d us on the quiet that there
mustn't be any disturbance that evening, no one ever went crusading--
Acton would have licked them if they had. Acton's going to propose to
Miss Eleanor some day, he told us so, and--"

"But what about the bedrooms?" interrupted Diggory; "have you given up
having crusades?"

"Yes, but we have other things instead. We call our rooms by different
names, and it's all against all; one lot come and make a raid on you,
and then you go and pay them out. This term Kennedy and Jacobs sleep in
the room above ours, and next to the big attic. They're always reading
sea stories, and they call their room the 'Main-top,' because it's so
high up. Then at the end of the passage are Acton, Shaw, and Morris,
and they're the 'House of Lords;' and next to them is the 'Dogs' Home,'
where all the other fellows are put."

A few hours later Diggory and his two room-mates were standing at the
foot of their beds and discussing the formation of a few simple rules
for conducting a race in undressing, the last man to put the candle out.

"You needn't bother to race," said Mugford; "I'll do it--I'm sure to be
the last."

"No, you aren't," answered Vance. "We'll give you coat and waistcoat
start; it'll be good fun--"

At this moment the door was suddenly flung open, two half-dressed
figures sprang into the room, and discharged a couple of snowballs
point-blank at its occupants. One of the missiles struck Diggory on the
shoulder, and the other struck Mugford fair and square on the side of
the head, the fragments flying all over the floor. There was a subdued
yell of triumph, the door was slammed to with a bang, and the muffled
sound of stockinged feet thudding up the neighbouring staircase showed
that the enemy were in full retreat.

"It's those confounded Main-top men!" cried Jack Vance; "I will pay them
out. I wonder where the fellows got the snow from?"

"Oh, I expect they opened the window and took it off the ledge,"
answered Diggory. "Look here--let's sweep it up into this piece of
paper before it melts."

This having been done, the three friends hastily threw off their clothes
and scrambled into bed, forgetting all about the proposed race in their
eagerness to form some plan for an immediate retaliation on the
occupants of the "Main-top."

"I wonder if they'll hear anything of the ghost again this term?" said
Mugford,

"What ghost?" asked Diggory.

"Oh, it's nothing really," answered Vance; "