y hours, he could hardly repress an
involuntary shudder; but on the whole, he was in high spirits, and Mr
Grayson received him with something almost approaching to cordiality.

"You did very well in the examination, Mr Kennedy; very well indeed.
With diligence you might have been head of your year--as it was, you
were in the first ten."

"Was Owen head of the year, sir?"

"No, Home was head; his brilliant composition, and thorough knowledge of
the books, brought him to the top. Either he or Owen were first in all
the papers except one."

"Which was that, sir?"

"The Aeschylus paper, in which you were first, Mr Kennedy; you did it
remarkably accurately. If you had seen the paper, you could hardly have
done it better."

"Indeed! Would you give me a library order, sir?" said Kennedy, rising
abruptly, to change the subject. Mr Grayson was offended at this
sudden change of subject, and, silently writing the order, bade Kennedy
a cold "good morning." All that Kennedy hoped was that he would not
tell others as well as himself, the odious fact of his success.

The thought damped his spirits, but he shook it off. The novelty of
returning as a junior soph, the pleasure of meeting the familiar faces
once more, the consciousness of that bright change of existence, which,
during the past vacation, had bound the golden thread of Violet's
destiny with his, filled him with inward exultation. And then there was
real delight in the warmth with which he was greeted by all alike.

He found himself, very unexpectedly, a hero in the general estimation.
The romantic adventure on the Schilthorn had been rumoured about among
the numerous English visitors to the Valley of Lauterbrunnen, until it
had reached the editor of a local paper, and so had flowed through
_Galignani_ into the general stream of the English journals. True, the
names had been suppressed, but all the Saint Werner's men knew who was
intended by "Mr K dash y," and as he entered the hall there was a
murmur of applause.

He was greeted on all sides with eager questions.

"I say, Mr K dash y," said one, "did the fellow whom you shot die of
his wound?"

"It was rather a chouse to shoot a cretin, though," said another, in
chaff.

"I _didn't_ shoot him," said Kennedy.

"No, you very leerily managed to make the other fellow shoot him.
Preserve me from my friends, must have been his secret reflections."

"Have you kept the guns, Kennedy? You must let me have a