The supper was ended, the tables were removed, and the challenge took place.  Duke Murdoch, leaning back in his high chair by the peat-fire, while the ladies sat round at their spinning, called for the two young clerks to begin their tourney of words.  They stood opposite one another, on the step of the dais; and Kennedy, as host and challenger, assigned to his opponent the choice of a subject, when Malcolm, brightening, proposed one that he had so often heard and practised on, as to have the arguments at his fingers’ ends; namely, that the real consists only in that which is substantial to the senses, and which we see, hear, taste, smell, or touch.

Kennedy’s shrewd gray eye glanced at him in a manner that startled him, as he made reply, ’Fellow-alumnus, you speak as Oxford scholars speak; but I rede ye well that the real is not that which is grossly tangible to the corporeal sense, but the idea that is conceived within the immortal intelligence.’

The argument was carried on in the vernacular, but there was an unlimited license of quotation from authors of all kinds, classics, Fathers, and schoolmen.  It was like a game at chess, in which the first moves were always so much alike, that they might have been made by automatons; and Malcolm was repeating reply and counter-reply, almost by rote, when a citation brought in by Kennedy again startled him.

‘Outward things,’ said James, ’are the mere mark; for have we not heard how

   “Telephus et Peleus, quum pauper et exsul uterque,
   Projicit ampullas et sesquipedalia verba"?’ {6}

Was this to prove that he recognized a wandering prince in his opponent? thought Malcolm; but, much on his guard, he made answer, as usual, in his native tongue.  ’That which is not touched and held is but a vain and fleeting shadow—­“solvitur in nube.” {7}

‘Negatur, it is denied!’ said Kennedy, fixing his eyes full upon him.  ’The Speculum of the Soul, which is immortal, retains the image even while the bodily presence is far away.  Wherefore else was it that Ulysses sat as a beggar by his paternal hearth, or that Cadmus wandered to seek his sister?’

This was anything but the regular illustration—­the argument was far too directly ad hominem—­and Malcolm hesitated for a moment, ere framing his reply.  ’If the image had satisfied the craving of their hearts, they had never wandered, nor endangered themselves.’

‘Nor,’ said Kennedy, ’endeared themselves to all who love the leal and the brave, and count these indeed as verities for which to live.’

From the manner in which these words were spoken, Malcolm had no further doubt either that Kennedy knew him, or that he meant to assist him; and the discussion thenceforth proceeded without further departures from the regular style, and was sustained with considerable spirit, till the Regent grew weary of it, and bed-time approached, when Kennedy announced his intention of taking his fellow-student to share his chamber; and, as this did not appear at all an unnatural proposal, in the crowded Castle, Malcolm followed him up various winding stairs into a small circular chamber, with a loop-hole window, within one of the flanking towers.