"I felt equal to it,” replied Henry. "The one, originally put up, could not be done."

"Then they should have put up a third, for me. The cathedral does not lack anthems, F hope. Show me where your head was struck." Henry put his hand to his ear, then higher up, then to his temple. "It was somewhere here-all about here-I cannot tell the exact spot.'

As he spoke, a tribe of college boys was heard to clatter in at the gate. Henry would have risen, but Mr. St. John laid his arm across him.

"You are not going to those boys. I will send them off. Lie still and go to sleep, and dream of pleasant things."

"Pleasant things!" echoed Henry Arkell, in a tone full of pain. Mr. St. John leaned over him.

'Henry, I have never had a brother; but I have almost loved you as such. Treat me as one now. What tale is it those demons of mischief have got hold of, about your watch and medal?"

With a sharp cry, Henry Arkell turned his face to the pillow, and lay there in distress.

"I suppose old Rutterley has got them. But that's nothing; it's the fashion in the school: and I expect you had some urgent motive."

"Oh, Mr. St. John, I shall never overget this day's shame: they told Georgina Beauclerc! I would rather die this moment, here, as I lie, than see her face again."

His tone was a wail of anguish, and Mr. St. John's heart ached for him though he chose to appear to make light of the matter.

:

"Told Georgina Beauclerc: what if they did? She is the very one to glory in such exploits. Had she been the dean's son, instead of his daughter, she would have been in Rutterley's sanctum three times a week. I don't think she would stand at going, as it is, if she were hard up."

"Oh, why did they tell her! I could not have acted so cruelly by them. If I could but go to some far-off desert, and never face her, or the school, again!"

"If you could but work yourself into a brain fever, you had better say; for that's what you are likely to do. As to falling in Georgina Beauclerc's opinion, which you seem to estimate so highly (it's more than I do), if you pledged all you possess in a lump, and yourself into the bargain, she would only think the better of you. Now I tell you so, for I know it."

I saw

"I could not help it; I could not, indeed. Money is so badly wanted at home; and mamma said the daily worry was wearing her out. a letter, pressing papa for ten pounds, to be paid before to-morrow, or else- He stopped in confusion, having said more than he meant: and St. John took up the discourse in a careless tone.

66

Money is wanted badly everywhere. I have done worse than you, Harry, for I am pawning my estate, piecemeal, to the Jews. Mind! that's a true confession, and has never been given to another soul: it must lie between us."

"It was yesterday afternoon when college was over," groaned Henry. "I only thought of giving Rutterley my watch: I thought he would be sure to let me have ten pounds upon it. But he would not; only six:

and I had the medal in my pocket; I had been showing it to you. I never did such a thing in all my life before."

"That is more than your companions could say. How did it get to their knowledge?"

"I cannot think."

"Where's the the exchange?"

"The what?" asked Henry.

"How dull you are!" cried Mr. St. John. "I am trying to be genteel, aud you won't let me. The ticket. Let me see it."

They are in my jacket-pocket.

Two." He languidly reached forth

the pieces, and Mr. St. John slipped them into his own. Why do you do that, sir ?"

"To study them at leisure. What's the matter ?" "My head is beginning to ache ?"

"No wonder, with all this talking. I'm off.

as fast as you can."

Good-by. Get to sleep

The boys were in the garden and round the gate still, when he went

down.

“Oh, if you please, sir, is he half killed?

so."

Edwin Wilberforce says

"No, he is not half killed," responded Mr. St. John. quiet, and you must disperse, that he may have it."

66

"But he wants

My brother, the senior boy, says he must have fallen down from vexation, because his tricks came out," cried Prattleton, junior. Mr. St. John ran his eyes over the assemblage.

"What tricks ?"

"He has been pawning the gold medal, Mr. St. John," cried Cookesley, the second senior of the school.

dean: Bright Vaughan heard him."

"Oh, he has told the dean, has he ?"

"Aultane has told the

"The dean was going into the deanery, sir, and Miss Beauclerc was standing at the door, waiting for him," explained Vaughan to Mr. St. John. "Something she said to Aultane put him in a passion, and he took and told the dean. It was his temper made him do it, sir."

