To return, however, to the first week or fortnight which saw me and my
original housemate established as full-blown freshmen; I cannot for the
life of me remember by what steps we entered on any course of formal
instruction, but he and I were told with very surprising promptitude
that we should, without loss of time, give a breakfast to the Balliol
Eight. We did so, and never before had I seen on any one matutinal
tablecloth provisions which weighed so much, or disappeared so rapidly.

Not many days later I found myself at another breakfast table of a very
different character, in the capacity not of host, but guest. The host
on this occasion was Jowett, who asked me to breakfast with him in order
that I might meet Browning. Browning by some one or other--I think it
was James Spedding--had been shown certain manuscript verses--precious
verses of my own. He had sent me a message of a flattering kind with
regard to them, and he now held out both his hands to me with an almost
boisterous cordiality. His eyes sparkled with laughter, his beard was
carefully trimmed, and an air of fashion was exhaled from his dazzling
white waistcoat. He did not embarrass me by any mention of my own
performances. He did not, so far as I remember, make any approach to the
subject of literature at all, but reduced both Jowett and myself to
something like complete silence by a constant flow of anecdotes and
social allusions, which, though not deficient in point, had more in them
of jocularity than wit. He was not, perhaps, my ideal of the author of
"Men and Women," or the singer of "Lyric Love" as "a wonder and a wild
desire"; but there the great man was, and when I quitted his presence
and found myself once more in undergraduate circles I felt myself
shining like Moses when he came down from the mount.

I was subsequently enveloped in a further reflected glory, due also to
Jowett's kindness--a kindness which survived many outbursts of what I
thought somewhat petulant disapproval. I received from him one day a
curt invitation to dinner, and presented myself, wondering mildly to
what this mark of favor could be due. But wonder turned to alarm when,
on entering the Master's drawing-room, I discovered in the dim twilight
no other figure than his own. His manner, however, though not effusive,
was civil, and was certainly fraught with no menace of any coming
judgment on my sins. We exchanged some ordinary observations on the
weather and kindred topics