figure in the Union debates, argued passionately against every conventional English tradition, and attacked authority, complacence, and fetichism of every kind.  Never were dons of the donnish sort more brilliantly twitted than by young Belloc.  And, partly because of his failure to capture an All Souls fellowship (the most coveted prize of intellectual Oxford) the word “don” has retained a tinge of acid in Belloc’s mind ever since. (Who can read without assentive chuckles his delicious “Lines to a Don!” It was the favourite of all worthy dons at Oxford when I was there.) He has never had any reverence for a man merely because he held a post of authority.

Of the Balliol years Mr. Seccombe says: 

“He was a few years older and more experienced than most of his college friends, but had lost little of the intoxication, the contagion and the ringing laughter of earliest manhood.  He dazzled and infected everyone with his mockery and his laughter.  There never was such an undergraduate, so merry, so learned in medieval trifling and terminology, so perfectly spontaneous in rhapsody and extravaganza, so positive and final in his judgments—­who spoke French, too, like a Frenchman, in a manner unintelligible to our public-school-French-attuned ears.”

No one can leave those Balliol years behind without some hope to quote the ringing song in which Belloc recalled them at the time of the Boer War.  It is the perfect expression of joyful masculine life and overflowing fellowship.  It echoes unforgettably in the mind.

    TO THE BALLIOL MEN STILL IN AFRICA

    Years ago when I was at Balliol,
      Balliol men—­and I was one—­
    Swam together in winter rivers,
      Wrestled together under the sun. 
    And still in the heart of us, Balliol, Balliol,
      Loved already, but hardly known,
    Welded us each of us into the others: 
      Called a levy and chose her own.

    Here is a House that armours a man
      With the eyes of a boy and the heart of a ranger,
    And a laughing way in the teeth of the world
      And a holy hunger and thirst for danger: 
    Balliol made me, Balliol fed me,
      Whatever I had she gave me again: 
    And the best of Balliol loved and led me,
      God be with you, Balliol men.

    I have said it before, and I say it again,
      There was treason done, and a false word spoken,
    And England under the dregs of men,
      And bribes about, and a treaty broken: 
    But angry, lonely, hating it still,
      I wished to be there in spite of the wrong. 
    My heart was heavy for Cumnor Hill
      And the hammer of galloping all day long.

    Galloping outward into the weather,
      Hands a-ready and battle in all: 
    Words together and wine together
      And song together in Balliol Hall. 
    Rare and single!  Noble and few!... 
      Oh! they have wasted you over the sea! 
    The only brothers ever I knew,
      The men that laughed and quarrelled with me.