christian frame of mind is the crowd 
 that a fine summer evening fetches out into the roaring 
 Strand, as the sun fetches out flies on the window of a 
 village grocery. To him just then it was at once depress- 
 ing and provoking, and he went shouldering his way tow- 
 ards Temple Bar as thoroughly out of tune as he had 
 been for many a long day. 
 
 As he passed from the narrowest part of the Strand 
 into the space round St. Clement Dane's church, he was 
 startled, in a momentary lull of the uproar, by the sound 
 of chiming bells. He slackened his pace to listen ; but a 
 huge van lumbered by, shaking the houses on both sides, 
 and drowning all sounds but its own rattle ; and then he 
 found himself suddenly immersed in a crowd, vociferating 
 and gesticulating round a policeman, who was conveying 
 a woman towards the station-house. He shouldered 
 through it, another lull came, and with it the same 
 slow, gentle, calm cadence of chiming bells. Again and 
 again he caught it as he passed on to Temple Bar ; when- 
 ever the roar subsided the notes of the old hymn tune 
 came drooping down on him like balm from the air. 
 If the ancient benefactor who caused the bells of St. 
 Clement Dane's church to be arranged to play that chime 
 so many times a day is allowed to hover round the steeple 
 at such times, to watch the effect of his benefaction on 
 posterity, he must have been well satisfied on that even- 
 ing. Tom passed under the Bar, and turned into the 
 Temple another man, softened again, and in his right 
 mind. 
 
 " There's always a voice saying the right thing to you 
 somewhere, if you'll only listen for it," he thought. Ho 
 34*
 
 402 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 took a few turns in the court to clear bis head, and then 
 went up, and found Harry East reclining on a sofa, in 
 full view of the gardens and river, solacing himself with 
 his accustomed cheroot. 
 
 " Oh, here you are," he said, making room on the sofa ; 
 "how did it go off?" 
 
 " "Well enough. Where have you been ? " 
 
 " In the city and at the docks. I've been all over our 
 vessel. She's a real clipper." 
 
 " When do you sail ? " 
 
 " Not quite certain. I should say in a fortnight, though." 
 East puffed away for a minute, and then, as Tom said 
 nothing, went on. " I'm not so sweet on it as the time 
 draws near. There are more of my chums turning up 
 every day from India at the Rag. And this is uncom- 
 monly pleasant, too, living with you here in chambers. 
 You may think it odd, but I don't half like getting rid of 
 you." 
 
 " Thanks : but I don't think you will get rid of me." 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 " I mean that I shall go with you, if my people will let 
 me, and you will take me." 
 
 " W-h-ew ! Any thing happened ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " You've seen her ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Well, go on. Don't keep a fellow in suspense. I 
 shall be introduced, and eat one of the old boy's good 
 dinners, after all, before I sail." 
 
 Tom looked out of window, and found some difficulty 
 in getting out the words, " No, it's all up." 
 
 " You don't mean it ? " said East, coming to a sitting 
 position by Tom's side. " But how do you know ? Are 
 you sure ? What did she say ? "
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 403 
 
 " Nothing. I haven't spoken to her ; but it's all up. 
 She was riding with her father and the fellow to whom 
 she's engaged. I have heard it a dozen times, but never 
 would believe it." 
 
 " But, is that all ? Riding with her father and another 
 man ! Why, there's nothing in that." 
 
 " Yes, but there is though. You should have seen his 
 look. And they all knew me well enough, but not one of 
 them nodded even." 
 
 " Well, there's not much in that after all. It may have 
 been chance, or you may have fancied it." 
 
 " No, one isn't quite such a fool. However, I have no 
 right to complain, and I wont. I could bear it all well 
 enough if he were not such a cold-hearted blackguard." 
 
 " What, this fellow she was riding with ? " 
 
 " Yes. He hasn't a heart the size of a pin's head. 
 He'll break hers. He's a mean brute too. She can't 
 know him, though he has been after her this year and 
 more. They must have forced her into it. Ah ! it's a 
 bitter business," and he put his head between his hands, 
 and East heard the deep catches of his laboring breath, as 
 he sat by him, feeling deeply for him, but puzzled what to 
 say. 
 
 " She can't be worth so much after all, Tom," he said 
 at last, " if she would have such a fellow as that. Depend 
 upon it, she's not what you thought her." 
 
 Tom made no answer ; so the captain went on presently, 
 thinking he had hit the right note. 
 
 " Cheer up, old boy. There's as good fish in the sea 
 yet as ever came out of it. Don't you remember the 
 song whose is it ? Lovelace's : 
 
 " ' If she be not fair for me, 
 
 What care I for whom she be ? ' "
 
 404 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Tom started up almost fiercely, but recovered himself 
 in a moment, and then leant his head down again. 
 
 " Don't talk about her, Harry ; you don't know her," he 
 said. 
 
 " And don't want to know her, Tom, if she is going to 
 throw you over. "Well, I shall leave you for an hour or 
 so. Come up to me presently at the Rag, when you feel 
 better." 
 
 East started for his club, debating within himself what 
 he could do for his friend whether calling out the party 
 mightn't do good. 
 
 Tom, left to himself, broke down at first sadly ; but, as 
 the evening wore on he began to rally, and sat down and 
 wrote a long letter to his father, making a clean breast, 
 and asking his permission to go with East
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 " My Dear Katie, I know you will be very much 
 pained when you read this letter. You two have been 
 my only confidantes, and you have always kept me up, 
 and encouraged me to hope that all would come right. 
 And after all that happened last week, Patty's marriage, 
 and your engagement, the two things upon earth, with 
 one exception, that I most wished for, I quite felt that 
 my own turn was coming. I can't tell why I had such a 
 strong feeling about it, but somehow all the most impor- 
 tant changes in my life for the last four years have been 
 so interwoven with Patty and Harry Winburn's history 
 that, now they were married, I was sure something would 
 happen to me as soon as I came to London. And, indeed, 
 it has. Dear Katie, I can hardly bring myself to write 
 it. It is all over. I met her in the street to-day ; she 
 was riding with her father and the man I told you about. 
 They had to pull up not to ride over me ; so I had a good 
 look at her, and there can be no mistake about it. I have 
 often tried to reason myself into the belief that the evil 
 day must come sooner or later, and to prepare myself for 
 it, but I might have spared myself, for it could not have 
 been worse than it is if I had never anticipated it. My 
 future is all a blank now. I can't stay in England, so I 
 have written home to ask them to let me go to New 
 Zealand with East, and I am sure they will consent, when 
 they know all.
 
