Running along to the end of the north cloister, near to the famous gravestone "Miserrimus," near to the spot where a ghost had once appeared to Charles Channing he pointed to an obscure corner of the green grave-yard, which the cloisters enclosed. Many and many a time had Roland perched himself on those dilapidated old mullioned window-frames in the days gone by.
"It's there," said the boy. "Old Ketch, the cloister porter, lies on this side him."
"Oh, Ketch does, does he! I wonder whose doings that was! It's a shame to have placed him, a cross-grained old wretch, side by side with poor Jenkins."
"Jenkins was cross-grained too, for the matter of that," cried the boy. "He was always asking the fellows for a tip to buy baccy, and grumbling if they did not give it."
Roland stared indignantly. "Jenkins was! Why, what are you talking of? Jenkins never smoked."
"Oh; didn't he though! Why, he died smoking; he was smoking always. Pretty well, that, for an old one of seventy-six."
"I'm not talking of old Jenkins," cried Roland. "Who wants to know about him?--what a senseless fellow you are! It's young Jenkins. Joe; who was at Galloway's."
"Oh, him! He was buried in front, not here. I can't go round to show you, sir for time's up."
The boy took to his heels, As schoolboys only can take to them, and Roland heard him rattle up the steps of the college hall to join his comrades. Propped against the frame-work, his memory lost itself in many things; and the minutes passed unheeded by. The procession of the king's scholars aroused him. They filed along the cloisters from the college hall, two and two, in their surplices and trenchers, his brother Harry, one of the seniors nearly the last of them. When they had disappeared, Roland ran round to the front grave-yard. Between the cathedral gates and those leading to the palace, stood a black-robed verger, with his silver mace, awaiting the appearance of the Dean. Roland accosted the man and asked him which was Joe Jenkins's grave.
"That's it, sir," and the verger indicated a flat stone, which was nearly buried in the grass. "You can't miss it his name's there."