The end of term, so exasperating to the harried teacher, brings exhilaration to the taught. As Christmas approached Martin found prefectorial discipline slackening and, though exams might mean harder work in school, there was in the house a very agreeable relaxation of tension. Even games were taken less seriously, and one or two of the more audacious spirits actually cut without detection. But just as Berney's began to slacken their reins, Randall's, the neighbouring house, became more vigorous than usual: for Randall's were in the final of the "footer pot." Berney's always objected to Randall's. This animosity might have been accounted for by the mere fact of neighbourship, but there was more in it than that. As was Athens to Sparta, so was Berney's house to Randall's. Berney's stood always for an easy-going tolerance and, though, for instance, it was not a particularly well-dressed house, it left its nuts in peace. In all its pursuits it was either brilliant or ineffectual, and, if it did anything at all, it did it beautifully: both in games and work it was a house of individuals. A typical batsman from Berney's would make three divine, soul-satisfying cuts and be caught in attempting an impossible fourth: Berney's was never thorough and never took defeat to heart. Randall's, on the other hand, had no nuts and suspected with Draconian severity the faintest traces of nuttishness. The average member of the house was tall and lumpy and sallow, badly dressed and with no grease to his hair. It was a standing joke with the school that Randall's youths owed their yellow faces not only to general unhealthiness, but also to a dislike of soap and water. They trained like professionals and made tin gods of their challenge cups. They worked always with a dull, sickening energy: they never had a decent three-quarter among them, but won their matches by working the touch-line and scoring from forward rushes. Yet undoubtedly, despite all their ignorance of the way things should be done, they achieved results.