An additional reason for this was that he was in fact getting seven buckets of coal a day and so much clean laundry that even his socks were starched. This was because no one else had realised that Blunk, the coal porter, who was far too surly to read, delivered the buckets strictly according to the titles on the study doors.

The Dean, therefore, got one bucket. So did the Bursar.

Rincewind got seven because the Archchancellor had found him a useful recipient of all the titles, chairs and.posts which (because of ancient bequests, covenants and, in one case at least, a curse) the University was obliged to keep filled. In most instances no one knew what the hell they were for or wanted anything to do with them, in case some clause somewhere involved students, so they were given to Rincewind.

Every morning, therefore, Blunk stoically delivered seven buckets to the joint door of the Professor of Cruel and Unusual Geography, the Chair of Experimental Serendipity, the Reader in Slood Dynamics, the Fretwork Teacher,2 the Chair for the Public Misunderstanding of Magic, the Professor of Virtual Anthropology and the Lecturer in Approximate Accuracy ... who usually opened the door in his underpants -that is to say, opened the door in the wall whilst wearing his underpants - and took the coal happily, even if it was a sweltering day. At Unseen University you had budgets, and if you didn't use up everything you'd been given you wouldn't get as much next time. If this meant you roasted all summer in order to be moderately warm during the winter, then that was a small price to pay for proper fiscal procedures.