on ecrite" for the oral examination
that comes after, and which is so easy to pass--the examiners having
lunched themselves into good-nature.

There we stood panting, some fifty boys and masters, in a small,
whitewashed room like a prison. An official comes in and puts the
list of candidates in a frame on the wall, and we crane our necks
over each other's shoulders.

And, lo! Barty is plucked--_colle_! and I have passed, and actually
Rapaud--and no one else from Brossard's!

An old man--a parent or grandparent probably of some unsuccessful
candidate--bursts into tears and exclaims,

"Oh! que malheur--que malheur!"

A shabby, tall, pallid youth, in the uniform of the College
Ste.-Barbe, rushes down the stone stair's shrieking,

"Ca pue l'injustice, ici!"

One hears him all over the place: terrible heartburns and tragic
disappointments in the beginning of life resulted from failure in
this first step--a failure which disqualified one for all the little
government appointments so dear to the heart of the frugal French
parent. "Mille francs par an! c'est le Pactole!"

* * * * *

Barty took his defeat pretty easily--he put it all down to his nose
bleeding--and seemed so pleased at my success, and my dear mother's
delight in it, that he was soon quite consoled; he was always like
that.

To M. Merovee, Barty's failure was as great a disappointment as it
was a painful surprise.

[Illustration: "'MAURICE AU PIQUET!'"]

"Try again Josselin! Don't leave here till you have passed. If you are
content to fail in this, at the very outset of your career, you will
never succeed in anything through life! Stay with us as my guest till
you can go up again, and again if necessary. _Do_, my dear child--it
will make me so happy! I shall feel it as a proof that you reciprocate
in some degree the warm friendship I have always borne you--in common
with everybody in the school! Je t'en prie, mon garcon!"

Then he went to the Rohans and tried to persuade them. But Lord
Archibald didn't care much about Bachots, nor his wife either. They
were going back to live in England, besides; and Barty was going
into the Guards.

I left school also--with a mixture of hope and elation, and yet the
most poignant regret.

I can hardly find words to express the gratitude and affection I
felt for Merovee Brossard when I bade him farewell.

Except his father before him, he was the best and finest Frenchman I
ever