The looked-for morrow came at last. A minute before breakfast we
heard the steps of Monsieur Mareschal and of the new boy in the quiet
courtyard. Every head was turned at once to the door of the classroom.
Father Haugoult, who participated in our torments of curiosity, did not
sound the whistle he used to reduce our mutterings to silence and bring
us back to our tasks. We then saw this famous new boy, whom Monsieur
Mareschal was leading by the hand. The superintendent descended from his
desk, and the headmaster said to him solemnly, according to etiquette:
"Monsieur, I have brought you Monsieur Louis Lambert; will you place him
in the fourth class? He will begin work to-morrow."

Then, after speaking a few words in an undertone to the class-master, he
said:

"Where can he sit?"

It would have been unfair to displace one of us for a newcomer; so as
there was but one desk vacant, Louis Lambert came to fill it, next to
me, for I had last joined the class. Though we still had some time to
wait before lessons were over, we all stood up to look at Louis Lambert.
Monsieur Mareschal heard our mutterings, saw how eager we were, and
said, with the kindness that endeared him to us all:

"Well, well, but make no noise; do not disturb the other classes."

These words set us free to play some little time before breakfast, and
we all gathered round Lambert while Monsieur Mareschal walked up and
down the courtyard with Father Haugoult.

There were about eighty of us little demons, as bold as birds of prey.
Though we ourselves had all gone through this cruel novitiate, we showed
no mercy on a newcomer, never sparing him the mockery, the catechism,
the impertinence, which were inexhaustible on such occasions, to the
discomfiture of the neophyte, whose manners, strength, and temper were
thus tested. Lambert, whether he was stoical or dumfounded, made no
reply to any questions. One of us thereupon remarked that he was no
doubt of the school of Pythagoras, and there was a shout of laughter.
The new boy was thenceforth Pythagoras through all his life at the
college. At the same time, Lambert's piercing eye, the scorn expressed
in his face for our childishness, so far removed from the stamp of his
own nature, the easy attitude he assumed, and his evident strength in
proportion to his years, infused a certain respect into the veriest
scamps among us. For my part, I kept near him, absorbed in studying him
in silence.

Louis Lamb