 406 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I shall wait in town till I get the answer. Perhaps 1 
 may be able to get off with East in a few weeks. The 
 sooner the better ; but, of course, I shall not go without 
 seeing you and dear old Jack. -You mustn't mind me 
 calling him Jack. The only thing that gives me any 
 pleasure to think about is your engagement. It is so 
 right, and one wants to see something going right, some 
 one getting their due, to keep alive one's belief in justice 
 being done somehow or another in the world ; and I do 
 see it, and acknowledge it when I think over his history 
 and mine since we first met. We have both got our due ; 
 and you have got yours, Katie, for you have got the best 
 fellow in England. 
 
 " Ah, if I only could think that she has got hers ! If I 
 could only believe that the man she has chosen is worthy 
 of her ! I will try hard to think better of him. There 
 must be more good in him than I have ever seen, or she 
 would never have engaged herself to him. But I can't bear 
 to stop here, and see it all going on. The sooner I am out 
 of England the better. I send you a parcel with this ; it 
 contains her notes, and some old flowers, and other mat- 
 ters which I haven't the heart to burn. You will be the 
 best judge what should be done with them. If you see 
 your way to managing it, I should like her to know that I 
 had sent them all to you, and that whatever may happen 
 to me hereafter, my love for her has been the mainstay 
 and the guiding-star of my life ever since that happy time 
 when you all came to stay with us in my first long vaca- 
 tion. It found me eaten up with selfishness and conceit, 
 the puppet of my own lusts and vanities, and has left me 
 Well, never mind what it has left me. At any rate, if 
 I have not gone from worse to worse, it is all owing to 
 her ; and she ought to know it. It cannot be wrong to 
 let her know what good she has scattered unknowingly
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 407 
 
 about her path. May God bless and reward her for it, 
 and you, too, dear cousin, for all your long love and kind- 
 ness to one who is very unworthy of, but very thankful 
 for, them. Ever yours, affectionately, T. B." 
 
 The above letter, and that to his father, asking for leave 
 to emigrate, having been written and sent off, Tom was 
 left on the afternoon of the day following his upset, mak- 
 ing manful, if not very successful, efforts to shake off the 
 load of depression which weighed on him, and to turn his 
 thoughts resolutely forward to a new life in a new country. 
 East was away at the docks. There was no one moving 
 in the Temple. The men who had business were all at 
 Westminster, or out of sight and hearing in the recesses 
 of their chambers. Those who had none were for the 
 most part away enjoying themselves, in one way or 
 another, amongst the mighty whirl of the mighty human 
 sea of London. There was nothing left for him to do, he 
 had written the only two letters he had to write, and had 
 only to sit still and wait for the answers, killing the mean 
 time as well as he could. Reading came hard to him, 
 but it was the best thing to do perhaps ; at any rate, he 
 was trying it on, though his studies were constantly inter- 
 rupted by long fits of absence of mind, during which, 
 though his body remained in the Temple, he was again in 
 the well-kept garden of Barton, or in the hazel wood 
 under the lea of the Berkshire hills. 
 
 He was roused out of one of these reveries, and brought 
 back to external life and Fig-tree Court, by a single 
 knock at the outer door, and a shout of the newsman's 
 boy for the paper. So he got up, found the paper, which 
 he had forgotten to read, and as he went to the door cast 
 his eye on it, and saw that a great match was going on at 
 Lord's. This gave a new turn to his thoughts. He stood
 
 408 
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 looking down-stairs after the boy, and considering whether 
 he should not start at once for the match. 
 
 He would be sure to see a lot of acquaintance there at 
 any rate. But the idea of seeing and having to talk to 
 mere acquaintance was more distasteful than his present 
 solitude. He was turning to bury himself again in his 
 hole, when he saw a white dog walk quietly up seven or 
 eight stairs at the bottom of the flight, and then turn 
 round, and look for some one to follow. 
 
 " How odd ! " thought Tom, as he watched him ; " as 
 like as two peas. It can't be. No. "Why, yes it is." 
 And then he whistled, and called "Jack," and the dog 
 looked up, and wagged his tail, as much as to say, " All 
 right, I'm coming directly ; but I must wait for my 
 master." The next moment Drysdale appeared at the 
 bottom of the stairs, and looking up, said, 
 
 " Oh ! that's you, is it ? I'm all right then. So you 
 knew the old dog ? " 
 
 " I should rather think so," said Tom. " I hope I never 
 forget a dog or a horse I have once known." 
 
 In the short minute which Drysdale and Jack took to 
 arrive at his landing, Tom had time for a rush of old col- 
 lege memories, in which grave and gay, pleasant and bit- 
 ter, were strangely mingled. The night when he had 
 been first brought to his senses about Patty came up very 
 vividly before him, and the commemoration days, when 
 he had last seen Drysdale. " How strange ! " he thought ; 
 " is my old life coming back again just now ? Here, on 
 the very day after it is all over, comes back the man with 
 whom I was so intimate up to the day it began, and have 
 never seen since. What does it mean ? " 
 
 There was a little touch of embarrassment in the man- 
 ner of both of them as they shook hands at the top of the 
 stairs, and turned into the chambers. Tom motioned to
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 409 
 
 Jack to take his old place at one end of the sofa, and be- 
 gan caressing him there, the clog showing unmistakably, 
 by gesture and whine, that delight at renewing an old 
 friendship, for which his race are so nobly distinguished. 
 Drysdale threw himself down in an arm-chair, and 
 watched them. 
 
