“No more Margate, my son,” said Mr. Dodson, “never again, as long as I live, will I go with you there. But we will spend a day at the Oval, my boy--they are giving Joe Cox a trial for the first eleven, and we must see what he does. Then we will get a bit of dinner somewhere, and round up the evening at the Alcazar. You have never seen Hermione in full war paint, have you? Off the stage she is a bit of all right, but on it, my son, she beats anything you ever saw. When you see her she will knock you.” To this carefully devised programme William Jordan assented submissively. During this phase of his existence, when every day that he passed brought a further largesse of knowledge, the overpowering curiosity to see, to know, to understand all things seemed to return upon him. His mentor had taken him already into divers and strange places. He owed it to that friendly but mysterious guidance that the curtain was rolled back from many hidden recesses of the life about him, which otherwise could never have been revealed. On that burning August forenoon he mingled with the throng about the gates of the cricket-ground, and passed through its portals and came to stand on the parched grass under the pitiless sun. All about him was a close-packed and vastly excited multitude. Yet to the young man, who was sandwiched within the very heart of the perspiring crowd of street-persons, with the skin being frizzled upon his neck, the solemn rites, of which occasionally he caught a glimpse, had no meaning for his eyes. “Surrey’s fielding,” said his mentor, in a voice that was by no means as calm as was its wont. “See, there’s Joe standing at mid-on. Why don’t they put him on to bowl?” “Not his wicket,” said Mr. Dodson’s neighbour, an enthusiast in a straw hat with a yellow ribbon, and dirty white flannel trousers. “Then why do they play him?” demanded Mr. Dodson. “The Committee have had private information of a thunderstorm to-morrow night,” said Mr. Dodson’s neighbour, who appeared to be extremely well-informed. To Mr. William Jordan, however, these technicalities and a thousand others, which were even more recondite, proved very baffling indeed. “I suppose, Jimmy,” said the young man at last, in sheer desperation, driven by the inflexible rules of politeness to speak, yet not knowing in the least what to say, “that those street-per--those gentlemen in the white suits are what you call Surrey?” “You are positively brilliant this morning, Luney,” said his mentor. “You sparkle. Upon my word, you are nearly as bright as the sun.”