school when Raffles was captain of
cricket. I believe he owed his nickname entirely to the popular
prejudice against a day-boy; and in view of the special reproach which
the term carried in my time, as also of the fact that his father was
one of the school trustees, partner in a banking firm of four
resounding surnames, and manager of the local branch, there can be
little doubt that the stigma was undeserved. But we did not think so
then, for Nasmyth was unpopular with high and low, and appeared to
glory in the fact. A swollen conscience caused him to see and hear
even more than was warranted by his position, and his uncompromising
nature compelled him to act on whatsoever he heard or saw: a savage
custodian of public morals, he had in addition a perverse enthusiasm
for lost causes, loved a minority for its own sake, and untenable
tenets for theirs. Such, at all events, was my impression of Nipper
Nasmyth, after my first term, which was also his last. I had never
spoken to him, but I had heard him speak with extraordinary force and
fervor in the school debates. I carried a clear picture of his unkempt
hair, his unbrushed coat, his dominant spectacles, his dogmatic jaw.
And it was I who knew the combination at a glance, after years and
years, when the fateful whim seized Raffles to play once more in the
Old Boys' Match, and his will took me down with him to participate in
the milder festivities of Founder's Day.

It was, however, no ordinary occasion. The bicentenary loomed but a
year ahead, and a movement was on foot to mark the epoch with an
adequate statue of our pious founder. A special meeting was to be held
at the school-house, and Raffles had been specially invited by the new
head master, a man of his own standing, who had been in the eleven
with him up at Cambridge. Raffles had not been near the old place for
years; but I had never gone down since the day I left; and I will not
dwell on the emotions which the once familiar journey awakened in my
unworthy bosom. Paddington was alive with Old Boys of all ages--but
very few of ours--if not as lively as we used to make it when we all
landed back for the holidays. More of us had moustaches and cigarettes
and "loud" ties. That was all. Yet of the throng, though two or three
looked twice and thrice at Raffles, neither he nor I knew a soul
until we had to change at the junction near our journey's end, when,
as I say, it was I who recognized Nipper Nasmyth at sight.

Th