It happened thus. Just at this time the sixth form boys were on the average smaller and younger than usual, while there were a great number of big boys, not high up in the school, but excellent cricketers and football players, and otherwise manly and popular fellows. They swarmed in the eleven, and big-side football, and were naturally thrown very much with George and his friend Mackie.[6] In some houses, no doubt, they were inclined rather to ignore the authority of the sixth themselves, and of course their example was followed by the fags, so that the discipline of the school began to fall out of gear. At last matters came to a crisis. Some of the sixth form took to reporting to the Doctor cases which, according to school traditions, they ought to have dealt with themselves; and in other ways began to draw the reins too tightly. There were “levies” (as we called them) of the sixth and fifth, at which high words passed, and several of the sixth were sent to Coventry. This made the Doctor very angry, and he took the side of the disciplinarians. Then came a rebellious exhibition of fireworks one evening in the quadrangle. Then an Italian, with a lot of plaster casts, committed the unpardonable sin of coming into the Close without leave, and his wares were taken, and put up for “cock-shyes.” He went straight to the Doctor, who insisted that the sixth should discover and report the offenders; but those who would could not, and those who might would not. The Doctor’s face had been getting blacker and blacker for some time, and at last, one November morning, he sent half a dozen of the big fifth and middle fifth boys home, and told George and his friend Mackie, and one or two other sixth form boys, that they could not return after the end of the half-year. [6] Afterwards M.P. for Dumfriesshire, a fine scholar and great athlete, who died only nine months before his old friend. And here I will give you two of your grandfather’s letters to us on these matters, to show you how we were brought up. He was an old Westminster himself, and so quite understood the boys’ side of the dispute. He begins to George, telling him first about home doings, and then goes on:—