PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. VOL. 99. October 25, 1890. MR. PUNCH'S PRIZE NOVELS. NO. IV.--BOB SILLIMERE. (_BY MRS._ HUMPHRY JOHN WARD PREACHER, _AUTHOR OF "MASTER SISTERSON."_) [On the paper in which the MS. of this novel was wrapped, the following note was written in a bold feminine hand:--"This is a highly religious story. GEORGE ELIOT was unable to write properly about religion. The novel is certain to be well reviewed. It is calculated to adorn the study-table of a Bishop. The £1000 prize must be handed over at once to the Institute which is to be founded to encourage new religions in the alleys of St. Pancras.--H.J.W.P."] CHAPTER I. It was evening--evening in Oxford. There are evenings in other places occasionally. Cambridge sometimes puts forward weak imitations. But, on the whole, there are no evenings which have so much of the true, inward, mystic spirit as Oxford evenings. A solemn hush broods over the grey quadrangles, and this, too, in spite of the happy laughter of the undergraduates playing touch last on the grass-plots, and leaping, like a merry army of marsh-dwellers, each over the back of the other, on their way to the deeply impressive services of their respective college chapels. Inside, the organs were pealing majestically, in response to the deft fingers of many highly respectable musicians, and all the proud traditions, the legendary struggles, the well-loved examinations, the affectionate memories of generations of proctorial officers, the innocent rustications, the warning appeals of authoritative Deans--all these seemed gathered together into one last loud trumpet-call, as a tall, impressionable youth, carrying with him a spasm of feeling, a Celtic temperament, a moved, flashing look, and a surplice many sizes too large for him, dashed with a kind of quivering, breathless sigh, into the chapel of St. Boniface's just as the porter was about to close the door. This was ROBERT, or, as his friends lovingly called him, BOB SILLIMERE. His mother had been an Irish lady, full of the best Irish humour; after a short trial, she was, however, found to be a superfluous character, and as she began to develop differences with CATHERINE, she caught an acute inflammation of the lungs, and died after a few days, in the eleventh chapter. [Illustration]