 " So you knew the old dog, Brown ? " he repeated. 
 
 " Knew him ? of course I did. Dear old Jack I 
 How well he wears ; he is scarcely altered at all." 
 
 " Very little ; only steadier. More than I can say for 
 his master. I'm very glad you knew Jack." 
 
 " Come, Drysdale, take the other end of the sofa, or it 
 wont look like old times. There, now I can fancy myself 
 back at St. Ambrose's." 
 
 " By Jove, Brown, you're the right sort. I always said 
 so, even after that last letter. You pitched it rather too 
 strong in that though. I was very near coming back 
 from Norway to quarrel with you." 
 
 " Well, I was very angry at being left in the lurch by 
 you and Blake." 
 
 " You got the coin all right, I suppose ? You never 
 acknowledged it." 
 
 " Didn't I ? Then T ought to have. Yes, I got it all 
 right about six months afterwards. I ought to have 
 acknowledged it, and I thought I had. I'm sorry I didn't. 
 Now we're all quits, and wont talk any more about that 
 rascally bill." 
 
 " I suppose I may light up," said Drysdale, dropping 
 into his old lounging attitude on the sofa, and pulling out 
 his cigar-case. 
 
 " Yes, of course. "Will you have any thing? " 
 
 " A cool drink wouldn't be amiss." 
 
 " They make a nice tankard with cider and a lump of 
 ice at the Rainbow. What do you say to that?" 
 35
 
 410 TOM BROWN A.T OXFORD. 
 
 " It sounds touching," said Drysdale. So Tom posted 
 off to Fleet Street to order the liquor, and came back fol- 
 lowed by a waiter with the tankard. Drysdale took a 
 long pull, and smacked his lips. 
 
 " That's a wrinkle," he said, handing the tankard to 
 Tom. " I suppose the lawyers teach all the publicans 
 about here a trick or two. Why, one can fancy one's self 
 back in the old quad looking out on this court. If it 
 weren't such an outlandish out-of-the-way place I think I 
 should take some chambers here myself. How did you 
 get here ? " 
 
 " Oh, they belong to a friend of mine who is away. 
 But how did you get here ? " 
 
 " Why along the Strand in a Hansom." 
 
 " I mean, how did you know I was here ? " 
 
 " Grey told me." 
 
 " What ! Grey who was at St. Ambrose's with us ? " 
 
 " Yes. You look puzzled." 
 
 " I didn't think you knew Grey." 
 
 " No more I do. But a stout old party I met last 
 night your godfather, I should think he is told me 
 where he was, and said I should get your address from 
 him. So I looked him up this morning, in that dog-hole 
 in Westminster where he lives. He didn't know Jack 
 from Adam." 
 
 " But what in the world do you mean by my god- 
 father?" 
 
 " I had better tell my story from the beginning I see. 
 Last night I did what I don't often do, went out to a great 
 drum. There was an awful crush of course, and you may 
 guess what the heat was in these dog-days, with gas-lights 
 and wax-lights going, and a jam of people in every cor- 
 ner. I was fool enough to get into the rooms, so that my 
 retreat was cut off, and I had to work right through, and
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 411 
 
 got at last into a back room, which was not so full. The 
 window was in a recess, and there was a balcony out- 
 side, looking over a little bit of garden. 1 got into the 
 balcony, talking with a girl who was sensible enough to 
 like the cool. Presently I heard a voice I thought I knew 
 inside. Then I heard St. Ambrose, and then your name. 
 Of course I listened, I couldn't help myself. They were 
 just inside the window, in the recess, not live feet from us, 
 so I hea^d Dretty nearly every word. Give us the tank- 
 ard, I'm as dry as an ash-heap with talking." 
 
 Tom scarcely able to control his impatience, handed the 
 tankard. " But who was it ? you haven't told me," he 
 said, as Drysdale put it down at last empty. 
 
 " Why, that d d St. Cloud. He was giving you a 
 
 nice character, in a sort of sneaking deprecatory way, as 
 if he was sorry for it. Amongst other little tales, he said 
 you used to borrow money from Jews he knew it for a 
 certainty because he had been asked himself to join you 
 and another man, meaning me, of course, in such a trans- 
 action. You remember how he wouldn't acknowledge the 
 money I lent him at play, and the note he wrote me which 
 upset Blake so. I had never forgotten it. I knew I 
 should get my chance some day, and here it was. I don't 
 know what the girl thought of me, or how she got out of 
 the balcony, but I stepped into the recess just as he had 
 finished his precious story, and landed between him and a 
 comfortable old boy, who was looking shocked. He must 
 be your godfather, or something of the kind. I'll bet you 
 a pony you are down for something handsome in his 
 will." 
 
 " What was his name ? Did you find out ? " 
 
 " Yes ; Potter, or Porter, or something like it. I've got 
 his card somewhere. I just stared St. Cloud in the face,
 
 412 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 and you may depend upon it he winced. Then I told the 
 old boy that I had heard their talk ; and as I was at St. 
 Ambrose with you, I should like to have five minutes with 
 him when St. Cloud had done. He seemed rather in a 
 corner between us. However, I kept in sight till St. 
 Cloud was obliged to draw off, and, to cut my story short 
 as the tankard is empty, I think I put you pretty straight 
 there. You said we were quits just now : after last night, 
 perhaps we are, for I told him the truth of the Benjamin 
 story, and I think he is squared. He seems a good sort 
 of old boy. He's a relation of yours, eh ? " 
 
 " Only a distant connection. Did any thing more 
 happen ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I saw that he was flurried, and didn't know 
 quite what to think ; so I asked him to let me call, and I 
 would bring him some one else to speak to your charac- 
 ter. He gave me his card, and I'm going to take Blake 
 there to-day. Then I asked him where you were, and 
 he didn't know, but said he thought Grey could tell me." 
 
