party started off.

Kink, it seems, had reached Oxford that morning, and was at the Green
Man, where the Slowcoach was an object of extraordinary interest to the
neighbourhood. They found him seated on the top step reading the paper,
while forty-five children (at least) stared at him. Diogenes lay at the
foot of the steps.

Kink was very glad to see them. No, he said, he hadn't had any
adventures exactly, but driving a caravan was no work for a modest man
who wished for a quiet life among vegetables.

"This," he said, waving his pipe at the increasing crowd, "is nothing.
You should have see them at Beaconsfield and High Wycombe. They began
by thinking I was Lord John Sanger, and when they were satisfied that I
wasn't, they made sure I was a Cheap Jack with gold watches for a
shilling each."

"How does it go, Kink?" Robert asked.

"It goes all right," said Kink, "but the crockery wants muffling. You
can't hear yourself think when you trot."

"And Diogenes?"

"Diogenes," said Kink, "is a masterpiece. He begins to growl at tramps
when they're half a mile away. Why is it, I wonder," Kink added, "that
dogs can't abide ragged clothes? This Oxford, they tell me, is a clever
place. I wonder if anyone here can explain that?"

Mr. Lenox's young brother and his friends had now to be shown the
Slowcoach, which they pronounced "top hole," and then Moses was
inspected in his stable; and, this being done, they were ready for the
river--or, rather, for the ices at a pastrycook's shop in the High
Street--called the High--which were, to precede the river.

Then they all trooped down to the boats and had a perfect hour's
rowing; and then they explored Oxford a little, and saw Tom Quad at
Christ Church (or "The House," as it is called), and were shown the
rooms in which the author of "Alice in Wonderland" lived for so many
years; and so right up through the city to Magdalen Grove, where the
deer live, and Magdalen Tower, on the top of which the May Day carols
are sung.

Mr. Lenox's young brother lived in rooms outside his college; he would
not enter the college until next term. They were in Oriel Lane, and
exceedingly comfortable, with at least twenty pipes in a pipe-rack on
the wall, and at least thirty photographs of his favourite actresses,
chiefly Pauline Chase, and five cricket-bats in the corner, and about
forty walking-sticks, and a large number of puzzles of the "Pigs in
Clover" type, which nearly drove Gregory mad whi