I was very afraid of this superior and critical young man, but I could not help asking a question.

'You've heard the lecture before?' I said hesitantly. 'I mean, you haven't just arrived in the hospital like the rest of us?'

'This makes the fourth time I've heard old Lofty say his little piece,' he replied, smiling faintly. 'Wouldn't have come to-day, except that I got the dates mixed. I was expecting an anatomy lecture.'

The rest of the class was filing past us through the door and clattering down the iron stairs. We rose and joined the end of the line.

'You must be a very senior student,' I said respectfully.

'Not a bit of it, old boy.' My companion absently flicked a crumpled piece of paper to one side with his stick. 'I'm not a minute senior to you and the end of the year will probably find me back here again.'

'But surely,' I said from behind him as we descended the stairs, 'if you have four years' study to your credit…'

He laughed.

'Ah, the ingenuousness of youth! Four years' study, or at least four years' spasmodic attendance at the medical school, is of no significance. Exams, my dear old boy, exams,' he explained forcibly. 'You'll find they control your progress through hospital like the signals on a railway line-you can't go on to the next section if they're against you. I've come down in my anatomy four times now,' he added cheerfully.

I condoled with him over this quadruple misfortune.

'Don't sympathize, old boy. I appreciate it, but it's wasted. All my failures were achieved with careful forethought. As a matter of fact, it's much more difficult to fail an examination skilfully than to pass the damn thing. To give that impression of once again just having been unfortunate in the choice of the questions, you know…Come along and have a beer. The King George will be open.'

We crossed the road and the experienced examinee thrust open the door of the saloon bar with his cane. I had meanwhile decided the medical course was a far more complicated affair than I had imagined.