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diff --git a/39525-0.txt b/39525-0.txt index 7a9685e..2fd035b 100644 --- a/39525-0.txt +++ b/39525-0.txt @@ -1,27 +1,4 @@ - ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD - - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost -no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at http://www.gutenberg.org/license. - - -Title: Aspects of Modern Oxford - -Author: A. D. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at http://www.gutenberg.org/license. - - -Title: Aspects of Modern Oxford - -Author: A. D. Godley - -Release Date: April 23, 2012 [EBook #39525] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD *** - - - - -Produced by Al Haines. - - - - -[Illustration: Cover art] - - - -[Illustration: _IN CORNMARKET STREET. Drawn by T. H. Crawford._] - - - - ASPECTS - - OF - - MODERN OXFORD - - - - BY - - A MERE DON - - (A. D. GODLEY) - - - - - _WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY_ - - J. H. Lorimer, Lancelot Speed, T. H. Crawford, - - and E. Stamp - - - - LONDON - - SEELEY AND CO. LIMITED - - Essex Street, Strand - - 1894 - - - - ---- - - - - -CONTENTS - - - I--OF DONS AND COLLEGES - II--OF UNDERGRADUATES - III--OF SIGHTSEERS - IV--OF EXAMINATIONS - V--UNIVERSITY JOURNALISM - VI--THE UNIVERSITY AS SEEN FROM OUTSIDE. - VII--DIARY OF A DON - VIII--THE UNIVERSITY AS A PLACE OF LEARNED LEISURE. - - ---- - - LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - - -In Cornmarket Street. _By T. H. Crawford_ . . . . . . . . . -_Frontispiece_ - -In Christchurch Cathedral. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -New College, Oxford. _By E. Stamp_ - -Corpus Christi College. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -Smoking-Room at the Union. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -Cricket in the Parks. _By L. Speed_ - -Waiting for the Cox. _By L. Speed_ - -Ringoal in New College. _By L. Speed_ - -Golf at Oxford. The Plateau Hole And Arnold's Tree. _By L. Speed_ - -Commemoration: Outside the Sheldonian Theatre. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -In College Rooms. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -A Ball at Christchurch. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -The Deer Park, Magdalen College, Oxford. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -In Convocation: Conferring a Degree. _By E. Stamp_ - -A Lecture-Room in Magdalen College. _By E. Stamp_ - -The Library, Merton College. _By E. Stamp_ - -Reading the Newdigate. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -A Dance at St. John's. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -The Radcliffe. _By E. Stamp_ - -In the Bodleian. _By E. Stamp_ - -Sailing on the Upper River. _By L. Speed_ - -Porch of St. Mary's. _By J. Pennell_ - -In Exeter College Chapel. _By E. Stamp_ - -Parsons' Pleasure. _By L. Speed_ - -Fencing. _By L. Speed_ - -Lawn Tennis at Oxford. _By L. Speed_ - -Bowls in New College Garden. _By L. Speed_ - -Coaching the Eight. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -Evening on the River. _By E. Stamp_ - - - - - ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD - - - - -I--OF DONS AND COLLEGES - - - 'We ain't no thin red heroes, nor we ain't no blackguards too, - But single men in barracks, most remarkable like you.' - _Rudyard Kipling_. - -Fellows of Colleges who travel on the continent of Europe have, from -time to time, experienced the almost insuperable difficulty of -explaining to the more or less intelligent foreigner their own reason of -existence, and that of the establishment to which they are privileged to -belong. It is all the worse if your neighbour at the _table d'hte_ is -acquainted with the Universities of his own country, for these offer no -parallel at all, and to attempt to illustrate by means of them is not -only futile but misleading. Define any college according to the general -scheme indicated by its founder; when you have made the situation as -intelligible as a limited knowledge of French or German will allow, the -inquirer will conclude that '_also_ it is a monastic institution,' and -that you are wearing a hair shirt under your tourist tweeds. Try to -disabuse him of this impression by pointing out that colleges do not -compel to celibacy, and are intended mainly for the instruction of -youth, and your Continental will go away with the conviction that an -English University is composed of a conglomeration of public schools. -If he tries to get further information from the conversation of a casual -undergraduate, it will appear that a _Ruderverein_ on the Danube offers -most points of comparison. - -Fellows themselves fare no better, and are left in an--if -possible--darker obscurity. That they are in some way connected with -education is tolerably obvious, but the particular nature of the -connexion is unexplained. Having thoroughly confused the subject by -showing inconclusively that you are neither a monk, nor a schoolmaster, -nor a _Privat Docent_, you probably acquiesce from sheer weariness in -the title of _Professor_, which, perhaps, is as convenient as any other; -and, after all, _Professoren_ are very different from Professors. But -all this does nothing to elucidate the nature of a College. To do this -abroad is nearly as hard as to define the function of a University in -England. - -[Illustration: _IN CHRISTCHURCH CATHEDRAL. By J. H. Lorimer._] - -For even at home the general uneducated public, taking but a passing -interest in educational details, is apt to be hopelessly at sea as to -the mutual relation of Colleges and Universities. In the public mind -the College probably represents the University: an Oxonian will be -sometimes spoken of as 'at College;' University officials are confused -with heads of houses, and Collections with University examinations. -That foundation which is consecrated to the education of Welsh Oxonians -is generally referred to in the remote fastnesses of the Cymru as Oxford -College. As usual, a concrete material object, palpable and visible, is -preferred before a cold abstraction like the University. Explain to the -lay mind that a University is an aggregate of Colleges: it is not, of -course, but the definition will serve sometimes. Then how about the -London University, which is an examining body? And how does it happen -that there is a University College in Oxford, not to mention another in -Gower Street? and that Trinity College across the water is often called -Dublin University? All these problems are calculated to leave the -inquirer very much where he was at first, and in him who tries to -explain them to shake the firm foundations of Reason. - -It may be a truism, but it is nevertheless true--according to a phrase -which has done duty in the Schools ere now--that the history of the -University is, and has been for the last five hundred years, the history -of its Colleges; and it is also true that the interweaving of Collegiate -with University life has very much complicated the question of the -student's reason of existence. We do not, of course, know what may have -been the various motives which prompted the bold baron, or squire, or -yeoman of the twelfth or thirteenth century to send the most clerkly or -least muscular of his sons to herd with his fellows in the crowded -streets or the mean hostelries of pre-collegiate Oxford; nor have we -very definite data as to the kind of life which the scholar of the -family lived when he got there. Perhaps he resided in a 'hall;' -according to some authorities there were as many as three hundred halls -in the days of Edward I.; perhaps he was master of his own destinies, -like the free and independent unattached student of modern days--minus a -Censor to watch over the use of his liberties. But what is tolerably -certain is that he did not then come to Oxford so much with the -intention of 'having a good time' as with the desire of improving his -mind, or, at least, in some way or other taking part in the intellectual -life of the period, which then centred in the University. It might be -that among the throngs of boys and young men who crowded the straitened -limits of mediaeval Oxford, there were many who supported the obscure -tenets of their particular Doctor Perspicuus against their opponents' -Doctor Inexplicabilis rather with bills and bows than with disputations -in the Schools; but every Oxonian was in some way vowed to the -advancement of learning--at least, it is hard to see what other -inducement there was to face what must have been, even with all due -allowance made, the exceptional hardships of a student's life. Then -came the Colleges--University dating from unknown antiquity, although -the legend which connects its foundation with Alfred has now shared the -fate of most legends; Balliol and Merton, at the end of the thirteenth -century; and the succeeding centuries were fruitful in the establishment -of many other now venerable foundations, taking example and -encouragement from the success and reputation of their earlier compeers. -In their original form colleges were probably intended to be places of -quiet retirement and study, where the earnest scholar might peacefully -pursue his researches without fear of disturbance by the wilder spirits -who roamed the streets and carried on the traditional feuds of Town and -Gown or of North and South. - -[Illustration: _NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD. Drawn by E. Stamp._] - -By a curious reverse of circumstances the collegian and the '_scholaris -nulli collegio vel aulae ascriptus_' of modern days seem to have changed -characters. For I have heard it said by those who have to do with -college discipline that their _alumni_ are no longer invariably -distinguished by 'a gentle nature and studious habits'--qualities for -which, as the Warden of Merton says, colleges were originally intended -to provide a welcome haven of rest, and which are now the especial and -gratifying characteristics of that whilom roisterer and boon companion, -the Unattached Student. - -We have it on the authority of historians that the original collegiate -design was, properly speaking, a kind of model lodging-house; an -improved, enlarged, and strictly supervised edition of the many hostels -where the primitive undergraduate did mostly congregate. Fellows and -scholars alike were to be studious and discreet persons; the seniors -were to devote themselves to research, and to stand in a quasi-parental -or elder-brotherly relation to the juniors who had not yet attained to -the grade of a Baccalaureus. Very strict rules--probably based on those -of monastic institutions--governed the whole body: rules, however, which -are not unnecessarily severe when we consider the fashion of the age and -the comparative youth of both fellows and scholars. Many scholars must -have been little more than children, and the junior don of the fifteenth -century may often have been young enough to receive that corporal -punishment which our rude forefathers inflicted even on the gentler sex. - - 'Solomon said, in accents mild, - Spare the rod and spoil the child; - Be they man or be they maid, - Whip 'em and wallop 'em, Solomon said' - ---and the sage's advice was certainly followed in the case of scholars, -who were birched for offences which in these latter days would call down -a 'gate,' a fine, or an imposition. Authorities tell us that the early -fellow might even in certain cases be mulcted of his dress, a penalty -which is now reserved for Irish patriots in gaol; and it would seem that -his consumption of beer was limited by regulations which would now be -intolerable to his scout. Some of the details respecting crime and -punishment, which have been preserved in ancient records, are of the -most remarkable description. A former Fellow of Corpus (so we are -informed by Dr. Fowler's History of that College) who had been proved -guilty of an over-susceptibility to the charms of beauty, was condemned -as a penance to preach eight sermons in the Church of St. -Peter-in-the-East. Such was the inscrutable wisdom of a bygone age. - -Details have altered since then, but the general scheme of college -discipline remains much the same. Even in the days when practice was -slackest, theory retained its ancient stringency. When Mr. Gibbon of -Magdalen absented himself from his lectures, his excuses were received -'with an indulgent smile;' when he desired to leave Oxford for a few -days, he appears to have done so without let or hindrance; but both -residence and attendance at lectures were theoretically necessary. The -compromise was hardly satisfactory, but as the scholars' age increased -and the disciplinary rule meant for fourteen had to be applied to -eighteen, what was to be done? So, too, we are informed that in the -days of our fathers undergraduates endured a Procrustean tyranny. So -many chapel services you must attend; so many lectures you must hear, -connected or not with your particular studies; and there was no -relaxation of the rule; no excuse even of 'urgent business' would serve -the pale student who wanted to follow the hounds or play in a cricket -match. Things, in fact, would have been at a deadlock had not the -authorities recognised the superiority of expediency to mere morality, -and invariably accepted without question the plea of ill-health. To -'put on an _aeger_' when in the enjoyment of robust health was after all -as justifiable a fiction as the 'not at home' of ordinary society. You -announced yourself as too ill to go to a lecture, and then rode with the -Bicester or played cricket to your heart's content. This remarkable -system is now practically obsolete; perhaps we are more moral. - -[Illustration: _CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE. Drawn by F. H. Lorimer._] - -Modern collegiate discipline is a parlous matter. There are still the -old problems to be faced--the difficulty of adapting old rules to new -conditions--the danger on the one hand of treating boys too much like -men, and on the other of treating men too much like boys. Hence college -authorities generally fall back on some system of more or less ingenious -compromise--a course which is no doubt prudent in the long run, and -shows a laudable desire for the attainment of the Aristotelian 'mean,' -but which, like most compromises, manages to secure the disapproval -alike of all shades of outside opinion. We live with the fear of the -evening papers before our eyes, and an erring undergraduate who has been -sent down may quite possibly be avenged by a newspaper column reflecting -on college discipline in general, and the dons who sent him down in -particular. Every day martinets tell us that the University is going to -the dogs from excess of leniency; while critics of the -'Boys-will-be-boys' school point out the extreme danger of sitting -permanently on the safety valve, and dancing on the edge of an active -volcano. - -In recent years most of the 'Halls' have been practically extinguished, -and thereby certain eccentricities of administration removed from our -midst. It was perhaps as well; some of these ancient and honourable -establishments having during the present century rather fallen from -their former reputation, from their readiness to receive into the fold -incapables or minor criminals to whom the moral or intellectual -atmosphere of a college was uncongenial. This was a very convenient -system for colleges, who could thus get rid of an idle or stupid man -without the responsibility of blighting his University career and his -prospects in general; but the Halls, which were thus turned into a kind -of sink, became rather curious and undesirable abiding-places in -consequence. They were inhabited by grave and reverend seniors who -couldn't, and by distinguished athletes who wouldn't, pass Smalls, much -less Mods. At one time 'Charsley's' was said to be able to play the -'Varsity Eleven. These mixed multitudes appear to have been governed on -very various and remarkable principles. At one establishment it was -considered a breach of courtesy if you did not, when going to London, -give the authorities some idea of the _probable_ length of your absence. -'The way to govern a college,' the venerated head of this institution is -reported to have said, 'is this--_to keep one eye shut_,' presumably the -optic on the side of the offender. Yet it is curious that while most of -the Halls appear to have been ruled rather by the _gant de velours_ than -the _main de fer_, one of them is currently reported to have been the -scene of an attempt to inflict corporal punishment. This heroic -endeavour to restore the customs of the ancients was not crowned with -immediate success, and he who should have been beaten with stripes fled -for justice to the Vice-Chancellor's Court. - -[Illustration: _SMOKING-ROOM AT THE UNION. Drawn by T. H. Crawford._] - -Casual visitors to Oxford who are acquainted with the statutes of the -University will no doubt have observed that it has been found -unnecessary to insist on exact obedience to all the rules which were -framed for the student of four hundred years ago. For instance, boots -are generally worn; undergraduates are not prohibited from riding -horses, nor even from carrying lethal weapons; the _herba nicotiana sive -Tobacco_ is in common use; and, especially in summer, garments are not -so 'subfusc' as the strict letter of the law requires. Perhaps, too, the -wearing of the academic cap and gown is not so universally necessary as -it was heretofore. All these are matters for the jurisdiction of the -Proctors, who rightly lay more stress on the real order and good -behaviour of their realm. And whatever evils civilisation may bring in -the train, there can be no doubt that the task of these officials is far -less dangerous than of old, as their subjects are less turbulent. They -have no longer to interfere in the faction fights of Northern and -Southern students. It is unusual for a Proctor to carry a pole-axe, -even when he is 'drawing' the most dangerous of billiard-rooms. The -Town and Gown rows which used to provide so attractive a picture for the -novelist--where the hero used to stand pale and determined, defying a -crowd of infuriated bargemen--are extinct and forgotten these last ten -years. Altogether the streets are quieter; models, in fact, of peace and -good order: when the anarchical element is loose it seems to prefer the -interior of Colleges. Various reasons might be assigned for this: -sometimes the presence of too easily defied authority gives a piquancy -to crime; or it is the place itself which is the incentive. The open -space of a quadrangle is found to be a convenient stage for the -performance of the midnight reveller. He is watched from the windows by -a ring of admiring friends, and the surrounding walls are a kind of -sounding-board which enhances the natural beauty of -'Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay' (with an accompaniment of tea-tray and poker -_obbligato_). Every one has his own ideal of an enjoyable evening. - - - - -II--OF UNDERGRADUATES - - - 'In the sad and sodden street - To and fro - Flit the feverstricken feet - Of the Freshers, as they meet, - Come and go.' - _Q_ - -Whatever the theory of their founders, it is at no late period in the -history of colleges that we begin to trace the development of the modern -undergraduate. It was only natural that the 'gentle natures and studious -habits' of a select band of learners should undergo some modification as -college after college was founded, and comparative frivolity would from -time to time obtain admission to the sacred precincts. The University -became the resort of wealth and rank, as well as of mere intellect, and -the gradual influx of commoners--still more, of 'gentlemen -commoners'--once for all determined the character of colleges as places -of serious and uninterrupted study. Probably the Civil War, bringing -the Court to Oxford, was a potent factor in relaxation of the older -academic discipline; deans or sub-wardens of the period doubtless -finding some difficulty in adapting their rules to the requirements of -undergraduates who might from time to time absent themselves from chapel -or lecture in order to raid a Parliamentary outpost. - -But perhaps the most instructive picture of the seventeenth-century -undergraduate is to be found in the account-book of one Wilding, of -Wadham (published by the Oxford Historical Society), apparently a -reading man and a scholar of his college, destined for Holy Orders. The -number of his books (he gives a list of them) shows him to have been -something of a student, while repeated entries of large sums paid for -'Wiggs' (on one occasion as much as 14*s*--more than his 'Battles' for -the quarter!) would seem to suggest something of the habits of the 'gay -young sparks' alluded to by Hearne in the next century. On the whole, -Master Wilding appears to have been a virtuous and studious young -gentleman. Now and then the natural man asserts himself, and he treats -his friends to wine or 'coffea,' or even makes an excursion to -'Abbington' (4*s.*!). Towards the end of his career a 'gaudy' costs -2*s.* 6*d.*, after which comes the too-suggestive entry, 'For a purge, -1*s.*' Then comes the close: outstanding bills are paid to the alarming -extent of 7*s.* 8*d.*; a 'wigg,' which originally cost 14*s.*, is -disposed of at a ruinous reduction for 6*s.*--the prudent man does not -give it away to his scout--and J. Wilding, B.A., e. Coll., Wadh., -retires to his country parsonage--having first invested sixpence in a -sermon. Evidently a person of methodical habits and punctual payments; -that had two wigs, and everything handsome about him; and that probably -grumbled quite as much at the 10*s.* fee for his tutor as his modern -successor does at his 8*l.* 6*s.* 8*d.* But, on the whole, collegiate -and university fees seem to have been small. - -After this description of the _vie intime_ of an undergraduate at -Wadham, history is reserved on the subject of the junior members of the -University; which is the more disappointing, as the historic Muse is not -only garrulous, but exceedingly scandalous in recounting the virtues and -the aberrations of eighteenth-century dons. Here and there we find an -occasional notice of the ways of undergraduates--here a private memoir, -there an academic _brochure_. We learn, incidentally, how Mr. John -Potenger, of New College, made 'theams in prose and verse,' and -eventually 'came to a tollerable proficiency in colloquial Latin;' how -Mr. Meadowcourt, of Merton, got into serious trouble--was prevented, in -fact, from taking his degree--for drinking the health of His Majesty -King George the First; and how Mr. Carty, of University College, -suffered a similar fate 'for prophaning, with mad intemperance, that -day, on which he ought, with sober chearfulness, to have commemorated -the restoration of King Charles the Second' (this was in 1716); how Mr. -Shenstone found, at Pembroke College, both sober men 'who amused -themselves in the evening with reading Greek and drinking water,' and -also 'a set of jolly sprightly young fellows .... who drank ale, smoked -tobacco,' and even 'punned;' and how Lord Shelburne had a 'narrow-minded -tutor.' From which we may gather, that University life was not so very -different from what it is now: our forefathers were more exercised about -politics, for which we have now substituted a perhaps extreme devotion -to athletics. But for the most part, the undergraduate is not prominent -in history--seeming, in fact, to be regarded as the least important -element in the University. On the other hand, his successor of the -present century--the era of the Examination Schools--occupies so -prominent a place in the eyes of the public that it is difficult to -speak of him, lest haply one should be accused of frivolity or want of -reverence for the _raison d'tre_ of all academic institutions. - -[Illustration: _CRICKET IN THE PARKS. By Launcelot Speed._] - -His own reason of existence is not so obvious. It was, as we have said, -tolerably clear that the mediaeval student came to Oxford primarily for -the love of learning something, at any rate; but the student _fin de -sicle_ is one of the most labyrinthine parts of a complex civilisation. -Of the hundreds of boys who are shot on the G.W.R. platform every -October to be caressed or kicked by Alma Mater, and returned in due time -full or empty, it is only an insignificant minority who come up with the -ostensible purpose of learning. Their reasons are as many as the colours -of their portmanteaus. Brown has come up because he is in the sixth -form at school, and was sent in for a scholarship by a head-master -desiring an advertisement; Jones, because it is thought by his friends -that he might get into the 'Varsity eleven; Robinson, because his father -considers a University career to be a stepping-stone to the -professions--which it fortunately is not as yet. Mr. Sangazur is, going -to St. Boniface because his father was there; and Mr. J. Sangazur -Smith--well, probably because _his_ father wasn't. Altogether they are -a motley crew, and it is not the least achievement of the University -that she does somehow or other manage to impress a certain stamp on so -many different kinds of metal. But in this she is only an instrument in -the hands of modern civilisation, which is always extinguishing -eccentricities and abnormal types; and even Oxford, while her sons are -getting rid of those interesting individualities which used to -distinguish them from each other, is fast losing many of the -peculiarities which used to distinguish it from the rest of the world. -It is an age of monotony. Even the Freshman, that delightful creation -of a bygone age, is not by any means what he was. He is still young, -but no longer innocent; the bloom is off his credulity; you cannot play -practical jokes upon him any more. Now and then a young man will -present himself to his college authorities in a gown of which the -superfluous dimensions and unusual embroidery betray the handiwork of -the provincial tailor; two or three neophytes may annually be seen -perambulating the High in academic dress with a walking-stick; but these -are only survivals. Senior men have no longer their old privileges of -'ragging' the freshman. In ancient times, as we are informed by the -historian of Merton College, 'Freshmen were expected to sit on a form, -and make jokes for the amusement of their companions, on pain of being -"tucked," or scarified by the thumb-nail applied under the lip. The -first Earl of Shaftesbury describes in detail this rather barbarous jest -as practised at Exeter College, and relates how, aided by some freshmen -of unusual size and strength, he himself headed a mutiny which led to -the eventual abolition of 'tucking.' Again, on Candlemas Day every -freshman received notice to prepare a speech to be delivered on the -following Shrove Tuesday, when they were compelled to declaim in undress -from a form placed on the high table, being rewarded with "cawdel" if -the performances were good, with cawdel and salted drink if it were -indifferent, and with salted drink and "tucks" if it were dull. This is -what American students call 'hazing,' and the German _Fuchs_ is -subjected to similar ordeals. But we have changed all that, and treat -the 'fresher' now with the respect he deserves. - -Possibly the undergraduate of fiction and the drama may have been once a -living reality. But he is so no more, and modern realistic novelists -will have to imagine some hero less crude in colouring and more in -harmony with the compromises and neutral tints of the latter half of the -nineteenth century. The young Oxonian or Cantab of fifty years back, as -represented by contemporary or nearly contemporary writers, was always -in extremes:-- - - 'When he was good he was very, very good; - But when he was bad he was horrid,' - -like the little girl of the poet. He was either an inimitable example -of improbable virtue, or abnormally vicious. The bad undergraduate -defied the Ten Commandments, all and severally, with the ease and -success of the villain of transpontine melodrama. Nothing came amiss to -him, from forgery to screwing up the Dean and letting it be understood -that some one else had done it; but retribution generally came at last, -and this compound of manifold vices was detected and rusticated; and it -was understood that from rustication to the gallows was the shortest and -easiest of transitions. The virtuous undergraduate wore trousers too -short for him and supported his relations. He did not generally join in -any athletic pastimes, but when the stroke of his college eight fainted -from excitement just before the start, the neglected sizar threw off his -threadbare coat, leapt into the vacant seat, and won his crew at once -the proud position of head of the river by the simple process of making -four bumps on the same night, explaining afterwards that he had -practised in a dingey and saw how it could be done. Then there was the -Admirable Crichton of University life, perhaps the commonest type among -these heroes of romance. He was invariably at Christ Church, and very -often had a background of more or less tragic memories from the far-away -days of his _jeunesse orageuse_. Nevertheless he unbent so far as to do -nothing much during the first three and a half years of his academic -career, except to go to a good many wine parties, where he always wore -his cap and gown (especially in female fiction), and drank more than any -one else. Then, when every one supposed he must be ploughed in Greats, -he sat up so late for a week, and wore so many wet towels, that -eventually he was announced at the Encaenia, amid the plaudits of his -friends and the approving smiles of the Vice-Chancellor, as the winner -of a Double-First, several University prizes, and a Fellowship; after -which it was only right and natural that the recipient of so many -coveted distinctions should lead the heroine of the piece to the altar. - -[Illustration: _WAITING FOR THE COX. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -Possibly the Oxford of a bygone generation may have furnished models for -these brilliantly coloured pictures; or, as is more probable, they were -created by the licence of fiction. At any rate the 'man' of modern times -is a far less picturesque person--unpicturesque even to the verge of -becoming ordinary. He is seldom eccentric or _outr_ in externals. His -manners are such as he has learnt at school, and his customs those of -the world he lives in. His dress would excite no remark in Piccadilly. -The gorgeous waistcoats of Leech's pencil and Calverley's '_crurum non -enarrabile tegmen_' belong to ancient history. He is, on the whole, -inexpensive in his habits, as it is now the fashion to be poor; he no -longer orders in a tailor's whole shop, and his clubs are generally -managed with economy and prudence. If, however, the undergraduate -occasionally displays the virtues of maturer age, there are certain -indications that he is less of a grown-up person than he was in the -brave days of old. It takes him a long time to forget his school-days. -Only exceptionally untrammelled spirits regard independent reading as -more important than the ministrations of their tutor. Pass-men have been -known to speak of their work for the schools as 'lessons,' and, in their -first term, to call the head of the College the head-master. Naturally, -too, school-life has imbued both Pass and Class men with an enduring -passion for games--probably rather a good thing in itself, although -inadequate as the be-all and end-all of youthful energy. Even those who -do not play them can talk about them. Cricket and football are always -as prolific a topic as the weather, and nearly as interesting, as many a -perfunctory 'Fresher's breakfast' can testify. - -[Illustration: _RINGOAL IN NEW COLLEGE. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -The undergraduate, in these as in other things, is like the young of his -species, with whom, after all, he has a good deal in common. Take, in -short, the ordinary provincial young man; add a dash of the schoolboy -and just a touch of the _Bursch_, and you have what Mr. Hardy calls the -'Normal Undergraduate.' - -[Illustration: Ringoal] - -It used to be the custom to draw a very hard-and-fast line of -demarcation between the rowing and the reading man--rowing being taken -as a type of athletics in general, and indeed being the only form of -physical exercise which possessed a regular organization. Rumour has it -that a certain tutor (now defunct) laid so much emphasis on this -distinction that men whose circumstances permitted them to be idle were -regarded with disfavour if they took to reading. He docketed freshmen -as reading or non-reading men, and would not allow either kind to stray -into the domain of the other. However, the general fusion of classes and -professions has levelled these boundaries now. The rowing man reads to a -certain extent, and the reading man has very often pretensions to -athletic eminence; it is in fact highly desirable that he should, now -that a 'Varsity 'blue' provides an assistant master in a school with at -least as good a salary as does a brilliant degree. Yet, although the -great majority of men belong to the intermediate class of those who take -life as they find it, and make no one occupation the object of their -exclusive devotion, it is hardly necessary to say that there are still -extremes--the Brutal Athlete at one end of the line and the bookish -recluse (often, though wrongly, identified with the 'Smug') at the -other. The existence of the first is encouraged by the modern tendency -to professionalism in athletics. Mere amateurs who regard games as an -amusement can never hope to do anything; a thing must be taken -seriously. Every schoolboy who wishes to obtain renown in the columns -of sporting papers has his 'record,' and comes up to Oxford with the -express intention of 'cutting' somebody else's, and the athletic -authorities of the University know all about Jones's bowling average at -Eton, or Brown's form as three-quarter-back at Rugby, long before these -distinguished persons have matriculated. Nor is it only cricket, -football, and rowing that are the objects of our worship. Even so staid -and contemplative a pastime as golf ranks among 'athletics;' and perhaps -in time the authorities will be asked to give a 'Blue' for croquet. -These things being so, on the whole, perhaps, we should be grateful to -the eminent athlete for the comparative affability of his demeanour, so -long as he is not seriously contradicted. He is great, but he is -generally merciful. - -Thews and sinews have probably as much admiration as is good for them, -and nearly as much as they want. On the other hand, the practice of -reading has undoubtedly been popularised. It is no longer a clique of -students who seek honours; public opinion in and outside the University -demands of an increasing majority of men that they should appear to be -improving their minds. The Pass-man pure and simple diminishes in -numbers annually; no doubt in time he will be a kind of pariah. -Colleges compete with each other in the Schools. Evening papers prove -by statistics the immorality of an establishment where a scholar who -obtains a second is allowed to remain in residence. The stress and -strain of the system would be hardly bearable were it not decidedly less -difficult to obtain a class in honours than it used to be--not, perhaps, -a First, or even a Second; but certainly the lower grades are easier of -attainment. Then the variety of subjects is such as to appeal to every -one: history, law, theology, natural science (in all its branches), -mathematics, all invite the ambitious student whose relations wish him -to take honours, and will be quite satisfied with a Fourth; and eminent -specialists compete for the privilege of instructing him. The tutor who -complained to the undergraduate that he had sixteen pupils was met by -the just retort that the undergraduate had sixteen tutors. - -[Illustration: _GOLF AT OXFORD. THE PLATEAU HOLE AND ARNOLD'S TREE. -Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -The relation of the University to the undergraduate is twofold; it is -'kept'--as a witty scholar of Dublin is fabled to have inscribed over -the door of his Dean, 'for his amusement and instruction'--and if the -latter is frequently formal, it is still more often and in a great -variety of ways 'informal,' and not communicated through his tutor. Not -to mention the many college literary societies--every college has one at -least, and they are all ready to discuss any topic, from the Origin of -Evil to bimetallism--there are now in the University various learned -societies, modelled and sometimes called after the German _Seminar_, -which are intended to supplement the deficiencies of tuition, and to -keep the serious student abreast of the newest erudition which has been -'made in Germany,' or anywhere else on the Continent. Then there is the -Union as a school of eloquence for the political aspirant; or the -'private business' of his college debating society, where a vote of -censure on Ministers is sometimes emphasised by their ejection into the -quadrangle, may qualify him for the possible methods of a future House -of Commons. - - - - -III--OF SIGHTSEERS - - - 'The women longed to go and see the _college_ and the _tutour_.' - _'The Guardian's Instruction' by Stephen Penton._ - -When the late Mr. Bright asserted that the tone of Oxford life and -thought was 'provincial with a difference,' great indignation was -aroused in the breasts of all Oxford men--residents, at least; whether -it was the provincialism or the 'difference' wherein lay the sting of -the taunt. Probably it was the first. For, although it is a tenable -hypothesis that _Kleinstdtigkeit_ has really been a potent factor in -the production of much that is best in art and literature, still nobody -likes to be called provincial by those whose business is in the -metropolis. Caesar said that he would rather be a great man at Gabii, -or whatever was the Little Pedlington of Italy, than an ordinary person -at Rome; but the modern Little Pedlingtonian would seldom confess to so -grovelling an ambition, whatever might be his real feelings. He would -much sooner be one of the crowd in London than mayor of his native city: -so at least he says. And so he is very angry if you call him -provincial, and venture to insinuate that his views of life are limited -by the jurisdiction of his Local Board or City Council; and thus the -University of Oxford refused for a long time to forgive John Bright, and -did not quite forget his strictures even when it gave him an honorary -degree and called him 'patriae et libertatis amantissimus.' And yet the -authorities had done what they could to keep the University provincial. -It was only after many and deep searchings of heart that the Hebdomadal -Council consented to countenance the advent of the Great Western -Railway; while the ten miles which separate Oxford from Steventon -preserved undergraduates from the contaminating contact of the -metropolis there was still hope, but many venerable Tories held that -University discipline was past praying for when a three-hours' run would -bring you into the heart of the dissipation of London. Some there were -who could not even imagine that so terrible a change had really taken -place; it is said that Dr. Routh, the President of Magdalen, who -attained the respectable age of ninety-nine in the year 1855 (he was -elected towards the close of the last century as a _warming-pan_, being -then of a delicate constitution and not supposed likely to live!), -persistently ignored the development of railways altogether; when -undergraduates came up late at the beginning of the winter term, he -would excuse them on the ground of the badness of the roads. - -We have changed all that, like other provincial centres; and -undergraduates who want to 'see their dentist'--a venerable and -time-honoured plea which we have heard expressed by the delicate-minded -as 'the necessity for keeping a dental engagement'--may now run up to -town and back between lunch and 'hall;' the latter function having also -marched with the times, and even six-o'clock dinner being now almost a -thing of the past. Not so long ago five was the regular hour. In the -early seventies seven-o'clock dinner was regarded as a doubtful -innovation; and there we have stopped for the present. But the -fashionable world outside the colleges imitates London customs--always -keeping a little way behind the age--and what has been called the 'Parks -System' actually dines as late as 7.45 when it is determined to be _trs -chic_. It is only one sign of the influx of metropolitan ideas; but -there are many others. Oxford tradesmen have learnt by bitter -experience that the modern undergraduate is not an exclusive preserve -for them like his father. That respected county magnate, when he was at -Oriel, bought his coats from an Oxford tailor and his wine from an -Oxford wine-merchant, to whom--being an honest man--he paid about half -as much again as he would have paid anywhere in London, thereby -recouping the men of coats or of wines for the many bad debts made by -dealing with the transitory and impecunious undergraduate. But his son -gets his clothes in London, and his wine from the college, which deals -directly with Bordeaux. And the tone and subject of conversation is -changed too. Oxford is thoroughly up to date, and knows all about the -latest play at the Criterion and the latest scandal in the inner circle -of London society--or thinks it does, at any rate: there is no one who -knows so much about London as the man who does not live there. - -[Illustration: _COMMEMORATION: OUTSIDE THE SHELDONIAN THEATRE. Drawn by -T. H. Crawford._] - -But if Oxford goes to London, so does London come to Oxford. Whether it -be fitting or not that the site of a theoretically learned University -should be in summer a sort of people's park or recreation-ground for the -jaded Londoner, the fact is so: the classes and the masses are always -with us in one form or another. It has become a common and laudable -practice for East-end clergymen and the staff of Toynbee Hall and the -Oxford House to bring down their flocks on Whit-Monday or other -appropriate occasions; and one may constantly see high academic -dignitaries piloting an unwieldy train of excursionists, and trying to -compress University history into a small compass, or to explain the -nature of a college (of all phenomena most unexplainable to the lay -mind) to an audience which has never seen any other place of education -than a Board school. As for the classes, they have raised the Eights -and 'Commem.' to the rank of regular engagements in a London season, and -they go through both with that unflinching heroism which the English -public invariably display in the performance of a social duty: they -shiver in summer frocks on the barges, despite the hail and snowstorms -of what is ironically described as the 'Summer' term; and after a hard -day's sightseeing they enjoy a well-earned repose by going to -Commemoration balls, where you really do dance, not for a perfunctory -two hours or so, but from 8.30 to 6.30 a.m. In spite of these hardships -it is gratifying to observe that, whether or not the University succeeds -in its educational mission, it appears to leave nothing to be desired as -a place of amusement for the jaded pleasure-seeker. People who go to -sleep at a farce have been known to smile at the (to a resident) dullest -and least impressive University function. Ladies appear to take an -especial delight in penetrating the mysteries of College life. Perhaps -the female mind is piqued by a subdued flavour of impropriety, dating -from a period when colleges were not what they are; or more probably -they find it gratifying to the self-respect of a superior sex to observe -and to pity the notoriously ineffectual attempts of mere bachelors to -render existence bearable. So much for the term; and when the vacation -begins Oxford is generally inundated by a swarm of heterogeneous -tourists--Americans, who come here on their way between Paris and -Stratford-on-Avon; Germans, distinguished by a white umbrella and a red -'Baedeker,' trying to realise that here, too, is a University, despite -the absence of students with slashed noses and the altogether different -quality of the beer. Then with August come the Extension students; the -more frivolous to picnic at Nuneham and Islip, the seriously-minded to -attend lectures which compress all knowledge into a fortnight's course, -and to speculate on the future when they--the real University, as they -say--will succeed to the inheritance of an unenlightened generation -which is wasting its great opportunities. - -[Illustration: _IN COLLEGE ROOMS. Drawn by T. H. Crawford._] - -At Commemoration a general sense of lobster salad pervades the -atmosphere, and the natural beauties of colleges are concealed or -enhanced by a profusion of planking and red cloth; the architectural -merit of a hall is as nothing compared to the elasticity of its floor. -The Eights, again, provide attractions of their own, not especially -academic. The truly judicious sightseer will avoid both of these festive -seasons, and will choose some time when there is less to interfere with -his own proper pursuit--the week after the Eights, perhaps, or the -beginning of the October term, when the red Virginia creeper makes a -pleasing contrast with the grey collegiate walls. Nor will he, if he is -wise, allow himself to be 'rushed' through the various objects of -interest: there are, it is believed, local guides who profess to show -the whole of Oxford in two hours; but rumour asserts that the feat is -accomplished by making the several quadrangles of one college do duty -for a corresponding number of separate establishments, so that the -credulous visitor leaves Christ Church with the impression that he has -seen not only 'The House,' but also several other foundations, all -curiously enough communicating with each other. And in any case, after -a mere scamper through the colleges, nothing remains in the mind but a -vague and inaccurate reminiscence, combining in one the characteristics -of all; the jaded sightseer goes back to London with a fortunately -soon-to-be-forgotten idea that Keble was founded by Alfred the Great, -and that Tom Quad is a nickname for the Vice-Chancellor. Samuel Pepys -seems to have been to a certain extent the prototype of this kind of -curiosity or antiquity hunter, and paid a 'shilling to a boy that showed -me the Colleges before dinner.' (Curiously enough, 'after dinner' the -honorarium to 'one that showed us the schools and library' was 10*s.