tones; and it was plain that
he spoke in all sincerity.

The position of students living in colleges and living in halls, as
they were called, was, as Garret had said, altogether different.
Graduates and undergraduates of the colleges which had sprung up
were fenced about with rules and restrictions which have been
modified rather than changed with the flight of time. But the hall
of olden Oxford was merely a sort of lodging house, generally kept
by a graduate or master, but not subject to any of the rules which
were binding upon those students who entered upon one of the
foundations. Indeed, the growth of colleges had been due in great
part to the desire on the part of far-seeing men and friends of
order as well as learning to curb the absolute and undesirable
freedom of the mass of students brought together at Oxford and
Cambridge, and in the middle ages living almost without discipline
or control, often indulging in open riots or acts of wholesale
insubordination.

Anthony Dalaber was not at present a member of any college, nor
even of one of the religious houses where students could lodge, and
where they lived beneath a sort of lesser control. He and Hugh
Fitzjames, both of them youths of limited means, shared a lodging
in a house called St. Alban Hall, and were free to come and go as
they pleased, none asking them wherefore or whither. He saw at once
that what would not be possible to a canon of Cardinal College
would be feasible enough to him and his friend, if Fitzjames should
sympathize with him in the matter. And, so far, he believed his
friend was with him, though without, perhaps, the same eager
enthusiasm.

When the visit to Garret came to an end, and Anthony Dalaber said
farewell to him at the water side, where a barge was to convey them
some distance up the river, the priest held his hands long and
earnestly, looking into his eyes with affectionate intensity, and
at the last he kissed him upon both cheeks and said: "God be with
thee, my young brother! May He keep thee firm and steadfast to the
last, whatever may befall!"

"I am very sure He will," answered Dalaber fervently. "I am yours,
and for the good cause, for life or death."

They parted then, and the voyage began; but little was spoken by
the travellers so long as they remained in the barge. Clarke seemed
to be thinking deeply, his eyes fixed earnestly upon Dalaber's face
from time to time; whilst the latter sat gazing behind him at the
cit