Hillyard, like other Englishmen, had been brought up in a creed which included the inefficiency of all Postmasters-general.

A blight fell upon such persons, withering their qualities and shrivelling them into the meanest caricatures of bureaucrats.

It could not be that the postal service was now to reveal resource and become the servant of romance.

Yet the Arab drew forth a sealed envelope and handed it to Hillyard.

And it bore the inscription of his name.
Oh, but it bore much more than that! It was written in a hand which Hillyard had not seen for seven years, and the mere sight of it swept him back in a glory of recollections to Oxford, its towers and tall roofs, which mean so much more to the man who has gone down than to the youth who is up.