e of the students; and it was
intimated that those who failed would be sent down into a lower class.
Bill dreaded anything like a degradation. He was proud, if he was
lazy. He knew that I had performed the examples, and while his
fellow-boarders were at dinner, he had stolen the opportunity to
appeal to me for the assistance he so much needed.

Though Bill was a disagreeable fellow, and though, in common with a
majority of the students, I disliked him, I would willingly have
assisted him if the prohibition to do so had not been so emphatic. Mr.
Parasyte was so particular in the present instance, that the following
declaration had been printed on the examination paper, and each boy
was required to sign it:--

_"I declare upon my honor, that I have had no assistance whatever in
solving these examples, and that I have given none to others."_

Bill begged me to assist him. I reasoned with him, and told him he had
better fail in the review than forfeit his honor by subscribing to a
falsehood. He made light of my scruples; and then I told him I had
already signed my own paper, and would not falsify my statement.

"Humph!" exclaimed he, with a sneer. "You hadn't given any one
assistance when you signed, but you can do it now, and it will be no
lie."

I was indignant at the proposition, it was so mean and base; and I
expressed myself squarely in regard to it. I had finished my dinner,
and, closing the locker, stepped out of the boat upon the pier. Bill
followed me, begging and pleading till I was disgusted with him. I
told him then that I would not do what he asked if he teased me for a
month. He was angry, and used insulting language. I turned on my heel
to leave him. He interpreted this movement on my part as an act of
cowardice, and, coming up behind me, struck me a heavy blow on the
back of the head with his fist. He was on the point of following it up
with another, when, though he was eighteen years old, and half a foot
taller than I was, I hit him fairly in the eye, and knocked him over
backwards, off the pier, and into the lake.

A madder fellow than Bill Poodles never floundered in shallow water.
The lake where he fell was not more than two or three feet deep, and
doubtless its soft bosom saved him from severe injury. He picked
himself up, and, dripping from his bath, rushed to the shore. He was
insane with passion. Seizing a large stone, he hurled it at me. I
moved towards him, with the intention of checking his