"He just glanced up at me, and the glance surprised me; it was like a dog looks at one. But my own hopes soon took possession of me again, and I can only remember being vaguely surprised by the appeal in his regard.
"When I was settled in my seat in the train, he did not say 'goodbye' and go, and leave me to my dreams; but brought me papers and things and hung about.
"I liked the 'Sir.' To my surprise my friend jumped into the carriage and said:
"'All right, guard, I'm not going, but I shall slip out as soon as you whistle.'
"The guard touched his cap and went. I said something, I don't know what; I was a little embarrassed.
"'You will write to me, Oscar, won't you, and tell me about everything?'
"'Oh, yes,' I replied, 'as soon as I get settled down, you know. There will be such a lot to do at first, and I am wild to see everything. I wonder how the professors will treat me. I do hope they will not be fools or prigs; what a pity it is that all professors are not poets....' And so I went on merrily, when suddenly the whistle sounded and a moment afterwards the train began to move.
"'Yes,' he replied, in a queer muffled voice, while standing with his hand on the door of the carriage. Suddenly he turned to me and cried:
"'Oh, Oscar,' and before I knew what he was doing he had caught my face in his hot hands, and kissed me on the lips. The next moment he had slipped out of the door and was gone....
"I sat there all shaken. Suddenly I became aware of cold, sticky drops trickling down my face--his tears. They affected me strangely. As I wiped them off I said to myself in amaze:
"'This is love: this is what he meant--love.'...
"I was trembling all over. For a long while I sat, unable to think, all shaken with wonder and remorse."
Oscar Wilde did well at school, but he did still better at college, where the competition was more severe. He entered Trinity on October 19th, 1871, just three days after his seventeenth birthday. Sir Edward Sullivan writes me that when Oscar matriculated at Trinity he was already "a thoroughly good classical scholar of a brilliant type," and he goes on to give an invaluable snap-shot of him at this time; a likeness, in fact, the chief features of which grew more and more characteristic as the years went on.