Produced by Al Haines PETER BINNEY A NOVEL BY ARCHIBALD MARSHALL NEW YORK DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 1921 PUBLISHED 1921 IN U. S. A. BY DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, INC. First Printing, September, 1921 Second Printing, October, 1921 Third Printing, December, 1921 Fourth Printing, January, 1922 PRINTED IN THE USA BY The Quinn & Boden Company BOOK MANUFACTURERS RAHWAY NEW JERSEY TO E. F. BENSON INTRODUCTION It is over twenty years since "Peter Binney" was first published in England, and I should be unwilling to offer it to my American readers at this time of day without some plea for leniency towards a young man's book, which contains perhaps more than the average number of crudities to be found in such beginnings. A few of the crudities I have been able to soften, but if you begin tampering with early work in the light of maturer knowledge, you are very apt to rub off the bloom that attaches to it just because it is early work, written with spirit and freshness, though with little skill. So I have left "Peter Binney" much as it was, with most of its imperfections on its head, and I trust some compensating merits. One merit I know it to possess. It presents a picture of the lighter side of undergraduate life as it was in Oxford and Cambridge, and as it still exists, in spite of superficial changes; and that is something that can only be done by a young man, whose memories are still fresh, and to whom that life is still important enough to make it the basis of a story. New York, July, 1921 CONTENTS CHAPTER I Mr. Binney Makes Up His Mind II Mr. Binney Interviews One Tutor, and Engages Another III Lucius Wins a Year's Respite IV No Help To Be Gained from Mrs. Higginbotham V Mr. Binney Arrives in Cambridge VI Lord Blathgowrie Has Something to Say VII Mr. Binney Speaks at the Union And Makes a Distinguished Acquaintance VIII The Newnham Girl IX Mr. Binney Gives a Dinner and Receives a Rebuff X "The New Court Chronicle" XI "Put Him in the Fountain" XII Lucius Makes One Discovery and Mrs. Toller Another XIII Mr. Binney Gets into Trouble XIV Nemesis XV Lucius Finds a Backwater XVI Third Trinity Makes a Bump XVII Mr. Binney Drinks the Health of a "Blue" CHAPTER I MR. BINNEY MAKES UP HIS MIND "I'll do it to-day," said Peter Binney.