don, and the play, and the
visit to the old Friars, and the brewery, and the party at Mr. Foker's,
to his dearest mother, who was saying her prayers at home in the lonely
house at Fairoaks, her heart full of love and tenderness unutterable for
the boy: and she and Laura read that letter and those which followed,
many, many times, and brooded over them as women do. It was the first
step in life that Pen was making--Ah! what a dangerous journey it
is, and how the bravest may stumble and the strongest fail. Brother
wayfarer! may you have a kind arm to support yours on the path, and a
friendly hand to succour those who fall beside you. May truth guide,
mercy forgive at the end, and love accompany always. Without that
lamp how blind the traveller would be, and how black and cheerless the
journey!

So the coach drove up to that ancient and comfortable inn the Trencher,
which stands in Main Street, Oxbridge, and Pen with delight and
eagerness remarked, for the first time, gownsmen going about, chapel
bells clinking (bells in Oxbridge are ringing from morning-tide till
even-song)--towers and pinnacles rising calm and stately over the gables
and antique house-roofs of the homely busy city. Previous communications
had taken place between Dr. Portman on Pen's part, and Mr. Buck,
Tutor of Boniface, on whose side Pen was entered; and as soon as Major
Pendennis had arranged his personal appearance, so that it should make
a satisfactory impression upon Pen's tutor, the pair walked down Main
Street, and passed the great gate and belfry-tower of Saint George's
College, and so came, as they were directed, to Saint Boniface: where
again Pen's heart began to beat as they entered at the wicket of the
venerable ivy-mantled gate of the College. It is surmounted with an
ancient dome almost covered with creepers, and adorned with the effigy
of the Saint from whom the House takes its name, and many coats-of-arms
of its royal and noble benefactors.

The porter pointed out a queer old tower at the corner of the
quadrangle, by which Mr. Buck's rooms were approached, and the two
gentlemen walked acrosse the square, the main features of which were at
once and for ever stamped in Pen's mind--the pretty fountain playing
in the centre of the fair grass plats; the tall chapel windows and
buttresses rising to the right; the hall with its tapering lantern and
oriel window; the lodge, from the doors of which the Master issued with
rustling silks; the line