 " It is very kind of you, Drysdale, to take so much 
 trouble." 
 
 " Trouble ! I'd go from here to Jericho to be even 
 with our fine friend. I never forget a bad turn. I met 
 him afterwards in the cloak-room, and went out of the 
 door close after him, to give him a chance if he wants to 
 say any thing. I only wish he would. But why do you 
 suppose he is lying about you ? " 
 
 " I can't tell. I've never spoken to him since he left 
 Oxford. Never saw him till yesterday, riding with Mr. 
 Porter. I suppose that reminded them of me." 
 
 " Well, St. Cloud is bent on getting round him for 
 some reason or another, you may take your oath of that. 
 Now my time's up ; I shall go and pick up Blake. J
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 413 
 
 should think I had better not take Jack to call in Eton 
 Square, though he'd give you a good character if he 
 could speak ; wouldn't you, Jack ? " 
 
 Jack wagged his tail and descended from the sofa. 
 
 " Does Blake live up here ? What is he doing?" 
 
 " Burning the candle at both ends, and in the middle, 
 as usual. Yes, he's living near his club. He writes 
 political articles, devilish well I hear, too, and is reading 
 for the bar ; besides which he is getting into society, and 
 going out whenever he can, and fretting his soul out that 
 he isn't prime minister, or something of the kind. He 
 wont last long at the pace he's going." 
 
 " I'm very sorry to hear it. But you'll come here 
 again, Drysdale ; or let me come and see you. I shall 
 be very anxious to hear what has happened." 
 
 " Here's my pasteboard ; I shall be in town for another 
 fortnight. Drop in when you like." 
 
 And so Drysdale and Jack went off, leaving Tom in a 
 chaotic state of mind. All his old hopes were roused 
 again as he thought over Drysdale's narrative. He could 
 no longer sit still, so he rushed out, and walked up and 
 down the river side-walk, in the Temple gardens, where a 
 fine breeze was blowing, at a pace which astonished the 
 gate-keepers and the nursery-maids, and children, who 
 were taking the air in that favorite spot. Once or twice 
 he returned to chambers, and at last found East reposing 
 after his excursion to the docks. 
 
 East's quick eye saw at once that something had hap- 
 pened, and had very soon heard the whole story, upon 
 which he deliberated for some> minutes, and rejoiced 
 Tom's heart by saying: "Ah ! all up with New Zealand, 
 I see. I shall be introduced after all, before we start. 
 Come along, I must stand you a dinner on the strength of 
 the good news, and we'll drink her health." 
 35*
 
 414 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 Tom called twice that evening at Drysdale's lodgings, 
 but he was out. The next morning he called again. Drys- 
 dale had gone to Hampton Court races, and had left no 
 message. He left a note for him, but got no answer. It 
 was trying work. Another day passed without any word 
 from Drysdale, who seemed never to be at home, and no 
 answer to either of his letters. On the third morning he 
 heard from his father. It was just the answer which he 
 had expected, as kind a letter as could be written. Mr. 
 Brown had suspected how matters stood at one time, but 
 had given up the idea in consequence of Tom's silence, 
 which he regretted, as possibly things might have hap- 
 pened otherwise had he known the state of the case. It 
 was too late now, however ; and the less said the better 
 about what might have been. As to New Zealand, he 
 should not oppose Tom's going, if, after some time, he con- 
 tinued in his present mind. It was very natural for him 
 just now to wish to go. They would talk it over as soon 
 as Tom came home, which Mr. Brown begged him to do 
 at once, or, at any rate, as soon as he had seen his friend 
 off. Home was the best place for him. 
 
 Tom sighed as he folded it up ; the hopes of the last 
 three days seemed to be fading away. He spent another 
 restless day, and by night had persuaded himself that 
 Drysdale's mission had been a complete failure, and that 
 he did not write out of kindness to him. 
 
 " Why, Tom, old fellow, you look as down in the mouth 
 as ever to-night," East said, when Tom opened the door 
 for him about midnight, on his return from his club ; 
 " cheer up, you may depend it's all to go right." 
 
 " But I haven't seen Drysdale again, and he hasn't writ- 
 ten." 
 
 " There's nothing in that. He was glad enough to do 
 you a good turn, I dare say, when it came in his way, but
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 415 
 
 that sort of fellow never can keep any tiling up. He has 
 been too much used to having his own way, and followin" 
 his own fancies. Don't you lose heart because he wont 
 put himself out for you." 
 
 " "Well, Harry, you are the best fellow in the world. 
 You would put backbone into any one." 
 
 " Now, we'll just have a quiet cheroot, and then turn in 
 and see if you don't have good news to-morrow. How 
 hot it is; the Strand to-night is as hot as the Punjaub, and 
 the reek of it Phah ! my throat is full of it still." 
 
 East took off his coat, and was just throwing it on a 
 chair, when he stopped, and, feeling in the pocket, said, 
 " Let's see, here's a note for you. The porter gave it 
 me as I knocked in." 
 
 Tom took it carelessly, but the next moment was tear- 
 ing it open with trembling fingers. " From my cousin," 
 he said. East watched him read, and saw the blood rush 
 to his face, and the light come into his eyes. 
 
 " Good news, Tom, I see. Bravo, old boy. You've 
 had a long fight for it, and deserve to win." 
 
 Tom got up, tossed the note across the table, and began 
 walking up and down the room ; his heart was too full for 
 speech. 
 
 " May I read ? " said East, looking up. 
 Tom nodded, and he read, 
 
 " Dear Tom, I am come to town to spend a week 
 with them in Eton Square. Call on me to-morrow at 
 twelve, or, if you are engaged then, from three to five. 
 I have no time to add more now, but long to see you. 
 Your loving cousin, Katie. 
 
