ur he appeared again at the lodge,
carrying a small bag, and handed the porter a letter addressed to the
President of the College. He then stepped out into the street, and
hurried off towards the railway station.

For a fortnight we heard nothing of him. Then suddenly he appeared
again--on an evening when the College, having won the "Fours," was
commemorating its success by a bonfire in the big quad. A certain
freshman, stealing down his staircase with a can of colza oil to feed
the flames, was confronted by our missing Senior Fellow.

"No," said the great scholar, "don't be afraid, and don't seek to hide
that oil-can; but come in here." And he led the way to his room.

This much is mere rumour; for the freshman was always reticent on the
encounter, and what followed. But many who were present that night can
bear witness that a big portmanteau appeared suddenly on the summit of
the bonfire, and blazed merrily to ashes, having clearly been saturated
with oil. Not until long after were its contents divined.

The Senior Fellow went back to his window above the bursar's garden,
though henceforward he dined but rarely in Common-room; and year by year
scholars expected his edition of Athenaeus, until he died and left his
desk full of notebooks to the youth who had carried the oil-can, and who
in course of years had become junior don. Also his will expressed a
wish that this, his favourite pupil, might be elected to succeed him as
steward of Common-room.

The new steward, eager to fulfil his duties, made it his first business
to inspect the college cellars. He found there abundance of old port,
much fair claret, a bin of inestimable Madeira, several casks of more
curious wines, and among them one labelled "For the Poor."

It struck him as a pleasant trait in his dead friend, thus to have
dispensed in charity that wine which doubtless had gone beyond its age,
and become unfit for the Fellows' palates. He drew a glassful and
tasted it.

The first sip was a revelation. He returned to his rooms, wrote a score
of letters inviting to dinner all the acknowledged connoisseurs of other
colleges. When they had dined with him, and fallen into easy attitudes
around the table, he introduced this wine casually among half a dozen
others, and watched the result.

Not a man who tasted it would taste any other.

As for the notebooks--those priceless materials for the final edition of
Athenaeus--they were empty, mere blank