*!) - -[Illustration: _A BALL AT CHRIST CHURCH. Drawn by T. H. Crawford_] - -He who is responsible for the proper conduct of a gang of relations or -friends will not treat them in this way. He will endeavour, so far as -possible, to confine them within the limits of his own college, where he -is on his native heath, and, if he is not an antiquarian, can at least -animate the venerable buildings with details of contemporary history. He -will point out his Dons (like the great French nation, 'objects of -hatred or admiration, but never of indifference') with such derision or -reverence as they may deserve, and affix to them ancient anecdotes -whereby their personality may be remembered. He will show to an -admiring circle the statue which was painted green, the pinnacle climbed -by a friend in the confidence of inebriation, and the marks of the -bonfire which the Dean did not succeed in putting out. Even the most -ignorant and frivolous-minded person can make his own college -interesting. When he has succeeded in impressing upon his friends the -true character of a college as a place of religion and sound learning, -he may be permitted to show them such external objects as form a part of -every one's education, and which no one (for the very shame of -confessing it) can pretermit unseen, such as the gardens of New College -or St. John's, the 'Nose' of B.N.C, the Burne-Jones tapestry at Exeter, -or the picture of Mr. Gladstone in the hall of Christ Church. Those who -absolutely insist on a more comprehensive view of the University and -City may be allowed to make the ascent of some convenient point of -view--Magdalen Tower, for instance; it is a stiff climb, but the view -from the top will repay your exertions. This is where, as since the -appearance of Mr. Holman Hunt's picture everybody is probably aware, the -choir of the college annually salute the rising sun from the top of the -tower by singing a Latin hymn on May morning--while the youth of the -city, for reasons certainly not known to themselves, make morning -hideous with blowing of unmelodious horns in the street below. At all -times--even at sunrise on a rainy May morning--it is a noble prospect. -The unlovely red-brick suburbs of the north are hidden from sight by the -intervening towers and pinnacles of the real Oxford; immediately below -the High Street winds westwards, flanked by colleges and churches, of -which the prevailing grey is relieved by the green trees of those many -gardens and unexplored nooks of verdure with which Oxford abounds; to -the south there are glimpses of the river flowing towards the dim grey -line of the distant Berkshire downs. To the historically-minded the -outlook may suggest many a picture of bygone times--scenes of brawling -in the noisy High Street, when the old battle of Town and Gown was -fought with cold steel, and blood flowed freely on both sides--in the -days when the maltreated townsman appealing to the Proctor could get no -satisfaction but a 'thrust at him with his poleaxe!' Down the street -which lies below passed Queen Elizabeth--'Virgo Pia Docta Felix'--after -being royally entertained with sumptuous pageants and the play of -'Palamon and Arcyte' in the Christ Church hall. Over the Cherwell, in -the troublous times of the Civil Wars, rode the Royalist horse to beat -up the Parliamentary quarters below the Chiltern hills and among the -woods of the Buckinghamshire border--enterprising undergraduates perhaps -taking an _exeat_ to accompany them. Here it was that certain scholars -of Magdalen, having a quarrel with Lord Norreys by reason of -deer-stealing, 'went up privately to the top of their tower, and waiting -till he should pass by towards Ricot' (Rycote) 'sent down a shower of -stones upon him and his retinew, wounding some and endangering others of -their lives'--and worse might have happened had not the 'retinew' taken -the precaution, foreseeing the assault, to put boards or tables on their -heads. At a later day Pope entered Oxford by this road, and there is a -pretty description of the scene in one of his letters--it will no doubt -appeal to the nineteenth-century visitor who departs through slums to -the architecturally unimpressive station of the Great Western. 'The -shades of the evening overtook me. The moon rose in the clearest sky I -ever saw, by whose solemn light I paced on slowly, without company, or -any interruption to the range of my own thoughts. About a mile before I -reached Oxford all the bells tolled in different notes, the clocks of -every college answered one another, and sounded forth (some in a deeper, -some in a softer tone) that it was eleven at night. All this was no ill -preparation to the life I have led since among those old walls, -venerable galleries, stone porticos, studious walks, and solitary scenes -of the University.' Jerry-built rows of lodging-houses rather militate -against the romance of the Iffley Road as we know it now. - -[Illustration: _THE DEER PARK, MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD. By J. H. -Lorimer._] - -But, after all, the majority of sightseers are not given to historical -reflections. What most people want is something that 'palpitates with -actuality;' they want to see the machine working. They are temporarily -happy if they can see a Proctor in his robes of office, and rise to the -enthusiasm of 'never having had such a delightful day' if the Proctor -happens to 'proctorise' an undergraduate within the ken of their vision. -'It was all so _delightful_ and mediaeval, and all that kind of thing, -don't you know? Poor young man--simply for not wearing one of those -horrid caps and gowns! _I_ call it a shame.' This is the reason why a -Degree Day is so wonderfully popular a ceremony. There is a sense of -attractive mystery about it all--the Vice-Chancellor throned in the -Theatre or Convocation House, discoursing in unintelligible scraps of -Latin like the refrain of a song, and the Proctors doing their -quarter-deck walk--although the dignity of the function be rather marred -by the undergraduates who jostle and giggle in the background forgetting -that they are assisting at a ceremony which is, after all, one of the -University's reasons of existence. It is the same kind of curiosity -which causes the lecturer to become suddenly conscious that he is being -watched with intense interest--an interest to which he is altogether -unaccustomed--by 'only a face at the window' of his lecture-room, to his -own confusion and the undisguised amusement of his audience. - -[Illustration: _IN CONVOCATION: CONFERRING A DEGREE. Drawn by Ernest -Stamp._] - -Such are sightseers: yet every man to his taste. When Samuel Pepys came -over from Abingdon to see the sights of the University town, it is -gratifying and rather surprising to learn that what most impressed him -was the small price paid for creature comforts: 'Oxford mighty fine -place,' such is the diarist's reflection, 'and _cheap entertainment_.' - - - - -IV--OF EXAMINATIONS - - - 'Thinketh one made them in a fit of the blues.' - _Q_ - -If there is one subject on which the professedly non-reading -undergraduate is nearly always eloquent it is the aggravation of his -naturally hard lot by the examination system; that is, not only 'The -Schools' themselves, but the ancillary organization of lectures, -'collections,' and college tuition in general; all which machinery, -being intended to save him from himself and enable him to accomplish the -ostensible purpose of his residence at the University, he very properly -regards as an entirely unnecessary instrument of torture, designed and -perfected by the gratuitous and malignant ingenuity of Dons, whose sole -object is the oppression of undergraduates in general and himself in -particular. He is obliged to attend lectures, at least occasionally. -His tutors compel him to attempt to pass his University examination at a -definite date; and then--adding insult to injury--actually reproach him -or even send him down for his ill success, just as if he had not always -demonstrated to them by repeated statements and constant proofs of -incapacity that he had not the smallest intention of getting through! -Small wonder, perhaps, that on returning from a highly unsatisfactory -interview with the University examiners to a yet more exasperating -colloquy with the authorities of his college, he should wish that fate -had not matched him with the 'cosmic process' of the nineteenth century; -and that it had been his happier lot to come up to Oxford in the days -when examinations were not, and his remote ancestors got their degrees -without any vain display of mere intellectual proficiency, or went down -without them if they chose. - -[Illustration: _A LECTURE-ROOM IN MAGDALEN COLLEGE. Drawn by E. -Stamp._] - -And yet, should the modern undergraduate take the trouble (which of -course he never does) to acquaint himself with the statutes and -ordinances which governed his University in the pre-examination period, -he would find that even then the rose was not wholly devoid of thorns. -Even then the powers that be had decreed that life should not be -completely beer, nor altogether skittles. It is true that the student -was probably less molested by his college; but the regulations of the -University dealt far more hardly with him than they do at present. -Under the statutes of Archbishop Laud, the University exercised those -functions of teaching and general supervision which it has since in -great part surrendered to its component colleges; and in theory the -University was a hard task-mistress. - -Attendance at professorial lectures was theoretically obligatory, and -'since not only reading and thought, but practice also, is of the -greatest avail towards proficiency in learning,' it was required that -the candidate for a degree should 'dispute' in the Schools at stated and -frequent times during the whole course of his academic career. -Beginning by listening to the disputations of his seniors (a custom -which perhaps survives in the modern fashion which sometimes provides a -'gallery' at the ceremony of _viva voce_), he was as time went on -required himself to maintain and publicly defend doctrines in a manner -which would be highly embarrassing to his modern successor--'responding' -at first to the arguments of the stater of a theory, and with riper -wisdom being promoted to the position of Opponent.' This opposing and -responding was termed 'doing generals.' 'Argufying' was the business of -the University in the seventeenth century, and had been so for a long -time. - -On the memorable occasion of Queen Elizabeth's visit to Oxford in the -year 1566, Her Majesty was entertained intermittently with disputations -on the moon's influence on the tides, and the right of rebellion against -bad government. Thus, Archbishop Laud required of the -seventeenth-century undergraduate so many disputations before he became -a _sophista_, and so many again before he could be admitted to the -degree of Bachelor; and if the system had worked in practice as it was -intended to do in theory, young Oxford would not have had an easy time -of it. In the days of Antony Wood's undergraduate career exercises in -the 'Schooles' were 'very good.' 'Philosophy disputations in Lent time, -frequent in the Greek tongue; _coursing_ very much, ending alwaies in -blowes,' which Wood considers scandalous; but at least it shows the -serious spirit of the disputants. But a University can always be -trusted to temper the biting wind of oppressive regulations to its shorn -alumni; and there can be no doubt that the comparative slackness and -sleepiness of the eighteenth century--a somnolence which it is easy to -exaggerate, but impossible altogether to deny--must have tended to wear -the sharp corners off the academic curriculum. Indications that this -was so are not wanting. After all, there must have been many ways of -avoiding originality in a disputation. A writer in 'Terrae Filius' -(1720) states the case as follows:-- - - -'All students in the University who are above one year's standing, and -have not taken their batchelor' (of arts) 'degree, are required by -statute to be present at this awful solemnity' (disputation for a -degree), 'which is designed for a public proof of the progress he has -made in the art of reasoning; tho' in fact it is no more than a formal -repetition of a set of syllogisms upon some ridiculous question in -logick, which they get by rote, or, perhaps, only read out of their -caps, which lie before them with their notes in them. These commodious -sets of syllogisms are call'd strings, and descend from undergraduate to -undergraduate, in regular succession; so that, when any candidate for a -degree is to exercise his talent in argumentation, he has nothing else -to do but to enquire amongst his friends for a string upon such-and-such -a question.' - - -So, even in the early part of the present century, reverend persons -proceeding to the degree of D.D. have been known to avail themselves of -a thesis (or written harangue on some point of theology) not compiled by -their unaided exertions, but kept among the archives of their college -and passed round as occasion might require. If mature theologians have -reconciled this with their consciences in the nineteenth, what may not -have been possible to an undergraduate in the eighteenth century? Also, -the functionary who stood in the place of the modern examiner was a very -different kind of person from his successor--that incarnation of cold -and impassive criticism; collusion between 'opponent' and 'respondent' -must have been possible and frequent; and so far had things gone that -the candidate for a degree was permitted to choose the 'Master' who was -to examine him, and it appears to have been customary to invite your -Master to dinner on the night preceding the final disputation. Witness -'Terrae Filius 'once more:-- - - -'Most candidates get leave .... to chuse their own examiners, who never -fail to be their old cronies and toping companions.... It is also well -known to be the custom for the candidates either to present their -examiners with a piece of gold, or to give them a handsome -entertainment, and make them drunk, which they commonly do the night -before examination, and some times keep them till morning, and so -adjourn, cheek by jowl, from their drinking-room to the school, where -they are to be examined.' - - -The same author adds: 'This to me seems the great business of -_determination_: to pay money and get drunk.' - -Vicesimus Knox, who took his B.A. degree in 1775, is at pains to -represent the whole process of so-called examination as an elaborate -farce. 'Every candidate,' he says, 'is obliged to be examined in the -whole circle of the sciences by three masters of arts, of his own -choice.' Naturally, the temptation is too much for poor humanity. 'It -is reckoned good management to get acquainted with two or three jolly -young masters and supply them well with port previously to the -examination.' _Viva voce_ once put on this convivial footing, it is not -surprising that 'the examiners and the candidate often converse on the -last drinking bout, or on horses, or read the newspapers, or a novel, or -divert themselves as well as they can till the clock strikes eleven, -when all parties descend, and the _testimonium_ is signed by the -masters.' Under such circumstances it is obvious that the provisions of -Archbishop Laud might be shorn of half their terrors. Even at an earlier -period other methods of evasion were not wanting. As early as 1656, -orders were made 'abolishing' the custom of candidates standing treat to -examiners. In the statute which still prescribes the duties of the -_clericus universitatis_, there is a clause threatening him with severe -penalties--to the extent of paying a fine of ten shillings--should he so -far misuse his especial charge, the University clock, as to 'retard and -presently precipitate the course' of that venerable time-piece, 'in such -a manner that the hours appointed for public exercises be unjustly -shortened, to the harm and prejudice of the studious.' Moreover, we -read in Wood that notice of examination was given by 'tickets stuck up -on certaine public corners, which would be suddenly after taken downe' -by the candidate's friends. To such straits and to such unworthy shifts -could disputants be reduced by mere inability to find matter. - -It has been said that attendance at professorial lectures was -theoretically obligatory; but it is hardly necessary to point out that -even serious students have occasionally dispensed with the duty of -attending lectures; and it is more than whispered there have been -occasions in recent centuries when it was not an audience only that was -wanting. There are, of course, instances of both extremes. Rumour -tells of a certain professor of anatomy, who, lacking a quorum, bade his -servant 'bring out the skeleton, in order that I may be able to address -you as "gentle*men*;"' but all professors have not been so -conscientious. Gibbon goes so far as to assert that 'in the University -of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have for these many -years given up altogether the pretence of teaching,' and the Reverend -James Hurdie does not much improve the matter, when he prepares to -refute the historian's charge in his 'Vindication of Magdalen College.' -So far as the College is concerned, the reverend gentleman has something -of a case; but his defence of the University is not altogether -satisfying. Some of the professors, no doubt, do lecture in a -statutable manner. But 'the late noble but unfortunate Professor of -Civil Law began his office with reading lectures, and only desisted for -want of an audience' (a plausible excuse, were it not that some -lecturers seem to have entertained peculiar ideas as to the constitution -of an audience). 'Terrae Filius' has a story of a Professor of Divinity -who came to his lecture-room, found to his surprise and displeasure, a -band of intending hearers, and dismissed them straightway with the -summary remark: 'Domini, vos non estis idonei auditores!' 'The present -Professor, newly appointed (the author has heard it from the highest -authority), means to read.' Moreover, 'the late Professor of Botany at -one time _did_ read.' In fact, as the 'Oxford Spy' observes in 1818:-- - - 'Yet here the rays of Modern Science spread: - Professors are appointed, lectures read. - If none attend, or hear: not ours the blame, - Theirs is the folly--and be theirs the shame.' - -It is evident that professorial lectures were not a wholly unbearable -burden. - -'It is recorded in the veracious chronicle of Herodotus that Sandoces, a -Persian judge, had been crucified by Darius, on the charge of taking a -bribe to determine a cause wrongly; but while he yet hung on the cross, -Darius found by calculation that the good deeds of Sandoces towards the -king's house were more numerous than his evil deeds, and so, confessing -that he had acted with more haste than wisdom, he ordered him to be -taken down and set at large.' - -[Illustration: _THE LIBRARY, MERTON COLLEGE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp._] - -So when the Universities are at last confronted with that great Day of -Reckoning which is continually held over their heads by external -enemies, and which timorous friends are always trying to stave off by -grudging concessions and half-hearted sympathy with Movements; when we -are brought to the bar of that grand and final commission, which is once -for all to purge Oxford and Cambridge of their last remnants of -mediaevalism, and bring them into line with the marching columns of -modern Democracy; when the judgment is set and the books are opened, we -may hope that some extenuating circumstances may be found to set against -the long enumeration of academic crimes. There will be no denying that -Oxford has been the home of dead languages and undying prejudice. It -will be admitted as only too true that Natural Science students were for -many years compelled to learn a little Greek, and that colleges have not -been prepared to sacrifice the greater part of their immoral revenues to -the furtherance of University Extension; and we shall have to plead -guilty to the damning charge of having returned two Tory members to -several successive Parliaments. All this Oxford has done, and more; -there is no getting out of it. Yet her counsel will be able to plead in -her favour that once at least she has been found not retarding the rear, -but actually leading the van of nineteenth-century progress; for it will -hardly be denied that if the Universities did not invent the Examination -System, at least they were among the first to welcome and to adapt it; -and that if it had not been for the development of examinations, -qualifying and competitive, at Oxford and Cambridge, the ranks of the -Civil Service would have continued for many years longer to be recruited -by the bad old method of nomination (commonly called jobbery and -nepotism by the excluded), and society would, perhaps, never have -realised that a knowledge of Chaucer is among the most desirable -qualifications for an officer in Her Majesty's Army. Here, at least, the -Universities have been privileged to set an example. - -The Oxford examination system is practically contemporaneous with the -century; the first regular class list having been published in 1807. -The change was long in coming, and when it did come the face of the -University was not revolutionised; if the alteration contained, as it -undoubtedly did, the germs of a revolution which was to extend far -beyond academic boundaries, it bore the aspect of a most desirable but -most moderate reform. Instead of obtaining a degree by the obsolete -process of perfunctory disputation, ambitious men were invited to offer -certain books (classical works for the most part), and in these to -undergo the ordeal of a written and oral examination; the oral part -being at that time probably as important as the other. Sudden and -violent changes are repugnant to all Englishmen, and more especially to -the rulers of Universities, those homes of ancient tradition; and just -as early railways found it difficult to escape from the form of the -stage-coach and the old nomenclature of the road, so the new Final -Honour School took over (so to speak) the plant of a system which it -superseded. _Viva voce_ was still (and is to the present day) -important, because it was the direct successor of oral disputation. The -candidate for a degree had obtained that distinction by a theoretical -argument with three 'opponents' in the Schools; so now the opponents -were represented by a nearly corresponding number of examiners, and the -_viva voce_ part of the examination was for a long time regarded as a -contest of wit between the candidate and the questioner. Nor did the -race for honours affect the great majority of the University as it does -at present. It was intended for the talented few: it was not a matter -of course that Tom, Dick, and Harry should go in for honours because -their friends wished it, or because their college tutor wished to keep -his college out of the evening papers. Candidates for honours were -regarded as rather exceptional persons, and a brilliant performance in -the Schools was regarded as a tolerably sure augury of success in life: -a belief which was, perhaps, justified by facts then, but which--like -most beliefs, dying hard--has unfortunately survived into a state of -society where it is impossible to provide the assurance of a successful -career for all and each of the eighty or hundred 'first-class' men whom -the University annually presents to an unwelcoming world. - -[Illustration: _READING THE NEWDIGATE. Drawn by T, H. Crawford._] - -However small its beginnings it was inevitable that the recognition of -intellect should exercise the greatest influence--though not immediately -and obviously--on the future of the University. _La carrire_ once -_ouverte aux talents_--the fact being established and recognised that -one man was intellectually not only as good as another, but a deal -better--colleges could not help following the example set them; the -first stirrings of 'inter-collegiate competition' began to be felt, and -after forty years or so (for colleges generally proceed in these and -similar matters with commendable caution, and it was only the earlier -part of the nineteenth century after all) began the gradual abolition of -'close' scholarships and fellowships--those admirable endowments whereby -the native of some specified county or town was provided with a -competence for life, solely in virtue of the happy accident of birth. -To disregard talent openly placarded and certificated was no longer -possible. The most steady-going and venerable institutions began to be -reanimated by the infusion of new blood, and to be pervaded by the -newest and most 'dangerous' ideas. - -Nor were the outside public slow to avail themselves after their manner -of the changed state of things. The possessor of a University degree -has at all times been regarded by less fortunate persons with a kind of -superstitious awe, as one who has lived in mysterious precincts and -practised curious (if not always useful) arts, and at first the title of -'Honourman,' implying that the holder belonged to a privileged -few--_lite_ of the _lites_--whom a University, itself learned, had -delighted to honour for their learning, could inspire nothing less than -reverence. Also the distinction was a very convenient one. The public -is naturally only too glad to have any ready and satisfactory -testimonial which may help as a method of selection among the host of -applicants for its various employments; and here was a diploma signed by -competent authorities and bearing no suspicion of fear or favour. -Presently the public began to follow the lead of Oxford and Cambridge, -and examine for itself, but that is another story: schoolmasters more -especially have always kept a keen eye on the class list. So an -intellectual distinction comes in time to have a commercial price, and -this no doubt has had something (though, we will hope, not everything) -to do with the increase in the number of 'Schools' and the growing -facilities for obtaining so-called honours. But it is needless to -observe that the multiplication of the article tends to the depreciation -of its value. The First-class man, who was a potential Cabinet Minister -or an embryo Archbishop at the beginning of the century, is now capable -of descending to all kinds of employments. He does not indeed--being -perhaps conscious of incapacity--serve as a waiter in a hotel, after the -fashion of American students in the vacation, but he has been known to -accept gratefully a post in a private school where his tenure of office -depends largely on the form he shows in bowling to the second eleven. - -Here in Oxford, though we still respect a 'First,' and though perhaps -the greater part of our available educational capacity is devoted to the -conversion of passmen into honourmen, there are signs that examinations -are no longer quite regarded as the highest good and the chief object of -existence. It is an age of specialism, and yet it is hard to mould the -whole University system to suit the particular studies of every -specialist. Multiply Final Schools as you will, 'the genuine student' -with one engrossing interest will multiply far more quickly; and just as -the athlete and non-reading man complains that the schools interrupt his -amusements, the man who specialises on the pips of an orange, or who -regards nothing in history worth reading except a period of two years -and six months in the later Byzantine empire, will pathetically lament -that examinations are interrupting his real work. Are men made for the -Schools, or the Schools for men? It is a continual problem; perhaps -examinations are only a _pis aller_, and we must be content to wait till -science instructs us how to gauge mental faculty by experiment without -subjecting the philosopher to the ordeal of Latin Prose, and the 'pure -scholar' to the test of a possibly useless acquaintance with the true -inwardness of Hegelianism. After all it is the greatest happiness of -the greatest number that has to be considered, and the majority as yet -are not special students. Moreover, there are various kinds of -specialists. If 'general knowledge' (as has been said) is too often -synonymous with 'particular ignorance,' it is equally true that -specialism in one branch is sometimes not wholly unconnected with -failure in another. - -[Illustration: _A DANCE AT ST. JOHN'S. Drawn by T. Hamilton Crawford, -R.W.S._] - -It was the severance of another link with the past when the scene of -examinations was transferred from the 'Old Schools'--the purlieus of the -Sheldonian and the Bodleian--to a new and perhaps unnecessarily palatial -building in the High Street, which is as little in keeping with the -dark, crumbling walls of its neighbour, University College, as the -motley throng of examinees (_pueri innuptaeque puellae_) is out of -harmony with the traditions of an age which did not recognise the -necessity of female education. We have changed all that, and possibly -the change is for the better, for while the atmosphere which pervaded -the ancient dens now appropriated to the use of the great library was -certainly academic, and was sometimes cool and pleasant in summer, the -conditions of the game became almost intolerable in winter. Unless he -would die under the process of examinations like the Chinese of story, -the candidate must provide himself with greatcoats and rugs enough (it -was said) to hide a 'crib,' or even a Liddell and Scott, for the -proximity of the Bodleian forbade any lighting or warming apparatus. -But in the new examination schools comfort and luxury reign; rare -marbles adorn even the least conspicuous corners, and the only survivals -of antiquity are the ancient tables, which are popularly supposed to be -contemporaneous with the examination system, and are bescrawled and -bescratched with every possible variety of inscription and -hieroglyphic--from adaptations of verses in the Psalms to a list of -possible Derby winners--from a caricature of the 'invigilating' examiner -to a sentimental but unflattering reminiscence of one's partner at last -night's dance. Here they sit, a remarkable medley, all sorts, -conditions, and even ages of men, herded together as they probably never -will be again in after-life: undeserving talent cheek by jowl with -meritorious dulness; callow youth fresh from the rod of the -schoolmaster, and mature age with a family waiting anxiously outside; -and a minority of the fairer sex, whose presence is rather embarrassing -to examiners who do not see their way to dealing with possible hysteria. -And in the evening they will return--if it is Commemoration week; the -venerable tables will be cleared away, and the 'Scholae Magnae Borealis -et Australis' will be used for the more desirable purpose of dancing. -Is it merely soft nothings that the Christ Church undergraduate is -whispering to that young lady from Somerville Hall, as they 'sit out' -the lancers in the romantic light of several hundred Chinese lanterns? -Not at all; they are comparing notes about their _viva voce_ in history. - - - - -V--UNIVERSITY JOURNALISM - - - 'I only wish my critics had to write - A High-class Paper!' - _Anon._ - -The business of those who teach in the Universities is to criticise -mistakes, and criticism of style has two results for the master and the -scholar. It may produce that straining after correctness in small -matters which the cold world calls pedantry; and in the case of those -who are not content only to observe, but are afflicted with a desire to -produce, criticism of style takes the form of parody or imitation; for a -good parody or a good imitation of an author's manner is an -object-lesson in criticism. Hence it is that that same intolerance of -error which makes members of a University slow in the production of -really great works stimulates the genesis of ephemeral and mostly -imitative literature. The more Oxford concerns herself with literary -style, the more she is likely in her less serious moods to ape the -manner of contemporary literature. It all comes, in the first instance, -of being taught to copy Sophocles and travesty Virgil. Ephemeral -literature, then, at the Universities has always been essentially -imitative. In the last century, when it was the fashion to be -classical--and when as in the earlier poems of Mr. Barry Lyndon, 'Sol -bedecked the verdant mead, or pallid Luna shed her ray'--Oxonian minor -poets imitated the London wits and sang the charms of the local belles -under the sobriquets of Chloe and Delia, and academic essayists copied -the manner of the 'Spectator,' and hit off the weaknesses of their -friends, Androtion and Clearchus; and now that the world has come to be -ruled by newspapers, it is only natural that the style and the methods -of the daily and weekly press should in some degree affect the lighter -literature of Universities, and that not only undergraduates, who are -naturally imitative, but even dons, who might be supposed to know -better, should find themselves contributing to and redacting -publications which are conducted more or less on the lines of the 'new -journalism.' - -[Illustration: _THE RADCLIFFE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp._] - -Oxford has been slow to develop in this particular direction, and the -reasons are not far to seek. The conditions just now are exceptionally -favourable--that is, a _cacothes scribendi_ has coincided with -abundance of matter to write about, but the organs of the great external -world naturally provide a model for the writer. But it is only recently -that these causes have been all together present and operative, and the -absence of one or more of them has at different times been as effectual -as the absence of all. In the early part of the present century there -can have been no lack of matter: University reform was at least in the -air, athletics were developing, the examination system was already in -full swing. But for some reason the tendency of the University was not -in the direction of the production of ephemeral or at least frivolous -literature. The pompous Toryism of University authorities seventy years -ago did not encourage any intellectual activity unconnected with the -regular curriculum of the student, and when intellectual activity began -to develop, it was rather on the lines of theological discussion--the -subjects were hardly fitted for the columns of a newspaper. At an -earlier date the Vice-Chancellor was interviewed by the delegate of an -aspiring clique of undergraduates, who wished to form a literary club -and to obtain the sanction of authority for its formation. He refused -to grant the society any formal recognition, on the ground that while it -was true that the statutes did not absolutely forbid such things, they -certainly did not specifically mention them; and the members of the -club--when it was eventually founded independent of the -Vice-Chancellarial auspices--were known among their friends as the -'Lunatics.' Such was the somewhat obscurantist temper of the University -about the year 1820; and we can imagine that the Vice-Chancellor, who -could find nothing in the statutes encouraging a debating society, would -not have looked with enthusiastic approbation on a newspaper designed to -discuss University matters without respect for authority. Even if he -had, it would have been hard to appeal to all sections of the community; -though there was certainly more general activity in the University than -formerly, the _gaudia_ and _discursus_ of undergraduates were matters of -comparatively small importance to their friends, and of none at all to -their pastors and masters. - -In the earlier part of the eighteenth century the conditions were -exactly reversed. To judge from the specimens that have survived to the -present day (and how much of our own lighter literature will be in -evidence 170 years hence?) there must have been plenty of 'available -talent.' It was an age of essayists. Addison and Steele set the -fashion for the metropolis: and as has been said before, Oxford -satirists followed at some distance in the wake of these giants. The -form of 'Terrae Filius' is that of the 'Tatler' and 'Spectator,' and the -'Oxford Magazine' of that day is largely composed of essays on men, -women, and manners; many are still quite readable, and most have been -recognised as remarkably smart in their day. Nor is it only in professed -and formal satire that the talent of the time displays itself. Thomas -Hearne of the Bodleian was careful to keep a voluminous note-book, -chronicling not only the 'plums' extracted by his daily researches from -the dark recesses of the library, but also various anecdotes, scandalous -or respectable, of his contemporaries; and one is tempted to regret that -so admirable a talent for bepraising his friends and libelling his -enemies should be comparatively _perdu_ among extracts from 'Schoppius -de Arte Critica,' copies of church brasses, and such-like antiquarian -lumber--the whole forming a 'Collection' only recently published for the -world's edification by the Oxford Historical Society. His -'appreciations' would have made the fortune of any paper relying for its -main interest on personalities, after the fashion which we are learning -from the Americans. 'Descriptions of his friends and enemies, such as -'An extravagant, haughty, loose man,' 'a Dull, Stupid, whiggish -Companion,' are frequent and free; and anecdotes of obscure college -scandal abound. We read how the 'Snivelling, conceited, and ignorant, -as well as Fanatical Vice-Principal of St. Edmund Hall .... _sconc'd_ -two gentlemen, which is a Plain Indication of his Furious Temper;' and -how 'Mr. ---- of _Christ Church_ last _Easter-day_, under pretence of -being ill, desired one of the other chaplains to read Prayers for him: -which accordingly was done. Yet such was the impudence of the man that -he appeared in the Hall at dinner!' - -[Illustration: _IN THE BODLEIAN. Drawn by Ernest Stamp._] - -As it was, however, those very collections which exhibit Hearne's -peculiar genius show us at the same time how impossible, even granting -the supposition to be not altogether anachronistic, a regular University -'News-letter' would have been. We talk now in a vague and, perhaps, -rather unintelligible fashion of 'University politics,' and in some way -contrive to identify Gladstonianism with a susceptibility to the claims -of a school of English literature, or whatever is the latest phrase of -progress--mixing up internal legislation with the external politics of -the great world. But in Hearne's time there were no University politics -to discuss. 'Their toasts,' says Gibbon of the Fellows of Magdalen -College, 'were not expressive of the most lively loyalty to the House of -Hanover,' and Hearne's interest in politics has nothing to do with the -Hebdomadal Council. When he speaks of 'our white-liver'd Professor, Dr. -----,' or describes the highest official in the University as 'old -Smooth-boots, the Vice-Chancellor,' it is generally for the very -sufficient reason that the person in question is what Dr. Johnson called -a 'vile Whig.' But Tory politics and common-room scandal and jobbery -apart, the University would appear to have slept the sleep of the -unjust. 'Terrae Filius' grumbles at the corrupt method of -'examination,' and 'The Student' is lively and satirical on the -peccadilloes and escapades of various members of society. But your -prose essayist is apt to be intermittent, and the publication that -relies mainly on him leans on a breaking reed; so that we can hardly be -surprised that the last-named periodical should eke out its pages with -imitations of Tibullus, to the first of which the Editor appends the -encouraging note, 'If this is approved by the publick, the Author will -occasionally oblige us with more _Elegies_ in the same style and -manner.' - -Now that every one is anxious to see his own name and his friend's name -in print, and that the general public takes, or pretends to take, a keen -interest in the details of every cricket-match and boat-race, a paper -chronicling University matters cannot complain of the smallness of its -_clientle_. Every one wants news. The undergraduate who has made a -speech at the Union, or a century for his college second eleven, wants a -printed certificate of his glorious achievements. Dons, and -undergraduates too, for that matter, are anxious to read about the last -hint of a possible Commission or the newest thing in University -Extension. Men who have gone down but a short time ago are still -interested in the doings of the (of course degenerate) remnant who are -left; and even the non-academic Oxford residents, a large and increasing -class, are on the watch for some glimpse of University doings, and some -distant echo of common-room gossip. Modern journalism appeals more or -less to all these classes; it cannot complain of the want of an -audience, nor, on the whole, of a want of news to satisfy it, and -certainly an Oxford organ cannot lack models for imitation, or awful -examples to avoid. It is, in fact, the very multiplicity of -contemporary periodicals that is the source of difficulty. A paper -conducted in the provinces by amateurs--that is, by persons who have -also other things to do--is always on its probation. The fierce light of -the opinion of a limited public is continually beating on it. Its -contributors should do everything a little better than the hirelings of -the merely professional organs of the unlearned metropolis; its leaders -must be more judicious than those of the 'Times,' its occasional notes a -little more spicy than Mr. Labouchere's, and its reviews a little more -learned than those of the 'Journal of Philology.' Should it fall short -of perfection in any of these branches, it 'has no reason for -existence,' and is in fact described as 'probably moribund.' Yet -another terror is added to the life of an Oxford editor: he _must_ be at -least often 'funny;' he must endeavour in some sort to carry out the -great traditions of the 'Oxford Spectator' and the 'Shotover Papers;' -and as the English public is generally best amused by personalities, he -must be careful to observe the almost invisible line which separates the -justifiable skit from the offensive attack. Now, the undergraduate -contributor to the press is seldom successful as a humourist. He is -occasionally violent and he is often--more especially after the festive -season of Christmas--addicted to sentimental verse; but for mere -frivolity and 'lightness of touch' it is safer to apply to his tutor. - -It is a rather remarkable fact that almost all University -papers--certainly all that have succeeded under the trying conditions of -the game--have been managed and for the most part written, not by the -exuberant vitality of undergraduate youth, but by the less interesting -prudence of graduate maturity. It is remarkable, but not surprising. -Undergraduate talent is occasionally brilliant, but is naturally -transient. Generations succeed each other with such rapidity that the -most capable editorial staff is vanishing into thin air just at the -moment when a journal has reached the highest pitch of popularity. -Moreover, amateur talent is always hard to deal with, as organizers of -private theatricals know to their cost; and there is no member of -society more capable of disappointing his friends at a critical moment -than the amateur contributor to the press. Should the spirit move him, -he will send four columns when the editor wants one; but if he is not in -the vein, or happens to have something else to do, there is no promise -so sacred and no threat so terrible as to persuade him to put pen to -paper. If these are statements of general application, they are doubly -true of undergraduates, who are always distracted by a too great -diversity of occupations: Jones, whose power of intermittent satire has -made him the terror of his Dons, has unaccountably taken to reading for -the Schools; the poet, Smith, has gone into training for the Torpids; -and Brown, whose '_Voces Populi_ in a Ladies' College' were to have been -something quite too excruciatingly funny, has fallen in love in the -vacation and will write nothing but bad poetry. Such are the trials of -the editor who drives an undergraduate team; and hence it comes about -that the steady-going periodicals for which the public can pay a yearly -subscription in advance, with the prospect of seeing at any rate half -the value of its money, are principally controlled by graduates. No -doubt they sometimes preserve a certain appearance of youthful vigour by -worshipping undergraduate talent, and using the word 'Donnish' as often -and as contemptuously as possible. - -[Illustration: _SAILING ON THE UPPER RIVER. Drawn by L. Speed._] - -Nevertheless, there appear from time to time various ephemeral and -meteoric publications, edited by junior members of the University. They -waste the editor's valuable time, no doubt; and yet he is learning a -lesson which may, perhaps, be useful to him in after-life; for it is -said that until he is undeceived by hard experience, every man is born -with the conviction that he can do three things--drive a dog-cart, sail -a boat, and edit a paper. - - - - -VI--THE UNIVERSITY AS SEEN FROM OUTSIDE. - - - 'A man must serve his time to every trade - Save censure--critics all are ready made.' - _Byron._ - -It has been said that the function of a University is to criticise; but -the proposition is at least equally true that Oxford and Cambridge are -continually conjugating the verb in the passive. We--and more -especially we who live in Oxford, for the sister University apparently -is either more virtuous or more skilful in concealing her peccadilloes -from the public eye--enjoy the priceless advantage of possessing -innumerable friends whose good nature is equalled by their frankness; -and if we do not learn wisdom, that is not because the opportunity is -not offered to us. It is true that our great governing body, the -Hebdomadal Council, has hitherto preserved its independence by a prudent -concealment of its deliberations: no reporter has ever as yet penetrated -into that august assemblage; but whatever emerges to the light of day is -seized upon with avidity. Debates in Convocation or even in Congregation -(the latter body including only the resident Masters of Arts), although -the subject may have been somewhat remote from the interests of the -general public, and the number of the voters perhaps considerably -increased by the frivolous reason that it was a wet afternoon, when -there was nothing else to do than to govern the University--debates on -every conceivable subject blush to find themselves reported the next -morning almost in the greatest of daily papers; and perhaps the result -of a division on the addition of one more Oriental language to -Responsions, or one more crocket to a new pinnacle of St. Mary's Church, -is even honoured by a leading article. This is highly gratifying to -residents in the precincts of the University, but even to them it is now -and then not altogether comprehensible. Nor is it only questions -concerning the University as a whole which appeal to the external -public; even college business and college scandal sometimes assume an -unnatural importance. Years ago one of the tutors of a certain college -was subjected to the venerable and now almost obsolete process of -'screwing up,' and some young gentlemen were rusticated for complicity -in the offence. Even in academic circles the crime and its punishment -were not supposed to be likely to interfere with the customary -revolution of the solar system; but the editor of a London daily -paper--and one, too, which was supposed to be more especially in touch -with that great heart of the people which is well known to hold -Universities in contempt--considered the incident so important as to -publish a leading article with the remarkable exordium, 'Every one knew -that Mr. ----, of ---- College, would be screwed up some day!' Most of -the _abonns_ of this journal must, it is to be feared, have blushed for -their discreditable ignorance of Mr. ----'s existence, not to mention -that leaden-footed retribution which was dogging him to a merited doom. - -[Illustration: _PORCH OF ST. MARY'S. Drawn by J. Pennell._] - -It is hardly necessary to say that in nine cases out of ten comment on -the proceedings of a learned University takes the form of censure: nor -are censors far to seek. There are always plenty of young men more or -less connected with the Press who have wrongs to avenge; who are only -too glad to have an opportunity of 'scoring off' the college authority -which did its best--perhaps unsuccessfully, but still with a manifest -intention--to embitter their academic existence; or of branding once for -all as reactionary and obscurantist the hide-bound regulations of a -University which did not accord them the highest honours. In these cases -accuracy of facts and statistics is seldom a matter of much importance. -Generally speaking, you can say what you like about a college, or the -University, without much fear of contradiction--provided that you -abstain from mere personalities. For one thing, the cap is always fitted -on some one else's head. It is not the business of St. Botolph's to -concern itself with an attack which is obviously meant for St. Boniface: -it is darkly whispered in the St. Boniface common-room that after all no -one knows what actually _does_ go on in St. Botolph's: and obviously -neither of these venerable foundations can have anything to do with -answering impeachments of the University and its financial system. -Moreover, even if the Dons should rouse themselves from their usual -torpor and attempt a defence, it is not very likely that the public will -listen to them: any statement proceeding from an academic source being -always regarded with the gravest suspicion. That is why 'any stick is -good enough to beat the Universities,' and there are always plenty of -sticks who are quite ready to perform the necessary castigation. - -Moreover, these writers generally deal with a subject which is always -interesting, because it is one on which every one has an opinion, and an -opinion which is entitled to respect--the education of youth. Any one -can pick holes in the University system of teaching and -examination--'can strike a finger on the place, and say, "Thou ailest -here and here,"'--or construct schemes of reform: more especially young -men who have recently quitted their Alma Mater, and are therefore -qualified to assert (as they do, and at times not without a certain -plausibility) that she has failed to teach them anything. - -That the British public, with so much to think about, should find time -to be diverted by abuse of its seats of learning, is at first a little -surprising; but there is no doubt that such satire has an agreeable -piquancy, and for tolerably obvious reasons. English humour is -generally of the personal kind, and needs a butt; a capacity in which -all persons connected with education have from time immemorial been -qualified to perform, _ex officio_ (education being generally considered -as an imparting of unnecessary and even harmful knowledge, and obviously -dissociated from the pursuit of financial prosperity, both as regards -the teachers and the taught): Shakespeare set the fashion, and Dickens -and Thackeray have settled the hash of schoolmasters and college tutors -for the next fifty years, at any rate. Schoolmasters, indeed, are -becoming so important and prosperous a part of the community that they -will probably be the first to reinstate themselves in the respect of the -public; but Dons have more difficulties to contend against. They have -seldom any prospect of opulence. Then, again, they suffer from the -quasi-monastic character of colleges; they have inherited some of the -railing accusations which used to be brought against monasteries. The -voice of scandal--especially feminine scandal--is not likely to be long -silent about celibate societies, and no Rudyard Kipling has yet arisen -to plead on behalf of Fellows that they - - 'aren't no blackguards too, - But single men in barracks, most remarkable like you.' - -Altogether the legend of 'monks,' 'port wine and prejudice,' 'dull and -deep potations,' and all the rest of it, still damages Dons in the eyes -of the general public. 