There was no chance of leaping to the top at a bound by some lucky answer, or even of advancing a single desk.

And therefore, however hard he worked this term, he would never rise above eighteenth classic in the eyes of the school, and that was not--well, he would have liked to be a little higher for the sake of Willoughby! The outlook was not encouraging.

Even Wibberly, the toady, and Silk, the Welcher, were better men than he was at classics.
Suppose, instead of spending his energy over classics, he were to get up one or two rousing speeches for the Parliament, which should take the shine out of every one else and carry the school by storm?
It was not a bad idea.

But the chance would not come.

No one could get up a fine speech on such a hackneyed subject as "That Rowing is a finer Sport than Cricket," or that "The Study of Science in Public Schools should be Abolished!" And when he did attempt to prepare an oration on the subject of Compulsory Football, the first friend he showed it to pointed out so many faults in the composition of the first sentence that prudence prompted him to put the effusion in the fire.
Meanwhile his friends and admirers kept him busy.