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never could understand. It was like a window on life that
he had a chance of peeping through, and he looked with a
wildly beating heart.
‘No, you can keep your dirty money,’ said Wharton.
‘But how about your dinner?’ said Philip, with a smile, for
he knew exactly how his master’s finances stood.
Wharton had even asked him to pay him the two shil-
lings which the lesson cost once a week rather than once a
month, since it made things less complicated.
‘Oh, never mind my dinner. It won’t be the first time I’ve
dined off a bottle of beer, and my mind’s never clearer than
when I do.’
He dived under the bed (the sheets were gray with want
of washing), and fished out another bottle. Philip, who was
young and did not know the good things of life, refused to
share it with him, so he drank alone.
‘How long are you going to stay here?’ asked Wharton.
Both he and Philip had given up with relief the pretence
of mathematics.
‘Oh, I don’t know. I suppose about a year. Then my people
want me to go to Oxford.’
Wharton gave a contemptuous shrug of the shoulders. It
was a new experience for Philip to learn that there were per-
sons who did not look upon that seat of learning with awe.
‘What d’you want to go there for? You’ll only be a glori-
fied schoolboy. Why don’t you matriculate here? A year’s no
good. Spend five years here. You know, there are two good
things in life, freedom of thought and freedom of action. In
France you get freedom of action: you can do what you like

1 Of Human Bondage