which seemed to me to imply that he had
abandoned the weak assertion as to his age, and no longer intended
to ask for a year of grace by the use of that falsehood. But it was
necessary that I should be sure of this. "As to your exact age, I've
been looking at the records," I began.

"The records are right enough," he said; "you need trouble yourself
no longer about the records. Eva and I have discussed all that." From
this I became aware that Eva had convinced him of the baseness of the
falsehood.

"Then there is the law," said I, with, as I felt, unflinching
hardness.

"Yes, there is the law,--if it be a law. Mr Exors is prepared to
dispute it, and says that he will ask permission to argue the case
out with the executive."

"He would argue about anything. You know what Exors is."

"And there is that poor man Barnes has gone altogether out of his
mind, and has become a drivelling idiot."

"They told me yesterday that he was a raging lunatic; but I learn
from really good authority that whether he takes one part or the
other, he is only acting."

"And Tallowax is prepared to run amuck against those who come to
fetch him. He swears that no one shall lead him up to the college."

"And you?" Then there was a pause, and Crasweller sat silent with
his face buried in his hands. He was, at any rate, in a far better
condition of mind for persuasion than that in which I had last found
him. He had given up the fictitious year, and had acknowledged that
he had assented to the doctrine with which he was now asked to
comply. But it was a hard task that of having to press him under such
circumstances. I thought of Eva and her despair, and of himself with
all that natural desire for life eager at his heart. I looked round
and saw the beauty of the scenery, and thought how much worse to
such a man would be the melancholy shades of the college than even
departure itself. And I am not by nature hard-hearted. I have none of
that steel and fibre which will enable a really strong man to stand
firm by convictions even when opposed by his affections. To have
liberated Crasweller at this moment, I would have walked off myself,
oh, so willingly, to the college! I was tearing my own heart to
pieces;--but I remembered Columbus and Galileo. Neither of them was
surely ever tried as I was at this moment. But it had to be done, or
I must yield, and for ever. If I could not be strong to prevail with
my own friend and fellow-labourer,--with Cr