'That's ---- College,' says the local guide to -his sightseers, 'and there they sits, on their Turkey carpets, -a-drinking of their Madeira, and Burgundy, and Tokay.' Such is, -apparently, the impression still entertained by Society. And no doubt -successive generations of Fellows who hunted four days a week, or, being -in Orders, 'thanked Heaven that no one ever took _them_ for parsons,' -did to a certain extent perpetuate the traditions of 'Bolton Abbey in -the olden time.' Well, their day is over now. If the Fellow _fin de -sicle_ should ever venture to indulge in the sports of the field, he -must pretend that he has met the hounds by accident; and even then he -risks his reputation. - -[Illustration: _IN EXETER COLLEGE CHAPEL. Drawn by E. Stamp._] - -It is always pleasant, too, to be wiser than one's erstwhile pastors and -masters. The pupil goes out into the great world; the teacher remains -behind, and continues apparently to go on in his old and crusted errors. -Outwardly the Universities do not change much, and it is easy to assume -that the habits and ideas of their denizens do not change either. Thus -it is that the young men of the 'National Observer,' coming back from a -Saturday-to-Monday visit to a university which they never respected and -are now entitled to despise, are moved to declare to the world the -complete inutility of what they call the Futile Don. 'He is dead,' they -say, 'quite dead;' and if he is, might not the poor relic of mortality -be allowed in mere charity to lie peacefully entombed in his collegiate -cloisters? Yet, after all, it is only among the great Anglo-Saxon race -that the profession of teaching is without honour; and even among us it -may be allowed that it is a mode of earning a pittance as decent and -comparatively innocuous as another. We cannot, all of us, taste the -fierce joys of writing for the daily or weekly press, and the -barrister's 'crowded hours of glorious life' in the law courts would be -more overcrowded than ever were not a few _fainants_ suffered to -moulder in the retirement of a university. Seriously, it was all very -well for the young lions of the Press to denounce the torpor of Dons in -the bad old days when colleges were close corporations--when Fellows -inherited their bloated revenues without competition, and simply because -they happened to be born in a particular corner of some rural district. -But now that nearly every First-class man has the chance of election and -would be a Fellow if he could, one is tempted to recall the ancient -fable of the sour grapes. Or at least the _esprits forts_ whom the -University has reluctantly driven out into the great world might be -grateful to her for saving them in spite of themselves from an existence -of futile incapacity. - -Probably as long as colleges exist in something like their present -form--until the People takes a short way with them, abolishes common -rooms and the Long Vacation, and pays college tutors by a system of -'results fees'--these things will continue to be said. Deans and Senior -Tutors will never escape the stigma of torpor or incapacity. That quite -respectable rhymester, Mr. Robert Montgomery (who, had he not been -unlucky enough to cross the path of Lord Macaulay, might have lived and -died and been forgotten as the author of metrical works not worse than -many that have escaped the lash), has left to the world a long poem--of -which the sentiments are always, and the rhymes usually, -correct--entitled 'Oxford.' He has taken all Oxford life for his -subject, Dons included; and this is how he describes the fate of College -Tutors:-- - - 'The dunce, the drone, the freshman or the fool, - 'Tis theirs to counsel, teach, o'erawe, and rule! - Their only meed--some execrating word - To blight the hour when first their voice was heard.' - -To a certain extent this is true in all ages. But there are worse things -than mere sloth: this is not the measure of the crimes charged against -college authorities. They--even such contemptible beings as they--are -said to have the audacity to neglect untitled merit, and to truckle to -the aristocracy. Every one knows Thackeray's terrible indictment of -University snobs: Crump, the pompous dignitary (who, to do him justice, -seriously thinks himself greater than the Czar of All the Russias), and -Hugby, the tutor grovelling before the lordling who has played him a -practical joke. Every one remembers how even the late Laureate gibbeted -his Dons--how - - 'One - Discussed his tutor, rough to common men. - But honeying at the whisper of a lord: - And one the Master, as a rogue in grain, - Veneer'd with sanctimonious theory.' - -No doubt Universities are not immaculate. There have been Tartuffes and -tuft-hunters there, as in the great world. No doubt, too, it was very -wrong to allow noblemen to wear badges of their rank, and take their -degrees without examination (although the crime was a lesser one in the -days before class-lists were, when even the untitled commoner became a -Bachelor by dark and disreputable methods); but these things are not -done any more. At this day there are probably few places where a title -is less regarded than at Oxford or Cambridge. It is true that rumour -asserts the existence of certain circles where, _ceteris paribus_, the -virtuous proprietor of wealth and a handle to his name is welcomed with -more effusion than the equally respectable, but less fortunate, holder -of an eleemosynary exhibition. But, after all, even external Society, -which regards tuft-hunting with just displeasure, does--it is -said--continue to maintain these invidious distinctions when it is -sending out invitations to dinner. The fact is that there are a great -many peccadilloes in London which become crimes at the University. - -Satire, however, does not confine itself to Dons: undergraduates come in -for a share of it too, though in a different way. When the novelist -condescends to depict the Fellow of a college, it is usually as a person -more or less feeble, futile, and generally _manqu_. The Don can never -be a hero, but neither is he qualified to play the part of villain; his -virtues and his vices are all alike inadequate. If he is bad, his -badness is rarely more than contemptible; if he is good, it is in a -negative and passionless way, and the great rewards of life are, as a -rule, considered as being out of his reach. But with the undergraduate -the case is different. He--as we have said--is always in extremes: -literature gives him the premier _rle_ either as hero or villain; but -it is as the villain that he is the most interesting and picturesque. -Satire and fiction generally describe him as an adept in vicious habits. -So sings Mr. Robert Montgomery, with admirable propriety:-- - - 'In Oxford see the Reprobate appear! - Big with the promise of a mad career: - With cash and consequence to lead the way, - A fool by night and more than fop by day!' - -Over and over again we have the old picture of the Rake's Progress which -the world has learnt to know so well: the youth absents himself from his -lectures, perhaps even goes to Woodstock (horrid thought!)--'Woodstock -rattles with eternal wheels' is the elegant phrase of Mr. -Montgomery--and, in short, plays the fool generally:-- - - 'Till night advance, whose reign divine - Is chastely dedicate to cards and wine.' - -[Illustration: _PARSON'S PLEASURE. Drawn by L. Speed._] - -The specimen student of the nineteenth century will probably survive in -history as represented in these remarkable colours, and the virtuous -youth of a hundred years hence will shudder to think of a generation so -completely given over to drunkenness, debauchery, and neglect of the -Higher Life generally. There is a _navet_ and directness about -undergraduate error which is the easy prey of any satirist; and -curiously enough the public, and even that large class which sends its -sons to the Universities, apparently likes to pretend a belief that -youth is really brought up in an atmosphere of open and unchecked -deviation from the paths of discipline and morality. If Paterfamilias -seriously believed that the academic types presented to him in -literature were genuine and frequent phenomena, he would probably send -his offspring in for the London Matriculation. But he knows pretty well -that the University is really not rotten to the core, and that colleges -are not always ruled by incapables, nor college opinion mainly formed by -rakes and spendthrifts; and at the same time it gives the British Public -a certain pleasure to imagine that it too has heard the chimes at -midnight, although it now goes to bed at half-past ten--that it has been -a devil of a fellow in its youth. This fancy is always piquant, and -raises a man in his own estimation and that of his friends. - -[Illustration: Fencing] - -These little inconsistences are of a piece with the whole attitude of -the unacademic world towards the Universities. Men come down from -London to rest, perhaps, for a day or two from the labours of the -Session. They are inspired with a transient enthusiasm for antiquity. -They praise academic calm: they affect to wish that they, too, were -privileged to live that life of learned leisure which is commonly -supposed to be the lot of all Fellows and Tutors. Then they go away, -and vote for a new University Commission. - - - - -VII--DIARY OF A DON - - - 'Collegiate life next opens on thy way, - Begins at morn and mingles with the day.' - _R. Montgomery._ - -Half-past seven A.M.: enter my scout, noisily, as one who is accustomed -to wake undergraduates. He throws my bath violently on the floor and -fills it with ice-cold water. 'What kind of a morning is it?' No -better than usual: rain, east wind, occasional snow. _Must_ get up -nevertheless: haven't superintended a roll-call for three days, and the -thing will become a scandal. Never mind: one more snooze.... There are -the bells (Oh, those bells!) ringing for a quarter to eight. Ugh! - -Dress in the dark, imperfectly: no time to shave. Cap and gown -apparently lost. Where the ---- Oh, here they are, under the table. -Must try to develop habits of neatness. Somebody else's cap: too big. - -Roll-call in full swing in Hall: that is, the college porter is there, -ticking off undergraduates' names as they come in. Hall very cold and -untidy: college cat scavenging remnants of last night's dinner. -Portrait of the Founder looking as if he never expected the college to -come to this kind of thing. Men appear in various stages of dishabille. -Must make an example of some one: 'Really Mr. Tinkler, I must ask you to -put on something besides an ulster.' Tinkler explains that he is fully -dressed, opening his ulster and disclosing an elaborate toilet: -unfortunate--have to apologise. During the incident several men without -caps and gowns succeed in making their escape. - -Back in my rooms: finish dressing. Fire out, no hot water. This is -what they call the luxurious existence of a College Fellow. Post -arrives: chiefly bills and circulars: several notes from undergraduates. -'Dear Sir,--May I go to London for the day in order to keep an important -engagement.' Dentist, I suppose. 'Dear Mr. ----,--I am sorry that I was -absent from your valuable lecture yesterday, as I was not aware you -would do so.' 'Dear Sir,--I shall be much obliged if I may have leave -off my lecture this morning, as I wish to go out hunting.' Candid, at -any rate. 'Mr. ---- presents his compliments to Mr. ---- and regrets -that he is compelled to be absent from his Latin Prose lecture, because -I cannot come.' Simple and convincing. Whip from the Secretary of the -Non-Placet Society: urgent request to attend in Convocation and oppose -nefarious attempt to insert 'and' in the wording of Stat. Tit. Cap. LXX. -18. Never heard of the statute before. Breakfast. - -College cook apparently thinks that a hitherto unimpaired appetite can -be satisfied by what seems to be a cold chaffinch on toast. 'Take it -away, please, and get me an egg.' Egg arrives: not so old as chaffinch, -but nearly: didn't say I wanted a chicken. Scout apologises: must have -brought me an undergraduate's egg by mistake. Never mind; plain living -and high thinking. Two college servants come to report men absent last -night from their rooms. Must have given them leave to go down: can't -remember it, though. Matter for investigation. Porter reports -gentleman coming into college at 12.10 last night. All right: 'The -Dean's compliment's to Mr. ----, and will he please to call upon him at -once. 'Mr. ----'s compliments to the Dean, and he has given orders not -to be awakened till ten, but will come when he is dressed.' Obliging. - -Lecture to be delivered at ten o'clock to Honours men, on point of -ancient custom: very interesting: Time of Roman Dinner, whether at 2.30 -or 2.45. Have got copious notes on the subject somewhere: must read -them up before lecture, as it never looks well to be in difficulties -with your own MS.--looks as if you hadn't the subject at your fingers' -ends. Notes can't be found. Know I saw them on my table three weeks -ago, and table can't have been dusted since then. Oh, here they are: -illegible. Wonder what I meant by all these abbreviations. Never mind: -can leave that part out. Five minutes past ten. - -Lecture-room pretty full: two or three scholars, with air of superior -intelligence: remainder commoners, in attitudes more or less expressive -of distracted attention. One man from another college, looking rather -_de trop_. Had two out-college men last time: different men, too: -disappointing. Begin my dissertation and try to make abstruse subject -attractive: 'learning put lightly, like powder in jam.' Wish that -scholar No. 1 wouldn't check my remarks by reference to the authority -from whom my notes are copied. Why do they teach men German? Second -scholar has last number of the 'Classical Review' open before him. Why? -Appears afterwards that the 'Review' contains final and satisfying -_reductio ad absurdum_ of my theory. Man from another college asks if -he may go away. Certainly, if he wishes. Explains that he thought this -was Mr. ----'s Theology lecture. Seems to have taken twenty minutes to -find out his mistake. Wish that two of the commoners could learn to -take notes intelligently, and not take down nothing except the -unimportant points. Hope they won't reproduce them next week in the -schools. - -Ten fifty-five: peroration. Interrupted by entrance of lecturer for -next hour. Begs pardon: sorry to have interrupted: doesn't go, however. -Peroration spoilt. Lecture over: general sense of relief. Go out with -the audience, and overhear one of them tell his friend that, after all, -it wasn't so bad as last time. Mem., not to go out with audience in -future. - -Eleven o'clock: lecture for Passmen. Twelve or fifteen young gentlemen -all irreproachably dressed in latest style of undergraduate -fashion--Norfolk jacket and brown boots indispensable--and all inclined -to be cheerfully tolerant of the lecturer's presence _quand mme_, -regarding him as a necessary nuisance and part of college system. After -all there isn't so much to do between eleven and twelve. Some of them -can construe, but consider it unbecoming to make any ostentation of -knowledge. Conversation at times animated. 'Really, gentlemen, you -might keep something to talk about at the next lecture.' Two men appear -at 11.25, noisily. Very sorry: have been at another lecture: couldn't -get away. General smile of incredulity, joined in by the new arrivals -as they find a place in the most crowded part of lecture-room. Every -one takes notes diligently, and is careful to burn them at the end of -the hour. Translation proceeds rather slowly. Try it myself: difficult -to translate Latin comedy with dignity. Give it up and let myself -go--play to the gallery. Gallery evidently considers that frivolity on -the lecturer's part is inappropriate to the situation. 11.55: 'Won't -keep you longer, gentlemen.' - -Twelve: time to do a little quiet work before lunch. Gentleman who was -out after twelve last night comes to explain. Was detained in a -friend's room (reading) and did not know how late it was. In any case -is certain he was in before twelve, because he looked at his watch, and -is almost sure his watch is fast. Fined and warned not to do it again: -exit grumbling. No more interruptions, I hope..... Boy from the -Clarendon Press: editor wants something for the 'Oxford Magazine,' at -once: not less than a column: messenger will wait while I write it. -Very considerate. Try to write something: presence of boy embarrassing. -Ask him to go outside and wait on the staircase. Does so, and continues -to whistle 'Daisy Bell,' with accompaniment on the banisters -_obbligato_. Composition difficult and result not satisfactory: hope no -one will read it. Column nearly finished: man comes to explain why he -wants to be absent during three weeks of next term. _Would_ he mind -going away and calling some other time? Very well: when? Oh, any time, -only not now. This is what they call the leisure and philosophic calm -of collegiate life. - -Lunch in Common Room: cold, clammy, and generally unappetising. Guest -who is apparently an old member of the college greets me and says he -supposes I've forgotten him. 'Not at all: remember you quite well: glad -to meet you again.' Haven't the faintest idea what his name is: -awkward. Appears in course of conversation to be ex-undergraduate whom -I knew very well and did not like. Evidently regards me as a venerable -fossil: he himself has grown bald and fat and looks fifty, more or less: -suppose I must be about seventy or eighty. Vice-Principal wants to know -if I will play fives at two: yes, if he likes. No, by the way, can't; -have got to go and vote in Convocation. Don't know what it is about, but -promised to go: can't think why. Time to go. - -In the Convocation House. Very few people there, nobody at all -interested. Borrow Gazette and study list of agenda. Question on which -I promised to vote comes on late, all sorts of uninteresting matters to -be settled first: mostly small money grants for scientific purposes: -pleasant way of wasting three-quarters of an hour. My question here at -last: prepare to die in last ditch in defence of original form of -statute. Member of Hebdomadal Council makes inaudible speech, -apparently on the subject. No one else has anything to say: Council's -proposal, whatever it is, carried _nem. con_. No voting: might as well -have played fives after all: next time shall. - -Time for walk round the Parks: rain and mud. Worst of the Parks is, you -always meet people of houses where you ought to have called and haven't. -Free fight under Rugby rules going on between University and somewhere -else. Watch it: don't understand game: try to feel patriotic: -can't...... Meeting at four to oppose introduction of Hawaiian as an -optional language in Responsions. Not select: imprudent for a caucus to -transact business by inviting its opponents: people of all sorts of -opinions present. Head of House makes highly respectable speech, -explaining that while qualified support of reform is conceivable and -even under possible circumstances advisable, premature action is rarely -consistent with mature deliberation. Nobody seems to have anything -definite to suggest: most people move amendments. Safe to vote against -all of them: difficult to know how you are voting, however: wording of -amendments so confusing. All of them negatived: substantive motion -proposed: lost as well. Question referred to a Committee: ought to have -been done at first. Hour and a half wasted. Remember that I have cut -my five-o'clock pupil for second time running. Am offered afternoon -tea: thirsty, but must be off: man at half-past five. On the way back -meet resident sportsman in the High. Has been out with hounds and had -best twenty-five minutes of the season, in the afternoon, three miles -off. Might have been there myself if it hadn't been for Convocation: -hang Convocation! Never mind; satisfaction of a good conscience: shall -always be able to say that I lost best run of season through devotion to -duty. - -[Illustration: _LAWN TENNIS AT OXFORD. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -Six forty-five: pupils gone; dress for seven-o'clock dinner with friend -at St. Anselm's. Man comes to ask why he has been gated: explain: man -not satisfied. Gone, at any rate. Another man, asking leave to be out -after twelve. Five minutes to dress and walk a quarter of a mile. Wish -men wouldn't choose this time for coming to see one. Very late: dinner -already begun: no soup, thanks. Meaty atmosphere: noisy atmosphere at -lower end of Hall: undergraduates throw bread about. No one in evening -dress but myself. Distinguished guest in shape of eminent German -Professor: have got next him somehow: wish I hadn't: wears flannel shirt -and evidently regards me as a mere butterfly of fashion. Speaks hardly -any English: try him in German: replies after an unusual effort on my -part, 'Ich spreche nur Deutsch.' My command of the language evidently -less complete than I thought: or perhaps he only speaks his own patois. -Man opposite me Demonstrator at the Museum, who considers that the -University and the world in general was made for physiologists. - -Small party in Common Room, most of diners having to see pupils or -attend meetings. Will I have any wine? No one else drinks any and my -host is a teetotaller: 'No, thanks--never drink wine after dinner.' -Truth only a conventional virtue after all. Eminent Teuton would like -more beer, but has been long enough in England to know better than to -ask for it. Am put next to Demonstrator, who endeavours to give general -ideas of digestive organs of a frog, interpreting occasionally in German -for Professor's benefit: illustrates with fragments of dessert: most -interesting, I am sure. Nothing like the really good talk of an Oxford -Common Room, after all. Senior Fellow drinks whisky and water and goes -to sleep. Coffee and cigarettes: or will I have a weed? 'Thanks, but -must be off: man at nine...' Back in college: rooms dark: can't find my -matches and fall over furniture. - -Man comes to read me an essay. Know nothing about the subject: thought -he was going to write on something else. Essay finished: must say -something: try to find fault with his facts. Man confronts me with -array of statistics, apparently genuine: if so nothing more to say. -Criticise his grammar: man offended. Interview rather painful, till -concluded by entrance of nine-thirty man with Latin prose. Rather -superior young man, who considers himself a scholar. Suggest that part -of his vocabulary is not according to classical usage: proves me wrong -by reference to dictionary. Is not surprised to find me mistaken. Wish -that Higher Education had stopped in Board Schools and not got down to -undergraduates. - -Man at ten, with a desire to learn. Stays till near eleven discussing -his chances in the schools at great length. Presently comes to his -prospects in life. Would send me to sleep if he wouldn't ask me -questions. - -Eleven: no more men, thank goodness. Tobacco and my lecture for -to-morrow.... Never could understand why a gentleman being neither -intoxicated nor in the society of his friends, cannot cross the -quadrangle without a view-halloo... There he is again: must go out and -see what is going on. Quadrangle very cold, raining. Group of men -playing football in the corner: friends look on and encourage them from -windows above. As I come on the scene all disappear, with shouts: none -identified: saves future trouble, at all events. More tobacco and -period of comparative peace. Bedtime. - -Wish my scout wouldn't hide hard things under the mattress. - -Noise in quadrangle renewed: 'Daddy wouldn't buy me a Bow-wow,' with -variations.... Some one's oak apparently battered with a poker. _Ought_ -to get up and go out to stop it.... - - - - -VIII--THE UNIVERSITY AS A PLACE OF LEARNED LEISURE. - - - 'I had been used for thirty years to no interruption - save the tinkling of the dinner-bell and the chapel-bell.' - _Essays of Vicesimus Knox._ - -Standing with one foot in the Middle Ages and the other in a luxuriously -furnished 'Common Room'--such is Oxford life as summarised by a German -visitor, who appears to have been a good deal perplexed, like the outer -world in general, by the academic mixture of things ancient and modern, -and a host who wore a cap and gown over his evening dress. Certainly -the University is a strange medley of contraries. It never seems to be -quite clear whether we are going too fast or too slow. We are always -reforming something, yet are continually reproached with irrational -conservatism. Change and permanence are side by side--permanence that -looks as if it could defy time: - - 'The form remains, the function never dies,' - -and yet all the while the change is rapid and complete. Men go down, -and are as if they had never been: as is the race of leaves so is that -of undergraduates; and so transiently are they linked with the enduring -existence of their University, that, except in the case of the minority -who have done great deeds on the river or the cricket-field, they either -pass immediately out of recollection or else remain only as a dim and -distant tradition of bygone ages. An undergraduate's memory is very -short. For him the history of the University is comprised in the three -or four years of his own residence. Those who came before him and those -who come after are alike separated from him by a great gulf; his -predecessors are infinitely older, and his successors immeasurably -younger. It makes no difference what his relations to them may be in -after-life. Jones, who went down in '74, may be an undistinguished -country parson or a struggling junior at the Bar; and Brown, who came up -in '75, may be a bishop or a Q.C. with his fortune made; but all the -same Brown will always regard Jones as belonging to the almost forgotten -heroic period before he came up, and Jones, whatever may be his respect -for Brown's undoubted talents, must always to a certain extent feel the -paternal interest of a veteran watching the development of youthful -promise. So complete is the severance of successive generations, that it -is hard to see how undergraduate custom and tradition and College -characteristics should have a chance of surviving; yet somehow they do -manage to preserve an unbroken continuity. Once give a College a good -or a bad name, and that name will stick to it. Plant a custom and it -will flourish, defying statutes and Royal Commissions. Conservatism is -in the air; even convinced Radicals (in politics) cannot escape from it, -and are sometimes Tories in matters relating to their University. They -will change the constitution of the realm, but will not stand any -tampering with the Hebdomadal Council. Whatever be the reason--whether -it be Environment or Heredity--Universities go on doing the same things, -only in different ways; they retain that indefinable habit of thought -which seems to cling to old grey walls and the shade of ancient elms, -which the public calls 'academic' when it is only contemptuous, -explaining the word as meaning 'provincial with a difference' when it is -angry. - -[Illustration: _BOWLS IN NEW COLLEGE GARDEN. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -There is the same kind of unalterableness about the few favoured -individuals to whom the spirit of the age has allowed a secure and -permanent residence in Oxford; a happy class which is now almost limited -to Heads of Houses and College servants. You scarcely ever see a scout -bearing the outward and visible signs of advancing years; age cannot -wither them, nor (it should be added) can custom stale their infinite -variety of mis-serving their masters. Perhaps it is they who are the -repositories of tradition. And even Fellows contrive to retain some of -the characteristics of their more permanent predecessors, whom we have -now learnt to regard as abuses. Hard-worked though they are, and -precarious of tenure, they are, nevertheless, in some sort imbued with -that flavour of humanity and _dolce far niente_ which continues to haunt -even a Common Room where Fellows drink nothing but water, and only dine -together once a fortnight. - -For times are sadly changed now, and a fellowship is far from being the -haven of rest which it once was, and still is to a few. Look at that old -Fellow pacing with slow and leisurely steps beneath Magdalen or -Christchurch elms: regard him well, for he is an interesting survival, -and presently he and his kind will be nothing but a memory, and probably -the progressive spirit of democracy will hold him up as an awful -example. He is a link with a practically extinct period. When he was -first elected _verus et perpetuus socius_ of his college--without -examination--the University of Oxford was in a parlous state. Reform was -as yet unheard of, or only loomed dimly in the distance. Noblemen still -wore tufts--think how that would scandalise us now!--and 'gentlemen -commoners' came up with the declared and recognised intention of living -as gentlemen commoners should. Except for the invention of the -examination system--and the demon of the schools was satisfied with only -a mouthful of victims then--Oxford of the forties had not substantially -changed since the last century--since the days when Mr. Gibbon was a -gentleman commoner at Magdalen College, where his excuses for cutting -his lectures in the morning were 'received with a smile,' and where he -found himself horribly bored by the 'private scandal' and 'dull and deep -potations' of the seniors with whom he was invited to associate in the -evening. Not much had changed since those days: lectures were still -disciplinary exercises rather than vehicles of instruction, and the -vespertinal port was rarely if ever interrupted in its circulation by -'the man who comes at nine.' Many holders of fellowships scarcely came -near the University; those who did reside were often not much concerned -about the instruction of undergraduates, and still less with -'intercollegiate competition.' Perhaps it was not their life's work: a -fellowship might be only a stepping-stone to a college living, when a -sufficiently fat benefice should fall vacant and allow the dean or -sub-warden to marry and retire into the country; and even the don who -meant to be a don all his days put study or learned leisure first and -instruction second, the world not yet believing in the 'spoon-feeding' -of youth. Very often, of course, they did nothing. After all, when you -pay a man for exercising no particular functions, you can scarcely blame -him for strictly fulfilling the conditions under which he was elected. -'But what do they do?' inquired--quite recently--a tourist, pointing to -the fellows' buildings of a certain college. 'Do?!!' replied the Oxford -cicerone--'do? ... why them's fellows!' But if there was inactivity, it -is only the more credit to the minority who really did interest -themselves in the work of their pupils. Not that the relation of -authorities to undergraduates was ever then what it has since -become--whether the change be for the better or the worse. Few attempts -were made to bridge the chasm which must always yawn between the life of -teacher and taught. Perhaps now the attempt is a little -over-emphasised; certainly things are done which would have made each -particular hair to stand on end on the head of a Fellow of the old -school. In his solemn and formal way he winked at rowing, considering -it rather fast and on the whole an inevitable sign of declining morals. -He wore his cap and gown with the anachronistic persistency of Mr. Toole -in 'The Don,' and sighed over the levity of a colleague who occasionally -sported a blue coat with brass buttons. Had you told him that within -the present century College Tutors would be seen in flannels, and that a -Head of a House could actually row on the river in an eight--albeit the -ship in question be manned by comparatively grave and reverend seniors, -yclept the Ancient Mariners--he would probably have replied in the -formula ascribed to Dr. Johnson: 'Let me tell you, sir, that in order to -be what you consider humorous it is not necessary that you should be -also indecent!' But there is a lower depth still; and grave dignitaries -of the University have been seen riding bicycles. - -All this would have been quite unintelligible to the youthful days of -our friend, whom we see leisurely approaching the evening of his days in -the midst of a generation that does not know him indeed, but which is -certainly benefited by his presence and the picture of academic repose -which he displays to his much-troubled and harassed successors: a -peaceful, cloistered life; soon to leave nothing behind it but a brass -in the College chapel, a few Common Room anecdotes, and a vague -tradition, perhaps, of a ghost on the old familiar staircase. Far -different is the lot of the Fellow _fin de sicle_; 'by many names men -know him,' whether he be the holder of an 'official' Fellowship, or a -'Prize Fellow' who is entitled to his emoluments only for the paltry -period of seven years. And what emoluments! Verily the mouth of -Democracy must water at the thought of the annual 'division of the -spoils' which used to take place under the old _rgime_: spoils which -were worth dividing, too, in the days when rents were paid without a -murmur, and colleges had not as yet to allow tenants to hold at -half-a-crown an acre, lest the farm should be unlet altogether. But now -if a Prize Fellow receives his 200*l.* a year he may consider himself -lucky; and remember that if he is not blessed with this world's goods, -the grim humours of the last Commission at least allowed him the -inestimable privilege of marrying--on 200*l.* a year. After all, it is -not every one who receives even that salary for doing nothing. - -The 'official' variety of Fellow, or the Prize Fellow who chooses to be -a College Tutor, is a schoolmaster, with a difference. He has rather -longer holidays--if he can afford to enjoy them-and a considerably -shorter purse than the instructors of youth at some great schools. He -is so far unfortunate in his predecessors, that he has inherited the -reputation of the Fellows of old time. Everybody else is working: the -Fellow is still a useless drone. As a matter of fact, the unfortunate -man is always doing something--working vehemently with a laudable desire -to get that into eight weeks which should properly take twelve; or -taking his recreation violently, riding forty miles on a bicycle, with a -spurt at the finish so as not to miss his five-o'clock pupil; sitting on -interminable committees--everything in Oxford is managed by a committee, -partly, perhaps, because 'Boards are very often screens;' or sitting -upon a disorderly undergraduate. On the whole, the kicks are many, and -the halfpence comparatively few. He has the Long Vacation, of course, -but then he is always employed in writing his lectures for next term, or -compiling a school edition, or a handbook, or an abridgment of somebody -else's school edition or handbook, in order to keep the pot -boiling--more especially if he has fallen a victim to matrimony, and -established himself in the red-brick part of Oxford. It is true that -there is the prospect--on paper--of a pension when he is past his work, -but in the present state of College finances that is not exactly a vista -of leisured opulence. Altogether there is not very much repose about -_him_. College Tutors in these days are expected to work. It is on -record that a tourist from a manufacturing district on seeing four -tutors snatching a brief hour at lawn-tennis, remarked, 'I suppose -there's _another shift_ working inside?' Such are the requirements of -the age and the manufacturing districts. - -Nor are beer and skittles unadulterated the lot of the undergraduate -either--whatever the impression that his sisters and cousins may derive -from the gaieties of the Eights and 'Commem.' For the spirit of the -century and the 'Sturm und Drang' of a restless world has got hold of -the 'Man,' too, and will not suffer him to live quite so peacefully as -the Verdant Greens and Bouncers of old. Everybody must do something; -they must be 'up and doing,' or else they have a good chance of finding -themselves 'sent down.' I do not speak of the reading man, who -naturally finds his vocation in a period of activity--but rather of the -man who is by nature non-reading, and has to sacrifice his natural -desires to the pressure of public opinion acting through his tutor. -Perhaps he is made to go in for honours; but even if he reads only for a -pass, the schools are always with him--he is always being pulled up to -see how he is growing; or at least he must be serving his College in one -way or another--if not by winning distinction in the schools, by toiling -on the river or the cricket-field. Then he is expected to interest -himself in all the movements of the last quarter of the nineteenth -century; he must belong to several societies; he cannot even be properly -idle without forming himself into an association for the purpose. If he -wants to make a practice of picnicing on the Cherwell he founds a -'Cherwell Lunch Club,' with meetings, no doubt, and possibly an 'organ' -to advocate his highly meritorious views. An excellent and a healthy -life, no doubt! but yet one is tempted sometimes to fear that the loafer -may become extinct; and then where are our poets to come from? For it is -a great thing to be able to loaf well: it softens the manners and does -not allow them to be fierce; and there is no place for it like the -streams and gardens of an ancient University. If a man does not learn -the great art of doing nothing there, he will never acquire it anywhere -else; and it is there, and in the summer term, that this laudable -practice will probably survive when it is unknown even in Government -Offices. - -[Illustration: _COACHING THE EIGHT. By J. H. Lorimer._] - -For there is a season of the year when even the sternest scholar or -athlete and the most earnest promoter of Movements yields to the _genius -loci_; when the summer term is drawing to a close, and the May east -winds have yielded to the warmth of June, and the lilacs and laburnums -are blossoming in College gardens; when the shouting and the glory and -the bonfires of the Eights are over, and the invasion of Commemoration -has not yet begun. Then, if ever, is the time for doing nothing. Then -the unwilling victim of lectures shakes off his chains and revels in a -temporary freedom, not unconnected with the fact that his tutor has gone -for a picnic to Nuneham. Perhaps he has been rowing in his College -Eight, and is entitled to repose on the laurels of 'six bumps;' perhaps -he is not in the schools himself, and can afford to pity the -unfortunates who are. And how many are the delightful ways of loafing! -You may propel the object of your affections--if she is up, as she very -often is at this time--in a punt on that most academic stream, the -Cherwell, while Charles (your friend) escorts the chaperon in a dingey -some little distance in front; you may lie lazily in the sun in -Worcester or St. John's gardens, with a novel, or a friend, or both; you -may search Bagley and Powderhill for late bluebells, and fancy that you -have found 'high on its heathy ridge' the tree known to Arnold and -Clough. Or if you are more enterprising you may travel further afield -and explore the high beech woods of the Chiltern slopes and the bare, -breezy uplands of the Berkshire downs; but this, perhaps, demands more -energy than belongs to the truly conscientious loafer. - -[Illustration: _EVENING ON THE RIVER. Drawn by E. Stamp._] - -Well, let the idle undergraduate make the most of his time now; it is -not likely that he will be able to loaf in after-life. Nor (for the -matter of that) will his successors be allowed to take their ease here -in Oxford even in the summer, in those happy days when the University is -to be turned into an industrial school, and a place for the education no -longer of the English gentleman but the British citizen. Will that day -ever come? The spirit of the age is determined that it shall. But -perhaps the spirit of the place may be too much for it yet. - - - - - _London: Strangeways, Printers._ - - - - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD *** - - - - -A Word from Project Gutenberg - - -We will update this book if we find any errors. - -This book can be found under: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39525 - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one -owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and -you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission -and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in the -General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and -distributing Project Gutenberg(tm) electronic works to protect the -Project Gutenberg(tm) concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a -registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, -unless you receive specific permission. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the <a class="reference internal" href="#project-gutenberg-license">Project Gutenberg License</a> -included with this eBook or online at -<a class="reference external" href="http://www.gutenberg.org/license">http://www.gutenberg.org/license</a>.</p> -<p class="noindent pnext"></p> -<div class="noindent vspace" style="height: 2em"> -</div> -<div class="align-None container noindent white-space-pre-line" id="pg-machine-header"> -<p class="noindent pfirst white-space-pre-line"><span class="white-space-pre-line">Title: Aspects of Modern Oxford<br /> -<br /> -Author: A. D. Godley<br /> -<br /> -Release Date: April 23, 2012 [EBook #39525]<br /> -<br /> -Language: English<br /> -<br /> -Character set encoding: UTF-8</span></p> -</div> -<div class="noindent vspace" style="height: 2em"> -</div> -<p class="noindent pfirst" id="pg-start-line">*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK <span>ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD</span> ***</p> <div class="noindent vspace" style="height: 4em"> </div> <p class="noindent pfirst" id="pg-produced-by"><span>Produced by Al Haines.</span></p> @@ -3959,347 +3934,6 @@ may be too much for it yet.</p> <!-- -*- encoding: utf-8 -*- --> <div class="backmatter"> </div> -<p class="pfirst" id="pg-end-line">*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK <span>ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD</span> ***</p> -<div class="cleardoublepage"> -</div> -</div> -<div class="language-en level-2 pgfooter section" id="a-word-from-project-gutenberg" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> -<span id="pg-footer"></span><h2 class="level-2 pfirst section-title title">A Word from Project Gutenberg</h2> -<p class="pfirst">We will update this book if we find any errors.</p> -<p class="pnext">This book can be found under: <a class="reference external" href="http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39525"><span>http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39525</span></a></p> -<p class="pnext">Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one -owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and -you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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-
-.. meta::
- :PG.Id: 39525
- :PG.Title: Aspects of Modern Oxford
- :PG.Released: 2012-04-23
- :PG.Rights: Public Domain
- :PG.Producer: Al Haines
- :DC.Creator: \A. \D. Godley
- :MARCREL.ill: \J. \H. Lorimer
- :MARCREL.ill: Lancelot Speed
- :MARCREL.ill: \T. \H. Crawford
- :MARCREL.ill: \E. Stamp
- :DC.Title: Aspects of Modern Oxford
- :DC.Language: en
- :DC.Created: 1894
- :coverpage: images/img-cover.jpg
-
-.. role:: small-caps
- :class: small-caps
-
-========================
-ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD
-========================
-
-.. pgheader::
-
-.. vspace:: 3
-
-.. _`Cover art`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-cover.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: Cover art
-
- Cover art
-
-.. vspace:: 3
-
-.. _`IN CORNMARKET STREET.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-front.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *IN CORNMARKET STREET. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
- *IN CORNMARKET STREET. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
-.. vspace:: 3
-
-.. container:: titlepage center white-space-pre-line
-
- .. class:: x-large
-
- ASPECTS
-
- .. class:: small
-
- OF
-
- .. class:: x-large
-
- MODERN OXFORD
-
- .. vspace:: 3
-
- .. class:: small
-
- BY
-
- .. class:: medium
-
- A MERE DON
-
- (A. D. GODLEY)
-
- .. vspace:: 4
-
- .. class:: medium
-
- *WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY*
-
- \J. \H. Lorimer, Lancelot Speed, \T. \H. Crawford,
-
- and \E. Stamp
-
- .. vspace:: 3
-
- .. class:: medium
-
- LONDON
-
- SEELEY AND CO. LIMITED
-
- Essex Street, Strand
-
- 1894
-
-..
