hich has happened once and is
rather a difficult matter for a college debating society to bring about
again. The reformation which they were bent upon was not, however,
religious, for they thought little of the religion which satisfies
ordinary people. One of them told me that religion was merely
emotional and sentimental, a crutch for a weak man, and went on to say
that their scheme was moral and social, a cry for a better life and
against the oppression of the poor. That man bored me terribly, but
since one of his own set had told me that he was the cleverest man in
Oxford I did not like to tell him what I thought. Besides I was only a
fresher who had not yet looked around, and he was the first man I had
met who was the cleverest man in Oxford, though I met several others
afterwards who had arrived at the same peak of distinction. I even got
so weary of meeting this particular brand of man that I asked Jack Ward
to help me along my way by spreading a report that I was a most
promising poet, but he said that no one who had ever seen me would
believe him. He meant to be complimentary, I believe.

It was into this medley of sets that I was plunged headlong. Crowds of
men called upon me and asked me to meals. Some of them wanted to know
me because I played cricket and football, the captain of the college
boat called because he wanted me to row, some of the "bloods" left
cards on me because they had seen me walking about with Jack Ward, whom
they had marked down as one of themselves. A few men called from other
colleges who had known me at Cliborough, or had been asked to see
something of me because their people knew mine. I got to know the
oddest lot of men imaginable, and as long as they looked clean and did
not try to rush me into helping them to reform the world, I liked them
all.

But in spite of Ward, who pretended that Rugby football was an
overrated amusement, I wanted to belong to the athletic set, and I
started by playing footer in a thing which is most correctly called
"The Freshers' Squash." In this struggle any fresher who had never
played rugger in his life, but thought he would like some exercise,
could play, while footer blues dodged round and took your names, if you
were lucky enough to touch the ball, and booked you for the proper
game. On the following day I played back in the real freshers' match,
and was most tremendously encouraged before I started by hearing one
man say to another that