confer was held to be within his grasp. His contemporaries looked
upon him as a marvellous being, who was destined to rise to the top
of whatever tree he felt disposed to climb. He was really a delightful
fellow, fresh, smiling, expansive, amusing, and his friends all
worshipped him. Of course he went in for the Hertford. His success was
certain; it was merely a question as to who should be second. On the
evening before the examination began, there was a strange commotion in
GORTON's College. GORTON, who was supposed to have been reading hard,
was found at about twelve o'clock in the quad in his nightgown. He was
on all fours, and was engaged in eating grass and roaring out ribald
snatches of Latin songs in a shrill voice. When the porter approached
him he said he was a hippogriff, and that in another ten minutes he
intended to fly to Iffley and back in half a second. He was carried
up to bed raving horribly. On the following day he grew calmer, and
in a week he was himself again. But by that time, of course, the
examination was over, and DUBBIN was soon afterwards announced as the
successful competitor.

Judging the past by what I know now, I cannot doubt that the madness
of GORTON was what patrons of the prize-ring call a put-up job, for
he never afterwards showed the smallest symptom of lunacy. He had not
worked sufficiently, and knew he must fail. So he became temporarily
insane, to avoid defeat and maintain his reputation for scholarship.
He left Oxford without taking a degree, and owing money right and
left--to tradesmen, to his friends, to his tutor. Then he disappeared
for some years.

Next he suddenly cropped up again in Ireland. A small borough
constituency had been suddenly declared vacant. GORTON happened to be
staying in the hotel. He promptly offered himself as a candidate, and