-
-.. vspace:: 3
-
-----
-
-.. contents:: CONTENTS
- :depth: 1
- :backlinks: entry
-
-----
-
-.. container:: plainpage left white-space-pre-line
-
- .. class:: center large
-
- LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
-
- .. vspace:: 2
-
- .. class:: medium
-
- `In Cornmarket Street.`_ *By T. H. Crawford* . . . . . . . . . *Frontispiece*
-
- `In Christchurch Cathedral.`_ *By J. H. Lorimer*
-
- `New College, Oxford.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `Corpus Christi College.`_ *By J. H. Lorimer*
-
- `Smoking-Room at the Union.`_ *By T. H. Crawford*
-
- `Cricket in the Parks.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Waiting for the Cox.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Ringoal in New College.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Golf at Oxford. The Plateau Hole And Arnold's Tree.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Commemoration: Outside the Sheldonian Theatre.`_ *By T. H. Crawford*
-
- `In College Rooms.`_ *By T. H. Crawford*
-
- `A Ball at Christchurch.`_ *By T. H. Crawford*
-
- `The Deer Park, Magdalen College, Oxford.`_ *By J. H. Lorimer*
-
- `In Convocation: Conferring a Degree.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `A Lecture-Room in Magdalen College.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `The Library, Merton College.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `Reading the Newdigate.`_ *By T. H. Crawford*
-
- `A Dance at St. John's.`_ *By T. H. Crawford*
-
- `The Radcliffe.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `In the Bodleian.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `Sailing on the Upper River.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Porch of St. Mary's.`_ *By J. Pennell*
-
- `In Exeter College Chapel.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
- `Parsons' Pleasure.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Fencing.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Lawn Tennis at Oxford.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Bowls in New College Garden.`_ *By L. Speed*
-
- `Coaching the Eight.`_ *By J. H. Lorimer*
-
- `Evening on the River.`_ *By E. Stamp*
-
-.. vspace:: 4
-
-.. class:: center x-large
-
- ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD
-
- .. vspace:: 3
-
-
-I--OF DONS AND COLLEGES
-=======================
-
- | 'We ain't no thin red heroes, nor we ain't no blackguards too,
- | But single men in barracks, most remarkable like you.'
- | *Rudyard Kipling*.
-
-
-Fellows of Colleges who travel on the
-continent of Europe have, from time to
-time, experienced the almost insuperable
-difficulty of explaining to the more or less
-intelligent foreigner their own reason of existence,
-and that of the establishment to which they
-are privileged to belong. It is all the worse
-if your neighbour at the *table d'hôte* is
-acquainted with the Universities of his own
-country, for these offer no parallel at all, and
-to attempt to illustrate by means of them is
-not only futile but misleading. Define any
-college according to the general scheme
-indicated by its founder; when you have made
-the situation as intelligible as a limited
-knowledge of French or German will allow, the
-inquirer will conclude that '*also* it is a monastic
-institution,' and that you are wearing a hair
-shirt under your tourist tweeds. Try to
-disabuse him of this impression by pointing out
-that colleges do not compel to celibacy, and
-are intended mainly for the instruction of
-youth, and your Continental will go away
-with the conviction that an English
-University is composed of a conglomeration of
-public schools. If he tries to get further
-information from the conversation of a casual
-undergraduate, it will appear that a
-*Ruderverein* on the Danube offers most points of
-comparison.
-
-Fellows themselves fare no better, and are
-left in an--if possible--darker obscurity.
-That they are in some way connected with
-education is tolerably obvious, but the
-particular nature of the connexion is unexplained.
-Having thoroughly confused the subject by
-showing inconclusively that you are neither
-a monk, nor a schoolmaster, nor a *Privat
-Docent*, you probably acquiesce from sheer
-weariness in the title of *Professor*, which,
-perhaps, is as convenient as any other; and,
-after all, *Professoren* are very different from
-Professors. But all this does nothing to
-elucidate the nature of a College. To do this
-abroad is nearly as hard as to define the
-function of a University in England.
-
-.. _`IN CHRISTCHURCH CATHEDRAL.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-002.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *IN CHRISTCHURCH CATHEDRAL. By J. H. Lorimer.*
-
- *IN CHRISTCHURCH CATHEDRAL. By J. H. Lorimer.*
-
-
-For even at home the general uneducated
-public, taking but a passing interest in
-educational details, is apt to be hopelessly at sea
-as to the mutual relation of Colleges and
-Universities. In the public mind the College
-probably represents the University: an
-Oxonian will be sometimes spoken of as
-'at College;' University officials are confused
-with heads of houses, and Collections with
-University examinations. That foundation
-which is consecrated to the education of
-Welsh Oxonians is generally referred to in
-the remote fastnesses of the Cymru as Oxford
-College. As usual, a concrete material object,
-palpable and visible, is preferred before a cold
-abstraction like the University. Explain to
-the lay mind that a University is an aggregate
-of Colleges: it is not, of course, but the
-definition will serve sometimes. Then how
-about the London University, which is an
-examining body? And how does it happen
-that there is a University College in Oxford,
-not to mention another in Gower Street? and
-that Trinity College across the water is often
-called Dublin University? All these problems
-are calculated to leave the inquirer very much
-where he was at first, and in him who tries
-to explain them to shake the firm foundations
-of Reason.
-
-It may be a truism, but it is nevertheless
-true--according to a phrase which has done
-duty in the Schools ere now--that the history
-of the University is, and has been for the last
-five hundred years, the history of its Colleges;
-and it is also true that the interweaving of
-Collegiate with University life has very much
-complicated the question of the student's reason
-of existence. We do not, of course, know
-what may have been the various motives which
-prompted the bold baron, or squire, or yeoman
-of the twelfth or thirteenth century to send
-the most clerkly or least muscular of his sons
-to herd with his fellows in the crowded streets
-or the mean hostelries of pre-collegiate Oxford;
-nor have we very definite data as to the kind
-of life which the scholar of the family lived
-when he got there. Perhaps he resided in a
-'hall;' according to some authorities there
-were as many as three hundred halls in the
-days of Edward I.; perhaps he was master
-of his own destinies, like the free and
-independent unattached student of modern
-days--minus a Censor to watch over the use of his
-liberties. But what is tolerably certain is that
-he did not then come to Oxford so much with
-the intention of 'having a good time' as with
-the desire of improving his mind, or, at least,
-in some way or other taking part in the
-intellectual life of the period, which then centred
-in the University. It might be that among
-the throngs of boys and young men who
-crowded the straitened limits of mediaeval
-Oxford, there were many who supported the
-obscure tenets of their particular Doctor
-Perspicuus against their opponents' Doctor
-Inexplicabilis rather with bills and bows than with
-disputations in the Schools; but every Oxonian
-was in some way vowed to the advancement
-of learning--at least, it is hard to see
-what other inducement there was to face
-what must have been, even with all due
-allowance made, the exceptional hardships of a
-student's life. Then came the
-Colleges--University dating from unknown antiquity,
-although the legend which connects its
-foundation with Alfred has now shared the fate of
-most legends; Balliol and Merton, at the end of
-the thirteenth century; and the succeeding
-centuries were fruitful in the establishment of
-many other now venerable foundations, taking
-example and encouragement from the success
-and reputation of their earlier compeers. In
-their original form colleges were probably
-intended to be places of quiet retirement and
-study, where the earnest scholar might
-peacefully pursue his researches without fear of
-disturbance by the wilder spirits who roamed
-the streets and carried on the traditional feuds
-of Town and Gown or of North and South.
-
-.. _`NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-006.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
- *NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
-
-By a curious reverse of circumstances the
-collegian and the '*scholaris nulli collegio vel
-aulae ascriptus*' of modern days seem to have
-changed characters. For I have heard it said
-by those who have to do with college
-discipline that their *alumni* are no longer
-invariably distinguished by 'a gentle nature
-and studious habits'--qualities for which, as
-the Warden of Merton says, colleges were
-originally intended to provide a welcome haven
-of rest, and which are now the especial and
-gratifying characteristics of that whilom
-roisterer and boon companion, the Unattached
-Student.
-
-We have it on the authority of historians
-that the original collegiate design was,
-properly speaking, a kind of model lodging-house;
-an improved, enlarged, and strictly supervised
-edition of the many hostels where the primitive
-undergraduate did mostly congregate. Fellows
-and scholars alike were to be studious and
-discreet persons; the seniors were to devote
-themselves to research, and to stand in a
-quasi-parental or elder-brotherly relation to the
-juniors who had not yet attained to the grade
-of a Baccalaureus. Very strict rules--probably
-based on those of monastic institutions--governed
-the whole body: rules, however,
-which are not unnecessarily severe when we
-consider the fashion of the age and the
-comparative youth of both fellows and scholars.
-Many scholars must have been little more
-than children, and the junior don of the
-fifteenth century may often have been young
-enough to receive that corporal punishment
-which our rude forefathers inflicted even on
-the gentler sex.
-
- | 'Solomon said, in accents mild,
- | Spare the rod and spoil the child;
- | Be they man or be they maid,
- | Whip 'em and wallop 'em, Solomon said'
-
---and the sage's advice was certainly followed
-in the case of scholars, who were birched for
-offences which in these latter days would
-call down a 'gate,' a fine, or an imposition.
-Authorities tell us that the early fellow might
-even in certain cases be mulcted of his dress,
-a penalty which is now reserved for Irish
-patriots in gaol; and it would seem that his
-consumption of beer was limited by regulations
-which would now be intolerable to his
-scout. Some of the details respecting crime
-and punishment, which have been preserved
-in ancient records, are of the most remarkable
-description. A former Fellow of Corpus (so
-we are informed by Dr. Fowler's History
-of that College) who had been proved guilty
-of an over-susceptibility to the charms of
-beauty, was condemned as a penance to preach
-eight sermons in the Church of St. Peter-in-the-East.
-Such was the inscrutable wisdom
-of a bygone age.
-
-Details have altered since then, but the
-general scheme of college discipline remains
-much the same. Even in the days when
-practice was slackest, theory retained its ancient
-stringency. When Mr. Gibbon of Magdalen
-absented himself from his lectures, his excuses
-were received 'with an indulgent smile;' when
-he desired to leave Oxford for a few days, he
-appears to have done so without let or
-hindrance; but both residence and attendance at
-lectures were theoretically necessary. The
-compromise was hardly satisfactory, but as the
-scholars' age increased and the disciplinary
-rule meant for fourteen had to be applied to
-eighteen, what was to be done? So, too, we
-are informed that in the days of our fathers
-undergraduates endured a Procrustean tyranny.
-So many chapel services you must attend; so
-many lectures you must hear, connected or
-not with your particular studies; and there
-was no relaxation of the rule; no excuse
-even of 'urgent business' would serve the pale
-student who wanted to follow the hounds or
-play in a cricket match. Things, in fact, would
-have been at a deadlock had not the authorities
-recognised the superiority of expediency
-to mere morality, and invariably accepted
-without question the plea of ill-health. To
-'put on an *aeger*' when in the enjoyment
-of robust health was after all as justifiable
-a fiction as the 'not at home' of ordinary
-society. You announced yourself as too ill to
-go to a lecture, and then rode with the
-Bicester or played cricket to your heart's
-content. This remarkable system is now
-practically obsolete; perhaps we are more moral.
-
-.. _`CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-010.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE. Drawn by F. H. Lorimer.*
-
- *CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE. Drawn by F. H. Lorimer.*
-
-
-Modern collegiate discipline is a parlous
-matter. There are still the old problems to
-be faced--the difficulty of adapting old rules
-to new conditions--the danger on the one
-hand of treating boys too much like men,
-and on the other of treating men too much
-like boys. Hence college authorities
-generally fall back on some system of more or
-less ingenious compromise--a course which
-is no doubt prudent in the long run, and shows
-a laudable desire for the attainment of the
-Aristotelian 'mean,' but which, like most
-compromises, manages to secure the disapproval
-alike of all shades of outside opinion. We
-live with the fear of the evening papers
-before our eyes, and an erring undergraduate
-who has been sent down may quite possibly
-be avenged by a newspaper column reflecting
-on college discipline in general, and the dons
-who sent him down in particular. Every
-day martinets tell us that the University is
-going to the dogs from excess of leniency;
-while critics of the 'Boys-will-be-boys' school
-point out the extreme danger of sitting
-permanently on the safety valve, and dancing
-on the edge of an active volcano.
-
-In recent years most of the 'Halls' have
-been practically extinguished, and thereby
-certain eccentricities of administration removed
-from our midst. It was perhaps as well;
-some of these ancient and honourable
-establishments having during the present century
-rather fallen from their former reputation,
-from their readiness to receive into the fold
-incapables or minor criminals to whom the
-moral or intellectual atmosphere of a college
-was uncongenial. This was a very convenient
-system for colleges, who could thus get rid
-of an idle or stupid man without the
-responsibility of blighting his University career
-and his prospects in general; but the Halls,
-which were thus turned into a kind of sink,
-became rather curious and undesirable
-abiding-places in consequence. They were inhabited
-by grave and reverend seniors who couldn't,
-and by distinguished athletes who wouldn't,
-pass Smalls, much less Mods. At one time
-'Charsley's' was said to be able to play
-the 'Varsity Eleven. These mixed multitudes
-appear to have been governed on very various
-and remarkable principles. At one establishment
-it was considered a breach of courtesy if
-you did not, when going to London, give
-the authorities some idea of the *probable* length
-of your absence. 'The way to govern a
-college,' the venerated head of this institution is
-reported to have said, 'is this--*to keep one eye
-shut*,' presumably the optic on the side of the
-offender. Yet it is curious that while most of
-the Halls appear to have been ruled rather
-by the *gant de velours* than the *main de fer*,
-one of them is currently reported to have been
-the scene of an attempt to inflict corporal
-punishment. This heroic endeavour to restore
-the customs of the ancients was not crowned
-with immediate success, and he who should
-have been beaten with stripes fled for justice
-to the Vice-Chancellor's Court.
-
-.. _`SMOKING-ROOM AT THE UNION.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-014.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *SMOKING-ROOM AT THE UNION. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
- *SMOKING-ROOM AT THE UNION. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
-
-Casual visitors to Oxford who are acquainted
-with the statutes of the University will no
-doubt have observed that it has been found
-unnecessary to insist on exact obedience to all
-the rules which were framed for the student
-of four hundred years ago. For instance, boots
-are generally worn; undergraduates are not
-prohibited from riding horses, nor even from
-carrying lethal weapons; the *herba nicotiana
-sive Tobacco* is in common use; and, especially
-in summer, garments are not so 'subfusc' as
-the strict letter of the law requires.
-Perhaps, too, the wearing of the academic cap
-and gown is not so universally necessary as
-it was heretofore. All these are matters for
-the jurisdiction of the Proctors, who rightly
-lay more stress on the real order and good
-behaviour of their realm. And whatever evils
-civilisation may bring in the train, there can
-be no doubt that the task of these officials
-is far less dangerous than of old, as their
-subjects are less turbulent. They have no
-longer to interfere in the faction fights
-of Northern and Southern students. It is
-unusual for a Proctor to carry a pole-axe,
-even when he is 'drawing' the most
-dangerous of billiard-rooms. The Town
-and Gown rows which used to provide so
-attractive a picture for the novelist--where
-the hero used to stand pale and determined,
-defying a crowd of infuriated bargemen--are
-extinct and forgotten these last ten years.
-Altogether the streets are quieter; models,
-in fact, of peace and good order: when the
-anarchical element is loose it seems to prefer
-the interior of Colleges. Various reasons might
-be assigned for this: sometimes the presence
-of too easily defied authority gives a piquancy
-to crime; or it is the place itself which is
-the incentive. The open space of a
-quadrangle is found to be a convenient stage for
-the performance of the midnight reveller. He
-is watched from the windows by a ring of
-admiring friends, and the surrounding walls
-are a kind of sounding-board which enhances
-the natural beauty of 'Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay'
-(with an accompaniment of tea-tray and poker
-*obbligato*). Every one has his own ideal of
-an enjoyable evening.
-
-
-
-
-II--OF UNDERGRADUATES
-=====================
-
- | 'In the sad and sodden street
- | To and fro
- | Flit the feverstricken feet
- | Of the Freshers, as they meet,
- | Come and go.'
- | *Q*
-
-
-Whatever the theory of their
-founders, it is at no late period in
-the history of colleges that we begin to trace
-the development of the modern undergraduate.
-It was only natural that the 'gentle natures
-and studious habits' of a select band of learners
-should undergo some modification as college
-after college was founded, and comparative
-frivolity would from time to time obtain
-admission to the sacred precincts. The
-University became the resort of wealth and rank,
-as well as of mere intellect, and the gradual
-influx of commoners--still more, of
-'gentlemen commoners'--once for all determined
-the character of colleges as places of serious
-and uninterrupted study. Probably the Civil
-War, bringing the Court to Oxford, was a
-potent factor in relaxation of the older academic
-discipline; deans or sub-wardens of the period
-doubtless finding some difficulty in adapting
-their rules to the requirements of
-undergraduates who might from time to time absent
-themselves from chapel or lecture in order to
-raid a Parliamentary outpost.
-
-But perhaps the most instructive picture of
-the seventeenth-century undergraduate is to be
-found in the account-book of one Wilding, of
-Wadham (published by the Oxford Historical
-Society), apparently a reading man and a
-scholar of his college, destined for Holy
-Orders. The number of his books (he gives
-a list of them) shows him to have been
-something of a student, while repeated entries of
-large sums paid for 'Wiggs' (on one occasion
-as much as 14*s*--more than his 'Battles' for
-the quarter!) would seem to suggest something
-of the habits of the 'gay young sparks'
-alluded to by Hearne in the next century.
-On the whole, Master Wilding appears to
-have been a virtuous and studious young
-gentleman. Now and then the natural man
-asserts himself, and he treats his friends to
-wine or 'coffea,' or even makes an excursion
-to 'Abbington' (4*s.*!). Towards the end of
-his career a 'gaudy' costs 2*s.* 6*d.*, after which
-comes the too-suggestive entry, 'For a purge,
-1*s.*' Then comes the close: outstanding bills
-are paid to the alarming extent of 7*s.* 8*d.*;
-a 'wigg,' which originally cost 14*s.*, is
-disposed of at a ruinous reduction for 6*s.*--the
-prudent man does not give it away to his
-scout--and J. Wilding, B.A., e. Coll., Wadh.,
-retires to his country parsonage--having first
-invested sixpence in a sermon. Evidently a
-person of methodical habits and punctual
-payments; that had two wigs, and everything
-handsome about him; and that probably
-grumbled quite as much at the 10*s.* fee for
-his tutor as his modern successor does at his
-8*l.* 6*s.* 8*d.* But, on the whole, collegiate and
-university fees seem to have been small.
-
-After this description of the *vie intime* of
-an undergraduate at Wadham, history is
-reserved on the subject of the junior members
-of the University; which is the more
-disappointing, as the historic Muse is not only
-garrulous, but exceedingly scandalous in
-recounting the virtues and the aberrations of
-eighteenth-century dons. Here and there we
-find an occasional notice of the ways of
-undergraduates--here a private memoir, there an
-academic *brochure*. We learn, incidentally, how
-Mr. John Potenger, of New College, made
-'theams in prose and verse,' and eventually
-'came to a tollerable proficiency in colloquial
-Latin;' how Mr. Meadowcourt, of Merton,
-got into serious trouble--was prevented, in
-fact, from taking his degree--for drinking the
-health of His Majesty King George the First;
-and how Mr. Carty, of University College,
-suffered a similar fate 'for prophaning, with
-mad intemperance, that day, on which he
-ought, with sober chearfulness, to have
-commemorated the restoration of King Charles
-the Second' (this was in 1716); how
-Mr. Shenstone found, at Pembroke College, both
-sober men 'who amused themselves in the
-evening with reading Greek and drinking
-water,' and also 'a set of jolly sprightly
-young fellows .... who drank ale, smoked
-tobacco,' and even 'punned;' and how Lord
-Shelburne had a 'narrow-minded tutor.' From
-which we may gather, that University
-life was not so very different from what it
-is now: our forefathers were more exercised
-about politics, for which we have now
-substituted a perhaps extreme devotion to
-athletics. But for the most part, the
-undergraduate is not prominent in history--seeming,
-in fact, to be regarded as the least important
-element in the University. On the other
-hand, his successor of the present century--the
-era of the Examination Schools--occupies
-so prominent a place in the eyes of the public
-that it is difficult to speak of him, lest haply
-one should be accused of frivolity or want of
-reverence for the *raison d'être* of all academic
-institutions.
-
-.. _`CRICKET IN THE PARKS.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-022.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *CRICKET IN THE PARKS. By Launcelot Speed.*
-
- *CRICKET IN THE PARKS. By Launcelot Speed.*
-
-
-His own reason of existence is not so
-obvious. It was, as we have said, tolerably
-clear that the mediaeval student came to
-Oxford primarily for the love of learning
-something, at any rate; but the student *fin de
-siècle* is one of the most labyrinthine parts of
-a complex civilisation. Of the hundreds of
-boys who are shot on the G.W.R. platform
-every October to be caressed or kicked by
-Alma Mater, and returned in due time full or
-empty, it is only an insignificant minority who
-come up with the ostensible purpose of learning.
-Their reasons are as many as the colours of
-their portmanteaus. Brown has come up
-because he is in the sixth form at school, and
-was sent in for a scholarship by a head-master
-desiring an advertisement; Jones, because it is
-thought by his friends that he might get into
-the 'Varsity eleven; Robinson, because his
-father considers a University career to be a
-stepping-stone to the professions--which it
-fortunately is not as yet. Mr. Sangazur is,
-going to St. Boniface because his father was
-there; and Mr. J. Sangazur Smith--well,
-probably because *his* father wasn't. Altogether
-they are a motley crew, and it is not the least
-achievement of the University that she does
-somehow or other manage to impress a certain
-stamp on so many different kinds of metal.
-But in this she is only an instrument in the
-hands of modern civilisation, which is always
-extinguishing eccentricities and abnormal types;
-and even Oxford, while her sons are getting
-rid of those interesting individualities which
-used to distinguish them from each other, is
-fast losing many of the peculiarities which used
-to distinguish it from the rest of the world.
-It is an age of monotony. Even the Freshman,
-that delightful creation of a bygone age, is
-not by any means what he was. He is still
-young, but no longer innocent; the bloom is
-off his credulity; you cannot play practical
-jokes upon him any more. Now and then a
-young man will present himself to his college
-authorities in a gown of which the superfluous
-dimensions and unusual embroidery betray the
-handiwork of the provincial tailor; two or
-three neophytes may annually be seen
-perambulating the High in academic dress with
-a walking-stick; but these are only survivals.
-Senior men have no longer their old privileges
-of 'ragging' the freshman. In ancient times,
-as we are informed by the historian of Merton
-College, 'Freshmen were expected to sit on a
-form, and make jokes for the amusement of
-their companions, on pain of being "tucked,"
-or scarified by the thumb-nail applied under
-the lip. The first Earl of Shaftesbury
-describes in detail this rather barbarous jest
-as practised at Exeter College, and relates
-how, aided by some freshmen of unusual size
-and strength, he himself headed a mutiny
-which led to the eventual abolition of
-'tucking.' Again, on Candlemas Day every
-freshman received notice to prepare a speech
-to be delivered on the following Shrove
-Tuesday, when they were compelled to declaim
-in undress from a form placed on the high
-table, being rewarded with "cawdel" if the
-performances were good, with cawdel and salted
-drink if it were indifferent, and with salted
-drink and "tucks" if it were dull. This is
-what American students call 'hazing,' and
-the German *Fuchs* is subjected to similar
-ordeals. But we have changed all that, and
-treat the 'fresher' now with the respect he
-deserves.
-
-Possibly the undergraduate of fiction and
-the drama may have been once a living
-reality. But he is so no more, and modern
-realistic novelists will have to imagine some hero
-less crude in colouring and more in harmony
-with the compromises and neutral tints of the
-latter half of the nineteenth century. The
-young Oxonian or Cantab of fifty years
-back, as represented by contemporary or
-nearly contemporary writers, was always in
-extremes:--
-
- | 'When he was good he was very, very good;
- | But when he was bad he was horrid,'
-
-like the little girl of the poet. He was either
-an inimitable example of improbable virtue, or
-abnormally vicious. The bad undergraduate
-defied the Ten Commandments, all and
-severally, with the ease and success of the
-villain of transpontine melodrama. Nothing
-came amiss to him, from forgery to screwing
-up the Dean and letting it be understood
-that some one else had done it; but retribution
-generally came at last, and this compound of
-manifold vices was detected and rusticated;
-and it was understood that from rustication to
-the gallows was the shortest and easiest of
-transitions. The virtuous undergraduate wore
-trousers too short for him and supported his
-relations. He did not generally join in any
-athletic pastimes, but when the stroke of his
-college eight fainted from excitement just
-before the start, the neglected sizar threw off
-his threadbare coat, leapt into the vacant seat,
-and won his crew at once the proud position
-of head of the river by the simple process of
-making four bumps on the same night,
-explaining afterwards that he had practised in a
-dingey and saw how it could be done. Then
-there was the Admirable Crichton of University
-life, perhaps the commonest type among these
-heroes of romance. He was invariably at
-Christ Church, and very often had a
-background of more or less tragic memories from
-the far-away days of his *jeunesse orageuse*.
-Nevertheless he unbent so far as to do nothing
-much during the first three and a half years
-of his academic career, except to go to a good
-many wine parties, where he always wore his
-cap and gown (especially in female fiction),
-and drank more than any one else. Then,
-when every one supposed he must be ploughed
-in Greats, he sat up so late for a week, and
-wore so many wet towels, that eventually he
-was announced at the Encaenia, amid the
-plaudits of his friends and the approving
-smiles of the Vice-Chancellor, as the winner
-of a Double-First, several University prizes,
-and a Fellowship; after which it was only
-right and natural that the recipient of so many
-coveted distinctions should lead the heroine of
-the piece to the altar.
-
-.. _`WAITING FOR THE COX.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-026.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *WAITING FOR THE COX. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
- *WAITING FOR THE COX. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
-
-Possibly the Oxford of a bygone generation
-may have furnished models for these brilliantly
-coloured pictures; or, as is more probable,
-they were created by the licence of fiction.
-At any rate the 'man' of modern times is a
-far less picturesque person--unpicturesque
-even to the verge of becoming ordinary. He
-is seldom eccentric or *outré* in externals. His
-manners are such as he has learnt at school,
-and his customs those of the world he lives in.
-His dress would excite no remark in Piccadilly.
-The gorgeous waistcoats of Leech's pencil and
-Calverley's '*crurum non enarrabile tegmen*'
-belong to ancient history. He is, on the
-whole, inexpensive in his habits, as it is now
-the fashion to be poor; he no longer orders
-in a tailor's whole shop, and his clubs are
-generally managed with economy and prudence.
-If, however, the undergraduate occasionally
-displays the virtues of maturer age, there are
-certain indications that he is less of a
-grown-up person than he was in the brave days of
-old. It takes him a long time to forget his
-school-days. Only exceptionally untrammelled
-spirits regard independent reading as more
-important than the ministrations of their tutor.
-Pass-men have been known to speak of their
-work for the schools as 'lessons,' and, in their
-first term, to call the head of the College the
-head-master. Naturally, too, school-life has
-imbued both Pass and Class men with an
-enduring passion for games--probably rather
-a good thing in itself, although inadequate
-as the be-all and end-all of youthful energy.
-Even those who do not play them can talk
-about them. Cricket and football are always
-as prolific a topic as the weather, and nearly
-as interesting, as many a perfunctory 'Fresher's
-breakfast' can testify.
-
-.. _`RINGOAL IN NEW COLLEGE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-028.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *RINGOAL IN NEW COLLEGE. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
- *RINGOAL IN NEW COLLEGE. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
-
-The undergraduate, in these as in other
-things, is like the young of his species, with
-whom, after all, he has a good deal in
-common. Take, in short, the ordinary
-provincial young man; add a dash of the
-schoolboy and just a touch of the *Bursch*, and you
-have what Mr. Hardy calls the 'Normal
-Undergraduate.'
