the--you know."

"It looks like him," said Magnus. "Anyhow, it'll do for him."

"I'd like to do for him," growled Joe.

They went on presently, in shocking tempers, both of them. They loathed
that mountain, and yet neither liked to propose to go back. That is the
way in which a good many mountains are climbed.

Magnus got riled with Joe for not giving in--he was the elder, and it
was his business to begin. Joe, on the other hand, never thought so ill
of Magnus as when he saw him pegging up twenty yards ahead, never giving
him (Joe) time to catch up. He made faces at him behind his back, and
tried to think of all the caddish things he had done since he came to
the school. But it was no good. As sure as ever Joe tried artfully to
cut a corner or "put it on" for a yard or two, Magnus, on ahead, cut a
corner and put it on too.

When Magnus presently, having improved his lead, sat down to rest, Joe
made sure he had caught his man at last. But--would you believe it?--
just as he approached the place, with every show of friendship,
announcing that he had something particular to say, Magnus got up and
went on again, leaving poor Joe not only still in the rear, but without
time even for a rest.

All this astonishing activity, as I said, was the result, not of energy,
but of bad temper. The worse their tempers became the greater the pace,
and the greater the pace the nearer the top of that interminable ridge.
Towards the end it was uncommonly like running. Magnus would have given
worlds to venture to look behind and see how the idiot below was
fagging; and Joe would have given a lot to see the lout above come a
cropper and smash his leg. It wants a pretty hot friendship to stand
the test of a mountain-side.

At last (without a suspicion of what o'clock it was, or how far they had
come), Magnus actually stopped and lay down.

"Serves him right," said Joe, triumphantly, running with all his might
to take advantage of his chance. Alas! when he got up to his friend, he
discovered that after all he was not dead-beat, or wounded, or ill.

The reason he had stopped was that he had got to the top.

As was natural, as soon as this agreeable and amazing discovery was
made, Magnus minor and my brother Joe forgot their rancour and loved one
another again with a mighty affection. Their own brothers weren't in
it.

"Good old Joey!" cried Magnus, as my brother lay on the turf beside him;
"crowd in, old hoss--lots of ro