There is a peculiar sensation on first seeing your name in print.
Instances are on record where people have taken a world of trouble
merely that they may have the pleasure of perusing their names "among
the fashionables present" at the Countess of So-and-so's
evening-reception; and cases are not wanting where young ladies and
gentlemen have expended no small amount of pocket-money in purchasing
copies of ~The Times~ (no reduction, too, being made on taking a
quantity!) in order that their sympathizing friends might have the
pride of seeing their names as coming out at drawing-rooms and
~levees~. When a young M.P. has stammered out his ~coup-d'essai~ in
the House, he views, with mingled emotions, his name given to the
world, for the first time, in capital letters. When young authors
and artists first see their names in print, is it not a pleasure to
them? When Ensign Dash sees himself gazetted, does he not look on
his name with a peculiar sensation, and forthwith send an impression
of the paper to Master Jones, who was flogged with him last week for
stealing apples? When Mr. Smith is called to the Bar, and Mr.
Robinson can dub himself M.R.C.S., do they not behold their names in
print with feelings of rapture? And when Miss Brown has been to her
first ball, does she not anxiously await the coming of the next
county newspaper, in order to have the happiness of reading her name
there?
But, different to these are the sensations that attend the seeing
your name first in print in a College examination-list. They are,
probably, somewhat similar to the sensations you would feel on seeing
your name in a death-warrant. Your blood runs hot, then cold, then
hot again; your pulse goes at
[216 ADVENTURES OF MR. VERDANT GREEN]
fever pace; the throbbing arteries of your brow almost jerk your cap
off. You know that the worst is come, - that the law of the Dons,
which altereth not, has fixed your name there, and that there is no
escape. The courage of despair then takes possession of your soul,
and nerves you for the worst. You join the crowd of nervous
fellow-sufferers who are thronging round the buttery-door to examine
the list, and you begin with them calmly to parcel out the names by
sixes and eights, <VG216.JPG> and then to arrive at an opinion when
your day of execution will be. If your name comes at the head of the
list, you wish that you were "YOUNG, ~Carolus, e Coll. Vigorn.~" that
you might have a reprieve of your sentence. If your name is at the
end of the list, you wish that you were "ADAMS, ~Edvardus Jacobus, e
Coll. Univ.~" that you might go in at once, and be put out of your
misery. If your name is in the middle of the list, you wish that it
were elsewhere: and then you wish that it were out of the list
altogether.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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