-
-
-.. figure:: images/img-029.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: Ringoal
-
- Ringoal
-
-
-It used to be the custom to draw a very
-hard-and-fast line of demarcation between the
-rowing and the reading man--rowing being
-taken as a type of athletics in general, and
-indeed being the only form of physical exercise
-which possessed a regular organization. Rumour
-has it that a certain tutor (now defunct) laid so
-much emphasis on this distinction that men
-whose circumstances permitted them to be idle
-were regarded with disfavour if they took to
-reading. He docketed freshmen as reading or
-non-reading men, and would not allow either
-kind to stray into the domain of the other.
-However, the general fusion of classes and
-professions has levelled these boundaries now.
-The rowing man reads to a certain extent, and
-the reading man has very often pretensions to
-athletic eminence; it is in fact highly desirable
-that he should, now that a 'Varsity 'blue'
-provides an assistant master in a school with at
-least as good a salary as does a brilliant
-degree. Yet, although the great majority of
-men belong to the intermediate class of those
-who take life as they find it, and make no
-one occupation the object of their exclusive
-devotion, it is hardly necessary to say that
-there are still extremes--the Brutal Athlete
-at one end of the line and the bookish recluse
-(often, though wrongly, identified with the
-'Smug') at the other. The existence of the
-first is encouraged by the modern tendency
-to professionalism in athletics. Mere amateurs
-who regard games as an amusement can never
-hope to do anything; a thing must be taken
-seriously. Every schoolboy who wishes to
-obtain renown in the columns of sporting
-papers has his 'record,' and comes up to Oxford
-with the express intention of 'cutting'
-somebody else's, and the athletic authorities of the
-University know all about Jones's bowling
-average at Eton, or Brown's form as
-three-quarter-back at Rugby, long before these
-distinguished persons have matriculated. Nor
-is it only cricket, football, and rowing that
-are the objects of our worship. Even so staid
-and contemplative a pastime as golf ranks
-among 'athletics;' and perhaps in time the
-authorities will be asked to give a 'Blue' for
-croquet. These things being so, on the whole,
-perhaps, we should be grateful to the eminent
-athlete for the comparative affability of his
-demeanour, so long as he is not seriously
-contradicted. He is great, but he is generally
-merciful.
-
-Thews and sinews have probably as much
-admiration as is good for them, and nearly as
-much as they want. On the other hand, the
-practice of reading has undoubtedly been
-popularised. It is no longer a clique of students
-who seek honours; public opinion in and
-outside the University demands of an
-increasing majority of men that they should appear
-to be improving their minds. The Pass-man
-pure and simple diminishes in numbers
-annually; no doubt in time he will be a kind of
-pariah. Colleges compete with each other in
-the Schools. Evening papers prove by statistics
-the immorality of an establishment where a
-scholar who obtains a second is allowed to
-remain in residence. The stress and strain
-of the system would be hardly bearable were
-it not decidedly less difficult to obtain a class
-in honours than it used to be--not, perhaps,
-a First, or even a Second; but certainly the
-lower grades are easier of attainment. Then
-the variety of subjects is such as to appeal
-to every one: history, law, theology, natural
-science (in all its branches), mathematics, all
-invite the ambitious student whose relations
-wish him to take honours, and will be quite
-satisfied with a Fourth; and eminent specialists
-compete for the privilege of instructing him.
-The tutor who complained to the undergraduate
-that he had sixteen pupils was met
-by the just retort that the undergraduate had
-sixteen tutors.
-
-.. _`GOLF AT OXFORD. THE PLATEAU HOLE AND ARNOLD'S TREE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-032.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *GOLF AT OXFORD. THE PLATEAU HOLE AND ARNOLD'S TREE. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
- *GOLF AT OXFORD. THE PLATEAU HOLE AND ARNOLD'S TREE. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
-
-The relation of the University to the
-undergraduate is twofold; it is 'kept'--as a
-witty scholar of Dublin is fabled to have
-inscribed over the door of his Dean, 'for his
-amusement and instruction'--and if the latter
-is frequently formal, it is still more often and
-in a great variety of ways 'informal,' and
-not communicated through his tutor. Not to
-mention the many college literary societies--every
-college has one at least, and they are
-all ready to discuss any topic, from the Origin
-of Evil to bimetallism--there are now in the
-University various learned societies, modelled
-and sometimes called after the German *Seminar*,
-which are intended to supplement the
-deficiencies of tuition, and to keep the serious
-student abreast of the newest erudition which
-has been 'made in Germany,' or anywhere
-else on the Continent. Then there is the
-Union as a school of eloquence for the political
-aspirant; or the 'private business' of his
-college debating society, where a vote of
-censure on Ministers is sometimes emphasised
-by their ejection into the quadrangle, may
-qualify him for the possible methods of a
-future House of Commons.
-
-
-
-
-III--OF SIGHTSEERS
-==================
-
- | 'The women longed to go and see the *college* and the *tutour*.'
- | *'The Guardian's Instruction' by Stephen Penton.*
-
-
-When the late Mr. Bright asserted
-that the tone of Oxford life and
-thought was 'provincial with a difference,'
-great indignation was aroused in the breasts of
-all Oxford men--residents, at least; whether
-it was the provincialism or the 'difference'
-wherein lay the sting of the taunt. Probably
-it was the first. For, although it is a tenable
-hypothesis that *Kleinstädtigkeit* has really been
-a potent factor in the production of much
-that is best in art and literature, still nobody
-likes to be called provincial by those whose
-business is in the metropolis. Caesar said
-that he would rather be a great man at
-Gabii, or whatever was the Little Pedlington
-of Italy, than an ordinary person at Rome;
-but the modern Little Pedlingtonian would
-seldom confess to so grovelling an ambition,
-whatever might be his real feelings. He
-would much sooner be one of the crowd in
-London than mayor of his native city: so
-at least he says. And so he is very angry
-if you call him provincial, and venture to
-insinuate that his views of life are limited by
-the jurisdiction of his Local Board or City
-Council; and thus the University of Oxford
-refused for a long time to forgive John
-Bright, and did not quite forget his strictures
-even when it gave him an honorary degree
-and called him 'patriae et libertatis
-amantissimus.' And yet the authorities had done
-what they could to keep the University
-provincial. It was only after many and deep
-searchings of heart that the Hebdomadal
-Council consented to countenance the advent
-of the Great Western Railway; while the
-ten miles which separate Oxford from Steventon
-preserved undergraduates from the contaminating
-contact of the metropolis there was
-still hope, but many venerable Tories held
-that University discipline was past praying for
-when a three-hours' run would bring you into
-the heart of the dissipation of London. Some
-there were who could not even imagine that
-so terrible a change had really taken place; it
-is said that Dr. Routh, the President of
-Magdalen, who attained the respectable age
-of ninety-nine in the year 1855 (he was
-elected towards the close of the last century
-as a *warming-pan*, being then of a delicate
-constitution and not supposed likely to live!),
-persistently ignored the development of
-railways altogether; when undergraduates came
-up late at the beginning of the winter term,
-he would excuse them on the ground of the
-badness of the roads.
-
-We have changed all that, like other
-provincial centres; and undergraduates who want
-to 'see their dentist'--a venerable and
-time-honoured plea which we have heard
-expressed by the delicate-minded as 'the necessity
-for keeping a dental engagement'--may now
-run up to town and back between lunch and
-'hall;' the latter function having also
-marched with the times, and even six-o'clock
-dinner being now almost a thing of the past.
-Not so long ago five was the regular hour.
-In the early seventies seven-o'clock dinner
-was regarded as a doubtful innovation; and
-there we have stopped for the present. But
-the fashionable world outside the colleges
-imitates London customs--always keeping a
-little way behind the age--and what has
-been called the 'Parks System' actually dines
-as late as 7.45 when it is determined to
-be *très chic*. It is only one sign of the
-influx of metropolitan ideas; but there
-are many others. Oxford tradesmen have
-learnt by bitter experience that the modern
-undergraduate is not an exclusive
-preserve for them like his father. That
-respected county magnate, when he was at
-Oriel, bought his coats from an Oxford tailor
-and his wine from an Oxford wine-merchant,
-to whom--being an honest man--he paid
-about half as much again as he would have
-paid anywhere in London, thereby recouping
-the men of coats or of wines for the many
-bad debts made by dealing with the transitory
-and impecunious undergraduate. But his son
-gets his clothes in London, and his wine
-from the college, which deals directly with
-Bordeaux. And the tone and subject of
-conversation is changed too. Oxford is
-thoroughly up to date, and knows all about the
-latest play at the Criterion and the latest
-scandal in the inner circle of London society--or
-thinks it does, at any rate: there is no
-one who knows so much about London as
-the man who does not live there.
-
-.. _`COMMEMORATION: OUTSIDE THE SHELDONIAN THEATRE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-038.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *COMMEMORATION: OUTSIDE THE SHELDONIAN THEATRE. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
- *COMMEMORATION: OUTSIDE THE SHELDONIAN THEATRE. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
-
-But if Oxford goes to London, so does
-London come to Oxford. Whether it be
-fitting or not that the site of a theoretically
-learned University should be in summer a
-sort of people's park or recreation-ground
-for the jaded Londoner, the fact is so: the
-classes and the masses are always with us in
-one form or another. It has become a
-common and laudable practice for East-end
-clergymen and the staff of Toynbee Hall
-and the Oxford House to bring down their
-flocks on Whit-Monday or other appropriate
-occasions; and one may constantly see high
-academic dignitaries piloting an unwieldy train
-of excursionists, and trying to compress
-University history into a small compass, or to
-explain the nature of a college (of all
-phenomena most unexplainable to the lay mind) to
-an audience which has never seen any other
-place of education than a Board school. As
-for the classes, they have raised the Eights and
-'Commem.' to the rank of regular engagements
-in a London season, and they go through
-both with that unflinching heroism which
-the English public invariably display in the
-performance of a social duty: they shiver in
-summer frocks on the barges, despite the hail
-and snowstorms of what is ironically described
-as the 'Summer' term; and after a hard day's
-sightseeing they enjoy a well-earned repose
-by going to Commemoration balls, where you
-really do dance, not for a perfunctory two
-hours or so, but from 8.30 to 6.30 a.m. In
-spite of these hardships it is gratifying to
-observe that, whether or not the University
-succeeds in its educational mission, it appears to
-leave nothing to be desired as a place of
-amusement for the jaded pleasure-seeker.
-People who go to sleep at a farce have been
-known to smile at the (to a resident) dullest
-and least impressive University function.
-Ladies appear to take an especial delight
-in penetrating the mysteries of College life.
-Perhaps the female mind is piqued by a subdued
-flavour of impropriety, dating from a period
-when colleges were not what they are; or
-more probably they find it gratifying to
-the self-respect of a superior sex to observe
-and to pity the notoriously ineffectual
-attempts of mere bachelors to render existence
-bearable. So much for the term; and when
-the vacation begins Oxford is generally
-inundated by a swarm of heterogeneous
-tourists--Americans, who come here on their way
-between Paris and Stratford-on-Avon;
-Germans, distinguished by a white umbrella and a
-red 'Baedeker,' trying to realise that here,
-too, is a University, despite the absence of
-students with slashed noses and the altogether
-different quality of the beer. Then with
-August come the Extension students; the more
-frivolous to picnic at Nuneham and Islip,
-the seriously-minded to attend lectures which
-compress all knowledge into a fortnight's
-course, and to speculate on the future when
-they--the real University, as they say--will
-succeed to the inheritance of an
-unenlightened generation which is wasting its
-great opportunities.
-
-.. _`IN COLLEGE ROOMS.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-040.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *IN COLLEGE ROOMS. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
- *IN COLLEGE ROOMS. Drawn by T. H. Crawford.*
-
-
-At Commemoration a general sense of
-lobster salad pervades the atmosphere, and
-the natural beauties of colleges are concealed
-or enhanced by a profusion of planking and
-red cloth; the architectural merit of a hall
-is as nothing compared to the elasticity of
-its floor. The Eights, again, provide
-attractions of their own, not especially academic.
-The truly judicious sightseer will avoid both
-of these festive seasons, and will choose some
-time when there is less to interfere with his
-own proper pursuit--the week after the Eights,
-perhaps, or the beginning of the October
-term, when the red Virginia creeper makes
-a pleasing contrast with the grey collegiate
-walls. Nor will he, if he is wise, allow
-himself to be 'rushed' through the various
-objects of interest: there are, it is believed,
-local guides who profess to show the whole
-of Oxford in two hours; but rumour asserts
-that the feat is accomplished by making the
-several quadrangles of one college do duty for
-a corresponding number of separate
-establishments, so that the credulous visitor leaves
-Christ Church with the impression that he has
-seen not only 'The House,' but also several
-other foundations, all curiously enough
-communicating with each other. And in any
-case, after a mere scamper through the
-colleges, nothing remains in the mind but a
-vague and inaccurate reminiscence, combining
-in one the characteristics of all; the jaded
-sightseer goes back to London with a
-fortunately soon-to-be-forgotten idea that Keble
-was founded by Alfred the Great, and that
-Tom Quad is a nickname for the Vice-Chancellor.
-Samuel Pepys seems to have been
-to a certain extent the prototype of this kind
-of curiosity or antiquity hunter, and paid a
-'shilling to a boy that showed me the Colleges
-before dinner.' (Curiously enough, 'after
-dinner' the honorarium to 'one that showed
-us the schools and library' was 10*s.*!)
-
-.. _`A BALL AT CHRISTCHURCH.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-042.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *A BALL AT CHRIST CHURCH. Drawn by T. H. Crawford*
-
- *A BALL AT CHRIST CHURCH. Drawn by T. H. Crawford*
-
-
-He who is responsible for the proper
-conduct of a gang of relations or friends will
-not treat them in this way. He will
-endeavour, so far as possible, to confine them
-within the limits of his own college, where he
-is on his native heath, and, if he is not an
-antiquarian, can at least animate the venerable
-buildings with details of contemporary history.
-He will point out his Dons (like the great
-French nation, 'objects of hatred or admiration,
-but never of indifference') with such derision
-or reverence as they may deserve, and affix to
-them ancient anecdotes whereby their
-personality may be remembered. He will show
-to an admiring circle the statue which was
-painted green, the pinnacle climbed by a friend
-in the confidence of inebriation, and the marks
-of the bonfire which the Dean did not succeed
-in putting out. Even the most ignorant and
-frivolous-minded person can make his own
-college interesting. When he has succeeded
-in impressing upon his friends the true
-character of a college as a place of religion and
-sound learning, he may be permitted to show
-them such external objects as form a part of
-every one's education, and which no one (for
-the very shame of confessing it) can pretermit
-unseen, such as the gardens of New College or
-St. John's, the 'Nose' of B.N.C, the
-Burne-Jones tapestry at Exeter, or the picture of
-Mr. Gladstone in the hall of Christ Church.
-Those who absolutely insist on a more
-comprehensive view of the University and City
-may be allowed to make the ascent of some
-convenient point of view--Magdalen Tower,
-for instance; it is a stiff climb, but the view
-from the top will repay your exertions. This
-is where, as since the appearance of
-Mr. Holman Hunt's picture everybody is probably
-aware, the choir of the college annually salute
-the rising sun from the top of the tower by
-singing a Latin hymn on May morning--while
-the youth of the city, for reasons certainly not
-known to themselves, make morning hideous
-with blowing of unmelodious horns in the
-street below. At all times--even at sunrise
-on a rainy May morning--it is a noble
-prospect. The unlovely red-brick suburbs of
-the north are hidden from sight by the
-intervening towers and pinnacles of the real
-Oxford; immediately below the High Street
-winds westwards, flanked by colleges and
-churches, of which the prevailing grey is
-relieved by the green trees of those many
-gardens and unexplored nooks of verdure with
-which Oxford abounds; to the south there
-are glimpses of the river flowing towards the
-dim grey line of the distant Berkshire downs.
-To the historically-minded the outlook may
-suggest many a picture of bygone times--scenes
-of brawling in the noisy High Street,
-when the old battle of Town and Gown
-was fought with cold steel, and blood flowed
-freely on both sides--in the days when the
-maltreated townsman appealing to the Proctor
-could get no satisfaction but a 'thrust at him
-with his poleaxe!' Down the street which
-lies below passed Queen Elizabeth--'Virgo
-Pia Docta Felix'--after being royally
-entertained with sumptuous pageants and the play
-of 'Palamon and Arcyte' in the Christ Church
-hall. Over the Cherwell, in the troublous
-times of the Civil Wars, rode the Royalist
-horse to beat up the Parliamentary quarters
-below the Chiltern hills and among the woods
-of the Buckinghamshire border--enterprising
-undergraduates perhaps taking an *exeat* to
-accompany them. Here it was that certain
-scholars of Magdalen, having a quarrel with
-Lord Norreys by reason of deer-stealing, 'went
-up privately to the top of their tower, and
-waiting till he should pass by towards Ricot'
-(Rycote) 'sent down a shower of stones upon
-him and his retinew, wounding some and
-endangering others of their lives'--and worse
-might have happened had not the 'retinew'
-taken the precaution, foreseeing the assault,
-to put boards or tables on their heads. At
-a later day Pope entered Oxford by this road,
-and there is a pretty description of the scene
-in one of his letters--it will no doubt appeal
-to the nineteenth-century visitor who departs
-through slums to the architecturally
-unimpressive station of the Great Western. 'The
-shades of the evening overtook me. The
-moon rose in the clearest sky I ever saw, by
-whose solemn light I paced on slowly, without
-company, or any interruption to the range of
-my own thoughts. About a mile before I
-reached Oxford all the bells tolled in different
-notes, the clocks of every college answered one
-another, and sounded forth (some in a deeper,
-some in a softer tone) that it was eleven at
-night. All this was no ill preparation to the
-life I have led since among those old walls,
-venerable galleries, stone porticos, studious
-walks, and solitary scenes of the
-University.' Jerry-built rows of lodging-houses rather
-militate against the romance of the Iffley Road as
-we know it now.
-
-.. _`THE DEER PARK, MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-046.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *THE DEER PARK, MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD. By J. H. Lorimer.*
-
- *THE DEER PARK, MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD. By J. H. Lorimer.*
-
-
-But, after all, the majority of sightseers
-are not given to historical reflections. What
-most people want is something that 'palpitates
-with actuality;' they want to see the machine
-working. They are temporarily happy if they
-can see a Proctor in his robes of office, and
-rise to the enthusiasm of 'never having had
-such a delightful day' if the Proctor happens
-to 'proctorise' an undergraduate within the
-ken of their vision. 'It was all so *delightful*
-and mediaeval, and all that kind of thing, don't
-you know? Poor young man--simply for not
-wearing one of those horrid caps and gowns!
-*I* call it a shame.' This is the reason why a
-Degree Day is so wonderfully popular a
-ceremony. There is a sense of attractive mystery
-about it all--the Vice-Chancellor throned in
-the Theatre or Convocation House, discoursing
-in unintelligible scraps of Latin like the
-refrain of a song, and the Proctors doing their
-quarter-deck walk--although the dignity of the
-function be rather marred by the undergraduates
-who jostle and giggle in the background
-forgetting that they are assisting at a
-ceremony which is, after all, one of the
-University's reasons of existence. It is the same
-kind of curiosity which causes the lecturer to
-become suddenly conscious that he is being
-watched with intense interest--an interest to
-which he is altogether unaccustomed--by 'only
-a face at the window' of his lecture-room, to
-his own confusion and the undisguised
-amusement of his audience.
-
-.. _`IN CONVOCATION: CONFERRING A DEGREE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-048.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *IN CONVOCATION: CONFERRING A DEGREE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
- *IN CONVOCATION: CONFERRING A DEGREE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
-
-Such are sightseers: yet every man to his
-taste. When Samuel Pepys came over from
-Abingdon to see the sights of the University
-town, it is gratifying and rather surprising to
-learn that what most impressed him was the
-small price paid for creature comforts: 'Oxford
-mighty fine place,' such is the diarist's
-reflection, 'and *cheap entertainment*.'
-
-
-
-
-IV--OF EXAMINATIONS
-===================
-
- | 'Thinketh one made them in a fit of the blues.'
- | *Q*
-
-
-If there is one subject on which the
-professedly non-reading undergraduate is
-nearly always eloquent it is the aggravation
-of his naturally hard lot by the examination
-system; that is, not only 'The Schools'
-themselves, but the ancillary organization of
-lectures, 'collections,' and college tuition in
-general; all which machinery, being intended
-to save him from himself and enable him to
-accomplish the ostensible purpose of his
-residence at the University, he very properly
-regards as an entirely unnecessary instrument
-of torture, designed and perfected by the
-gratuitous and malignant ingenuity of Dons,
-whose sole object is the oppression of
-undergraduates in general and himself in particular.
-He is obliged to attend lectures, at least
-occasionally. His tutors compel him to attempt
-to pass his University examination at a definite
-date; and then--adding insult to
-injury--actually reproach him or even send him
-down for his ill success, just as if he had not
-always demonstrated to them by repeated
-statements and constant proofs of incapacity
-that he had not the smallest intention of
-getting through! Small wonder, perhaps, that
-on returning from a highly unsatisfactory
-interview with the University examiners to a
-yet more exasperating colloquy with the
-authorities of his college, he should wish that
-fate had not matched him with the 'cosmic
-process' of the nineteenth century; and that
-it had been his happier lot to come up to
-Oxford in the days when examinations were
-not, and his remote ancestors got their degrees
-without any vain display of mere intellectual
-proficiency, or went down without them if
-they chose.
-
-.. _`A LECTURE-ROOM IN MAGDALEN COLLEGE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-052.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *A LECTURE-ROOM IN MAGDALEN COLLEGE. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
- *A LECTURE-ROOM IN MAGDALEN COLLEGE. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
-
-And yet, should the modern undergraduate
-take the trouble (which of course he never
-does) to acquaint himself with the statutes
-and ordinances which governed his University
-in the pre-examination period, he would find
-that even then the rose was not wholly devoid
-of thorns. Even then the powers that be had
-decreed that life should not be completely
-beer, nor altogether skittles. It is true that
-the student was probably less molested by his
-college; but the regulations of the University
-dealt far more hardly with him than they
-do at present. Under the statutes of
-Archbishop Laud, the University exercised those
-functions of teaching and general supervision
-which it has since in great part surrendered
-to its component colleges; and in theory the
-University was a hard task-mistress.
-
-Attendance at professorial lectures was
-theoretically obligatory, and 'since not only
-reading and thought, but practice also, is of
-the greatest avail towards proficiency in
-learning,' it was required that the candidate for a
-degree should 'dispute' in the Schools at stated
-and frequent times during the whole course
-of his academic career. Beginning by
-listening to the disputations of his seniors
-(a custom which perhaps survives in the
-modern fashion which sometimes provides
-a 'gallery' at the ceremony of *viva voce*),
-he was as time went on required himself to
-maintain and publicly defend doctrines in a
-manner which would be highly embarrassing
-to his modern successor--'responding' at first
-to the arguments of the stater of a theory,
-and with riper wisdom being promoted to
-the position of Opponent.' This opposing
-and responding was termed 'doing
-generals.' 'Argufying' was the business of the University
-in the seventeenth century, and had been so
-for a long time.
-
-On the memorable occasion of Queen
-Elizabeth's visit to Oxford in the year 1566,
-Her Majesty was entertained intermittently
-with disputations on the moon's influence
-on the tides, and the right of rebellion
-against bad government. Thus, Archbishop
-Laud required of the seventeenth-century
-undergraduate so many disputations before
-he became a *sophista*, and so many again
-before he could be admitted to the degree
-of Bachelor; and if the system had worked
-in practice as it was intended to do in
-theory, young Oxford would not have had
-an easy time of it. In the days of Antony
-Wood's undergraduate career exercises in the
-'Schooles' were 'very good.' 'Philosophy
-disputations in Lent time, frequent in the
-Greek tongue; *coursing* very much, ending
-alwaies in blowes,' which Wood considers
-scandalous; but at least it shows the serious
-spirit of the disputants. But a University can
-always be trusted to temper the biting wind
-of oppressive regulations to its shorn
-alumni; and there can be no doubt that
-the comparative slackness and sleepiness
-of the eighteenth century--a somnolence
-which it is easy to exaggerate, but
-impossible altogether to deny--must have
-tended to wear the sharp corners off
-the academic curriculum. Indications that
-this was so are not wanting. After all,
-there must have been many ways of avoiding
-originality in a disputation. A writer
-in 'Terrae Filius' (1720) states the case as follows:--
-
-.. vspace:: 2
-
-'All students in the University who are above
-one year's standing, and have not taken their
-batchelor' (of arts) 'degree, are required by statute
-to be present at this awful solemnity' (disputation
-for a degree), 'which is designed for a public proof
-of the progress he has made in the art of reasoning;
-tho' in fact it is no more than a formal repetition of
-a set of syllogisms upon some ridiculous question in
-logick, which they get by rote, or, perhaps, only
-read out of their caps, which lie before them with
-their notes in them. These commodious sets of
-syllogisms are call'd strings, and descend from
-undergraduate to undergraduate, in regular succession; so
-that, when any candidate for a degree is to exercise
-his talent in argumentation, he has nothing else to
-do but to enquire amongst his friends for a string
-upon such-and-such a question.'
-
-.. vspace:: 2
-
-So, even in the early part of the present
-century, reverend persons proceeding to the
-degree of D.D. have been known to avail
-themselves of a thesis (or written harangue on
-some point of theology) not compiled by their
-unaided exertions, but kept among the archives
-of their college and passed round as occasion
-might require. If mature theologians have
-reconciled this with their consciences in the
-nineteenth, what may not have been possible
-to an undergraduate in the eighteenth century?
-Also, the functionary who stood in the place
-of the modern examiner was a very different
-kind of person from his successor--that
-incarnation of cold and impassive criticism;
-collusion between 'opponent' and 'respondent'
-must have been possible and frequent; and
-so far had things gone that the candidate for
-a degree was permitted to choose the 'Master'
-who was to examine him, and it appears to
-have been customary to invite your Master
-to dinner on the night preceding the final
-disputation. Witness 'Terrae Filius 'once more:--
-
-.. vspace:: 2
-
-'Most candidates get leave .... to chuse their
-own examiners, who never fail to be their old
-cronies and toping companions.... It is also well
-known to be the custom for the candidates either
-to present their examiners with a piece of gold,
-or to give them a handsome entertainment, and
-make them drunk, which they commonly do the
-night before examination, and some times keep them
-till morning, and so adjourn, cheek by jowl, from
-their drinking-room to the school, where they are to
-be examined.'
-
-.. vspace:: 2
-
-The same author adds: 'This to me seems
-the great business of *determination*: to pay
-money and get drunk.'
-
-Vicesimus Knox, who took his B.A. degree
-in 1775, is at pains to represent the whole
-process of so-called examination as an elaborate
-farce. 'Every candidate,' he says, 'is obliged
-to be examined in the whole circle of the
-sciences by three masters of arts, of his own
-choice.' Naturally, the temptation is too much
-for poor humanity. 'It is reckoned good
-management to get acquainted with two or
-three jolly young masters and supply them
-well with port previously to the examination.' *Viva
-voce* once put on this convivial footing, it
-is not surprising that 'the examiners and the
-candidate often converse on the last drinking
-bout, or on horses, or read the newspapers, or
-a novel, or divert themselves as well as they
-can till the clock strikes eleven, when all
-parties descend, and the *testimonium* is signed
-by the masters.' Under such circumstances it
-is obvious that the provisions of Archbishop
-Laud might be shorn of half their terrors.
-Even at an earlier period other methods of
-evasion were not wanting. As early as 1656,
-orders were made 'abolishing' the custom of
-candidates standing treat to examiners. In
-the statute which still prescribes the duties
-of the *clericus universitatis*, there is a clause
-threatening him with severe penalties--to the
-extent of paying a fine of ten shillings--should
-he so far misuse his especial charge, the
-University clock, as to 'retard and presently
-precipitate the course' of that venerable
-time-piece, 'in such a manner that the hours
-appointed for public exercises be unjustly
-shortened, to the harm and prejudice of the
-studious.' Moreover, we read in Wood that
-notice of examination was given by 'tickets
-stuck up on certaine public corners, which
-would be suddenly after taken downe' by the
-candidate's friends. To such straits and to
-such unworthy shifts could disputants be
-reduced by mere inability to find matter.
-
-It has been said that attendance at professorial
-lectures was theoretically obligatory; but
-it is hardly necessary to point out that even
-serious students have occasionally dispensed
-with the duty of attending lectures; and it is
-more than whispered there have been occasions
-in recent centuries when it was not an audience
-only that was wanting. There are, of course,
-instances of both extremes. Rumour tells of
-a certain professor of anatomy, who, lacking
-a quorum, bade his servant 'bring out the
-skeleton, in order that I may be able to address
-you as "gentle*men*;"' but all professors have
-not been so conscientious. Gibbon goes so
-far as to assert that 'in the University of
-Oxford, the greater part of the public professors
-have for these many years given up altogether
-the pretence of teaching,' and the Reverend
-James Hurdie does not much improve the
-matter, when he prepares to refute the
-historian's charge in his 'Vindication of Magdalen
-College.' So far as the College is concerned,
-the reverend gentleman has something of a
-case; but his defence of the University is not
-altogether satisfying. Some of the professors,
-no doubt, do lecture in a statutable manner.
-But 'the late noble but unfortunate Professor
-of Civil Law began his office with reading
-lectures, and only desisted for want of an
-audience' (a plausible excuse, were it not that
-some lecturers seem to have entertained
-peculiar ideas as to the constitution of an
-audience). 'Terrae Filius' has a story of a
-Professor of Divinity who came to his
-lecture-room, found to his surprise and displeasure,
-a band of intending hearers, and dismissed
-them straightway with the summary remark:
-'Domini, vos non estis idonei auditores!' 'The
-present Professor, newly appointed (the
-author has heard it from the highest authority),
-means to read.' Moreover, 'the late
-Professor of Botany at one time *did* read.' In
-fact, as the 'Oxford Spy' observes in 1818:--
-
- | 'Yet here the rays of Modern Science spread:
- | Professors are appointed, lectures read.
- | If none attend, or hear: not ours the blame,
- | Theirs is the folly--and be theirs the shame.'
-
-It is evident that professorial lectures were not
-a wholly unbearable burden.
-
-'It is recorded in the veracious chronicle
-of Herodotus that Sandoces, a Persian judge,
-had been crucified by Darius, on the charge of
-taking a bribe to determine a cause wrongly;
-but while he yet hung on the cross, Darius
-found by calculation that the good deeds of
-Sandoces towards the king's house were more
-numerous than his evil deeds, and so, confessing
-that he had acted with more haste than
-wisdom, he ordered him to be taken down and
-set at large.'
-
-.. _`THE LIBRARY, MERTON COLLEGE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-062.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *THE LIBRARY, MERTON COLLEGE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
- *THE LIBRARY, MERTON COLLEGE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
-
-So when the Universities are at last
-confronted with that great Day of Reckoning
-which is continually held over their heads
-by external enemies, and which timorous friends
-are always trying to stave off by grudging
-concessions and half-hearted sympathy with
-Movements; when we are brought to the bar
-of that grand and final commission, which is
-once for all to purge Oxford and Cambridge
-of their last remnants of mediaevalism, and
-bring them into line with the marching columns
-of modern Democracy; when the judgment
-is set and the books are opened, we may hope
-that some extenuating circumstances may be
-found to set against the long enumeration of
-academic crimes. There will be no denying
-that Oxford has been the home of dead
-languages and undying prejudice. It will be
-admitted as only too true that Natural Science
-students were for many years compelled to learn
-a little Greek, and that colleges have not been
-prepared to sacrifice the greater part of their
-immoral revenues to the furtherance of
-University Extension; and we shall have to plead
-guilty to the damning charge of having
-returned two Tory members to several
-successive Parliaments. All this Oxford has done,
-and more; there is no getting out of it.
-Yet her counsel will be able to plead in
-her favour that once at least she has been
-found not retarding the rear, but actually
-leading the van of nineteenth-century
-progress; for it will hardly be denied that if the
-Universities did not invent the Examination
-System, at least they were among the first to
-welcome and to adapt it; and that if it had
-not been for the development of examinations,
-qualifying and competitive, at Oxford and
-Cambridge, the ranks of the Civil Service would
-have continued for many years longer to be
-recruited by the bad old method of nomination
-(commonly called jobbery and nepotism by
-the excluded), and society would, perhaps,
-never have realised that a knowledge of
-Chaucer is among the most desirable qualifications
-for an officer in Her Majesty's Army.
-Here, at least, the Universities have been
-privileged to set an example.
-
-The Oxford examination system is practically
-contemporaneous with the century; the
-first regular class list having been published
-in 1807. The change was long in coming,
-and when it did come the face of the
-University was not revolutionised; if the
-alteration contained, as it undoubtedly did, the germs
-of a revolution which was to extend far
-beyond academic boundaries, it bore the aspect
-of a most desirable but most moderate
-reform. Instead of obtaining a degree by the
-obsolete process of perfunctory disputation,
-ambitious men were invited to offer certain
-books (classical works for the most part), and
-in these to undergo the ordeal of a written
-and oral examination; the oral part being at
-that time probably as important as the other.
-Sudden and violent changes are repugnant to
-all Englishmen, and more especially to the
-rulers of Universities, those homes of ancient
-tradition; and just as early railways found it
-difficult to escape from the form of the
-stage-coach and the old nomenclature of the road,
-so the new Final Honour School took over
-(so to speak) the plant of a system which it
-superseded. *Viva voce* was still (and is to the
-present day) important, because it was the
-direct successor of oral disputation. The
-candidate for a degree had obtained that
-distinction by a theoretical argument with three
-'opponents' in the Schools; so now the
-opponents were represented by a nearly
-corresponding number of examiners, and the *viva
-voce* part of the examination was for a long
-time regarded as a contest of wit between the
-candidate and the questioner. Nor did the
-race for honours affect the great majority of
-the University as it does at present. It was
-intended for the talented few: it was not a
-matter of course that Tom, Dick, and Harry
-should go in for honours because their friends
-wished it, or because their college tutor
-wished to keep his college out of the evening
-papers. Candidates for honours were regarded
-as rather exceptional persons, and a brilliant
-performance in the Schools was regarded as
-a tolerably sure augury of success in life: a
-belief which was, perhaps, justified by facts
-then, but which--like most beliefs, dying hard--has
-unfortunately survived into a state of
-society where it is impossible to provide the
-assurance of a successful career for all and
-each of the eighty or hundred 'first-class' men
-whom the University annually presents to an
-unwelcoming world.
-
-.. _`READING THE NEWDIGATE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-066.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *READING THE NEWDIGATE. Drawn by T, H. Crawford.*
-
- *READING THE NEWDIGATE. Drawn by T, H. Crawford.*
-
-
-However small its beginnings it was
-inevitable that the recognition of intellect should
-exercise the greatest influence--though not
-immediately and obviously--on the future of
-the University. *La carrière* once *ouverte aux
-talents*--the fact being established and
-recognised that one man was intellectually not
-only as good as another, but a deal better--colleges
-could not help following the example
-set them; the first stirrings of 'inter-collegiate
-competition' began to be felt, and after forty
-years or so (for colleges generally proceed in
-these and similar matters with commendable
-caution, and it was only the earlier part of
-the nineteenth century after all) began the
-gradual abolition of 'close' scholarships and
-fellowships--those admirable endowments
-whereby the native of some specified county
-or town was provided with a competence for
-life, solely in virtue of the happy accident of
-birth. To disregard talent openly placarded
-and certificated was no longer possible. The
-most steady-going and venerable institutions
-began to be reanimated by the infusion of
-new blood, and to be pervaded by the newest
-and most 'dangerous' ideas.
