“We were in the same form at school.  He had been always near the bottom; I stood fairly up in it, and was generally second or third.  He took to reading, and in six weeks after the fight won his way to the top of the class and remained there; and not only so, but he soon showed himself so far superior to the rest of us that he got his remove to the form above.

“Then there was a competition in Latin verses open to both forms.  Latin verse was the one thing in which I was strong.  There is a sort of knack, you know, in stringing them together.  A fellow may be a duffer generally and yet turn out Latin verse better than fellows who are vastly superior to him on other points.  It was regarded as certain that I should gain that.  No one had intended to go in against me, but at the last moment he put his name down, and, to the astonishment of everyone, won in a canter.

“We left about the same time, and went up to Oxford together, but to different Colleges.  I rowed in my College Eight, he in his.  We were above them on the river, but they made a bump every night until they got behind us, and then bumped us.  He was stroke of his boat, and everyone said that success was due to his rowing, and I believe it was.  I did not so much mind that, for my line was chiefly sculling.  I had won in my own College, and entered for Henley, where it was generally thought that I had a fair chance of winning the Diamonds.  However, I heard a fortnight before the entries closed that he was out on the river every morning sculling.  I knew what it was going to be, and was not surprised when his name appeared next to mine in the entries.

“We were drawn together, and he romped in six lengths ahead of me, though curiously enough he was badly beaten in the final heat.  He stroked the University afterwards.  Though I was tried I did not even get a seat in the eight, contrary to general expectation, but I know that it was his influence that kept me out of it.

“We had only one more tussle, and again I was worsted.  I went in for the Newdigate—­that is the English poetry prize, you know.  I had always been fond of stringing verses together, and the friends to whom I showed my poem before sending it in all thought that I had a very good chance.  I felt hopeful myself, for I had not heard that he was thinking of competing, and, indeed, did not remember that he had ever written a line of verse when at school.  However, when the winner was declared, there was his name again.

“I believe that it was the disgust I felt at his superiority to me in everything that led me to ask my father to get me a commission at once, for it seemed to me that I should never succeed in anything if he were my rival.  Since then our lives have been altogether apart, although I have met him occasionally.  Of course we speak, for there has never been any quarrel between us since that fight, but I know that he has never forgiven me, and I have a sort of uneasy conviction that some day or other we shall come into contact again.