for the history medal, and I mean to crawl up
into the first three in the Fifth."

"And you'll do 'em, Toddy," said Jim, admiringly. "You're not quite such
an ass as you once were."

"Well, I'll work evenly and regularly, and, perhaps, pull off one or
other of them."

"I go, you know, at midsummer. Then I'm to cram somewhere for the Army.
Taylor's been advising a treble dose of mathematics, and I think I'll
oblige him this time."

"Taylor's not half a bad fellow," said Gus.

"Oh, you're a monomaniac on that subject, Gus! Once you felt ill if you
met Taylor or Corker on your pavement."

Jim Cotton was right. Gus was now a vastly different fellow from the
shiftless, lazy, elusive Gus of old; he worked evenly and steadily
onward, and, in consequence, his name danced delightfully near the top
of the weekly form-lists of the Fifth Form. He, however, did not sap
everlastingly, but on half holidays lounged luxuriantly on the school
benches, watching the cricket going on in the bright sunshine, or he
would take his rod and have an afternoon among the perch in the
Lodestone, that apology for a stream. Fishing was Gus's ideal of
athleticism; the exercise was gentle, and you sometimes had half a dozen
perch for your trouble. Gus argued there was nothing to show for an
eight hours' fag at cricket in a broiling sun.

CHAPTER XXVIII

ACTON'S LAST MOVE

Phil's unpopularity had somewhat abated, for his victory in the rackets
had given him a good leg up in the estimation of his fellows; but still
there was the uneasy feeling that in the matter of the "footer" cap his
conduct was shady, or at least dubious.

I was awfully sorry to see this, for I myself was leaving at midsummer,
and in my own mind I had always looked upon Phil to take up the
captaincy. He would have made, in my opinion, the _beau ideal_ of a
captain, for he was a gentleman, a scholar, and an athlete. But the
other monitors, or at least many of them, did not look upon Phil with
enthusiasm, and his election for the captaincy did not now seem the sure
thing it had done a few months before.

At St. Amory's the monitors elect a captain, and Corker confirms the
appointment if he thinks their choice suitable, but he insists that he
must be well up in the Sixth, and not a mere athlete.

Now, Phil's ambition was to be Captain of St. Amory's, as his father had
been before him, and when the home authorities finally decided that I
was to go to Cambridge in th