 "P. S. I will give you your parcel back to-morrow^ 
 and then you can burn the contents yourself or do what
 
 416 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 you like with them. Uncle bids me say he shall be glad 
 if you will come and dine to-morrow, and any other day 
 you can spare while I am here." 
 
 When he had read the note East got up and shook 
 hands heartily with Tom, and then sat down again quietly 
 to finish his cheroot, watching with a humorous look his 
 friend's march. 
 
 " And you think it is really all right now ? " Tom 
 asked, in one form or another, after every few turns ; and 
 East replied in various forms of chaffing assurance that 
 there could not be much further question on the point. 
 At last, when he had finished his cheroot, he got up, and 
 taking his candle said, " Good-night, Tom ; when that revo- 
 lution comes, which you're always predicting, remember if 
 you're not shot or hung, you'll always find a roost for you 
 and your wife in New Zealand." 
 
 " I don't feel so sure about the revolution now, Harry." 
 
 " Of course you don't. Mind, I bargain for the dinner 
 in Eton Square. I always told you I should dine there 
 before I started." 
 
 ****** 
 
 The next day Tom found that he was not engaged at 
 twelve o'clock, and was able to appear in Eton Square. 
 He was shown up into the drawing-room, and found Katie 
 alone there. The quiet and coolness of the darkened 
 room was most grateful to him after the glare of the 
 streets, as he sat down by her side. 
 
 " But, Katie," he said, as soon as the first salutations 
 and congratulations had passed, " how did it all happen ? 
 I can't believe my senses yet. I am afraid I may wake 
 up any minute." 
 
 " "Well, it was chiefly owing to two lucky coincidences ; 
 though no doubt it would have all come right in time 
 without them."
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 417 
 
 " Our meeting the other day in the street, I suppose, 
 for one ? " 
 
 " Yes. Coming across you so suddenly, carrying the 
 little girl, reminded Mary of the day when she sprained 
 her ankle, and you carried her through Hazel Copse. 
 Ah, you never told me all of that adventure, either of 
 you." 
 
 " All that was necessary, Katie." 
 
 " Oh ! I have pardoned you. Uncle saw then that she 
 was very much moved at something, and guessed well 
 enough what it was. He is so very kind, and so fond of 
 Mary, he would do any thing in the world that she wished. 
 She was quite unwell that evening; so he and aunt had 
 to go out alone, and they met that Mr. St. Cloud at a 
 party, who was said to be engaged to her." 
 
 " It wasn't true, then ? " 
 
 " No, never. lie is a very designing man, though I be- 
 lieve he was really in love with poor Mary. At any rate 
 he has persecuted her for more than a year. And, it is 
 very wicked, but I am afraid he spread all those reports 
 himself." 
 
 " Of their engagement ? Just like him ! " 
 
 " Uncle is so good-natured, you know, and he took ad- 
 vantage of it, and was always coming here, and riding 
 with them. And he had made uncle believe dreadful 
 stories about you, which made him seem so unkind. lie 
 was quite afraid to have you at the house." 
 
 " Yes, I saw that last year; and the second coincidence ? " 
 
 " It happened that very night. Poor uncle was very 
 much troubled what to do ; so when he met Mr. St. Cloud, 
 as I told you, he took him aside to ask him again about 
 you. Somehow, a gentleman who was a friend of yours 
 at Oxford overheard what was said, and came forward and 
 explained every thing."
 
 418 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Yes, he came and told me." 
 
 " Then you know more than I about it." 
 
 " And you think Mr. Porter is convinced that I am not 
 quite such a scamp after all ? " 
 
 " Yes, indeed ; and the boys are so delighted that they 
 will see you again. They are at home for the holidays, 
 and so grown." 
 
 "And Mary?" 
 
 " She is very well. You will see her before long, I 
 dare say." 
 
 " Is she at home ? " 
 
 u She is out riding with uncle. Now I will go up and 
 get your parcel, which I had opened at home before I got 
 aunt's note asking me here. No wonder we could never 
 find her boot." 
 
 Katie disappeared, and at the same time Tom thought 
 he heard the sound of horse's feet. Yes, and they have 
 stopped, too ; it must be Mary and her father. He could 
 not see, because of the blinds and other devices for keep- 
 ing the room cool. But the next moment there were 
 voices in the hall below, and then a light step on the 
 carpeted stair which no ear but his could have heard. 
 His heart beat with heavy, painful pulsations, and his 
 head swam as the door opened, and Mary in her riding- 
 ha-jit stood in the room.
 
 CHAPTEE XXVII. 
 
 THE POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 Our curtain must rise once again, and it shall be on a 
 familiar spot. Once more we must place ourselves on the 
 Hawk's Lynch, and look out over the well-known view, 
 and the happy autumn fields, ripe with the golden harvest. 
 Two people are approaching on horseback from the 
 Barton side, who have been made one since we left them 
 at the fall of the curtain in the last chapter. They ride 
 lovingly together, close to one another, and forgetful of 
 the whole world, as they should do, for they have scarcely 
 come to the end of their honeymoon. 
 
 They are in country costume, she in a light plain habit, 
 but well cut, and setting on her as well as she sits on her 
 dainty gray ; he in shooting-coat and wide-awake, with his 
 fishing-basket slung over his shoulder. They come steadily 
 up the hill-side, rousing a yellow hammer here and there 
 from the furze bushes, and only draw bit when they have 
 reached the very top of the knoll. Then they dismount, 
 and Tom produces two halters from his fishing-basket, and, 
 taking off the bridles, fastens the horses up in the shade 
 of the fir-trees, and loosens their girths, while Mary, after 
 searching in the basket, pulls out a bag, and pours out a 
 prodigal feed of corn before each of them, on the short 
 grass. 
 
 " What are you doing, you wasteful little woman ? You 
 should have put the bag underneath. They wont be able 
 to pick up half the corn."
 
 420 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Never mind, dear, then the birds will get it." 
 
