"I should like to hear what _you_ have got to say first, sir," said Mr. Binney. "Then I will give utterance to my opinions." "Very well," said Mr. Rimington. "Then I had better say what I have got to say in as few words and as strongly as possible. When we talked over your coming up here as an undergraduate in the spring, I pointed out that it would hardly be fair to your son to be under your constant supervision, and I pointed out other reasons why I thought you should reconsider your decision. You did not agree with me, and the objections were not strong enough to induce the college to refuse your application when you persisted in making it. No man in his senses could have foreseen that at the end of your first term, your son, who has been here over a year, should bear a high character in the college, while you, his father, should be giving us a great deal of trouble in matters of conduct. If that could have been foreseen I need scarcely say that we should not have admitted you. "Now, look here, Mr. Rimington," said Mr. Binney, with his most uncompromising air. "I take great objection to your manner of speaking to me. My son I refuse to discuss. As far as I myself am concerned, you have acknowledged that with one exception, for which I have paid the appointed penalty, my conduct has not been such as to have called for any special remark, supposing I had been of the age of the ordinary undergraduate with whom you have to deal. I take my stand on that statement. These references to my age are offensive to me. I am here in the position of an ordinary undergraduate, and I demand fair treatment as such. That puts the matter in a nutshell." Mr. Rimington kept his temper. "You seem to forget, Mr. Binney," he said quietly, "that no ordinary undergraduate would be permitted to speak to me in those terms. You take advantage of your age, which I think is about the same as mine, to address me as an equal, but wish it to be ignored entirely in my estimation of your behaviour. That, of course, is an unreasonable demand, and one that I cannot entertain. I sent for you to remonstrate with you on the course that you have seen fit to adopt. But as you have taken my remonstrance so badly, I must point out to you that my powers go far beyond a mere remonstrance, and if you are incapable of seeing yourself in the wrong and mending your ways, the college will have to think very seriously of asking you to take your name off the books."