d college friend,
Charles Cheviot, now a clergyman and an under-master at one of the
great schools recently opened for the middle classes, where he was
meeting with great success, and was considered a capital judge of boys'
characters. He was the guest of the Mays during the examination; and
though his shy formal manner, and convulsive efforts at young lady
talk, greatly affronted Gertrude, the brothers liked him.

He was in consternation at the decline of Stoneborough school since Mr.
Wilmot had ceased to be an under-master; the whole tone of the school
had degenerated, and it was no wonder that the Government inquiries
were ominously directed in that quarter. Scholarship was at a low ebb,
Dr. Hoxton seemed to have lost what power of teaching he had ever
possessed, and as Dr. May observed, the poor old school was going to
the dogs. But even in the present state of things, Leonard had no
chance of excelling his competitors. His study, like theirs, had been
mere task-work, and though he showed more native power than the rest,
yet perhaps this had made the mere learning by rote even more difficult
to an active mind full of inquiry. He was a whole year younger than
any other who touched the foremost ranks, two years younger than
several; and though he now and then showed a feverish spark of genius,
reminding Mr. Cheviot of Norman in his famous examination, it was not
sustained--there were will and force, but not scholarship--and besides,
there was a wide blurred spot in his memory, as though all the
brain-work of the quarter before his illness had been confused, and had
not yet become clear. There was every likelihood that a few years
would make him superior to the chosen Randall scholar, but at present
his utmost efforts did not even place him among the seven whose names
appeared honourably in the newspaper. It was a failure; but Mr.
Cheviot had become much interested in the boy for his own sake, as well
as from what he heard from the Mays, and he strongly advised that
Leonard should at Easter obtain employment for a couple of years at the
school in which he himself was concerned. He would thus be maintaining
himself, and pursuing his own studies under good direction, so as to
have every probability of success in getting an open scholarship at one
of the Universities.

Nothing could be better, and there was a perfect jubilee among the Mays
at the proposal. Aubrey was despatched as soon as breakfast was over
to