“Pshaw! this is no time for joking. What’s to be done?”
“Why, when does a man want a joke, Phil, but when he is in trouble? However, adieu to badinage, and hey for Cambridge, instantly.”
“Cambridge?”
“In the twinkling of an eye—not a moment to be lost. My uncle will post there with four horses instantly; and my only chance of avoiding that romantic misfortune of being cut off with a shilling, is to be there before him.”
Without settling the bill at the inn, or making a single arrangement, we dashed back to Cambridge. Never shall I forget the mental anxiety I endured on my way there. Every thing was against us. A heavy rain had fallen in the night, and the roads were wretched, the traces broke—turnpike gates were shut—droves of sheep and carts impeded our progress; but in spite of all these obstacles, we reached the college in less than six hours. “Has Sir Thomas ———— been here?” said I to the porter, with an agitation I could not conceal. “No, Sir.” Phil “thanked God, and took courage.”
“If he does, tell him so and so,” said I, giving veracious Thomas his instructions, and putting a guinea into his hand to sharpen his memory. “Phil, my dear fellow, don’t shew your face out of college for this fortnight. You twig! God bless you.”—I had barely time to get to my own room, to have my toga and trencher beside me, Newton and Aristotle before me—optics, mechanics, and hydrostatics, strewed around in learned confusion, when my uncle drove up to the gate.
“Porter, I wish to see Mr. ———,” said he; “is he in his rooms?”
“Yes, Sir; I saw him take a heap of books there ten minutes ago.” This was not the first bouncer the Essence of Truth, as Thomas was known through college, had told for me; nor the last he got well paid for. “Ay! Very likely; reads very hard, I dare say?”
“No doubt of that, I believe, Sir,” said Thomas, as bold as brass. “You audacious fellow! how dare you look in my face and tell me such a deliberate falsehood? You know he’s not in college!”
“Not in college! Sir; as I hope——”