136 HARPIES. 



judge that none of them can rival Cam- 

 bridge in the glossy blackness of their 

 plumage, the quick penetration of their evil 

 eye, the keenness of their appetite, or the 

 sharpness of their bills. 



But, to leave this metaphor, the under- 

 graduates first get involved without fair 

 means of extricating themselves, and 

 then fly to these harpies for relief, 

 which they administer by anticipating all 

 their dupes may have in reversion, 

 and by easing them of what little they 

 had left of honour, honesty, or good 

 principle. It would be supposed that 

 such practices, publicly known, would 

 consign the enactors to an unenvied dis- 

 tinction ; on the contrary, they live and 

 thrive in the midst of a community re- 

 nowned for its ethics, and have been 

 known to commit with impunity acts 

 which ought to have sent them to the 

 hulks. While, presuming on the rank of 

 gentlemen, which their profession gives 