"Such a disgrace, you know, Mr. St. John, to take the dean's medal there," rejoined Cookesley. "Anything else wouldn't have signified." "Oh, been rather meritorious, no doubt," returned Mr. St. John. "Boys."

"Yes, sir."

"You know I was one of yourselves once, and I can make allowance for you in all ways. But when I was in the school, our motto was, Fair play, and no sneaking."

"It's our motto still, sir," cried the flattered boys.

"Aul

"It does not appear to be. We would rather, any one of us, have pitched ourselves off that tower," pointing to it with his hand, "than have gone sneaking to the dean with a private complaint." "And so we would still, sir, in cool blood," cried Cookesley. tane must have been out of his mind with passion when he did it." "How does Aultane know that Arkell's medal is in pawn?" "He does not say how. He says he'll pledge his word to it.' "Then listen to me, boys: my word will, I believe, go as far with

you

as Aultane's. Yesterday afternoon I met Henry Arkell at this very gate: I asked him to let me see his medal, and he fetched it out of the house to show me. He is in bed now, but perhaps if you ask him tomorrow, he will be able to show it to you. At any rate, do not condemn him, until you are sure there's a just reason. Fair play's a jewel, boys:

fair play for ever."

The boys were breaking into a cheer for Fair play and Mr. St. John; but the latter put up his hand.

"I thought it was Sunday. Riverton? Disperse quietly."

Is that the way you keep Sunday in

"Poor lad! I'll clear him," muttered Mr. St. John, as he went towards his home. "I see how it was: he made a noble sacrifice to relieve his father. As to Aultane, I don't understand how he could have fathomed it, unless he was in the pawn-shop himself. He is a meanspirited coward. To tell the dean!"

Indeed, the incautious revelation of Mr. Aultane was already exciting some disagreeable consternation amongst the seniors; and that gentleman, himself, already wished his passionate tongue bitten out, for having made it.

The following morning early the school flocked up, in a body, to the judges' lodgings, to beg what was called the judges' holiday. The custom was, for the judges to send one of their cards out, and their.compliments to the head master, asking him to grant it: and the boys' custom was, as they tore back again, bearing the card in triumph, to raise the whole street with their cheers and shouts of "Holiday! holiday!" causing not a few alarmed sleepers to dart out of bed and throw up the windows, in dread belief that the town was on fire. But there was no such luck on this morning: the judges, instead of the card and the request, sent out a severe message that from what they had heard yesterday in the cathedral, the school appeared to merit punishment, rather than holiday. So the boys went back, dreadfully chapfallen, kicking as much mud as they could over their trousers and boots, for it had rained in the night, and ready to buffet Aultane as the source of the calamity; while the lie-a-bed-late folks slumbered on in peace.

That same morning, before nine, Mr. St. John was by Henry Arkell's bedside. "Well, how's the head ?"

"It feels light-or heavy; I hardly know which. It does not feel as it ought. I shall get up presently."

"All right. Put on this when you do," said Mr. St. John, producing the watch. "And put up this in your treasure place, wherever that may be," he added, laying the gold medal beside it.

"I shall have some sport to-day. I have wormed it out of Rutterley: and he tells me who was down there, and on what errand.

Ah ha, Mr.

Aultane! so you peached to the dean: wait till your turn comes.”

"I wonder Rutterley told you anything."

:

"He knew me and the name of St. John bears weight in Riverton," Ismiled he who owned it. Harry, of course you will not go to school to-day."

"It is the judges' holiday."

"The judges have refused it, and the boys have sneaked back like so

many dogs with their tails scorched. I am not at the bottom of that mischief yet something's wrong. Don't attempt to go to school, Harry, or to college either. Good-by. Oh-should I drop you a line or a message, asking you to send me the medal to-day, you will do so." Henry looked surprised. He caught Mr. St. John's arm as he was departing. "How can I ever thank you? I do not know when I shall be able to repay you the ten pounds: not until

"You never will," interrupted Mr. St. John. I should not take it if your were rolling in gold. I have done this for my own pleasure, and I will not be cheated out of it."

At eleven o'clock, immediately after morning service, Mr. Wilberforce and the nine choristers having re-entered the schoolroom, the dean and Mr. St. John walked into it. The master pushed his spectacles to the top of his brow, and rose in astonishment.

