entlemen in future years are competing
for--and I trust, I am sure, obtaining--positions of distinction and
emolument in the great world, you will be entitled to describe yourselves
as Boniface Men. You can drop the 'Apud Timbuctooenses' if you like: the
omission will not be considered fraudulent. But I see no reason why you
_should_ drop it. Personally, I should glory in it. Had I won a
scholarship for Moral Character, I would go to Timbuctoo to-morrow!
There, it seems to me, is your special sphere. In Oxford, Moral
Character is so frequent as to be a drug, a positive drug: but in
Timbuctoo the possession is precious in proportion to its rarity."

"But have they got the Tone and the Tradition there, sir?" asked the
holder of a 'Daily Thunderer' Scholarship. "That would be, for me, very
important. My family were especially anxious--"

"Assuredly they have got the Tone and the Tradition. _Coelum non animum
mutant_--you have met with that, probably, in the 'Encyclopaedia
Pananglica.' Absolutely unimpaired, I assure you. We take great pains
about that. Just an instance--the Visitor is the Bishop of Barchester,
just as here with us: the local King wanted to be Visitor, but of course
we couldn't allow that. Imagine--a Visitor with fifty-three wives, not
to mention! It wouldn't have done at all: the Tone _must_ have suffered.
We are in constant communication (wireless, of course) with the Timbuctoo
Branch: we are always being consulted. Only this morning we had to deal
rather severely with an undergraduate member of the College--aboriginal,
as many of them are--who insisted on playing the tom-tom in prohibited
hours. Of course, we must back up the Dean, and in case of--emergency,
we replace him and compensate his relations."

"You speak, sir," said the student of the Encyclopaedia, "of a local
King. I understood that the College was on British territory."

"The British Empire," replied the Tutor, "includes Hinterlands. This is
a Hinterland. It is consequently from time to time the duty of the local
college authorities to assist the British Resident at the Court of
Timbuctoo in pulling down the French, German, Italian, Russian, and
Portuguese flags, all of which have been occasionally erected. But the
country is practically annexed. We are--ah--suzerains."

"I understand, Professor, from your observation relative to the tom-tom,"
put the American scholar, "that the students of your College are
subjected