"A better man never lived" they agreed.

And they were right.
And she smiled again as she thought of some amongst those pupils, the young dogs of those days, the lovers of actresses of the minor order--ballet girls, it might have been; of the larks that went on sometimes within and without the staid precincts of the Temple.
Harmless larks they were; but such as she had to withdraw from discreetly.

She played lawn tennis with them, she fenced surprisingly well; but she had refused to join the "Devil's Own"-- the Inns of Court Volunteers, for prudent reasons; and though it had leaked out that she was a good swimmer--that tiresome impulsive Honoria had spread it abroad--she resolutely declined to give proofs of her prowess in swimming baths.

Her associates were not so young as the undergraduates she had met in Newnham days: they were an average ten years older.

Their language at times made David blush, but they had more discretion and reserve than the University student, and they respected his desire to withdraw himself into himself occasionally, and to abstain from their noisier amusements without questioning his camaraderie.
At this point in her smiling reminiscences, the wardress clanged open the door and slammed down a mug of cocoa and a slab of brown bread; and rapped out some orders in such a martinet utterance that they were difficult to understand.