Ruthita wanted to accompany me to the station. I would not let her. She was weepy in private; I knew that in public she would be worse. I had inherited my father’s dread of sentiment and his fear lest other people should construe it as weakness. At Paddington I met the Bantam; we were entering the same college and traveled up together. We chose our places in a “smoker” by way of emphasizing to ourselves our emancipation. We tried to appear ordinary and at ease; beneath our mask of carelessness we felt delightfully bold and bad. In our carriage were three undergraduates, finished products of indifferent haughtiness. Though no more than a year our seniors, they loaded their pipes and puffed away without fear or furtiveness. They affected to be unaware of us. They were infinitely bored in manner and addressed the porters in a tone of lackadaisical, frigid tolerance. What masterfulness! And yet one term of Oxford would give us the right to be like that!--we, who so recently had been liable to be told that children must be seen and not heard. The assurance of these youthful men imperiled our courage. As we neared Iffley, the domes and spires of the Mecca of dreamers swam up. The sky was pearl-colored without a cloud. Strewn throughout its great emptiness was the luminous dust of stars. All the tinsel ambitions which had lately stirred me were forgotten as the home of lost causes claimed me. I grew large within myself as, in watching its advance behind the river above the tree-tops, I merged my personality in this vision of architectural romance. Leaning against the horizon, stretching up and up, out of the murk of dusk and the blood-red decay of foliage, it symbolized for me all the yearning after perfection and the passionate desire for freedom that had always lain hidden in my heart. I wanted to be like that--the thing that gray pyramided stone seen at twilight can alone express--wise, unimpassioned, lovely, immutable. We came to a standstill in the shabby station, which of all stations is probably the best beloved. “Thank the Lord, we’re here at last.” In a hansom, with a sporting cabby for our driver, we rattled through the ancient lamp-lit town where the ghosts of the dead summer rustled and reddened against the walls. Past the Castle we sped, through Carfax, down the High, past Oriel and Christ Church till we drew up with a jerk at Lazarus. Whatever we had suffered in the train in the way of lowered opinion of self was now made up to us; the servility of the College porter and scouts was eloquent of respect. We were undoubtedly persons of importance. If we wanted further proof of it, this awaited us in the pile of communications from Oxford tradesmen, notified beforehand of our coming, humbly soliciting our patronage.