"Have the goodness to call up Aultane," said the dean, as he advanced to the master's desk.

"Senior, or junior, Mr. Dean ?"

"The chorister."

"Aultane, senior, walk up," cried the master. And Aultane, senior, walked up, wishing himself and his tongue, and the dean, and all the rest of the world, especially those within sight and hearing, were safely boxed up in the coffins in the cathedral crypt.

"Now, Aultane," began the dean, "you preferred a charge to me yesterday against your senior chorister: that he had been pledging his gold medal at Rutterley's. Have the goodness to substantiate it."

"Oh, my heart alive, I wish he'd drop through the floor," groaned Aultane to himself. "What will become of me? What a jackass I

was !"

"I did not enter into the matter then," proceeded the dean, for Aultane remained silent. "You had no business to make the complaint to me on a Sunday. What grounds have you for your charge?"

Aultane turned red and white, and green and yellow. The dean eyed him closely. "What proof have you?"

"I have no proof," faltered Aultane.

"No proof! Did you make the charge to me, knowing it was false ?" "No, sir. He has pledged his medal."

"Tell me how you know it. Mr. St. John knows he had it in his own house on Saturday."

Aultane shuffled first on one foot, then on the other; and the dean, failing explanation from him, appealed to the school, but all disclaimed cognisance of the matter. "If you behave in this extraordinary way, you will compel me to conclude that you have made the charge to prejudice me against Arkell; who, I hear, had a serious charge to prefer against you for ill-behaviour in college," continued the dean to Aultane.

"If you will send to the place, you will find his medal is there, sir,” sullenly replied Aultane.

"The shortest plan would be to send to Arkell's, and request him to despatch his medal here," interposed Mr. St. John.

The dean approved of this, and Cookesley and Vaughan were despatched on the errand. Henry was out, but Mrs. Arkell looked in the place where the medal was kept, found it, and sent it by them.

"Now, what do you mean by your conduct?" sternly asked the dean of Aultane.

"I know he pledged it on Saturday, if he has got it out to-day," persisted the discomfited Aultane, who was in a terrible state, between wishing to prove his charge true, and the fear of compromising himself.

"I know Henry Arkell could not be guilty of a despicable action," spoke up Mr. St. John; "and hearing of this charge, I went to Rutterley's to ask him a few questions. He informed me there was a college boy at his place on Saturday, endeavouring to pledge a table-spoon, but he knew the crest, and would not take it in-not wishing, he said, to encourage boys to rob their parents. Perhaps Aultane can tell the dean who that was.

There was a dead silence in the school, and the look of amazement on the head master's face, was only matched by the confusion of Aultane's. The dean, a kind-hearted man, would not examine further.

"But a

"I do not press the matter, until I hear the complaint of the senior chorister against Aultane" said he aloud to Mr. Wilberforce. few extra tasks, by way of present punishment, will do him no harm." "I'll give them to him, Mr. Dean," heartily responded the master, whose ears had been so scandalised by the mysterious allusions to Rutterley's, that he would have liked to treat the whole school to "tasks" and to something else, all round. The dean and Mr. St. John left the room, the former carrying the gold medal.

"You see what a Tom-fool you have made of yourself!" grumbled Prattleton, senior, to Aultane, as the latter returned to his desk, laden with work." That's all the good you have got by splitting to the dean."

THE "AUREA CARMINA."

66
BY ́A LITTÉRATEUR."

AMONG those "tentamina classica" which men, who will dabble in the classics after school days, are so apt to take up with furor, and lay down in fatigue, I once grappled with the " Symbola" and "Aurea Carmina" of Pythagoras. I was not at the time aware of the reams and tomes already sunk in the insane project of elucidating them, when something in one of these terse and pointed dicta so attracted me, that I never rested until I had gotten Iamblicus, and Hierocles, and Dacier, and Marcilius, with other commentators of less note, ranged on my studytable, and then I sat me down in hot haste to the following modest feat: first, to render these ancient Greek enigmas into as pithy and enigmatic English; and secondly, after extracting the essence of the varied and conflicting guesses of commentators at the meaning of the oracular utterances of an uncounted antiquity, to give my own judgment as to the true sense with all that authority which shallow scholarship and a young man's modest assurance combined could impart.