hey had time to rally and stand together again.

What happened to the rest--who was down, who fought, who
fled,--Tom had no time to inquire; for he found himself suddenly
the centre of a yelling circle of enemies. So he set his teeth
and buckled to his work; and the thought of splendid single
combat, and glory such as he had read of in college stories, and
tradition handing him down as the hero of that great night,
flashed into his head as he cast his eye round for foemen worthy
of his steel. None such appeared; so, selecting the one most of
his own size, he squared and advanced on him. But the challenged
one declined the combat, and kept retreating; while from behind,
and at the sides, one after another of the "town" rushing out
dealt Tom a blow and vanished again into the crowd. For a moment
or two he kept his head and temper; the assailants individually
were too insignificant to put out his strength upon; but head and
temper were rapidly going;--he was like a bull in the arena with
the picadores sticking their little javelins in him. A smart blow
on the nose, which set a myriad of stars dancing before his eyes,
finished the business, and he rushed after the last assailant,
dealing blows to right and left, on small and great. The mob
closed in on him, still avoiding attacks in front, but on the
flank and rear they hung on him and battered at him. He had to
turn sharply round after every step to shake himself clear, and
at each turn the press thickened, the shouts waxed louder and
fiercer; he began to get unsteady; tottered, swayed, and,
stumbling over a prostrate youth, at last went down full length
on to the pavement, carrying a couple of his assailants with him.
And now it would have fared hardly with him, and he would
scarcely have reached college with sound bones,--for I am sorry
to say an Oxford town mob is a cruel and brutal one, and a man
who is down has no chance with it,--but that for one moment he
and his prostrate foes were so jumbled together that the town
could not get at him, and the next cry of "Gown! gown!" rose high
above the din; the town were swept back again by the rush of a
reinforcement of gownsmen, the leader of whom seized him by the
shoulders and put him on his legs again; while his late
antagonists crawled away to the side of the road.

"Why, Brown!" said his rescuer,--Jervis, the Captain,--"this,
you? Not hurt, eh?"

"Not a bit," said Tom.

"Good; come on, then; stick to me." In three