,
and gladden their hearts by the news of his triumph.

Every moment his suspense made him more feverish, and now the clock
struck a quarter past nine, and he feared that in this case no news must
be bad news. He leaned out of the window, and at this moment Mr
Grayson strolled across the bowling-green. Then he heard another don,
who was following him, call out--

"I say, do you know that the Clerkland is out?"

"Is it?" said Mr Grayson, with unusual show of interest.

"Yes. Who do you think has got it?"

"A Saint Werner's man, I hope."

"Yes."

"Well, who is it?"

What was the answer--Owen or Home?--at that distance the names sounded
_exactly alike_.

"Oh, then, I am very sorry for--" Again Julian _could_ not, with his
utmost effort, catch the name with certainty; and, unable any longer to
endure this state of doubt, he seized his cap and gown, when the sound
of a slow footstep stopped him.

But it was Brogten's step, and Julian heard him pass into his own room.

A moment of breathless silence, and then another step, or rather the
steps of two men; he detected by the sound that they were Lillyston and
De Vayne. In one moment he would know the--Was it the best or the
worst? He stood with his hand on the handle of the door; but it seemed
as if they would never get to the top of the stairs. Why on earth were
they so slow?

"Well," said Julian, as they came in sight, "is the Clerkland out?" He
knew it was, but would not ask them the result.

"Yes," they both said; and Lillyston added, in a sorrowful tone of
voice, "I am sorry for you, Julian, but Owen has got it."

Julian grew very pale, and for one second reeled as if he would faint.
Lord De Vayne caught him as he staggered, and added eagerly, "But you
are most honourably mentioned, Julian, `proxime accessit,' and an
allusion to your illness during one paper."

"Nothing, nothing," muttered Julian; "please leave me by myself." They
were unwilling to leave him, and both lingered, but he entreated them to
go, and respecting his desire for solitude they left him alone.

Julian found relief in a burst of passionate tears. He flung himself on
the ground and cursed his birth, and his hard fate, and above all he
cursed Brogten, who, as was clear, had been the cause, the sole cause,
as Julian obstinately said, of his heavy misfortune. "Here I am," he
murmured, "a sizar, an orphan, poor, without relations, with others
depending on me, with my own way t