s clapped a crown on his head and
hailed him sovereign over a people of whom he has scarcely heard and
knows nothing save that they are warlike and extremely hot-tempered,
should be in a fair way to move ahead briskly. Nevertheless I shall
pass over the first two years of the reign of King Prosper, during
which he stayed at school and performed nothing worthy of mention:
and shall come to a summer's afternoon at Oxford, close upon the end
of term, when Nat Fiennes and I sat together in my rooms in New
College--he curled on the window-seat with a book, and I stretched in
an easy-chair by the fireplace, and deep in a news-sheet.

"By the way, Nat," said I, looking up as I turned the page,
"where will you spend your vacation?"

A groan answered me.

"Hullo!" I went on, making a hasty guess at his case. "Has the
little cordwainer's tall daughter jilted you, as I promised she
would?"

"A curse on this age!" swore Nat, who ever carried his heart on his
sleeve.

I began to hum--

"I loved a lass, a fair one,
As fair as e'er was seen;
She was indeed a rare one,
Another Sheba queen.
Her waist exceeding small,
The fives did fit her shoe;
But now alas! sh' 'as left me,
Falero, lero, loo!"

"Curse the age!" repeated Nat, viciously. "If these were Lancelot's
days now, a man could run mad in the forest and lie naked and chew
sticks; and then she'd be sorry."

"In summer time to Medley
My love and I would go;
The boatmen there stood read'ly
My love and me to row,"

sang I, and ducked my head to avoid the cushion he hurled.
"Well then, there's very pretty forest land around my home in
Cornwall, with undergrowth and dropped twigs to last you till
Michaelmas term. So why not ride down with me and spend at least the
fore-part of your madness there?"

"I hate your Cornwall."

"'Tis a poor rugged land," said I; "but hath this convenience above
your own home, that it contains no nymphs to whom you have yet sworn
passion. You may meet ours with a straight brow; and they are fair,
too, and unembarrassed, though I won't warrant them if you run bare."

"'Tis never I that am inconstant."

"Never, Nat; 'tis she, always and only--" she, she, and only she"--
and there have been six of her to my knowledge."

"If I were a king, now--"

"T'cht!" said I (for as my best friend, and almost my sole one, he
knew my story).

"If a fellow were a