p with the race of men--when
I, dissatisfied and anxious about those I was leaving behind me, and
nervous in the highest degree as to the result of the struggle for
distinction in which I was about to engage, once more took up my abode
at Trinity.~229~~

CHAPTER XXIX -- THE STRUGGLE IN CHESTERTON MEADOW

"Men
Put forth their sons to seek preferment out.

Some to the studious universities,
For any or for all these exercises."

"Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about you;
If not, we'll make you sit, and rifle you."

"A rescue! a rescue! Good people bring a rescue or two!"

"Construe me, art thou a gentleman? What is thy name?
Discuss!"
--_Shakspeare_.

HAVING now no one to interfere with me, I determined to read as hard as
my powers, mental and bodily, would allow, so as to give my talents, be
they great or small, full scope, and endeavour to evince my gratitude to
my unknown benefactor in the only manner that lay open to me, _i.e._, by
proving to him that his liberality had not been thrown away. As the
men began to come up, I took care to let it be generally known among my
friends that I was reading steadily and in earnest, with a view of going
out in honours; and when they became convinced that this was the case,
and that whenever I "sported oak" there was positively "no admittance,"
they left me to my fate, as one who, in the words of Lawless,
"having strayed from the paths of virtue and--eh!--what do you call it?
--jollity--had fallen a victim to the vice of mathematics--not a hope
of recovery--a regular case of hydrostatics on the brain--eh! don't you
see?"

Besides the regular college tutor, I secured the assistance of what, in
the slang of the day, we irreverently termed "a coach," which vehicle,
for the conveyance of heavy learning (from himself to his pupils),
consisted of a gentleman who, but few years older than those whom he
taught, possessed more practical knowledge, and a greater aptitude for
the highest scientific research, than it had ever before been my fate
to meet with combined in any one individual. Under his able tuition I
advanced rapidly, and reading men began to look upon me as a somewhat
formidable rival. Several of my opponents, however, were men of
first-rate talent, whose powers of mind, as I could not for a moment
disguise from myself, ~230~~were infinitely superior to m