-
-Nor were the outside public slow to avail
-themselves after their manner of the changed
-state of things. The possessor of a University
-degree has at all times been regarded by less
-fortunate persons with a kind of superstitious
-awe, as one who has lived in mysterious
-precincts and practised curious (if not always
-useful) arts, and at first the title of
-'Honourman,' implying that the holder belonged to a
-privileged few--*élite* of the *élites*--whom a
-University, itself learned, had delighted to
-honour for their learning, could inspire nothing
-less than reverence. Also the distinction was a
-very convenient one. The public is naturally
-only too glad to have any ready and
-satisfactory testimonial which may help as a method
-of selection among the host of applicants
-for its various employments; and here was a
-diploma signed by competent authorities and
-bearing no suspicion of fear or favour.
-Presently the public began to follow the lead of
-Oxford and Cambridge, and examine for itself,
-but that is another story: schoolmasters more
-especially have always kept a keen eye on
-the class list. So an intellectual distinction
-comes in time to have a commercial price,
-and this no doubt has had something (though,
-we will hope, not everything) to do with the
-increase in the number of 'Schools' and the
-growing facilities for obtaining so-called
-honours. But it is needless to observe that the
-multiplication of the article tends to the
-depreciation of its value. The First-class man,
-who was a potential Cabinet Minister or an
-embryo Archbishop at the beginning of the
-century, is now capable of descending to all
-kinds of employments. He does not indeed--being
-perhaps conscious of incapacity--serve as
-a waiter in a hotel, after the fashion of
-American students in the vacation, but he has been
-known to accept gratefully a post in a private
-school where his tenure of office depends
-largely on the form he shows in bowling to
-the second eleven.
-
-Here in Oxford, though we still respect a
-'First,' and though perhaps the greater part
-of our available educational capacity is devoted
-to the conversion of passmen into honourmen,
-there are signs that examinations are no
-longer quite regarded as the highest good
-and the chief object of existence. It is an
-age of specialism, and yet it is hard to mould
-the whole University system to suit the
-particular studies of every specialist. Multiply
-Final Schools as you will, 'the genuine student'
-with one engrossing interest will multiply far
-more quickly; and just as the athlete and
-non-reading man complains that the schools
-interrupt his amusements, the man who specialises
-on the pips of an orange, or who regards
-nothing in history worth reading except a period
-of two years and six months in the later
-Byzantine empire, will pathetically lament that
-examinations are interrupting his real work.
-Are men made for the Schools, or the Schools
-for men? It is a continual problem; perhaps
-examinations are only a *pis aller*, and we must
-be content to wait till science instructs us how
-to gauge mental faculty by experiment without
-subjecting the philosopher to the ordeal of Latin
-Prose, and the 'pure scholar' to the test of a
-possibly useless acquaintance with the true
-inwardness of Hegelianism. After all it is the
-greatest happiness of the greatest number that
-has to be considered, and the majority as yet
-are not special students. Moreover, there are
-various kinds of specialists. If 'general
-knowledge' (as has been said) is too often
-synonymous with 'particular ignorance,' it is equally
-true that specialism in one branch is
-sometimes not wholly unconnected with failure in
-another.
-
-.. _`A DANCE AT ST. JOHN'S.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-072.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *A DANCE AT ST. JOHN'S. Drawn by T. Hamilton Crawford, R.W.S.*
-
- *A DANCE AT ST. JOHN'S. Drawn by T. Hamilton Crawford, R.W.S.*
-
-
-It was the severance of another link with
-the past when the scene of examinations was
-transferred from the 'Old Schools'--the
-purlieus of the Sheldonian and the Bodleian--to
-a new and perhaps unnecessarily palatial
-building in the High Street, which is as little in
-keeping with the dark, crumbling walls of its
-neighbour, University College, as the motley
-throng of examinees (*pueri innuptaeque puellae*)
-is out of harmony with the traditions of an
-age which did not recognise the necessity of
-female education. We have changed all that,
-and possibly the change is for the better, for
-while the atmosphere which pervaded the
-ancient dens now appropriated to the use of
-the great library was certainly academic, and
-was sometimes cool and pleasant in summer,
-the conditions of the game became almost
-intolerable in winter. Unless he would die under
-the process of examinations like the Chinese
-of story, the candidate must provide himself
-with greatcoats and rugs enough (it was said)
-to hide a 'crib,' or even a Liddell and Scott,
-for the proximity of the Bodleian forbade any
-lighting or warming apparatus. But in the new
-examination schools comfort and luxury reign;
-rare marbles adorn even the least conspicuous
-corners, and the only survivals of antiquity are
-the ancient tables, which are popularly supposed
-to be contemporaneous with the examination
-system, and are bescrawled and bescratched
-with every possible variety of inscription and
-hieroglyphic--from adaptations of verses in
-the Psalms to a list of possible Derby
-winners--from a caricature of the 'invigilating'
-examiner to a sentimental but unflattering
-reminiscence of one's partner at last night's
-dance. Here they sit, a remarkable medley,
-all sorts, conditions, and even ages of men,
-herded together as they probably never will
-be again in after-life: undeserving talent cheek
-by jowl with meritorious dulness; callow
-youth fresh from the rod of the schoolmaster,
-and mature age with a family waiting anxiously
-outside; and a minority of the fairer sex,
-whose presence is rather embarrassing to
-examiners who do not see their way to
-dealing with possible hysteria. And in the
-evening they will return--if it is
-Commemoration week; the venerable tables will be
-cleared away, and the 'Scholae Magnae Borealis
-et Australis' will be used for the more
-desirable purpose of dancing. Is it merely soft
-nothings that the Christ Church undergraduate
-is whispering to that young lady from
-Somerville Hall, as they 'sit out' the lancers
-in the romantic light of several hundred
-Chinese lanterns? Not at all; they are
-comparing notes about their *viva voce* in history.
-
-
-
-
-V--UNIVERSITY JOURNALISM
-========================
-
- | 'I only wish my critics had to write
- | A High-class Paper!'
- | *Anon.*
-
-
-The business of those who teach in the
-Universities is to criticise mistakes,
-and criticism of style has two results for the
-master and the scholar. It may produce that
-straining after correctness in small matters
-which the cold world calls pedantry; and in
-the case of those who are not content only to
-observe, but are afflicted with a desire to
-produce, criticism of style takes the form of
-parody or imitation; for a good parody or
-a good imitation of an author's manner is an
-object-lesson in criticism. Hence it is that
-that same intolerance of error which makes
-members of a University slow in the
-production of really great works stimulates the
-genesis of ephemeral and mostly imitative
-literature. The more Oxford concerns herself
-with literary style, the more she is likely in
-her less serious moods to ape the manner of
-contemporary literature. It all comes, in the
-first instance, of being taught to copy Sophocles
-and travesty Virgil. Ephemeral literature,
-then, at the Universities has always been
-essentially imitative. In the last century, when
-it was the fashion to be classical--and when
-as in the earlier poems of Mr. Barry Lyndon,
-'Sol bedecked the verdant mead, or pallid
-Luna shed her ray'--Oxonian minor poets
-imitated the London wits and sang the charms
-of the local belles under the sobriquets of
-Chloe and Delia, and academic essayists copied
-the manner of the 'Spectator,' and hit off
-the weaknesses of their friends, Androtion and
-Clearchus; and now that the world has come
-to be ruled by newspapers, it is only natural
-that the style and the methods of the daily
-and weekly press should in some degree affect
-the lighter literature of Universities, and that
-not only undergraduates, who are naturally
-imitative, but even dons, who might be
-supposed to know better, should find themselves
-contributing to and redacting publications
-which are conducted more or less on the lines
-of the 'new journalism.'
-
-.. _`THE RADCLIFFE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-076.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *THE RADCLIFFE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
- *THE RADCLIFFE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
-
-Oxford has been slow to develop in this
-particular direction, and the reasons are not far
-to seek. The conditions just now are
-exceptionally favourable--that is, a *cacoëthes
-scribendi* has coincided with abundance of
-matter to write about, but the organs of the
-great external world naturally provide a model
-for the writer. But it is only recently that
-these causes have been all together present
-and operative, and the absence of one or
-more of them has at different times been as
-effectual as the absence of all. In the early
-part of the present century there can have been
-no lack of matter: University reform was at
-least in the air, athletics were developing, the
-examination system was already in full swing.
-But for some reason the tendency of the
-University was not in the direction of the
-production of ephemeral or at least frivolous
-literature. The pompous Toryism of
-University authorities seventy years ago did not
-encourage any intellectual activity unconnected
-with the regular curriculum of the student,
-and when intellectual activity began to develop,
-it was rather on the lines of theological
-discussion--the subjects were hardly fitted for
-the columns of a newspaper. At an earlier
-date the Vice-Chancellor was interviewed by
-the delegate of an aspiring clique of
-undergraduates, who wished to form a literary club
-and to obtain the sanction of authority for its
-formation. He refused to grant the society any
-formal recognition, on the ground that while it
-was true that the statutes did not absolutely
-forbid such things, they certainly did not
-specifically mention them; and the members of
-the club--when it was eventually founded
-independent of the Vice-Chancellarial auspices--were
-known among their friends as the 'Lunatics.' Such
-was the somewhat obscurantist temper of
-the University about the year 1820; and we can
-imagine that the Vice-Chancellor, who could find
-nothing in the statutes encouraging a debating
-society, would not have looked with enthusiastic
-approbation on a newspaper designed to discuss
-University matters without respect for authority.
-Even if he had, it would have been hard to
-appeal to all sections of the community; though
-there was certainly more general activity in the
-University than formerly, the *gaudia* and
-*discursus* of undergraduates were matters of
-comparatively small importance to their friends, and
-of none at all to their pastors and masters.
-
-In the earlier part of the eighteenth century
-the conditions were exactly reversed. To judge
-from the specimens that have survived to the
-present day (and how much of our own lighter
-literature will be in evidence 170 years hence?)
-there must have been plenty of 'available
-talent.' It was an age of essayists. Addison
-and Steele set the fashion for the metropolis:
-and as has been said before, Oxford satirists
-followed at some distance in the wake of these
-giants. The form of 'Terrae Filius' is that
-of the 'Tatler' and 'Spectator,' and the 'Oxford
-Magazine' of that day is largely composed of
-essays on men, women, and manners; many
-are still quite readable, and most have been
-recognised as remarkably smart in their day.
-Nor is it only in professed and formal satire
-that the talent of the time displays itself.
-Thomas Hearne of the Bodleian was careful
-to keep a voluminous note-book, chronicling
-not only the 'plums' extracted by his daily
-researches from the dark recesses of the library,
-but also various anecdotes, scandalous or
-respectable, of his contemporaries; and one is
-tempted to regret that so admirable a talent for
-bepraising his friends and libelling his enemies
-should be comparatively *perdu* among extracts
-from 'Schoppius de Arte Critica,' copies of
-church brasses, and such-like antiquarian lumber--the
-whole forming a 'Collection' only recently
-published for the world's edification by the
-Oxford Historical Society. His 'appreciations'
-would have made the fortune of any paper
-relying for its main interest on personalities,
-after the fashion which we are learning from
-the Americans. 'Descriptions of his friends
-and enemies, such as 'An extravagant, haughty,
-loose man,' 'a Dull, Stupid, whiggish
-Companion,' are frequent and free; and anecdotes
-of obscure college scandal abound. We read
-how the 'Snivelling, conceited, and ignorant,
-as well as Fanatical Vice-Principal of
-St. Edmund Hall .... *sconc'd* two gentlemen,
-which is a Plain Indication of his Furious
-Temper;' and how 'Mr. ---- of *Christ
-Church* last *Easter-day*, under pretence of
-being ill, desired one of the other chaplains
-to read Prayers for him: which accordingly
-was done. Yet such was the impudence of
-the man that he appeared in the Hall at dinner!'
-
-.. _`IN THE BODLEIAN.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-080.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *IN THE BODLEIAN. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
- *IN THE BODLEIAN. Drawn by Ernest Stamp.*
-
-
-As it was, however, those very collections
-which exhibit Hearne's peculiar genius show
-us at the same time how impossible, even
-granting the supposition to be not altogether
-anachronistic, a regular University 'News-letter'
-would have been. We talk now in a vague
-and, perhaps, rather unintelligible fashion of
-'University politics,' and in some way contrive
-to identify Gladstonianism with a susceptibility
-to the claims of a school of English literature,
-or whatever is the latest phrase of progress--mixing
-up internal legislation with the external
-politics of the great world. But in Hearne's
-time there were no University politics to
-discuss. 'Their toasts,' says Gibbon of the
-Fellows of Magdalen College, 'were not
-expressive of the most lively loyalty to the
-House of Hanover,' and Hearne's interest in
-politics has nothing to do with the Hebdomadal
-Council. When he speaks of 'our white-liver'd
-Professor, Dr. ----,' or describes the
-highest official in the University as 'old
-Smooth-boots, the Vice-Chancellor,' it is generally for
-the very sufficient reason that the person in
-question is what Dr. Johnson called a 'vile
-Whig.' But Tory politics and common-room
-scandal and jobbery apart, the University
-would appear to have slept the sleep of the
-unjust. 'Terrae Filius' grumbles at the corrupt
-method of 'examination,' and 'The Student' is
-lively and satirical on the peccadilloes and
-escapades of various members of society. But
-your prose essayist is apt to be intermittent,
-and the publication that relies mainly on him
-leans on a breaking reed; so that we can
-hardly be surprised that the last-named
-periodical should eke out its pages with
-imitations of Tibullus, to the first of which
-the Editor appends the encouraging note, 'If
-this is approved by the publick, the Author
-will occasionally oblige us with more *Elegies*
-in the same style and manner.'
-
-Now that every one is anxious to see his
-own name and his friend's name in print, and
-that the general public takes, or pretends to
-take, a keen interest in the details of every
-cricket-match and boat-race, a paper chronicling
-University matters cannot complain of the
-smallness of its *clientèle*. Every one wants
-news. The undergraduate who has made a
-speech at the Union, or a century for his
-college second eleven, wants a printed
-certificate of his glorious achievements. Dons, and
-undergraduates too, for that matter, are
-anxious to read about the last hint of a
-possible Commission or the newest thing in
-University Extension. Men who have gone
-down but a short time ago are still interested
-in the doings of the (of course degenerate)
-remnant who are left; and even the
-non-academic Oxford residents, a large and
-increasing class, are on the watch for some glimpse
-of University doings, and some distant echo
-of common-room gossip. Modern journalism
-appeals more or less to all these classes; it
-cannot complain of the want of an audience,
-nor, on the whole, of a want of news to satisfy
-it, and certainly an Oxford organ cannot lack
-models for imitation, or awful examples to
-avoid. It is, in fact, the very multiplicity of
-contemporary periodicals that is the source of
-difficulty. A paper conducted in the provinces
-by amateurs--that is, by persons who have also
-other things to do--is always on its probation.
-The fierce light of the opinion of a limited
-public is continually beating on it. Its
-contributors should do everything a little better
-than the hirelings of the merely professional
-organs of the unlearned metropolis; its leaders
-must be more judicious than those of the
-'Times,' its occasional notes a little more spicy
-than Mr. Labouchere's, and its reviews a little
-more learned than those of the 'Journal of
-Philology.' Should it fall short of perfection
-in any of these branches, it 'has no reason
-for existence,' and is in fact described as
-'probably moribund.' Yet another terror is added
-to the life of an Oxford editor: he *must* be
-at least often 'funny;' he must endeavour in
-some sort to carry out the great traditions of
-the 'Oxford Spectator' and the 'Shotover
-Papers;' and as the English public is generally
-best amused by personalities, he must be
-careful to observe the almost invisible line which
-separates the justifiable skit from the offensive
-attack. Now, the undergraduate contributor
-to the press is seldom successful as a humourist.
-He is occasionally violent and he is often--more
-especially after the festive season of
-Christmas--addicted to sentimental verse; but
-for mere frivolity and 'lightness of touch' it
-is safer to apply to his tutor.
-
-It is a rather remarkable fact that almost
-all University papers--certainly all that have
-succeeded under the trying conditions of the
-game--have been managed and for the most
-part written, not by the exuberant vitality of
-undergraduate youth, but by the less interesting
-prudence of graduate maturity. It is
-remarkable, but not surprising. Undergraduate talent
-is occasionally brilliant, but is naturally
-transient. Generations succeed each other with such
-rapidity that the most capable editorial staff is
-vanishing into thin air just at the moment when
-a journal has reached the highest pitch of
-popularity. Moreover, amateur talent is always hard
-to deal with, as organizers of private theatricals
-know to their cost; and there is no member of
-society more capable of disappointing his friends
-at a critical moment than the amateur contributor
-to the press. Should the spirit move him,
-he will send four columns when the editor wants
-one; but if he is not in the vein, or happens
-to have something else to do, there is no
-promise so sacred and no threat so terrible as to
-persuade him to put pen to paper. If these
-are statements of general application, they are
-doubly true of undergraduates, who are always
-distracted by a too great diversity of
-occupations: Jones, whose power of intermittent satire
-has made him the terror of his Dons, has
-unaccountably taken to reading for the Schools;
-the poet, Smith, has gone into training for the
-Torpids; and Brown, whose '*Voces Populi* in a
-Ladies' College' were to have been something
-quite too excruciatingly funny, has fallen in
-love in the vacation and will write nothing but
-bad poetry. Such are the trials of the editor
-who drives an undergraduate team; and hence
-it comes about that the steady-going periodicals
-for which the public can pay a yearly
-subscription in advance, with the prospect of
-seeing at any rate half the value of its money,
-are principally controlled by graduates. No
-doubt they sometimes preserve a certain
-appearance of youthful vigour by worshipping
-undergraduate talent, and using the word
-'Donnish' as often and as contemptuously as
-possible.
-
-.. _`SAILING ON THE UPPER RIVER.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-086.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *SAILING ON THE UPPER RIVER. Drawn by L. Speed.*
-
- *SAILING ON THE UPPER RIVER. Drawn by L. Speed.*
-
-
-Nevertheless, there appear from time to
-time various ephemeral and meteoric
-publications, edited by junior members of the
-University. They waste the editor's valuable
-time, no doubt; and yet he is learning a lesson
-which may, perhaps, be useful to him in after-life;
-for it is said that until he is undeceived
-by hard experience, every man is born with
-the conviction that he can do three things--drive
-a dog-cart, sail a boat, and edit a paper.
-
-
-
-
-VI--THE UNIVERSITY AS SEEN FROM OUTSIDE.
-========================================
-
- | 'A man must serve his time to every trade
- | Save censure--critics all are ready made.'
- | *Byron.*
-
-
-It has been said that the function of a
-University is to criticise; but the
-proposition is at least equally true that Oxford
-and Cambridge are continually conjugating
-the verb in the passive. We--and more
-especially we who live in Oxford, for the
-sister University apparently is either more
-virtuous or more skilful in concealing her
-peccadilloes from the public eye--enjoy the
-priceless advantage of possessing innumerable
-friends whose good nature is equalled by
-their frankness; and if we do not learn
-wisdom, that is not because the opportunity
-is not offered to us. It is true that our
-great governing body, the Hebdomadal Council,
-has hitherto preserved its independence by a
-prudent concealment of its deliberations: no
-reporter has ever as yet penetrated into
-that august assemblage; but whatever emerges
-to the light of day is seized upon with avidity.
-Debates in Convocation or even in Congregation
-(the latter body including only the
-resident Masters of Arts), although the subject
-may have been somewhat remote from the
-interests of the general public, and the
-number of the voters perhaps considerably
-increased by the frivolous reason that it was
-a wet afternoon, when there was nothing
-else to do than to govern the University--debates
-on every conceivable subject blush
-to find themselves reported the next morning
-almost in the greatest of daily papers; and
-perhaps the result of a division on the
-addition of one more Oriental language to
-Responsions, or one more crocket to a new
-pinnacle of St. Mary's Church, is even
-honoured by a leading article. This is highly
-gratifying to residents in the precincts of the
-University, but even to them it is now and
-then not altogether comprehensible. Nor is
-it only questions concerning the University as
-a whole which appeal to the external public;
-even college business and college scandal
-sometimes assume an unnatural importance. Years
-ago one of the tutors of a certain college was
-subjected to the venerable and now almost
-obsolete process of 'screwing up,' and some
-young gentlemen were rusticated for complicity
-in the offence. Even in academic circles the
-crime and its punishment were not supposed
-to be likely to interfere with the customary
-revolution of the solar system; but the editor
-of a London daily paper--and one, too, which
-was supposed to be more especially in touch
-with that great heart of the people which
-is well known to hold Universities in
-contempt--considered the incident so important
-as to publish a leading article with the
-remarkable exordium, 'Every one knew
-that Mr. ----, of ---- College, would be
-screwed up some day!' Most of the *abonnés*
-of this journal must, it is to be feared, have
-blushed for their discreditable ignorance of
-Mr. ----'s existence, not to mention that
-leaden-footed retribution which was dogging
-him to a merited doom.
-
-.. _`PORCH OF ST. MARY'S.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-090.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *PORCH OF ST. MARY'S. Drawn by J. Pennell.*
-
- *PORCH OF ST. MARY'S. Drawn by J. Pennell.*
-
-
-It is hardly necessary to say that in
-nine cases out of ten comment on the
-proceedings of a learned University takes the
-form of censure: nor are censors far to
-seek. There are always plenty of young
-men more or less connected with the Press
-who have wrongs to avenge; who are only
-too glad to have an opportunity of 'scoring
-off' the college authority which did its
-best--perhaps unsuccessfully, but still with a
-manifest intention--to embitter their
-academic existence; or of branding once for
-all as reactionary and obscurantist the
-hide-bound regulations of a University which
-did not accord them the highest honours.
-In these cases accuracy of facts and statistics
-is seldom a matter of much importance.
-Generally speaking, you can say what you
-like about a college, or the University,
-without much fear of contradiction--provided
-that you abstain from mere personalities.
-For one thing, the cap is always
-fitted on some one else's head. It is not
-the business of St. Botolph's to concern itself
-with an attack which is obviously meant for
-St. Boniface: it is darkly whispered in the
-St. Boniface common-room that after all no
-one knows what actually *does* go on in
-St. Botolph's: and obviously neither of these
-venerable foundations can have anything to
-do with answering impeachments of the
-University and its financial system.
-Moreover, even if the Dons should rouse
-themselves from their usual torpor and attempt
-a defence, it is not very likely that the
-public will listen to them: any statement
-proceeding from an academic source being
-always regarded with the gravest suspicion.
-That is why 'any stick is good enough
-to beat the Universities,' and there are
-always plenty of sticks who are quite ready
-to perform the necessary castigation.
-
-Moreover, these writers generally deal
-with a subject which is always interesting,
-because it is one on which every one has an
-opinion, and an opinion which is entitled to
-respect--the education of youth. Any one
-can pick holes in the University system of
-teaching and examination--'can strike a finger
-on the place, and say, "Thou ailest here and
-here,"'--or construct schemes of reform: more
-especially young men who have recently quitted
-their Alma Mater, and are therefore qualified
-to assert (as they do, and at times not
-without a certain plausibility) that she has failed
-to teach them anything.
-
-That the British public, with so much to
-think about, should find time to be diverted
-by abuse of its seats of learning, is at first
-a little surprising; but there is no doubt
-that such satire has an agreeable piquancy, and
-for tolerably obvious reasons. English humour
-is generally of the personal kind, and needs a
-butt; a capacity in which all persons
-connected with education have from time
-immemorial been qualified to perform, *ex officio*
-(education being generally considered as an
-imparting of unnecessary and even harmful
-knowledge, and obviously dissociated from the
-pursuit of financial prosperity, both as regards
-the teachers and the taught): Shakespeare set
-the fashion, and Dickens and Thackeray have
-settled the hash of schoolmasters and college
-tutors for the next fifty years, at any rate.
-Schoolmasters, indeed, are becoming so
-important and prosperous a part of the community
-that they will probably be the first to
-reinstate themselves in the respect of the public;
-but Dons have more difficulties to contend
-against. They have seldom any prospect of
-opulence. Then, again, they suffer from the
-quasi-monastic character of colleges; they have
-inherited some of the railing accusations which
-used to be brought against monasteries. The
-voice of scandal--especially feminine scandal--is
-not likely to be long silent about celibate
-societies, and no Rudyard Kipling has yet
-arisen to plead on behalf of Fellows that they
-
- | 'aren't no blackguards too,
- | But single men in barracks, most remarkable like you.'
-
-Altogether the legend of 'monks,' 'port wine
-and prejudice,' 'dull and deep potations,' and
-all the rest of it, still damages Dons in the
-eyes of the general public. 'That's ----
-College,' says the local guide to his sightseers,
-'and there they sits, on their Turkey carpets,
-a-drinking of their Madeira, and Burgundy,
-and Tokay.' Such is, apparently, the
-impression still entertained by Society. And no
-doubt successive generations of Fellows who
-hunted four days a week, or, being in Orders,
-'thanked Heaven that no one ever took *them*
-for parsons,' did to a certain extent
-perpetuate the traditions of 'Bolton Abbey in the
-olden time.' Well, their day is over now.
-If the Fellow *fin de siècle* should ever
-venture to indulge in the sports of the field,
-he must pretend that he has met the hounds
-by accident; and even then he risks his reputation.
-
-.. _`IN EXETER COLLEGE CHAPEL.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-094.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *IN EXETER COLLEGE CHAPEL. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
- *IN EXETER COLLEGE CHAPEL. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
-
-It is always pleasant, too, to be wiser than
-one's erstwhile pastors and masters. The
-pupil goes out into the great world; the
-teacher remains behind, and continues
-apparently to go on in his old and crusted errors.
-Outwardly the Universities do not change
-much, and it is easy to assume that the
-habits and ideas of their denizens do not
-change either. Thus it is that the young
-men of the 'National Observer,' coming back
-from a Saturday-to-Monday visit to a
-university which they never respected and are
-now entitled to despise, are moved to declare
-to the world the complete inutility of what
-they call the Futile Don. 'He is dead,'
-they say, 'quite dead;' and if he is, might
-not the poor relic of mortality be allowed in
-mere charity to lie peacefully entombed in his
-collegiate cloisters? Yet, after all, it is only
-among the great Anglo-Saxon race that the
-profession of teaching is without honour;
-and even among us it may be allowed that
-it is a mode of earning a pittance as decent
-and comparatively innocuous as another. We
-cannot, all of us, taste the fierce joys of
-writing for the daily or weekly press, and
-the barrister's 'crowded hours of glorious
-life' in the law courts would be more
-overcrowded than ever were not a few *fainéants*
-suffered to moulder in the retirement of a
-university. Seriously, it was all very well for
-the young lions of the Press to denounce the
-torpor of Dons in the bad old days when
-colleges were close corporations--when
-Fellows inherited their bloated revenues
-without competition, and simply because they
-happened to be born in a particular corner
-of some rural district. But now that nearly
-every First-class man has the chance of election
-and would be a Fellow if he could, one is
-tempted to recall the ancient fable of the sour
-grapes. Or at least the *esprits forts* whom
-the University has reluctantly driven out
-into the great world might be grateful to
-her for saving them in spite of themselves
-from an existence of futile incapacity.
-
-Probably as long as colleges exist in something
-like their present form--until the People
-takes a short way with them, abolishes
-common rooms and the Long Vacation, and pays
-college tutors by a system of 'results fees'--these
-things will continue to be said. Deans
-and Senior Tutors will never escape the
-stigma of torpor or incapacity. That quite
-respectable rhymester, Mr. Robert Montgomery
-(who, had he not been unlucky enough to
-cross the path of Lord Macaulay, might
-have lived and died and been forgotten as
-the author of metrical works not worse than
-many that have escaped the lash), has left
-to the world a long poem--of which the
-sentiments are always, and the rhymes usually,
-correct--entitled 'Oxford.' He has taken all
-Oxford life for his subject, Dons included;
-and this is how he describes the fate of
-College Tutors:--
-
- | 'The dunce, the drone, the freshman or the fool,
- | 'Tis theirs to counsel, teach, o'erawe, and rule!
- | Their only meed--some execrating word
- | To blight the hour when first their voice was heard.'
-
-To a certain extent this is true in all ages.
-But there are worse things than mere sloth:
-this is not the measure of the crimes
-charged against college authorities. They--even
-such contemptible beings as they--are
-said to have the audacity to neglect
-untitled merit, and to truckle to the
-aristocracy. Every one knows Thackeray's terrible
-indictment of University snobs: Crump, the
-pompous dignitary (who, to do him justice,
-seriously thinks himself greater than the Czar
-of All the Russias), and Hugby, the tutor
-grovelling before the lordling who has played
-him a practical joke. Every one remembers
-how even the late Laureate gibbeted his
-Dons--how
-
- | 'One
- | Discussed his tutor, rough to common men.
- | But honeying at the whisper of a lord:
- | And one the Master, as a rogue in grain,
- | Veneer'd with sanctimonious theory.'
-
-
-No doubt Universities are not immaculate.
-There have been Tartuffes and tuft-hunters
-there, as in the great world. No doubt,
-too, it was very wrong to allow noblemen
-to wear badges of their rank, and take their
-degrees without examination (although the
-crime was a lesser one in the days before
-class-lists were, when even the untitled
-commoner became a Bachelor by dark and
-disreputable methods); but these things are
-not done any more. At this day there are
-probably few places where a title is less
-regarded than at Oxford or Cambridge. It
-is true that rumour asserts the existence of
-certain circles where, *ceteris paribus*, the
-virtuous proprietor of wealth and a handle to
-his name is welcomed with more effusion
-than the equally respectable, but less fortunate,
-holder of an eleemosynary exhibition. But,
-after all, even external Society, which regards
-tuft-hunting with just displeasure, does--it is
-said--continue to maintain these invidious
-distinctions when it is sending out invitations
-to dinner. The fact is that there are a
-great many peccadilloes in London which
-become crimes at the University.
-
-Satire, however, does not confine itself to
-Dons: undergraduates come in for a share
-of it too, though in a different way. When
-the novelist condescends to depict the Fellow
-of a college, it is usually as a person more
-or less feeble, futile, and generally *manqué*.
-The Don can never be a hero, but neither
-is he qualified to play the part of villain;
-his virtues and his vices are all alike
-inadequate. If he is bad, his badness is rarely
-more than contemptible; if he is good, it is
-in a negative and passionless way, and the
-great rewards of life are, as a rule,
-considered as being out of his reach. But with
-the undergraduate the case is different. He--as
-we have said--is always in extremes:
-literature gives him the premier *rôle* either
-as hero or villain; but it is as the villain
-that he is the most interesting and picturesque.
-Satire and fiction generally describe
-him as an adept in vicious habits. So
-sings Mr. Robert Montgomery, with admirable
-propriety:--
-
- | 'In Oxford see the Reprobate appear!
- | Big with the promise of a mad career:
- | With cash and consequence to lead the way,
- | A fool by night and more than fop by day!'
-
-Over and over again we have the old picture
-of the Rake's Progress which the world has
-learnt to know so well: the youth absents
-himself from his lectures, perhaps even goes
-to Woodstock (horrid thought!)--'Woodstock
-rattles with eternal wheels' is the
-elegant phrase of Mr. Montgomery--and, in
-short, plays the fool generally:--
-
- | 'Till night advance, whose reign divine
- | Is chastely dedicate to cards and wine.'
-
-.. _`PARSONS' PLEASURE.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-102.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *PARSON'S PLEASURE. Drawn by L. Speed.*
-
- *PARSON'S PLEASURE. Drawn by L. Speed.*
-
-
-The specimen student of the nineteenth
-century will probably survive in history
-as represented in these remarkable colours,
-and the virtuous youth of a hundred years
-hence will shudder to think of a generation
-so completely given over to drunkenness,
-debauchery, and neglect of the Higher Life
-generally. There is a *naïveté* and directness
-about undergraduate error which is the easy
-prey of any satirist; and curiously enough
-the public, and even that large class which
-sends its sons to the Universities, apparently
-likes to pretend a belief that youth is really
-brought up in an atmosphere of open and
-unchecked deviation from the paths of
-discipline and morality. If Paterfamilias seriously
-believed that the academic types presented to
-him in literature were genuine and frequent
-phenomena, he would probably send his
-offspring in for the London Matriculation. But
-he knows pretty well that the University
-is really not rotten to the core, and that
-colleges are not always ruled by incapables,
-nor college opinion mainly formed by rakes
-and spendthrifts; and at the same time it
-gives the British Public a certain pleasure to
-imagine that it too has heard the chimes at
-midnight, although it now goes to bed at
-half-past ten--that it has been a devil of
-a fellow in its youth. This fancy is always
-piquant, and raises a man in his own
-estimation and that of his friends.
-
-.. _`Fencing.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-103.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: Fencing
-
- Fencing
-
-
-These little inconsistences are of a piece
-with the whole attitude of the unacademic
-world towards the Universities. Men come
-down from London to rest, perhaps, for a
-day or two from the labours of the Session.
-They are inspired with a transient enthusiasm
-for antiquity. They praise academic calm:
-they affect to wish that they, too, were
-privileged to live that life of learned leisure
-which is commonly supposed to be the lot of
-all Fellows and Tutors. Then they go away,
-and vote for a new University Commission.
-
-
-
-
-VII--DIARY OF A DON
-===================
-
- | 'Collegiate life next opens on thy way,
- | Begins at morn and mingles with the day.'
- | *R. Montgomery.*
-
-
-Half-past seven A.M.: enter my
-scout, noisily, as one who is accustomed
-to wake undergraduates. He throws
-my bath violently on the floor and fills it
-with ice-cold water. 'What kind of a
-morning is it?' No better than usual: rain,
-east wind, occasional snow. *Must* get up
-nevertheless: haven't superintended a roll-call
-for three days, and the thing will become a
-scandal. Never mind: one more snooze....
-There are the bells (Oh, those bells!) ringing
-for a quarter to eight. Ugh!
-
-Dress in the dark, imperfectly: no time to
-shave. Cap and gown apparently lost. Where
-the ---- Oh, here they are, under the table.
-Must try to develop habits of neatness.
-Somebody else's cap: too big.
-
-Roll-call in full swing in Hall: that is,
-the college porter is there, ticking off
-undergraduates' names as they come in. Hall very
-cold and untidy: college cat scavenging
-remnants of last night's dinner. Portrait of
-the Founder looking as if he never expected
-the college to come to this kind of thing.
-Men appear in various stages of dishabille.
-Must make an example of some one: 'Really
-Mr. Tinkler, I must ask you to put on something
-besides an ulster.' Tinkler explains that
-he is fully dressed, opening his ulster and
-disclosing an elaborate toilet: unfortunate--have
-to apologise. During the incident several men
-without caps and gowns succeed in making
-their escape.
-
-Back in my rooms: finish dressing. Fire
-out, no hot water. This is what they call
-the luxurious existence of a College Fellow.
-Post arrives: chiefly bills and circulars: several
-notes from undergraduates. 'Dear Sir,--May
-I go to London for the day in order to keep
-an important engagement.' Dentist, I suppose.
-'Dear Mr. ----,--I am sorry that I was
-absent from your valuable lecture yesterday, as
-I was not aware you would do so.' 'Dear
-Sir,--I shall be much obliged if I may have
-leave off my lecture this morning, as I wish to
-go out hunting.' Candid, at any rate. 'Mr. ----
-presents his compliments to Mr. ---- and
-regrets that he is compelled to be absent from
-his Latin Prose lecture, because I cannot
-come.' Simple and convincing. Whip from the
-Secretary of the Non-Placet Society: urgent request
-to attend in Convocation and oppose nefarious
-attempt to insert 'and' in the wording of
-Stat. Tit. Cap. LXX. 18. Never heard of the
-statute before. Breakfast.
-
-College cook apparently thinks that a
-hitherto unimpaired appetite can be satisfied
-by what seems to be a cold chaffinch on toast.
-'Take it away, please, and get me an egg.' Egg
-arrives: not so old as chaffinch, but
-nearly: didn't say I wanted a chicken. Scout
-apologises: must have brought me an undergraduate's
-egg by mistake. Never mind; plain
-living and high thinking. Two college
-servants come to report men absent last night
-from their rooms. Must have given them leave
-to go down: can't remember it, though. Matter
-for investigation. Porter reports gentleman
-coming into college at 12.10 last night. All
-right: 'The Dean's compliment's to Mr. ----,
-and will he please to call upon him at once.
-'Mr. ----'s compliments to the Dean, and he
-has given orders not to be awakened till ten,
-but will come when he is dressed.' Obliging.
-
-Lecture to be delivered at ten o'clock to
-Honours men, on point of ancient custom:
-very interesting: Time of Roman Dinner,
-whether at 2.30 or 2.45. Have got copious
-notes on the subject somewhere: must read
-them up before lecture, as it never looks well
-to be in difficulties with your own MS.--looks
-as if you hadn't the subject at your
-fingers' ends. Notes can't be found. Know
-I saw them on my table three weeks ago,
-and table can't have been dusted since then.
-Oh, here they are: illegible. Wonder what
-I meant by all these abbreviations. Never
-mind: can leave that part out. Five minutes
-past ten.
-
-Lecture-room pretty full: two or three
-scholars, with air of superior intelligence:
-remainder commoners, in attitudes more or
-less expressive of distracted attention. One
-man from another college, looking rather *de
-trop*. Had two out-college men last time:
-different men, too: disappointing. Begin my
-dissertation and try to make abstruse subject
-attractive: 'learning put lightly, like powder
-in jam.' Wish that scholar No. 1 wouldn't
-check my remarks by reference to the authority
-from whom my notes are copied. Why do
-they teach men German? Second scholar has
-last number of the 'Classical Review' open
-before him. Why? Appears afterwards that
-the 'Review' contains final and satisfying
-*reductio ad absurdum* of my theory. Man
-from another college asks if he may go away.
-Certainly, if he wishes. Explains that he
-thought this was Mr. ----'s Theology lecture.
-Seems to have taken twenty minutes to find
-out his mistake. Wish that two of the
-commoners could learn to take notes intelligently,
-and not take down nothing except the
-unimportant points. Hope they won't reproduce
-them next week in the schools.
-
-Ten fifty-five: peroration. Interrupted
-by entrance of lecturer for next hour. Begs
-pardon: sorry to have interrupted: doesn't
-go, however. Peroration spoilt. Lecture over:
-general sense of relief. Go out with the
-audience, and overhear one of them tell his
-friend that, after all, it wasn't so bad as last
-time. Mem., not to go out with audience in
-future.
-
-Eleven o'clock: lecture for Passmen.
-Twelve or fifteen young gentlemen all
-irreproachably dressed in latest style of
-undergraduate fashion--Norfolk jacket and brown
-boots indispensable--and all inclined to be
-cheerfully tolerant of the lecturer's presence
-*quand même*, regarding him as a necessary
-nuisance and part of college system. After
-all there isn't so much to do between eleven
-and twelve. Some of them can construe,
-but consider it unbecoming to make any
-ostentation of knowledge. Conversation at times
-animated. 'Really, gentlemen, you might keep
-something to talk about at the next lecture.' Two
-men appear at 11.25, noisily. Very
-sorry: have been at another lecture: couldn't
-get away. General smile of incredulity, joined
-in by the new arrivals as they find a place in
-the most crowded part of lecture-room. Every
-one takes notes diligently, and is careful to
-burn them at the end of the hour. Translation
-proceeds rather slowly. Try it myself:
-difficult to translate Latin comedy with dignity.
-Give it up and let myself go--play to the
-gallery. Gallery evidently considers that
-frivolity on the lecturer's part is inappropriate
-to the situation. 11.55: 'Won't keep you
-longer, gentlemen.'
-
-Twelve: time to do a little quiet work
-before lunch. Gentleman who was out after
-twelve last night comes to explain. Was
-detained in a friend's room (reading) and did
-not know how late it was. In any case is
-certain he was in before twelve, because he
-looked at his watch, and is almost sure his
-watch is fast. Fined and warned not to do it
-again: exit grumbling. No more interruptions,
-I hope..... Boy from the Clarendon Press:
-editor wants something for the 'Oxford
-Magazine,' at once: not less than a column:
-messenger will wait while I write it. Very
-considerate. Try to write something: presence of
-boy embarrassing. Ask him to go outside and
-wait on the staircase. Does so, and continues
-to whistle 'Daisy Bell,' with accompaniment on
-the banisters *obbligato*. Composition difficult
-and result not satisfactory: hope no one will
-read it. Column nearly finished: man comes to
-explain why he wants to be absent during three
-weeks of next term. *Would* he mind going
-away and calling some other time? Very well:
-when? Oh, any time, only not now. This is
-what they call the leisure and philosophic calm
-of collegiate life.
-
-Lunch in Common Room: cold, clammy,
-and generally unappetising. Guest who is
-apparently an old member of the college greets
-me and says he supposes I've forgotten him.
-'Not at all: remember you quite well: glad to
-meet you again.' Haven't the faintest idea what
-his name is: awkward. Appears in course of
-conversation to be ex-undergraduate whom I
-knew very well and did not like. Evidently
-regards me as a venerable fossil: he himself has
-grown bald and fat and looks fifty, more or less:
-suppose I must be about seventy or eighty.
-Vice-Principal wants to know if I will play
-fives at two: yes, if he likes. No, by the way,
-can't; have got to go and vote in Convocation.
-Don't know what it is about, but promised to
-go: can't think why. Time to go.
-
-In the Convocation House. Very few
-people there, nobody at all interested. Borrow
-Gazette and study list of agenda. Question on
-which I promised to vote comes on late, all
-sorts of uninteresting matters to be settled first:
-mostly small money grants for scientific
-purposes: pleasant way of wasting three-quarters
-of an hour. My question here at last: prepare
-to die in last ditch in defence of original form
-of statute. Member of Hebdomadal Council
-makes inaudible speech, apparently on the
-subject. No one else has anything to say:
-Council's proposal, whatever it is, carried
-*nem. con*. No voting: might as well have played
-fives after all: next time shall.
-
-Time for walk round the Parks: rain and
-mud. Worst of the Parks is, you always meet
-people of houses where you ought to have called
-and haven't. Free fight under Rugby rules going
-on between University and somewhere else.
-Watch it: don't understand game: try to feel
-patriotic: can't...... Meeting at four to
-oppose introduction of Hawaiian as an optional
-language in Responsions. Not select:
-imprudent for a caucus to transact business by inviting
-its opponents: people of all sorts of opinions
-present. Head of House makes highly
-respectable speech, explaining that while qualified
-support of reform is conceivable and even under
-possible circumstances advisable, premature
-action is rarely consistent with mature
-deliberation. Nobody seems to have anything definite
-to suggest: most people move amendments.
-Safe to vote against all of them: difficult to
-know how you are voting, however: wording
-of amendments so confusing. All of them
-negatived: substantive motion proposed: lost
-as well. Question referred to a Committee:
-ought to have been done at first. Hour and a
-half wasted. Remember that I have cut my
-five-o'clock pupil for second time running. Am
-offered afternoon tea: thirsty, but must be off:
-man at half-past five. On the way back meet
-resident sportsman in the High. Has been out
-with hounds and had best twenty-five minutes
-of the season, in the afternoon, three miles off.
-Might have been there myself if it hadn't been
-for Convocation: hang Convocation! Never
-mind; satisfaction of a good conscience: shall
-always be able to say that I lost best run of
-season through devotion to duty.
-
-.. _`LAWN TENNIS AT OXFORD.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-114.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *LAWN TENNIS AT OXFORD. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
- *LAWN TENNIS AT OXFORD. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
-
-Six forty-five: pupils gone; dress for
-seven-o'clock dinner with friend at St. Anselm's. Man
-comes to ask why he has been gated: explain:
-man not satisfied. Gone, at any rate. Another
-man, asking leave to be out after twelve. Five
-minutes to dress and walk a quarter of a mile.
-Wish men wouldn't choose this time for coming
-to see one. Very late: dinner already begun:
-no soup, thanks. Meaty atmosphere: noisy
-atmosphere at lower end of Hall:
-undergraduates throw bread about. No one in
-evening dress but myself. Distinguished guest
-in shape of eminent German Professor: have
-got next him somehow: wish I hadn't: wears
-flannel shirt and evidently regards me as a
-mere butterfly of fashion. Speaks hardly any
-English: try him in German: replies after an
-unusual effort on my part, 'Ich spreche nur
-Deutsch.' My command of the language
-evidently less complete than I thought: or
-perhaps he only speaks his own patois. Man
-opposite me Demonstrator at the Museum, who
-considers that the University and the world in
-general was made for physiologists.
-
-Small party in Common Room, most of
-diners having to see pupils or attend meetings.
-Will I have any wine? No one else drinks
-any and my host is a teetotaller: 'No, thanks--never
-drink wine after dinner.' Truth only a
-conventional virtue after all. Eminent Teuton
-would like more beer, but has been long enough
-in England to know better than to ask for it.
-Am put next to Demonstrator, who endeavours
-to give general ideas of digestive organs of a
-frog, interpreting occasionally in German for
-Professor's benefit: illustrates with fragments
-of dessert: most interesting, I am sure.
-Nothing like the really good talk of an Oxford
-Common Room, after all. Senior Fellow drinks
-whisky and water and goes to sleep. Coffee
-and cigarettes: or will I have a weed?
-'Thanks, but must be off: man at nine...' Back
-in college: rooms dark: can't find my
-matches and fall over furniture.
-
-Man comes to read me an essay. Know
-nothing about the subject: thought he was
-going to write on something else. Essay
-finished: must say something: try to find
-fault with his facts. Man confronts me with
-array of statistics, apparently genuine: if so
-nothing more to say. Criticise his grammar:
-man offended. Interview rather painful, till
-concluded by entrance of nine-thirty man with Latin
-prose. Rather superior young man, who
-considers himself a scholar. Suggest that part of his
-vocabulary is not according to classical usage:
-proves me wrong by reference to dictionary.
-Is not surprised to find me mistaken. Wish
-that Higher Education had stopped in Board
-Schools and not got down to undergraduates.
-
-Man at ten, with a desire to learn. Stays
-till near eleven discussing his chances in the
-schools at great length. Presently comes to
-his prospects in life. Would send me to sleep
-if he wouldn't ask me questions.
-
-Eleven: no more men, thank goodness.
-Tobacco and my lecture for to-morrow....
-Never could understand why a gentleman being
-neither intoxicated nor in the society of his
-friends, cannot cross the quadrangle without a
-view-halloo... There he is again: must go
-out and see what is going on. Quadrangle
-very cold, raining. Group of men playing
-football in the corner: friends look on and
-encourage them from windows above. As I
-come on the scene all disappear, with shouts:
-none identified: saves future trouble, at all
-events. More tobacco and period of comparative
-peace. Bedtime.
-
-Wish my scout wouldn't hide hard things
-under the mattress.
-
-Noise in quadrangle renewed: 'Daddy
-wouldn't buy me a Bow-wow,' with variations....
-Some one's oak apparently battered
-with a poker. *Ought* to get up and go out
-to stop it....
-
-
-
-
-VIII--THE UNIVERSITY AS A PLACE OF LEARNED LEISURE.
-===================================================
-
- | 'I had been used for thirty years to no interruption
- | save the tinkling of the dinner-bell and the chapel-bell.'
- | *Essays of Vicesimus Knox.*
-
-
-Standing with one foot in the Middle
-Ages and the other in a luxuriously
-furnished 'Common Room'--such is Oxford life
-as summarised by a German visitor, who
-appears to have been a good deal perplexed,
-like the outer world in general, by the
-academic mixture of things ancient and
-modern, and a host who wore a cap and
-gown over his evening dress. Certainly the
-University is a strange medley of contraries.
-It never seems to be quite clear whether
-we are going too fast or too slow. We are
-always reforming something, yet are
-continually reproached with irrational
-conservatism. Change and permanence are side by
-side--permanence that looks as if it could
-defy time:
-
- | 'The form remains, the function never dies,'
-
-and yet all the while the change is rapid and
-complete. Men go down, and are as if they
-had never been: as is the race of leaves so
-is that of undergraduates; and so transiently
-are they linked with the enduring existence
-of their University, that, except in the case
-of the minority who have done great deeds
-on the river or the cricket-field, they either
-pass immediately out of recollection or else
-remain only as a dim and distant tradition of
-bygone ages. An undergraduate's memory is
-very short. For him the history of the
-University is comprised in the three or four
-years of his own residence. Those who
-came before him and those who come after
-are alike separated from him by a great
-gulf; his predecessors are infinitely older,
-and his successors immeasurably younger. It
-makes no difference what his relations to
-them may be in after-life. Jones, who went
-down in '74, may be an undistinguished
-country parson or a struggling junior at the
-Bar; and Brown, who came up in '75, may
-be a bishop or a Q.C. with his fortune made;
-but all the same Brown will always regard
-Jones as belonging to the almost forgotten
-heroic period before he came up, and Jones,
-whatever may be his respect for Brown's
-undoubted talents, must always to a certain
-extent feel the paternal interest of a veteran
-watching the development of youthful promise.
-So complete is the severance of successive
-generations, that it is hard to see how
-undergraduate custom and tradition and College
-characteristics should have a chance of
-surviving; yet somehow they do manage to
-preserve an unbroken continuity. Once give
-a College a good or a bad name, and that
-name will stick to it. Plant a custom and
-it will flourish, defying statutes and Royal
-Commissions. Conservatism is in the air;
-even convinced Radicals (in politics) cannot
-escape from it, and are sometimes Tories in
-matters relating to their University. They
-will change the constitution of the realm, but
-will not stand any tampering with the
-Hebdomadal Council. Whatever be the reason--whether
-it be Environment or Heredity--Universities
-go on doing the same things,
-only in different ways; they retain that
-indefinable habit of thought which seems to
-cling to old grey walls and the shade
-of ancient elms, which the public calls
-'academic' when it is only contemptuous,
-explaining the word as meaning 'provincial
-with a difference' when it is angry.
-
-.. _`BOWLS IN NEW COLLEGE GARDEN.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-120.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *BOWLS IN NEW COLLEGE GARDEN. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
- *BOWLS IN NEW COLLEGE GARDEN. Drawn by Lancelot Speed.*
-
-
-There is the same kind of unalterableness
-about the few favoured individuals to whom
-the spirit of the age has allowed a secure
-and permanent residence in Oxford; a happy
-class which is now almost limited to Heads
-of Houses and College servants. You
-scarcely ever see a scout bearing the
-outward and visible signs of advancing years;
-age cannot wither them, nor (it should be
-added) can custom stale their infinite variety
-of mis-serving their masters. Perhaps it is
-they who are the repositories of tradition.
-And even Fellows contrive to retain some of
-the characteristics of their more permanent
-predecessors, whom we have now learnt to
-regard as abuses. Hard-worked though they
-are, and precarious of tenure, they are,
-nevertheless, in some sort imbued with that flavour
-of humanity and *dolce far niente* which
-continues to haunt even a Common Room
-where Fellows drink nothing but water, and
-only dine together once a fortnight.
-
-For times are sadly changed now, and a
-fellowship is far from being the haven of
-rest which it once was, and still is to a few.
-Look at that old Fellow pacing with slow
-and leisurely steps beneath Magdalen or
-Christchurch elms: regard him well, for he is
-an interesting survival, and presently he and
-his kind will be nothing but a memory, and
-probably the progressive spirit of democracy
-will hold him up as an awful example. He is
-a link with a practically extinct period. When
-he was first elected *verus et perpetuus socius* of
-his college--without examination--the
-University of Oxford was in a parlous state.
-Reform was as yet unheard of, or only loomed
-dimly in the distance. Noblemen still wore
-tufts--think how that would scandalise us
-now!--and 'gentlemen commoners' came up
-with the declared and recognised intention of
-living as gentlemen commoners should. Except
-for the invention of the examination system--and
-the demon of the schools was satisfied
-with only a mouthful of victims then--Oxford
-of the forties had not substantially changed
-since the last century--since the days when
-Mr. Gibbon was a gentleman commoner at
-Magdalen College, where his excuses for
-cutting his lectures in the morning were
-'received with a smile,' and where he found
-himself horribly bored by the 'private scandal'
-and 'dull and deep potations' of the seniors
-with whom he was invited to associate in the
-evening. Not much had changed since those
-days: lectures were still disciplinary exercises
-rather than vehicles of instruction, and the
-vespertinal port was rarely if ever interrupted
-in its circulation by 'the man who comes at
-nine.' Many holders of fellowships scarcely
-came near the University; those who did
-reside were often not much concerned about
-the instruction of undergraduates, and still
-less with 'intercollegiate competition.' Perhaps
-it was not their life's work: a fellowship
-might be only a stepping-stone to a
-college living, when a sufficiently fat benefice
-should fall vacant and allow the dean or
-sub-warden to marry and retire into the country;
-and even the don who meant to be a don all
-his days put study or learned leisure first and
-instruction second, the world not yet believing
-in the 'spoon-feeding' of youth. Very often,
-of course, they did nothing. After all, when
-you pay a man for exercising no particular
-functions, you can scarcely blame him for
-strictly fulfilling the conditions under which
-he was elected. 'But what do they do?'
-inquired--quite recently--a tourist, pointing
-to the fellows' buildings of a certain college.
-'Do?!!' replied the Oxford cicerone--'do? ... why
-them's fellows!' But if there was
-inactivity, it is only the more credit to the
-minority who really did interest themselves in
-the work of their pupils. Not that the relation
-of authorities to undergraduates was ever then
-what it has since become--whether the change
-be for the better or the worse. Few attempts
-were made to bridge the chasm which must
-always yawn between the life of teacher and
-taught. Perhaps now the attempt is a little
-over-emphasised; certainly things are done
-which would have made each particular hair
-to stand on end on the head of a Fellow of
-the old school. In his solemn and formal way
-he winked at rowing, considering it rather
-fast and on the whole an inevitable sign of
-declining morals. He wore his cap and gown
-with the anachronistic persistency of Mr. Toole
-in 'The Don,' and sighed over the levity of
-a colleague who occasionally sported a blue
-coat with brass buttons. Had you told him
-that within the present century College Tutors
-would be seen in flannels, and that a Head
-of a House could actually row on the river
-in an eight--albeit the ship in question
-be manned by comparatively grave and
-reverend seniors, yclept the Ancient
-Mariners--he would probably have replied in the
-formula ascribed to Dr. Johnson: 'Let me
-tell you, sir, that in order to be what you
-consider humorous it is not necessary that you
-should be also indecent!' But there is a
-lower depth still; and grave dignitaries of
-the University have been seen riding bicycles.
-
-All this would have been quite unintelligible
-to the youthful days of our friend,
-whom we see leisurely approaching the evening
-of his days in the midst of a generation that
-does not know him indeed, but which is
-certainly benefited by his presence and the
-picture of academic repose which he displays
-to his much-troubled and harassed successors:
-a peaceful, cloistered life; soon to leave
-nothing behind it but a brass in the College
-chapel, a few Common Room anecdotes, and
-a vague tradition, perhaps, of a ghost on
-the old familiar staircase. Far different is
-the lot of the Fellow *fin de siècle*; 'by
-many names men know him,' whether he be
-the holder of an 'official' Fellowship, or a
-'Prize Fellow' who is entitled to his
-emoluments only for the paltry period of seven
-years. And what emoluments! Verily the
-mouth of Democracy must water at the
-thought of the annual 'division of the spoils'
-which used to take place under the old
-*régime*: spoils which were worth dividing, too,
-in the days when rents were paid without a
-murmur, and colleges had not as yet to allow
-tenants to hold at half-a-crown an acre, lest
-the farm should be unlet altogether. But now
-if a Prize Fellow receives his 200*l.* a year
-he may consider himself lucky; and remember
-that if he is not blessed with this world's
-goods, the grim humours of the last
-Commission at least allowed him the inestimable
-privilege of marrying--on 200*l.* a year. After
-all, it is not every one who receives even that
-salary for doing nothing.
-
-The 'official' variety of Fellow, or the
-Prize Fellow who chooses to be a College
-Tutor, is a schoolmaster, with a difference.
-He has rather longer holidays--if he can
-afford to enjoy them-and a considerably
-shorter purse than the instructors of youth
-at some great schools. He is so far unfortunate
-in his predecessors, that he has inherited
-the reputation of the Fellows of old time.
-Everybody else is working: the Fellow is
-still a useless drone. As a matter of fact,
-the unfortunate man is always doing
-something--working vehemently with a laudable
-desire to get that into eight weeks which
-should properly take twelve; or taking his
-recreation violently, riding forty miles on a
-bicycle, with a spurt at the finish so as not
-to miss his five-o'clock pupil; sitting on
-interminable committees--everything in Oxford
-is managed by a committee, partly, perhaps,
-because 'Boards are very often screens;' or
-sitting upon a disorderly undergraduate. On
-the whole, the kicks are many, and the
-halfpence comparatively few. He has the
-Long Vacation, of course, but then he is
-always employed in writing his lectures for next
-term, or compiling a school edition, or a
-handbook, or an abridgment of somebody
-else's school edition or handbook, in order to
-keep the pot boiling--more especially if he
-has fallen a victim to matrimony, and established
-himself in the red-brick part of Oxford.
-It is true that there is the prospect--on paper--of
-a pension when he is past his work, but in
-the present state of College finances that is
-not exactly a vista of leisured opulence.
-Altogether there is not very much repose
-about *him*. College Tutors in these days are
-expected to work. It is on record that a
-tourist from a manufacturing district on seeing
-four tutors snatching a brief hour at lawn-tennis,
-remarked, 'I suppose there's *another shift*
-working inside?' Such are the requirements
-of the age and the manufacturing districts.
-
-Nor are beer and skittles unadulterated
-the lot of the undergraduate either--whatever
-the impression that his sisters and
-cousins may derive from the gaieties of the
-Eights and 'Commem.' For the spirit of
-the century and the 'Sturm und Drang' of
-a restless world has got hold of the 'Man,'
-too, and will not suffer him to live quite so
-peacefully as the Verdant Greens and Bouncers
-of old. Everybody must do something; they
-must be 'up and doing,' or else they have a
-good chance of finding themselves 'sent
-down.' I do not speak of the reading man,
-who naturally finds his vocation in a period
-of activity--but rather of the man who is by
-nature non-reading, and has to sacrifice his
-natural desires to the pressure of public
-opinion acting through his tutor. Perhaps
-he is made to go in for honours; but even
-if he reads only for a pass, the schools are
-always with him--he is always being pulled
-up to see how he is growing; or at least he
-must be serving his College in one way or
-another--if not by winning distinction in
-the schools, by toiling on the river or
-the cricket-field. Then he is expected to
-interest himself in all the movements of the
-last quarter of the nineteenth century; he
-must belong to several societies; he cannot even
-be properly idle without forming himself into
-an association for the purpose. If he wants
-to make a practice of picnicing on the
-Cherwell he founds a 'Cherwell Lunch Club,'
-with meetings, no doubt, and possibly an
-'organ' to advocate his highly meritorious
-views. An excellent and a healthy life, no
-doubt! but yet one is tempted sometimes to
-fear that the loafer may become extinct; and
-then where are our poets to come from?
-For it is a great thing to be able to loaf
-well: it softens the manners and does not
-allow them to be fierce; and there is no
-place for it like the streams and gardens of
-an ancient University. If a man does not
-learn the great art of doing nothing there,
-he will never acquire it anywhere else; and
-it is there, and in the summer term, that
-this laudable practice will probably survive
-when it is unknown even in Government Offices.
-
-.. _`COACHING THE EIGHT.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-132.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *COACHING THE EIGHT. By J. H. Lorimer.*
-
- *COACHING THE EIGHT. By J. H. Lorimer.*
-
-
-For there is a season of the year when
-even the sternest scholar or athlete and the
-most earnest promoter of Movements yields to
-the *genius loci*; when the summer term is
-drawing to a close, and the May east winds
-have yielded to the warmth of June, and the
-lilacs and laburnums are blossoming in College
-gardens; when the shouting and the glory
-and the bonfires of the Eights are over, and
-the invasion of Commemoration has not yet
-begun. Then, if ever, is the time for doing
-nothing. Then the unwilling victim of lectures
-shakes off his chains and revels in a temporary
-freedom, not unconnected with the fact that
-his tutor has gone for a picnic to Nuneham.
-Perhaps he has been rowing in his College
-Eight, and is entitled to repose on the laurels
-of 'six bumps;' perhaps he is not in the
-schools himself, and can afford to pity the
-unfortunates who are. And how many are
-the delightful ways of loafing! You may
-propel the object of your affections--if she
-is up, as she very often is at this time--in
-a punt on that most academic stream, the
-Cherwell, while Charles (your friend) escorts
-the chaperon in a dingey some little
-distance in front; you may lie lazily in the
-sun in Worcester or St. John's gardens, with
-a novel, or a friend, or both; you may search
-Bagley and Powderhill for late bluebells, and
-fancy that you have found 'high on its heathy
-ridge' the tree known to Arnold and Clough.
-Or if you are more enterprising you may
-travel further afield and explore the high beech
-woods of the Chiltern slopes and the bare,
-breezy uplands of the Berkshire downs; but
-this, perhaps, demands more energy than
-belongs to the truly conscientious loafer.
-
-.. _`EVENING ON THE RIVER.`:
-
-.. figure:: images/img-134.jpg
- :align: center
- :alt: *EVENING ON THE RIVER. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
- *EVENING ON THE RIVER. Drawn by E. Stamp.*
-
-
-Well, let the idle undergraduate make the
-most of his time now; it is not likely that
-he will be able to loaf in after-life. Nor (for
-the matter of that) will his successors be allowed
-to take their ease here in Oxford even in the
-summer, in those happy days when the
-University is to be turned into an industrial
-school, and a place for the education no
-longer of the English gentleman but the
-British citizen. Will that day ever come?
-The spirit of the age is determined that it
-shall. But perhaps the spirit of the place
-may be too much for it yet.
-
-.. vspace:: 4
-
-.. class:: center small
-
- *London: Strangeways, Printers.*
-
-.. vspace:: 4
-
-.. pgfooter::
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--- a/39525.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,2745 +0,0 @@ - ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD - - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost -no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at http://www.gutenberg.org/license. - - -Title: Aspects of Modern Oxford - -Author: A. D. Godley - -Release Date: April 23, 2012 [EBook #39525] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: US-ASCII - - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD *** - - - - -Produced by Al Haines. - - - - -[Illustration: Cover art] - - - -[Illustration: _IN CORNMARKET STREET. Drawn by T. H. Crawford._] - - - - ASPECTS - - OF - - MODERN OXFORD - - - - BY - - A MERE DON - - (A. D. GODLEY) - - - - - _WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY_ - - J. H. Lorimer, Lancelot Speed, T. H. Crawford, - - and E. Stamp - - - - LONDON - - SEELEY AND CO. LIMITED - - Essex Street, Strand - - 1894 - - - - ---- - - - - -CONTENTS - - - I--OF DONS AND COLLEGES - II--OF UNDERGRADUATES - III--OF SIGHTSEERS - IV--OF EXAMINATIONS - V--UNIVERSITY JOURNALISM - VI--THE UNIVERSITY AS SEEN FROM OUTSIDE. - VII--DIARY OF A DON - VIII--THE UNIVERSITY AS A PLACE OF LEARNED LEISURE. - - ---- - - LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - - -In Cornmarket Street. _By T. H. Crawford_ . . . . . . . . . -_Frontispiece_ - -In Christchurch Cathedral. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -New College, Oxford. _By E. Stamp_ - -Corpus Christi College. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -Smoking-Room at the Union. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -Cricket in the Parks. _By L. Speed_ - -Waiting for the Cox. _By L. Speed_ - -Ringoal in New College. _By L. Speed_ - -Golf at Oxford. The Plateau Hole And Arnold's Tree. _By L. Speed_ - -Commemoration: Outside the Sheldonian Theatre. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -In College Rooms. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -A Ball at Christchurch. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -The Deer Park, Magdalen College, Oxford. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -In Convocation: Conferring a Degree. _By E. Stamp_ - -A Lecture-Room in Magdalen College. _By E. Stamp_ - -The Library, Merton College. _By E. Stamp_ - -Reading the Newdigate. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -A Dance at St. John's. _By T. H. Crawford_ - -The Radcliffe. _By E. Stamp_ - -In the Bodleian. _By E. Stamp_ - -Sailing on the Upper River. _By L. Speed_ - -Porch of St. Mary's. _By J. Pennell_ - -In Exeter College Chapel. _By E. Stamp_ - -Parsons' Pleasure. _By L. Speed_ - -Fencing. _By L. Speed_ - -Lawn Tennis at Oxford. _By L. Speed_ - -Bowls in New College Garden. _By L. Speed_ - -Coaching the Eight. _By J. H. Lorimer_ - -Evening on the River. _By E. Stamp_ - - - - - ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD - - - - -I--OF DONS AND COLLEGES - - - 'We ain't no thin red heroes, nor we ain't no blackguards too, - But single men in barracks, most remarkable like you.' - _Rudyard Kipling_. - -Fellows of Colleges who travel on the continent of Europe have, from -time to time, experienced the almost insuperable difficulty of -explaining to the more or less intelligent foreigner their own reason of -existence, and that of the establishment to which they are privileged to -belong. It is all the worse if your neighbour at the _table d'hote_ is -acquainted with the Universities of his own country, for these offer no -parallel at all, and to attempt to illustrate by means of them is not -only futile but misleading. Define any college according to the general -scheme indicated by its founder; when you have made the situation as -intelligible as a limited knowledge of French or German will allow, the -inquirer will conclude that '_also_ it is a monastic institution,' and -that you are wearing a hair shirt under your tourist tweeds. Try to -disabuse him of this impression by pointing out that colleges do not -compel to celibacy, and are intended mainly for the instruction of -youth, and your Continental will go away with the conviction that an -English University is composed of a conglomeration of public schools. -If he tries to get further information from the conversation of a casual -undergraduate, it will appear that a _Ruderverein_ on the Danube offers -most points of comparison. - -Fellows themselves fare no better, and are left in an--if -possible--darker obscurity. That they are in some way connected with -education is tolerably obvious, but the particular nature of the -connexion is unexplained. Having thoroughly confused the subject by -showing inconclusively that you are neither a monk, nor a schoolmaster, -nor a _Privat Docent_, you probably acquiesce from sheer weariness in -the title of _Professor_, which, perhaps, is as convenient as any other; -and, after all, _Professoren_ are very different from Professors. But -all this does nothing to elucidate the nature of a College. To do this -abroad is nearly as hard as to define the function of a University in -England. - -[Illustration: _IN CHRISTCHURCH CATHEDRAL. By J. H. Lorimer._] - -For even at home the general uneducated public, taking but a passing -interest in educational details, is apt to be hopelessly at sea as to -the mutual relation of Colleges and Universities. In the public mind -the College probably represents the University: an Oxonian will be -sometimes spoken of as 'at College;' University officials are confused -with heads of houses, and Collections with University examinations. -That foundation which is consecrated to the education of Welsh Oxonians -is generally referred to in the remote fastnesses of the Cymru as Oxford -College. As usual, a concrete material object, palpable and visible, is -preferred before a cold abstraction like the University. Explain to the -lay mind that a University is an aggregate of Colleges: it is not, of -course, but the definition will serve sometimes. Then how about the -London University, which is an examining body? And how does it happen -that there is a University College in Oxford, not to mention another in -Gower Street? and that Trinity College across the water is often called -Dublin University? All these problems are calculated to leave the -inquirer very much where he was at first, and in him who tries to -explain them to shake the firm foundations of Reason. - -It may be a truism, but it is nevertheless true--according to a phrase -which has done duty in the Schools ere now--that the history of the -University is, and has been for the last five hundred years, the history -of its Colleges; and it is also true that the interweaving of Collegiate -with University life has very much complicated the question of the -student's reason of existence. We do not, of course, know what may have -been the various motives which prompted the bold baron, or squire, or -yeoman of the twelfth or thirteenth century to send the most clerkly or -least muscular of his sons to herd with his fellows in the crowded -streets or the mean hostelries of pre-collegiate Oxford; nor have we -very definite data as to the kind of life which the scholar of the -family lived when he got there. Perhaps he resided in a 'hall;' -according to some authorities there were as many as three hundred halls -in the days of Edward I.; perhaps he was master of his own destinies, -like the free and independent unattached student of modern days--minus a -Censor to watch over the use of his liberties. But what is tolerably -certain is that he did not then come to Oxford so much with the -intention of 'having a good time' as with the desire of improving his -mind, or, at least, in some way or other taking part in the intellectual -life of the period, which then centred in the University. It might be -that among the throngs of boys and young men who crowded the straitened -limits of mediaeval Oxford, there were many who supported the obscure -tenets of their particular Doctor Perspicuus against their opponents' -Doctor Inexplicabilis rather with bills and bows than with disputations -in the Schools; but every Oxonian was in some way vowed to the -advancement of learning--at least, it is hard to see what other -inducement there was to face what must have been, even with all due -allowance made, the exceptional hardships of a student's life. Then -came the Colleges--University dating from unknown antiquity, although -the legend which connects its foundation with Alfred has now shared the -fate of most legends; Balliol and Merton, at the end of the thirteenth -century; and the succeeding centuries were fruitful in the establishment -of many other now venerable foundations, taking example and -encouragement from the success and reputation of their earlier compeers. -In their original form colleges were probably intended to be places of -quiet retirement and study, where the earnest scholar might peacefully -pursue his researches without fear of disturbance by the wilder spirits -who roamed the streets and carried on the traditional feuds of Town and -Gown or of North and South. - -[Illustration: _NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD. Drawn by E. Stamp._] - -By a curious reverse of circumstances the collegian and the '_scholaris -nulli collegio vel aulae ascriptus_' of modern days seem to have changed -characters. For I have heard it said by those who have to do with -college discipline that their _alumni_ are no longer invariably -distinguished by 'a gentle nature and studious habits'--qualities for -which, as the Warden of Merton says, colleges were originally intended -to provide a welcome haven of rest, and which are now the especial and -gratifying characteristics of that whilom roisterer and boon companion, -the Unattached Student. - -We have it on the authority of historians that the original collegiate -design was, properly speaking, a kind of model lodging-house; an -improved, enlarged, and strictly supervised edition of the many hostels -where the primitive undergraduate did mostly congregate. Fellows and -scholars alike were to be studious and discreet persons; the seniors -were to devote themselves to research, and to stand in a quasi-parental -or elder-brotherly relation to the juniors who had not yet attained to -the grade of a Baccalaureus. Very strict rules--probably based on those -of monastic institutions--governed the whole body: rules, however, which -are not unnecessarily severe when we consider the fashion of the age and -the comparative youth of both fellows and scholars. Many scholars must -have been little more than children, and the junior don of the fifteenth -century may often have been young enough to receive that corporal -punishment which our rude forefathers inflicted even on the gentler sex. - - 'Solomon said, in accents mild, - Spare the rod and spoil the child; - Be they man or be they maid, - Whip 'em and wallop 'em, Solomon said' - ---and the sage's advice was certainly followed in the case of scholars, -who were birched for offences which in these latter days would call down -a 'gate,' a fine, or an imposition. Authorities tell us that the early -fellow might even in certain cases be mulcted of his dress, a penalty -which is now reserved for Irish patriots in gaol; and it would seem that -his consumption of beer was limited by regulations which would now be -intolerable to his scout. Some of the details respecting crime and -punishment, which have been preserved in ancient records, are of the -most remarkable description. A former Fellow of Corpus (so we are -informed by Dr. Fowler's History of that College) who had been proved -guilty of an over-susceptibility to the charms of beauty, was condemned -as a penance to preach eight sermons in the Church of St. -Peter-in-the-East. Such was the inscrutable wisdom of a bygone age. - -Details have altered since then, but the general scheme of college -discipline remains much the same. Even in the days when practice was -slackest, theory retained its ancient stringency. When Mr. Gibbon of -Magdalen absented himself from his lectures, his excuses were received -'with an indulgent smile;' when he desired to leave Oxford for a few -days, he appears to have done so without let or hindrance; but both -residence and attendance at lectures were theoretically necessary. The -compromise was hardly satisfactory, but as the scholars' age increased -and the disciplinary rule meant for fourteen had to be applied to -eighteen, what was to be done? So, too, we are informed that in the -days of our fathers undergraduates endured a Procrustean tyranny. So -many chapel services you must attend; so many lectures you must hear, -connected or not with your particular studies; and there was no -relaxation of the rule; no excuse even of 'urgent business' would serve -the pale student who wanted to follow the hounds or play in a cricket -match. Things, in fact, would have been at a deadlock had not the -authorities recognised the superiority of expediency to mere morality, -and invariably accepted without question the plea of ill-health. To -'put on an _aeger_' when in the enjoyment of robust health was after all -as justifiable a fiction as the 'not at home' of ordinary society. You -announced yourself as too ill to go to a lecture, and then rode with the -Bicester or played cricket to your heart's content. This remarkable -system is now practically obsolete; perhaps we are more moral. - -[Illustration: _CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE. Drawn by F. H. Lorimer._] - -Modern collegiate discipline is a parlous matter. There are still the -old problems to be faced--the difficulty of adapting old rules to new -conditions--the danger on the one hand of treating boys too much like -men, and on the other of treating men too much like boys. Hence college -authorities generally fall back on some system of more or less ingenious -compromise--a course which is no doubt prudent in the long run, and -shows a laudable desire for the attainment of the Aristotelian 'mean,' -but which, like most compromises, manages to secure the disapproval -alike of all shades of outside opinion. We live with the fear of the -evening papers before our eyes, and an erring undergraduate who has been -sent down may quite possibly be avenged by a newspaper column reflecting -on college discipline in general, and the dons who sent him down in -particular. Every day martinets tell us that the University is going to -the dogs from excess of leniency; while critics of the -'Boys-will-be-boys' school point out the extreme danger of sitting -permanently on the safety valve, and dancing on the edge of an active -volcano. - -In recent years most of the 'Halls' have been practically extinguished, -and thereby certain eccentricities of administration removed from our -midst. It was perhaps as well; some of these ancient and honourable -establishments having during the present century rather fallen from -their former reputation, from their readiness to receive into the fold -incapables or minor criminals to whom the moral or intellectual -atmosphere of a college was uncongenial. This was a very convenient -system for colleges, who could thus get rid of an idle or stupid man -without the responsibility of blighting his University career and his -prospects in general; but the Halls, which were thus turned into a kind -of sink, became rather curious and undesirable abiding-places in -consequence. They were inhabited by grave and reverend seniors who -couldn't, and by distinguished athletes who wouldn't, pass Smalls, much -less Mods. At one time 'Charsley's' was said to be able to play the -'Varsity Eleven. These mixed multitudes appear to have been governed on -very various and remarkable principles. At one establishment it was -considered a breach of courtesy if you did not, when going to London, -give the authorities some idea of the _probable_ length of your absence. -'The way to govern a college,' the venerated head of this institution is -reported to have said, 'is this--_to keep one eye shut_,' presumably the -optic on the side of the offender. Yet it is curious that while most of -the Halls appear to have been ruled rather by the _gant de velours_ than -the _main de fer_, one of them is currently reported to have been the -scene of an attempt to inflict corporal punishment. This heroic -endeavour to restore the customs of the ancients was not crowned with -immediate success, and he who should have been beaten with stripes fled -for justice to the Vice-Chancellor's Court. - -[Illustration: _SMOKING-ROOM AT THE UNION. Drawn by T. H. Crawford._] - -Casual visitors to Oxford who are acquainted with the statutes of the -University will no doubt have observed that it has been found -unnecessary to insist on exact obedience to all the rules which were -framed for the student of four hundred years ago. For instance, boots -are generally worn; undergraduates are not prohibited from riding -horses, nor even from carrying lethal weapons; the _herba nicotiana sive -Tobacco_ is in common use; and, especially in summer, garments are not -so 'subfusc' as the strict letter of the law requires. Perhaps, too, the -wearing of the academic cap and gown is not so universally necessary as -it was heretofore. All these are matters for the jurisdiction of the -Proctors, who rightly lay more stress on the real order and good -behaviour of their realm. And whatever evils civilisation may bring in -the train, there can be no doubt that the task of these officials is far -less dangerous than of old, as their subjects are less turbulent. They -have no longer to interfere in the faction fights of Northern and -Southern students. It is unusual for a Proctor to carry a pole-axe, -even when he is 'drawing' the most dangerous of billiard-rooms. The -Town and Gown rows which used to provide so attractive a picture for the -novelist--where the hero used to stand pale and determined, defying a -crowd of infuriated bargemen--are extinct and forgotten these last ten -years. Altogether the streets are quieter; models, in fact, of peace and -good order: when the anarchical element is loose it seems to prefer the -interior of Colleges. Various reasons might be assigned for this: -sometimes the presence of too easily defied authority gives a piquancy -to crime; or it is the place itself which is the incentive. The open -space of a quadrangle is found to be a convenient stage for the -performance of the midnight reveller. He is watched from the windows by -a ring of admiring friends, and the surrounding walls are a kind of -sounding-board which enhances the natural beauty of -'Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay' (with an accompaniment of tea-tray and poker -_obbligato_). Every one has his own ideal of an enjoyable evening. - - - - -II--OF UNDERGRADUATES - - - 'In the sad and sodden street - To and fro - Flit the feverstricken feet - Of the Freshers, as they meet, - Come and go.' - _Q_ - -Whatever the theory of their founders, it is at no late period in the -history of colleges that we begin to trace the development of the modern -undergraduate. It was only natural that the 'gentle natures and studious -habits' of a select band of learners should undergo some modification as -college after college was founded, and comparative frivolity would from -time to time obtain admission to the sacred precincts. The University -became the resort of wealth and rank, as well as of mere intellect, and -the gradual influx of commoners--still more, of 'gentlemen -commoners'--once for all determined the character of colleges as places -of serious and uninterrupted study. Probably the Civil War, bringing -the Court to Oxford, was a potent factor in relaxation of the older -academic discipline; deans or sub-wardens of the period doubtless -finding some difficulty in adapting their rules to the requirements of -undergraduates who might from time to time absent themselves from chapel -or lecture in order to raid a Parliamentary outpost. - -But perhaps the most instructive picture of the seventeenth-century -undergraduate is to be found in the account-book of one Wilding, of -Wadham (published by the Oxford Historical Society), apparently a -reading man and a scholar of his college, destined for Holy Orders. The -number of his books (he gives a list of them) shows him to have been -something of a student, while repeated entries of large sums paid for -'Wiggs' (on one occasion as much as 14*s*--more than his 'Battles' for -the quarter!) would seem to suggest something of the habits of the 'gay -young sparks' alluded to by Hearne in the next century. On the whole, -Master Wilding appears to have been a virtuous and studious young -gentleman. Now and then the natural man asserts himself, and he treats -his friends to wine or 'coffea,' or even makes an excursion to -'Abbington' (4*s.*!). Towards the end of his career a 'gaudy' costs -2*s.* 6*d.*, after which comes the too-suggestive entry, 'For a purge, -1*s.*' Then comes the close: outstanding bills are paid to the alarming -extent of 7*s.* 8*d.*; a 'wigg,' which originally cost 14*s.*, is -disposed of at a ruinous reduction for 6*s.*--the prudent man does not -give it away to his scout--and J. Wilding, B.A., e. Coll., Wadh., -retires to his country parsonage--having first invested sixpence in a -sermon. Evidently a person of methodical habits and punctual payments; -that had two wigs, and everything handsome about him; and that probably -grumbled quite as much at the 10*s.* fee for his tutor as his modern -successor does at his 8*l.* 6*s.* 8*d.* But, on the whole, collegiate -and university fees seem to have been small. - -After this description of the _vie intime_ of an undergraduate at -Wadham, history is reserved on the subject of the junior members of the -University; which is the more disappointing, as the historic Muse is not -only garrulous, but exceedingly scandalous in recounting the virtues and -the aberrations of eighteenth-century dons. Here and there we find an -occasional notice of the ways of undergraduates--here a private memoir, -there an academic _brochure_. We learn, incidentally, how Mr. John -Potenger, of New College, made 'theams in prose and verse,' and -eventually 'came to a tollerable proficiency in colloquial Latin;' how -Mr. Meadowcourt, of Merton, got into serious trouble--was prevented, in -fact, from taking his degree--for drinking the health of His Majesty -King George the First; and how Mr. Carty, of University College, -suffered a similar fate 'for prophaning, with mad intemperance, that -day, on which he ought, with sober chearfulness, to have commemorated -the restoration of King Charles the Second' (this was in 1716); how Mr. -Shenstone found, at Pembroke College, both sober men 'who amused -themselves in the evening with reading Greek and drinking water,' and -also 'a set of jolly sprightly young fellows .... who drank ale, smoked -tobacco,' and even 'punned;' and how Lord Shelburne had a 'narrow-minded -tutor.' From which we may gather, that University life was not so very -different from what it is now: our forefathers were more exercised about -politics, for which we have now substituted a perhaps extreme devotion -to athletics. But for the most part, the undergraduate is not prominent -in history--seeming, in fact, to be regarded as the least important -element in the University. On the other hand, his successor of the -present century--the era of the Examination Schools--occupies so -prominent a place in the eyes of the public that it is difficult to -speak of him, lest haply one should be accused of frivolity or want of -reverence for the _raison d'etre_ of all academic institutions. - -[Illustration: _CRICKET IN THE PARKS. By Launcelot Speed._] - -His own reason of existence is not so obvious. It was, as we have said, -tolerably clear that the mediaeval student came to Oxford primarily for -the love of learning something, at any rate; but the student _fin de -siecle_ is one of the most labyrinthine parts of a complex civilisation. -Of the hundreds of boys who are shot on the G.W.R. platform every -October to be caressed or kicked by Alma Mater, and returned in due time -full or empty, it is only an insignificant minority who come up with the -ostensible purpose of learning. Their reasons are as many as the colours -of their portmanteaus. Brown has come up because he is in the sixth -form at school, and was sent in for a scholarship by a head-master -desiring an advertisement; Jones, because it is thought by his friends -that he might get into the 'Varsity eleven; Robinson, because his father -considers a University career to be a stepping-stone to the -professions--which it fortunately is not as yet. Mr. Sangazur is, going -to St. Boniface because his father was there; and Mr. J. Sangazur -Smith--well, probably because _his_ father wasn't. Altogether they are -a motley crew, and it is not the least achievement of the University -that she does somehow or other manage to impress a certain stamp on so -many different kinds of metal. But in this she is only an instrument in -the hands of modern civilisation, which is always extinguishing -eccentricities and abnormal types; and even Oxford, while her sons are -getting rid of those interesting individualities which used to -distinguish them from each other, is fast losing many of the -peculiarities which used to distinguish it from the rest of the world. -It is an age of monotony. Even the Freshman, that delightful creation -of a bygone age, is not by any means what he was. He is still young, -but no longer innocent; the bloom is off his credulity; you cannot play -practical jokes upon him any more. Now and then a young man will -present himself to his college authorities in a gown of which the -superfluous dimensions and unusual embroidery betray the handiwork of -the provincial tailor; two or three neophytes may annually be seen -perambulating the High in academic dress with a walking-stick; but these -are only survivals. Senior men have no longer their old privileges of -'ragging' the freshman. In ancient times, as we are informed by the -historian of Merton College, 'Freshmen were expected to sit on a form, -and make jokes for the amusement of their companions, on pain of being -"tucked," or scarified by the thumb-nail applied under the lip. The -first Earl of Shaftesbury describes in detail this rather barbarous jest -as practised at Exeter College, and relates how, aided by some freshmen -of unusual size and strength, he himself headed a mutiny which led to -the eventual abolition of 'tucking.' Again, on Candlemas Day every -freshman received notice to prepare a speech to be delivered on the -following Shrove Tuesday, when they were compelled to declaim in undress -from a form placed on the high table, being rewarded with "cawdel" if -the performances were good, with cawdel and salted drink if it were -indifferent, and with salted drink and "tucks" if it were dull. This is -what American students call 'hazing,' and the German _Fuchs_ is -subjected to similar ordeals. But we have changed all that, and treat -the 'fresher' now with the respect he deserves. - -Possibly the undergraduate of fiction and the drama may have been once a -living reality. But he is so no more, and modern realistic novelists -will have to imagine some hero less crude in colouring and more in -harmony with the compromises and neutral tints of the latter half of the -nineteenth century. The young Oxonian or Cantab of fifty years back, as -represented by contemporary or nearly contemporary writers, was always -in extremes:-- - - 'When he was good he was very, very good; - But when he was bad he was horrid,' - -like the little girl of the poet. He was either an inimitable example -of improbable virtue, or abnormally vicious. The bad undergraduate -defied the Ten Commandments, all and severally, with the ease and -success of the villain of transpontine melodrama. Nothing came amiss to -him, from forgery to screwing up the Dean and letting it be understood -that some one else had done it; but retribution generally came at last, -and this compound of manifold vices was detected and rusticated; and it -was understood that from rustication to the gallows was the shortest and -easiest of transitions. The virtuous undergraduate wore trousers too -short for him and supported his relations. He did not generally join in -any athletic pastimes, but when the stroke of his college eight fainted -from excitement just before the start, the neglected sizar threw off his -threadbare coat, leapt into the vacant seat, and won his crew at once -the proud position of head of the river by the simple process of making -four bumps on the same night, explaining afterwards that he had -practised in a dingey and saw how it could be done. Then there was the -Admirable Crichton of University life, perhaps the commonest type among -these heroes of romance. He was invariably at Christ Church, and very -often had a background of more or less tragic memories from the far-away -days of his _jeunesse orageuse_. Nevertheless he unbent so far as to do -nothing much during the first three and a half years of his academic -career, except to go to a good many wine parties, where he always wore -his cap and gown (especially in female fiction), and drank more than any -one else. Then, when every one supposed he must be ploughed in Greats, -he sat up so late for a week, and wore so many wet towels, that -eventually he was announced at the Encaenia, amid the plaudits of his -friends and the approving smiles of the Vice-Chancellor, as the winner -of a Double-First, several University prizes, and a Fellowship; after -which it was only right and natural that the recipient of so many -coveted distinctions should lead the heroine of the piece to the altar. - -[Illustration: _WAITING FOR THE COX. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -Possibly the Oxford of a bygone generation may have furnished models for -these brilliantly coloured pictures; or, as is more probable, they were -created by the licence of fiction. At any rate the 'man' of modern times -is a far less picturesque person--unpicturesque even to the verge of -becoming ordinary. He is seldom eccentric or _outre_ in externals. His -manners are such as he has learnt at school, and his customs those of -the world he lives in. His dress would excite no remark in Piccadilly. -The gorgeous waistcoats of Leech's pencil and Calverley's '_crurum non -enarrabile tegmen_' belong to ancient history. He is, on the whole, -inexpensive in his habits, as it is now the fashion to be poor; he no -longer orders in a tailor's whole shop, and his clubs are generally -managed with economy and prudence. If, however, the undergraduate -occasionally displays the virtues of maturer age, there are certain -indications that he is less of a grown-up person than he was in the -brave days of old. It takes him a long time to forget his school-days. -Only exceptionally untrammelled spirits regard independent reading as -more important than the ministrations of their tutor. Pass-men have been -known to speak of their work for the schools as 'lessons,' and, in their -first term, to call the head of the College the head-master. Naturally, -too, school-life has imbued both Pass and Class men with an enduring -passion for games--probably rather a good thing in itself, although -inadequate as the be-all and end-all of youthful energy. Even those who -do not play them can talk about them. Cricket and football are always -as prolific a topic as the weather, and nearly as interesting, as many a -perfunctory 'Fresher's breakfast' can testify. - -[Illustration: _RINGOAL IN NEW COLLEGE. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -The undergraduate, in these as in other things, is like the young of his -species, with whom, after all, he has a good deal in common. Take, in -short, the ordinary provincial young man; add a dash of the schoolboy -and just a touch of the _Bursch_, and you have what Mr. Hardy calls the -'Normal Undergraduate.' - -[Illustration: Ringoal] - -It used to be the custom to draw a very hard-and-fast line of -demarcation between the rowing and the reading man--rowing being taken -as a type of athletics in general, and indeed being the only form of -physical exercise which possessed a regular organization. Rumour has it -that a certain tutor (now defunct) laid so much emphasis on this -distinction that men whose circumstances permitted them to be idle were -regarded with disfavour if they took to reading. He docketed freshmen -as reading or non-reading men, and would not allow either kind to stray -into the domain of the other. However, the general fusion of classes and -professions has levelled these boundaries now. The rowing man reads to a -certain extent, and the reading man has very often pretensions to -athletic eminence; it is in fact highly desirable that he should, now -that a 'Varsity 'blue' provides an assistant master in a school with at -least as good a salary as does a brilliant degree. Yet, although the -great majority of men belong to the intermediate class of those who take -life as they find it, and make no one occupation the object of their -exclusive devotion, it is hardly necessary to say that there are still -extremes--the Brutal Athlete at one end of the line and the bookish -recluse (often, though wrongly, identified with the 'Smug') at the -other. The existence of the first is encouraged by the modern tendency -to professionalism in athletics. Mere amateurs who regard games as an -amusement can never hope to do anything; a thing must be taken -seriously. Every schoolboy who wishes to obtain renown in the columns -of sporting papers has his 'record,' and comes up to Oxford with the -express intention of 'cutting' somebody else's, and the athletic -authorities of the University know all about Jones's bowling average at -Eton, or Brown's form as three-quarter-back at Rugby, long before these -distinguished persons have matriculated. Nor is it only cricket, -football, and rowing that are the objects of our worship. Even so staid -and contemplative a pastime as golf ranks among 'athletics;' and perhaps -in time the authorities will be asked to give a 'Blue' for croquet. -These things being so, on the whole, perhaps, we should be grateful to -the eminent athlete for the comparative affability of his demeanour, so -long as he is not seriously contradicted. He is great, but he is -generally merciful. - -Thews and sinews have probably as much admiration as is good for them, -and nearly as much as they want. On the other hand, the practice of -reading has undoubtedly been popularised. It is no longer a clique of -students who seek honours; public opinion in and outside the University -demands of an increasing majority of men that they should appear to be -improving their minds. The Pass-man pure and simple diminishes in -numbers annually; no doubt in time he will be a kind of pariah. -Colleges compete with each other in the Schools. Evening papers prove -by statistics the immorality of an establishment where a scholar who -obtains a second is allowed to remain in residence. The stress and -strain of the system would be hardly bearable were it not decidedly less -difficult to obtain a class in honours than it used to be--not, perhaps, -a First, or even a Second; but certainly the lower grades are easier of -attainment. Then the variety of subjects is such as to appeal to every -one: history, law, theology, natural science (in all its branches), -mathematics, all invite the ambitious student whose relations wish him -to take honours, and will be quite satisfied with a Fourth; and eminent -specialists compete for the privilege of instructing him. The tutor who -complained to the undergraduate that he had sixteen pupils was met by -the just retort that the undergraduate had sixteen tutors. - -[Illustration: _GOLF AT OXFORD. THE PLATEAU HOLE AND ARNOLD'S TREE. -Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -The relation of the University to the undergraduate is twofold; it is -'kept'--as a witty scholar of Dublin is fabled to have inscribed over -the door of his Dean, 'for his amusement and instruction'--and if the -latter is frequently formal, it is still more often and in a great -variety of ways 'informal,' and not communicated through his tutor. Not -to mention the many college literary societies--every college has one at -least, and they are all ready to discuss any topic, from the Origin of -Evil to bimetallism--there are now in the University various learned -societies, modelled and sometimes called after the German _Seminar_, -which are intended to supplement the deficiencies of tuition, and to -keep the serious student abreast of the newest erudition which has been -'made in Germany,' or anywhere else on the Continent. Then there is the -Union as a school of eloquence for the political aspirant; or the -'private business' of his college debating society, where a vote of -censure on Ministers is sometimes emphasised by their ejection into the -quadrangle, may qualify him for the possible methods of a future House -of Commons. - - - - -III--OF SIGHTSEERS - - - 'The women longed to go and see the _college_ and the _tutour_.' - _'The Guardian's Instruction' by Stephen Penton._ - -When the late Mr. Bright asserted that the tone of Oxford life and -thought was 'provincial with a difference,' great indignation was -aroused in the breasts of all Oxford men--residents, at least; whether -it was the provincialism or the 'difference' wherein lay the sting of -the taunt. Probably it was the first. For, although it is a tenable -hypothesis that _Kleinstaedtigkeit_ has really been a potent factor in -the production of much that is best in art and literature, still nobody -likes to be called provincial by those whose business is in the -metropolis. Caesar said that he would rather be a great man at Gabii, -or whatever was the Little Pedlington of Italy, than an ordinary person -at Rome; but the modern Little Pedlingtonian would seldom confess to so -grovelling an ambition, whatever might be his real feelings. He would -much sooner be one of the crowd in London than mayor of his native city: -so at least he says. And so he is very angry if you call him -provincial, and venture to insinuate that his views of life are limited -by the jurisdiction of his Local Board or City Council; and thus the -University of Oxford refused for a long time to forgive John Bright, and -did not quite forget his strictures even when it gave him an honorary -degree and called him 'patriae et libertatis amantissimus.' And yet the -authorities had done what they could to keep the University provincial. -It was only after many and deep searchings of heart that the Hebdomadal -Council consented to countenance the advent of the Great Western -Railway; while the ten miles which separate Oxford from Steventon -preserved undergraduates from the contaminating contact of the -metropolis there was still hope, but many venerable Tories held that -University discipline was past praying for when a three-hours' run would -bring you into the heart of the dissipation of London. Some there were -who could not even imagine that so terrible a change had really taken -place; it is said that Dr. Routh, the President of Magdalen, who -attained the respectable age of ninety-nine in the year 1855 (he was -elected towards the close of the last century as a _warming-pan_, being -then of a delicate constitution and not supposed likely to live!), -persistently ignored the development of railways altogether; when -undergraduates came up late at the beginning of the winter term, he -would excuse them on the ground of the badness of the roads. - -We have changed all that, like other provincial centres; and -undergraduates who want to 'see their dentist'--a venerable and -time-honoured plea which we have heard expressed by the delicate-minded -as 'the necessity for keeping a dental engagement'--may now run up to -town and back between lunch and 'hall;' the latter function having also -marched with the times, and even six-o'clock dinner being now almost a -thing of the past. Not so long ago five was the regular hour. In the -early seventies seven-o'clock dinner was regarded as a doubtful -innovation; and there we have stopped for the present. But the -fashionable world outside the colleges imitates London customs--always -keeping a little way behind the age--and what has been called the 'Parks -System' actually dines as late as 7.45 when it is determined to be _tres -chic_. It is only one sign of the influx of metropolitan ideas; but -there are many others. Oxford tradesmen have learnt by bitter -experience that the modern undergraduate is not an exclusive preserve -for them like his father. That respected county magnate, when he was at -Oriel, bought his coats from an Oxford tailor and his wine from an -Oxford wine-merchant, to whom--being an honest man--he paid about half -as much again as he would have paid anywhere in London, thereby -recouping the men of coats or of wines for the many bad debts made by -dealing with the transitory and impecunious undergraduate. But his son -gets his clothes in London, and his wine from the college, which deals -directly with Bordeaux. And the tone and subject of conversation is -changed too. Oxford is thoroughly up to date, and knows all about the -latest play at the Criterion and the latest scandal in the inner circle -of London society--or thinks it does, at any rate: there is no one who -knows so much about London as the man who does not live there. - -[Illustration: _COMMEMORATION: OUTSIDE THE SHELDONIAN THEATRE. Drawn by -T. H. Crawford._] - -But if Oxford goes to London, so does London come to Oxford. Whether it -be fitting or not that the site of a theoretically learned University -should be in summer a sort of people's park or recreation-ground for the -jaded Londoner, the fact is so: the classes and the masses are always -with us in one form or another. It has become a common and laudable -practice for East-end clergymen and the staff of Toynbee Hall and the -Oxford House to bring down their flocks on Whit-Monday or other -appropriate occasions; and one may constantly see high academic -dignitaries piloting an unwieldy train of excursionists, and trying to -compress University history into a small compass, or to explain the -nature of a college (of all phenomena most unexplainable to the lay -mind) to an audience which has never seen any other place of education -than a Board school. As for the classes, they have raised the Eights -and 'Commem.' to the rank of regular engagements in a London season, and -they go through both with that unflinching heroism which the English -public invariably display in the performance of a social duty: they -shiver in summer frocks on the barges, despite the hail and snowstorms -of what is ironically described as the 'Summer' term; and after a hard -day's sightseeing they enjoy a well-earned repose by going to -Commemoration balls, where you really do dance, not for a perfunctory -two hours or so, but from 8.30 to 6.30 a.m. In spite of these hardships -it is gratifying to observe that, whether or not the University succeeds -in its educational mission, it appears to leave nothing to be desired as -a place of amusement for the jaded pleasure-seeker. People who go to -sleep at a farce have been known to smile at the (to a resident) dullest -and least impressive University function. Ladies appear to take an -especial delight in penetrating the mysteries of College life. Perhaps -the female mind is piqued by a subdued flavour of impropriety, dating -from a period when colleges were not what they are; or more probably -they find it gratifying to the self-respect of a superior sex to observe -and to pity the notoriously ineffectual attempts of mere bachelors to -render existence bearable. So much for the term; and when the vacation -begins Oxford is generally inundated by a swarm of heterogeneous -tourists--Americans, who come here on their way between Paris and -Stratford-on-Avon; Germans, distinguished by a white umbrella and a red -'Baedeker,' trying to realise that here, too, is a University, despite -the absence of students with slashed noses and the altogether different -quality of the beer. Then with August come the Extension students; the -more frivolous to picnic at Nuneham and Islip, the seriously-minded to -attend lectures which compress all knowledge into a fortnight's course, -and to speculate on the future when they--the real University, as they -say--will succeed to the inheritance of an unenlightened generation -which is wasting its great opportunities. - -[Illustration: _IN COLLEGE ROOMS. Drawn by T. H. Crawford._] - -At Commemoration a general sense of lobster salad pervades the -atmosphere, and the natural beauties of colleges are concealed or -enhanced by a profusion of planking and red cloth; the architectural -merit of a hall is as nothing compared to the elasticity of its floor. -The Eights, again, provide attractions of their own, not especially -academic. The truly judicious sightseer will avoid both of these festive -seasons, and will choose some time when there is less to interfere with -his own proper pursuit--the week after the Eights, perhaps, or the -beginning of the October term, when the red Virginia creeper makes a -pleasing contrast with the grey collegiate walls. Nor will he, if he is -wise, allow himself to be 'rushed' through the various objects of -interest: there are, it is believed, local guides who profess to show -the whole of Oxford in two hours; but rumour asserts that the feat is -accomplished by making the several quadrangles of one college do duty -for a corresponding number of separate establishments, so that the -credulous visitor leaves Christ Church with the impression that he has -seen not only 'The House,' but also several other foundations, all -curiously enough communicating with each other. And in any case, after -a mere scamper through the colleges, nothing remains in the mind but a -vague and inaccurate reminiscence, combining in one the characteristics -of all; the jaded sightseer goes back to London with a fortunately -soon-to-be-forgotten idea that Keble was founded by Alfred the Great, -and that Tom Quad is a nickname for the Vice-Chancellor. Samuel Pepys -seems to have been to a certain extent the prototype of this kind of -curiosity or antiquity hunter, and paid a 'shilling to a boy that showed -me the Colleges before dinner.' (Curiously enough, 'after dinner' the -honorarium to 'one that showed us the schools and library' was 10*s.*!) - -[Illustration: _A BALL AT CHRIST CHURCH. Drawn by T. H. Crawford_] - -He who is responsible for the proper conduct of a gang of relations or -friends will not treat them in this way. He will endeavour, so far as -possible, to confine them within the limits of his own college, where he -is on his native heath, and, if he is not an antiquarian, can at least -animate the venerable buildings with details of contemporary history. He -will point out his Dons (like the great French nation, 'objects of -hatred or admiration, but never of indifference') with such derision or -reverence as they may deserve, and affix to them ancient anecdotes -whereby their personality may be remembered. He will show to an -admiring circle the statue which was painted green, the pinnacle climbed -by a friend in the confidence of inebriation, and the marks of the -bonfire which the Dean did not succeed in putting out. Even the most -ignorant and frivolous-minded person can make his own college -interesting. When he has succeeded in impressing upon his friends the -true character of a college as a place of religion and sound learning, -he may be permitted to show them such external objects as form a part of -every one's education, and which no one (for the very shame of -confessing it) can pretermit unseen, such as the gardens of New College -or St. John's, the 'Nose' of B.N.C, the Burne-Jones tapestry at Exeter, -or the picture of Mr. Gladstone in the hall of Christ Church. Those who -absolutely insist on a more comprehensive view of the University and -City may be allowed to make the ascent of some convenient point of -view--Magdalen Tower, for instance; it is a stiff climb, but the view -from the top will repay your exertions. This is where, as since the -appearance of Mr. Holman Hunt's picture everybody is probably aware, the -choir of the college annually salute the rising sun from the top of the -tower by singing a Latin hymn on May morning--while the youth of the -city, for reasons certainly not known to themselves, make morning -hideous with blowing of unmelodious horns in the street below. At all -times--even at sunrise on a rainy May morning--it is a noble prospect. -The unlovely red-brick suburbs of the north are hidden from sight by the -intervening towers and pinnacles of the real Oxford; immediately below -the High Street winds westwards, flanked by colleges and churches, of -which the prevailing grey is relieved by the green trees of those many -gardens and unexplored nooks of verdure with which Oxford abounds; to -the south there are glimpses of the river flowing towards the dim grey -line of the distant Berkshire downs. To the historically-minded the -outlook may suggest many a picture of bygone times--scenes of brawling -in the noisy High Street, when the old battle of Town and Gown was -fought with cold steel, and blood flowed freely on both sides--in the -days when the maltreated townsman appealing to the Proctor could get no -satisfaction but a 'thrust at him with his poleaxe!' Down the street -which lies below passed Queen Elizabeth--'Virgo Pia Docta Felix'--after -being royally entertained with sumptuous pageants and the play of -'Palamon and Arcyte' in the Christ Church hall. Over the Cherwell, in -the troublous times of the Civil Wars, rode the Royalist horse to beat -up the Parliamentary quarters below the Chiltern hills and among the -woods of the Buckinghamshire border--enterprising undergraduates perhaps -taking an _exeat_ to accompany them. Here it was that certain scholars -of Magdalen, having a quarrel with Lord Norreys by reason of -deer-stealing, 'went up privately to the top of their tower, and waiting -till he should pass by towards Ricot' (Rycote) 'sent down a shower of -stones upon him and his retinew, wounding some and endangering others of -their lives'--and worse might have happened had not the 'retinew' taken -the precaution, foreseeing the assault, to put boards or tables on their -heads. At a later day Pope entered Oxford by this road, and there is a -pretty description of the scene in one of his letters--it will no doubt -appeal to the nineteenth-century visitor who departs through slums to -the architecturally unimpressive station of the Great Western. 'The -shades of the evening overtook me. The moon rose in the clearest sky I -ever saw, by whose solemn light I paced on slowly, without company, or -any interruption to the range of my own thoughts. About a mile before I -reached Oxford all the bells tolled in different notes, the clocks of -every college answered one another, and sounded forth (some in a deeper, -some in a softer tone) that it was eleven at night. All this was no ill -preparation to the life I have led since among those old walls, -venerable galleries, stone porticos, studious walks, and solitary scenes -of the University.' Jerry-built rows of lodging-houses rather militate -against the romance of the Iffley Road as we know it now. - -[Illustration: _THE DEER PARK, MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD. By J. H. -Lorimer._] - -But, after all, the majority of sightseers are not given to historical -reflections. What most people want is something that 'palpitates with -actuality;' they want to see the machine working. They are temporarily -happy if they can see a Proctor in his robes of office, and rise to the -enthusiasm of 'never having had such a delightful day' if the Proctor -happens to 'proctorise' an undergraduate within the ken of their vision. -'It was all so _delightful_ and mediaeval, and all that kind of thing, -don't you know? Poor young man--simply for not wearing one of those -horrid caps and gowns! _I_ call it a shame.' This is the reason why a -Degree Day is so wonderfully popular a ceremony. There is a sense of -attractive mystery about it all--the Vice-Chancellor throned in the -Theatre or Convocation House, discoursing in unintelligible scraps of -Latin like the refrain of a song, and the Proctors doing their -quarter-deck walk--although the dignity of the function be rather marred -by the undergraduates who jostle and giggle in the background forgetting -that they are assisting at a ceremony which is, after all, one of the -University's reasons of existence. It is the same kind of curiosity -which causes the lecturer to become suddenly conscious that he is being -watched with intense interest--an interest to which he is altogether -unaccustomed--by 'only a face at the window' of his lecture-room, to his -own confusion and the undisguised amusement of his audience. - -[Illustration: _IN CONVOCATION: CONFERRING A DEGREE. Drawn by Ernest -Stamp._] - -Such are sightseers: yet every man to his taste. When Samuel Pepys came -over from Abingdon to see the sights of the University town, it is -gratifying and rather surprising to learn that what most impressed him -was the small price paid for creature comforts: 'Oxford mighty fine -place,' such is the diarist's reflection, 'and _cheap entertainment_.' - - - - -IV--OF EXAMINATIONS - - - 'Thinketh one made them in a fit of the blues.' - _Q_ - -If there is one subject on which the professedly non-reading -undergraduate is nearly always eloquent it is the aggravation of his -naturally hard lot by the examination system; that is, not only 'The -Schools' themselves, but the ancillary organization of lectures, -'collections,' and college tuition in general; all which machinery, -being intended to save him from himself and enable him to accomplish the -ostensible purpose of his residence at the University, he very properly -regards as an entirely unnecessary instrument of torture, designed and -perfected by the gratuitous and malignant ingenuity of Dons, whose sole -object is the oppression of undergraduates in general and himself in -particular. He is obliged to attend lectures, at least occasionally. -His tutors compel him to attempt to pass his University examination at a -definite date; and then--adding insult to injury--actually reproach him -or even send him down for his ill success, just as if he had not always -demonstrated to them by repeated statements and constant proofs of -incapacity that he had not the smallest intention of getting through! -Small wonder, perhaps, that on returning from a highly unsatisfactory -interview with the University examiners to a yet more exasperating -colloquy with the authorities of his college, he should wish that fate -had not matched him with the 'cosmic process' of the nineteenth century; -and that it had been his happier lot to come up to Oxford in the days -when examinations were not, and his remote ancestors got their degrees -without any vain display of mere intellectual proficiency, or went down -without them if they chose. - -[Illustration: _A LECTURE-ROOM IN MAGDALEN COLLEGE. Drawn by E. -Stamp._] - -And yet, should the modern undergraduate take the trouble (which of -course he never does) to acquaint himself with the statutes and -ordinances which governed his University in the pre-examination period, -he would find that even then the rose was not wholly devoid of thorns. -Even then the powers that be had decreed that life should not be -completely beer, nor altogether skittles. It is true that the student -was probably less molested by his college; but the regulations of the -University dealt far more hardly with him than they do at present. -Under the statutes of Archbishop Laud, the University exercised those -functions of teaching and general supervision which it has since in -great part surrendered to its component colleges; and in theory the -University was a hard task-mistress. - -Attendance at professorial lectures was theoretically obligatory, and -'since not only reading and thought, but practice also, is of the -greatest avail towards proficiency in learning,' it was required that -the candidate for a degree should 'dispute' in the Schools at stated and -frequent times during the whole course of his academic career. -Beginning by listening to the disputations of his seniors (a custom -which perhaps survives in the modern fashion which sometimes provides a -'gallery' at the ceremony of _viva voce_), he was as time went on -required himself to maintain and publicly defend doctrines in a manner -which would be highly embarrassing to his modern successor--'responding' -at first to the arguments of the stater of a theory, and with riper -wisdom being promoted to the position of Opponent.' This opposing and -responding was termed 'doing generals.' 'Argufying' was the business of -the University in the seventeenth century, and had been so for a long -time. - -On the memorable occasion of Queen Elizabeth's visit to Oxford in the -year 1566, Her Majesty was entertained intermittently with disputations -on the moon's influence on the tides, and the right of rebellion against -bad government. Thus, Archbishop Laud required of the -seventeenth-century undergraduate so many disputations before he became -a _sophista_, and so many again before he could be admitted to the -degree of Bachelor; and if the system had worked in practice as it was -intended to do in theory, young Oxford would not have had an easy time -of it. In the days of Antony Wood's undergraduate career exercises in -the 'