John liked Mr. Tobin on first contact. He was a man of about fifty years of age, with, a tanned face and kindly blue eyes. The famous athlete was fast disappearing in a bulky schoolmaster, who added weight each term with considerable anxiety, coupled with a feeling that his appearance at least was a good advertisement of the school. He had a genuine love of boys and worked hard with them, being strict and kind, with a determination to do his best for them! The boys, in fact, were watched day and night; convicts would not have had closer attention, and the same supervision extended to the two assistant masters. Mr. Tobin had little imagination, and the whole of it had been expended in the prospectus. The grounds of Chawley School were certainly extensive. The former tenant, like the present, had found them too much so, and let them go wild. The lawns on the front part of the house were kept tidy; elsewhere the walks were weed-grown. The ornamental lake stank, and might have been the death place of Shelley's "Sensitive Plant." The prospectus mentioned boating on the lake as one of the diversions of the fortunate boys. The only boat was an old punt, one end of which had been long submerged among the water lilies. It was the floating end that appeared in the prospectus photograph. Afternoon tea on the lawn was also slightly different from the photograph. Three quarters of the boys had never been on the lawn. Every Sunday, as a reward, six top form boys, with the assistant master, were invited to tea with Mrs. Tobin on the lawn. A fear of her presence was mingled with the love of her cake, and had the boys had a free will in the matter they had rather not have been rewarded. Mrs. Tobin was a tall woman of about forty-eight years. She was cold and looked at people with eagle eyes. Her voice was deep, her features gaunt, framed in straight brown hair brushed severely back. She had the full equipment of a bishopric's conventions and never forgot her very reverend origin. She was the business woman, and constantly reminded her husband of the fact. She knew that to make a school pay, it required at least fifty boys. All over that number represented profit. Chawley School had forty-nine boys. She lived her days as though on the edge of a precipice. Mr. Tobin, as became a sportsman, delighted in feeding his boys, and invited them to a second helping of favourite puddings. Fortunate youngsters who sat at his end of the table! At Mrs. Tobin's end a second request did not bring a refusal, but, "Are you sure you have not had sufficient?" John, who struggled desperately with his pies, found a problem in the differential calculus easier than the elementary mathematics required for cutting a pie into fourteen portions to the satisfaction of twelve hungry boys.