 "And you have given them enough for three feeds." 
 
 " Why did you put so much in the bag ? Besides, you 
 
 know it is the last feed I shall give her. Poor dear little 
 
 Gipsy," she added, patting the neck of her dapple gray ; 
 
 " you have found a kind mistress for her, dear, haven't 
 
 you?" 
 
 " Yes ; she will be lightly worked, and well cared for," 
 he said, shortly, turning away, and busying himself with 
 the basket again. 
 
 " But no one will ever love you, Gipsy, like your old 
 mistress. Now give me a kiss, and you shall have your 
 treat," and she pulled a piece of sugar out of the pocket 
 of her riding-habit, at the sight of which the gray held 
 out her beautiful nose to be fondled, and then lapped up 
 the sugar with eager lips from Mary's hand, and turned to 
 her corn. 
 
 The young wife tripped across and sat down near her 
 husband, who was laying out their luncheon on the turf. 
 
 " It was very dear of you to think of coming here for 
 our last ride," she said. " I remember how charmed I 
 was with the place the first Sunday I ever spent at 
 Englebourn, when Katie brought me up here directly 
 after breakfast, before we went to the school. Such a 
 time ago it seems before I ever saw you. And I have 
 never been here since. But I love it most for your sake, 
 dear. Now tell me again all the times you have been 
 here." 
 
 Tom proceeded to recount some of his visits to the 
 Hawk's Lynch, in which we have accompanied him. 
 And then they talked on about Katie, and East, and the 
 Englebourn people, past and present, old Betty, and Harry 
 and his wife in New Zealand, and David patching coats
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 421 
 
 and tending bees, and executing the queen's justice to the 
 best of his ability in the village at their feet. 
 
 " Poor David, I must get over somehow to see him 
 before we leave home. lie feels your uncle's death, and 
 the other changes in the parish, more than any one." 
 
 "I am so sorry the living was sold," said Mary; "Katie 
 and her husband would have made Englebourn into a 
 little paradise." 
 
 " It could not be helped, dear. I can't say I'm sorry. 
 There would not have been work enough for him. lie is 
 better where he is, in a great town parish." 
 
 " But Katie did love the place so, and was so used 
 to it, she had become quite a little queen there before her 
 marriage. See what we women have to give up for you," 
 she said, playfully, turning to him. But a shadow passed 
 over his face, and he looked away without answering. 
 
 " What makes you look sorrowful, dear ? What are 
 you thinking of ? " 
 
 "Oh! nothing!" 
 
 " That isn't true. Now tell me what it is. You have 
 no right, you know, to keep any thing from me." 
 
 " I can't bear to think of you having had to sell 
 Gipsy. You have never been without a riding-horse 
 till now. You will miss your riding dreadfully, I am 
 6iire, dear." 
 
 " I shall do very well without riding. I am so proud 
 of learning my lesson from you. You will see what a poor 
 man's wife I shall make. I have been getting mamma 
 to let me do the housekeeping, and know how a joint 
 should look, and all sorts of useful things, and I have 
 made my own house-linen. I shall soon get to hate all 
 luxuries as much as you do." 
 
 " Now, Mary, you mustn't run into extremes. I never 
 36
 
 422 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 said you ought to hate all luxuries, but that almost every- 
 body one knows is a slave to them." 
 
 " Well, and I hate any thing that wants to make a slave 
 of me." 
 
 " You are a dear little free woman. But now we are 
 on this subject again, Mary, I really want to speak to you 
 about keeping a lady's maid. We can quite afford it, and 
 you ought to have one." 
 
 "I shall do nothing of the sort." 
 
 " Not to oblige me, Mary ? " 
 
 " No, not even to oblige you. There is something to 
 be said for dear Gipsy. But, take a maid again ! to do 
 nothing but torment me and pretend to take care of my 
 clothes, and my hair ! I never knew what freedom was 
 till I got rid of poor, foolish, grumbling Iliggins." 
 
 " But you may get a nice girl who will be a comfort to 
 you." 
 
 " No, I never will have a woman again to do nothing 
 but look after me. It isn't fair to them. Besides, dear, 
 you can't say that I don't look better since I have done 
 my own hair. Did you ever see it look brighter than it 
 does now ? " 
 
 " Never, and now here is luncheon all ready." So they 
 sat down on the verge of the slope, and eat their cold 
 chicken and tongue with the relish imparted by youth, a 
 long ride, and the bracing air. 
 
 Mary was merrier and brighter than ever, but it was 
 an effort with him to respond ; and soon she began to 
 notice this, and then there was a pause, which she broke 
 at last with something of an effort. 
 
 " What makes you look so serious, now ? I must 
 know." 
 
 " Was I looking serious ? I beg your pardon, dearest, 
 and I wont do so again any more ; " and he smiled as he
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 423 
 
 answered, but the smile faded away before her steady, 
 loving gaze, and he turned slightly from her, and looked 
 out over the vale below. 
 
 She watched him for a short time in silence, her own 
 fair young face changing like a summer sea, as the light 
 clouds pass over it. Presently she seemed to have come 
 to some decision ; for, taking off her riding-hat, she threw 
 it and her whip and gauntlets on the turf beside her, and 
 drawing nearer to his side, laid her hand on his. He 
 looked at her fondly, and stroking her hair, said, 
 
 " Take care of your complexion, Mary." 
 
 " Oh, it will take care of itself in this air, dear. Be- 
 sides, you are between me and the sun ; and now you 
 must tell me why you look so serious. It is not the first 
 time I have noticed that look. I am your wife, you know, 
 and I have a right to know your thoughts, and to share 
 all your joy, and all your sorrow. I do not mean to 
 give up any of my rights which I got by marrying you." 
 
 " Your rights, dearest ! your poor little rights, which 
 you have gained by changing name, and plighting troth. 
 It is thinking of that, thinking of what you have bought, 
 and the price you have paid for it, which makes me sad at 
 times ; even when you are sitting by me, and laying your 
 hand on my hand, and the sweet burden of your pure 
 life and being on my soiled and baffled manhood." 
 
