How all this was changed and I veered round of a sudden to the opposite I must hasten to tell. One April day, towards the close of my second year, I was going up the High Street toward the Cathedral with a great parcel of books beneath my arm, when I heard a shouting and a jingling, and a troop of horse came down the street. I stood back into the shelter of a doorway, for soldiers were wont to bear little love to scholars, and I did not care to risk their rough jests. From this place I watched their progress, and a gallant sight it was. Some twenty men in buff jerkins and steel headpieces rode with a fine clatter of bridles and clank of swords. I marked their fierce sun-brown faces and their daredevil eyes as they looked haughtily down on the crowd as on lower beings. And especially I marked their leader. He sat a fine bay horse with ease and grace; his plumed hat set off his high-coloured face and long brown curls worn in the fashion of the day; and as he rode he bowed to the people with large condescension. He was past in a second, but not before I had recognized the face and figure of my cousin Gilbert. I stood for some minutes staring before me, while the echoes of the horses’ hooves died away down the street. This, I thought, is the destiny of my cousin, only two years my elder, a soldier, a gentleman, a great man in his place; while I am but a nameless scholar, dreaming away my manhood in the pursuits of a dotard. I was so overwhelmed with confusion that I stood gaping with a legion of thoughts and opposing feelings running through my brain. Then all the old fighting spirit of my house rose within me. By Heaven, I would make an end of this; I would get me home without delay; I would fling my books into the Clyde; I would go to the wars; I would be a great cavalier, and, by the Lord, I would keep up the name of the house! I was astonished myself at the sudden change in my feelings, for in the space of some ten minutes a whole age had passed for me, and I had grown from a boy to some measure of manhood. I came out from the close-mouth with my head in the air and defiance against all the world in my eye. Before I had gone five spaces I met the lad who had jostled me aforetime, a big fellow of a raw-boned Ayrshire house, and before he could speak I had him by the arm and had pulled him across the way into the college gardens. There I found a quiet green place, and plucking off my coat I said, "Now, Master Dalrymple, you and I have a small account to settle." With that we fell to with our fists, and in the space of a quarter of an hour I had beaten him so grievously that he was fain to cry for mercy. I let him go, and with much whimpering he slunk away in disgust.