not by merit, where is the use of any of us putting out our mettle?"

"You be quiet, Miss Charley! you juniors have nothing to do with it,"
were all the thanks the boy received from Tom.

Now the facts really were very much as Tom Channing asserted; though
whether, or how far, Mr. Pye had promised, and whether Lady Augusta's
boast had been a vain one, was a matter for speculation. Neither could
it be surmised the part, if any, played in it by Prebendary Burrows. It
was certain that Lady Augusta had, on the previous day, boasted to Mr.
Galloway, in his office, that her son was to have the seniorship; that
Mr. Pye had promised it to her and Dr. Burrows, at the dinner-party.
She spoke of it without the least reserve, in a tone of much
self-gratulation, and she laughingly told Jenkins, who was at his desk
writing, that he might wish Gerald joy when he next saw him. Jenkins
accepted it all as truth: it may be questioned if Mr. Galloway did, for
he knew that Lady Augusta did not always weigh her words before
speaking.

In the evening--this same evening, mind, after the call at the office
of Lady Augusta--Mr. Jenkins proceeded towards home when he left his
work. He took the road through the cloisters. As he was passing the
porter's lodge, who should he see in it but his father, old Jenkins,
the bedesman, holding a gossip with Ketch; and they saw him.

"If that ain't our Joe a-going past!" exclaimed the bedesman.

Joe stepped in. He was proceeding to join in the converse, when a lot
of the college boys tore along, hooting and shouting, and kicking a
ball about. It was kicked into the lodge, and a few compliments were