 " But it was my own bargain, you know, dear, and I 
 am satisfied with my purchase. I paid the price with my 
 eyes open." 
 
 " Ah, if I could only feel that ! " 
 
 " But you know that it is true." 
 
 " No, dearest, that is the pinch. I do not know that it 
 is true. I often feel that it is just not a bit true. It was 
 a one-sided bargain, in which one of the parties had their 
 eyes open and got all the advantage, and that party was I."
 
 424 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " I will not have you so conceited," she said, patting 
 his hand once or twice, and looking more bravely than 
 ever up into his eyes. " Why should you think you 
 were so much the cleverer of the two, as to get all the 
 good out of our bargain ? I am not going to allow that 
 you were so much the most quick-witted and clear-sighted. 
 Women are said to be as quick-witted as men. Perhaps 
 it is not I who have been outwitted after all." 
 
 " Look at the cost, Mary. Think of what you will 
 have to give up. You cannot reckon it up yet." 
 
 " What ! you are going back to the riding-horses and 
 lady's maid again. I thought I had convinced you on 
 those points." 
 
 " They are only a very little part of the price. You 
 have left a home where everybody loved you. You 
 knew it; you were sure of it. You had felt their love 
 ever since you could remember any thing." 
 
 " Yes, dear, and I feel it still. They will be all just 
 as fond of me at home, though I am your wife." 
 
 " At home ! It is no longer your home." 
 
 " No, I have a home of my own now. A new home, 
 with new love there to live on ; and an old home, with the 
 old love to think of." 
 
 " A new home instead of an old one ; a poor home in- 
 stead of a rich one a home where the cry of the sorrow 
 and suffering of the world will reach you, for one in which 
 you had " 
 
 " In which I had not you, dear. There now, that was 
 my purchase. I set my mind on having you buying 
 you, as that is your word. I have paid my price, and got 
 my bargain, and you know, I was always an oddity, 
 and rather wilful am content with it." 
 
 " Yes, Mary, you have bought me,, and you little know, 
 dearest, what you have bought. I can scarcely bear my
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 425 
 
 own selfishness at times when I think of what your life 
 might have been had I left you alone, and what it must be 
 with me." 
 
 " And what might it have been, dear ? " 
 
 " Why you might have married some man with plenty 
 of money, who could have given you every thing to which 
 you have been used." 
 
 " I shall begin to think that you believe in luxuries, 
 after all, if you go on making so much of them. You 
 must not go on preaching one thing and practising another. 
 I am a convert to your preaching, and believe in the 
 misery of multiplying artificial wants. Your wife must 
 have none." 
 
 " Yes, but wealth and position are not to be despised. 
 I feel that, now that it is all done past recall, and I have 
 to think of you. But the loss of them is a mere nothing 
 to what you will have to go through." 
 
 " What do you mean, dear ? Of course we must expect 
 some troubles, like other people." 
 
 " Why, I mean, Mary, that you might, at least, have 
 married a contented man ; some one who found the world 
 a very good world, and was satisfied with things as they 
 are, and had light enough to steer himself by ; and not a 
 fellow like me, full of all manner of doubts and perplex- 
 ities, who sees little but wrong in the world about him, 
 and more in himself." 
 
 " You think I should have been more comfortable ? " 
 
 " Yes, more comfortable and happier. What right had 
 I to bring my worries on you ? For I know you can't 
 live with me, dearest, and not be bothered and annoyed 
 when I am anxious and dissatisfied." # 
 
 " But what if I did not marry you to be comfortable ?" 
 
 " My darling, you never thought about it, and I was too 
 selfish to think for you." 
 30*
 
 426 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " There now, you see, it is just as I said." 
 
 " How do you mean ? " 
 
 "I mean that you are quite wrong in thinking that 1 
 have been deceived. I did not marry you. dear, to be 
 comfortable and I did think it all over ; ay, over and 
 over again. So you are not to run away with the belief 
 that you have taken me in." 
 
 " I shall be glad enough to give it up, dearest, if you 
 can convince me." 
 
 " Then you will listen while I explain ?" 
 
 "Yes, with all my ears and all my heart." 
 
 " You remember the year that we met, when we danced 
 and went nutting together, a thoughtless boy and girl " 
 
 " Remember it ! Have I ever " 
 
 " You are not to interrupt. Of course you remember 
 it all, and are ready to tell me that you loved me the first 
 moment you saw me at the window in High Street. Well, 
 perhaps I shall not object to be told it at a proper time, 
 but now I am making my confessions. I liked you then, 
 because you were Katie's cousin, and almost my first 
 partner, and were never tired of dancing, and were 
 generally merry and pleasant, though you sometimes took 
 to lecturing, even in those days." 
 
 " But Mary " 
 
 " You are to be silent now, and listen. I liked you 
 then. But you are not to look conceited and flatter your- 
 self. It was only a girl's fancy. I couldn't have married 
 you then given myself up to you. No, I don't think I 
 could, oven on the night when you fished for me out of 
 the window with the heather and heliotrope, though I 
 kept them and have them still. And then came that 
 scene down below, at old Simon's cottage, and I thought I 
 should never wish to see you again. And then I came 
 out in London, and went abroad. I scarcely heard of
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 427 
 
