man among the whole number of undergraduates. He
was big and very handsome--as it seemed to Ernest the handsomest man whom
he ever had seen or ever could see, for it was impossible to imagine a
more lively and agreeable countenance. He was good at cricket and
boating, very good-natured, singularly free from conceit, not clever but
very sensible, and, lastly, his father and mother had been drowned by the
overturning of a boat when he was only two years old and had left him as
their only child and heir to one of the finest estates in the South of
England. Fortune every now and then does things handsomely by a man all
round; Towneley was one of those to whom she had taken a fancy, and the
universal verdict in this case was that she had chosen wisely.

Ernest had seen Towneley as every one else in the University (except, of
course, dons) had seen him, for he was a man of mark, and being very
susceptible he had liked Towneley even more than most people did, but at
the same time it never so much as entered his head that he should come to
know him. He liked looking at him if he got a chance, and was very much
ashamed of himself for doing so, but there the matter ended.

By a strange accident, however, during Ernest's last year, when the names
of the crews for the scratch fours were drawn he had found himself
coxswain of a crew, among whom was none other than his especial hero
Towneley; the three others were ordinary mortals, but they could row
fairly well, and the crew on the whole was rather a good one.

Ernest was frightened out of his wits. When, however, the two met, he
found Towneley no less remarkable for his entire want of anything like
"side," and for his power of setting those whom he came across at their
ease, than he was for outward accomplishments; the only difference he
found between Towneley and other people was that he was so very much
easier to get on with. Of course Ernest worshipped him more and more.

The scratch fours being ended the connection between the two came to an
end, but Towneley never passed Ernest thenceforward without a nod and a
few good-natured words. In an evil moment he had mentioned Towneley's
name at Battersby, and now what was the result? Here was his mother
plaguing him to ask Towneley to come down to Battersby and marry
Charlotte. Why, if he had thought there was the remotest chance of
Towneley's marrying Charlotte he would have gone down on his knees to him
and told him wha