They probably did not know that he was a fellow of a college, and treated him almost as they might have done had he come to them direct from King's College, in the Strand, or from the London University.

Down at Stratton a certain amount of honor had been paid to him.

They had known there who he was, and had felt some deference for him.

They had not slapped him on the back, or poked him in the ribs, or even called him old fellow, before some length of acquaintance justified such appellation.

But up at Mr.Beilby's, in the Adelphi, one young man, who was certainly his junior in age, and who did not seem as yet to have attained any high position in the science of engineering, manifestly thought that he was acting in a friendly and becoming way by declaring the stranger to be a lad of wax on the second day of his appearance.
Harry Clavering was not disinclined to believe that he was a "lad of wax," or "a brick," or "a trump," or "no small." But he desired that such complimentary and endearing appellations should be used to him only by those who had known him long enough to be aware that he deserved them.