see, Katie, we shall have two hours' perfect rest. You
shall lie upon the sofa, and I will read to you, and then we
shall go on all fresh again."

Miss Winter smiled and said, "Very well." She saw that her cousin
was bent on going, and she could deny her nothing.

"May I send you in anything from college?" said Tom; "you ought
to have something more than tea, I'm sure."

"Oh no, thank you. We dined in the middle of the day."

"Then I may call you about seven o'clock," said Tom, who had come
unwillingly to the conclusion that he had better leave them for
the present.

"Yes, and mind you come in good time; we mean to see the whole
sight, remember. We are country cousins."

"You must let me call you cousin then, just for the look of the
thing."

"Certainly, just for the look of the thing, we will be cousins
till further notice."

"Well, you and Tom seem to get on together, Mary," said Miss
Winter, as they heard the front door close. "I'm learning a
lesson from you, though I doubt whether I shall ever be able to
put it in practice. What a blessing it must be not to be shy!"

"Are you shy, then?" said Mary, looking at her cousin with a
playful loving smile.

"Yes, dreadfully. It is positive pain to me to walk into a room
where there are people I do not know."

"But I feel that too. I'm sure, now, you were much less
embarrassed than I last night at the Vice Chancellor's. I quite
envied you, you seemed so much at your ease."

"Did I? I would have given anything to be back here quietly. But
it is not the same thing with you. You have no real shyness, or
you would never have got on so fast with my cousin."

"Oh! I don't feel at all shy with him," said Mary, laughing. "How
lucky it is that he found us out so soon. I like him so much.
There is a sort of way about him, as if he couldn't help himself.
I am sure one could turn him round one's finger. Don't you think
so?"

"I'm not so sure of that. But he always was soft-hearted, poor
boy. But he isn't a boy any longer. You must take care, Mary.
Shall we ring for tea?"

CHAPTER XXVI

THE LONG WALK IN CHRISTCHURCH MEADOWS

"Do well unto thyself and men will speak good of thee," is a
maxim as old as King David's time, and just as true now as it was
then. Hardy had found it so since the publication of the class
list. Within a few days of that event it was known that his was a
very good first. His college tutor had made his own inquiries,
and repeated on seve