 you again for a year, for Katie hardly ever mentioned you 
 in her letters ; and though I sometimes wished that she 
 would, and thought that I should just like to know what 
 you were doing, I was too proud to ask. Meantime, I 
 went out and enjoyed myself, and had a great many pretty 
 things said to me much prettier things than you ever 
 said and made the acquaintance of pleasant young 
 men, friends of papa and mamma ; many of them with 
 good establishments too. But I shall not tell you any 
 thing more ahout them, or you will be going off about the 
 luxuries I have been used to. Then I began to hear of 
 you again. Katie came to stay with us, and I met some 
 of your Oxford friends. Poor dear Katie ! she was full 
 of you and your wild sayings and doings, half frightened 
 and half pleased, but all the time the best and truest 
 friend you ever had. Some of the rest were not friends 
 at all ; and I have heard many a sneer and unkind word, 
 and stories of your monstrous speeches and habits. Some 
 said you were mad ; others that you liked to be eccentric ; 
 that you couldn't bear to live with your equals ; that you 
 sought the society of your inferiors to be flattered. I 
 listened, and thought it all over, and being wilful and 
 eccentric myself, you know, liked more and more to hear 
 about you, and hoped I should see you again some day. 
 I was curious to judge for myself, whether you were much 
 changed for the better or the worse. And at last came 
 the day when I saw you again, carrying the poor lame 
 child; and after that, you know what happened. So here 
 we are, dear, and you are my husband. And you will 
 please never to look serious again, from any foolish 
 thought that I have been taken in ; that I did not know 
 what I was about when I took you ' for better for worse, 
 for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death 
 u do part.' Now, what have you to say for yourself?"
 
 428 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 " Nothing ; but a great deal for you. I see more and 
 more, my darling, what a brave, generous, pitying angel 
 I have tied to myself. But seeing that makes me despise 
 myself more." 
 
 " What ! you are going to dare to disobey me already ? " 
 
 " I can't help it, dearest. All you say shows me more 
 and more that you have made all the sacrifice, and I am 
 to get all the benefit. A man like me has no right to 
 bring such a woman as you under his burden." 
 
 " But you couldn't help yourself. It was because you 
 were out of sorts with the world, smarting with the wrongs 
 you saw on every side, struggling after something better 
 and higher, and siding and sympathizing with the poor 
 and weak, that I loved you. We should never have been 
 here, dear, if you had been a young gentleman satisfied 
 with himself and the world, and likely to get on well in 
 society." 
 
 " Ah, Mary, it is all very well for a man. It is a man's 
 business. But why is a woman's life to be made wretched ? 
 Why should you be dragged into all my perplexities, and 
 douhts, and dreams, and struggles ? " 
 
 " And why should I not ? " 
 
 " Life should be all bright and beautiful to a woman. 
 It is every man's duty to shield her from all that can vex, 
 or pain, or soil." 
 
 " But have women different souls from men ?" 
 
 " God forbid ! " 
 
 " Then are we not fit to share your highest hopes ? " 
 
 " To share our highest hopes ! Yes, when we have 
 any. But the mire and clay where one sticks fast over 
 and over again, with no high hopes or high any thing else 
 in sight a man must be a selfish brute to bring one he 
 pretends to love into all that." 
 
 " Now, Tom," she said, almost solemnly, " you are not
 
 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 429 
 
 true to yourself. "Would you part with your own deepest 
 convictions ? Would you, if you could, go back to the 
 time when you cared for and thought about none of these 
 things?" ' 
 
 He thought a minute, and then, pressing her hand, 
 said, 
 
 " No, dearest, I would not. The consciousness of the 
 darkness in one and around one brings the longing for 
 liorlit. And then the light dawns ; through mist and fog, 
 perhaps, but enough to pick one's way by." lie stopped 
 a moment, and then added, " and shines ever brighter unto 
 the perfect day. Yes, I begin to know it." 
 
 " Then why not put me on your own level ? Why not 
 let me pick my way by your side? Cannot a woman feel 
 the wrongs that are going on in the world ? Cannot she 
 long to see them set right, and pray that they may be set 
 right ? We are not meant to sit in fine silks, and look 
 pretty, and spend money, any more than you are meant 
 to make it, and cry peace where there is no peace. If 
 a woman cannot do much herself, she can honor and love 
 a man who can." 
 
 He turned to her, and bent over her, and kissed her 
 forehead, and kissed her lips. She looked up with spark- 
 ling eyes, and said, 
 
 " Am I not right, dear ? " 
 
 " Yes, you are right, and I have been fake to my creed. 
 You have taken a load off my heart, dearest. Henceforth 
 there shall be but one mind and one soul between us. 
 You have made me feel what it is that a man wants, what 
 is the help that is mete for him." 
 
 He looked into her eyes and kissed her again ; and 
 then rose up, for there was something within him like a 
 moving of new life, which lifted him, and set him on his 
 feet. And he stood with kindling brow, gazing into the
 
 430 TOM BROWN AT OXFORD. 
 
 autumn air, as his heart went sorrowing, but hopefully 
 " sorrowing, back through all the faultful past." And she 
 sat on at first, and watched his face, and neither spoke nor 
 moved for some minutes. Then she rose, too, and stood 
 by his side : 
 
 And on her lover's arm she leant, 
 
 And round her waist she felt it fold, 
 
 And so across the hills they went, 
 ' In that new world which is the old. 
 
 Yes, that new world, through the golden gates of which 
 they had passed together, which is the old, old world after 
 all, and nothing else. The same old and new world it 
 was to our fathers and mothers as it is to us, and shall be 
 to our children, a world clear and bright, and ever be- 
 coming clearer and brighter to the humble, and true, and 
 pure of heart, to every man and woman who will live in 
 it as the children of the Maker and Lord of it, their 
 Father. To them, and to them alone, is that world, old 
 and new, given, and all that is in it, fully and freely to 
 enjoy. All others but these are occupying where they 
 have no title ; " they are sowing much, but bringing in 
 little ; they eat, but have not enough ; they drink, but are 
 not filled with drink ; the}' clothe themselves, but there is 
 none warm ; and he of them who earneth wages, earneth 
 wages to put them into a bag with holes." But these have 
 the world and all things for a rightful and rich inherit- 
 ance, for they hold them as dear children of Him in whose 
 hand it and they are lying, and no power in earth or hell 
 Bhall pluck them out of their Father's hand.
 
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