to support
himself for three or four years at an expensive college like St. Mary's.
But when Mark was no more successful with another group of colleges, his
tutors began to be alarmed, wondering if their method of teaching Latin
and Greek lacked the tradition of the public school necessary to
success.

"Oh, no, it's obviously my fault," said Mark. "I expect I go to pieces
in examinations, or perhaps I'm not intended to go to Oxford."

"I beg you, my dear boy," said the Rector a little irritably, "not to
apply such a loose fatalism to your career. What will you do if you
don't go to the University?"

"It's not absolutely essential for a priest to have been to the
University," Mark argued.

"No, but in your case I think it's highly advisable. You haven't had a
public school education, and inasmuch as I stand to you _in loco
parentis_ I should consider myself most culpable if I didn't do
everything possible to give you a fair start. You haven't got a very
large sum of money to launch yourself upon the world, and I want you to
spend what you have to the best advantage. Of course, if you can't get a
scholarship, you can't and that's the end of it. But, rather than that
you should miss the University I will supplement from my own savings
enough to carry you through three years as a commoner."

Tears stood in Mark's eyes.

"You've already been far too generous," he said. "You shan't spend any
more on me. I'm sorry I talked in that foolish way. It was really only a
kind of affectation of indifference. I'm feeling pretty sore with myself
for being such a failure; but I'll have another shot and I hope I shall
do better."

Mark as a last chance tried for a close scholarship at St. Osmund's Hall
for the sons of clergymen.

"It's a tiny place of course," said the Rector. "But it's authentic
Oxford, and in some ways perhaps you would be happier at a very small
college. Certainly you'd find your money went much further."

The examination was held in the Easter vacation, and when Mark arrived
at the college he found only one other candidate besides himself. St.
Osmund's Hall with its miniature quadrangle, miniature hall, miniature
chapel, empty of undergraduates and with only the Principal and a couple
of tutors in residence, was more like an ancient almshouse than an
Oxford college. Mark and his rival, a raw-boned youth called Emmett who
was afflicted with paroxysms of stammering, moved about the precincts
upon tiptoe lik