l been kicking up a row--why, big
Cunningham had been braying like an ass only a minute before.

He spied Armstrong and Gillespie glinting across at him with a curious
look: they were wondering whether he had courage enough to stand to his
guns with a professor. He knew the meaning of the look, and resented it.
He was on his mettle before them, it seemed. The fellow who had
swaggered at the Howff last night about "what _he_ would do if a
professor jumped on _him_," mustn't prove wanting in the present trial,
beneath the eyes of those on whom he had imposed his blatancy.

When we think of what Gourlay did that day, we must remember that he was
soaked in alcohol--not merely with his morning's potation, but with the
dregs of previous carousals. And the dregs of drink, a thorough toper
will tell you, never leave him. He is drunk on Monday with his
Saturday's debauch. As "Drucken Wabster" of Barbie put it once, "When a
body's hard up, his braith's a consolation." If that be so--and Wabster,
remember, was an expert whose opinion on this matter is entitled to the
highest credence--if that be so, it proves the strength and persistence
of a thorough alcoholic impregnation, or, as Wabster called it, of "a
good soak." In young Gourlay's case, at any rate, the impregnation was
enduring and complete. He was like a rag steeped in fusel oil.

As the end of the hour drew near, he sank deeper in his dogged
sullenness. When the class streamed from the large door on the right, he
turned aside to the little anteroom on the left, with an insolent swing
of the shoulders. He knew the fellows were watching him curiously--he
felt their eyes upon his back. And, therefore, as he went through the
little door, he stood for a moment on his right foot, and waggled his
left, on a level with his hip behind, in a vulgar derision of them, the
professor, and the whole situation. That was a fine taunt flung back at
them!

There is nothing on earth more vindictive than a weakling. When he gets
a chance he takes revenge for everything his past cowardice forced him
to endure. The timid lecturer, angry at the poor figure he had cut on
the platform, was glad to take it out of young Gourlay for the
wrongdoing of the class. Gourlay was their scapegoat. The lecturer had
no longer over a hundred men to deal with, but one lout only, sullen yet
shrinking in the room before him. Instead of coming to the point at
once, he played with his victim. It was less from int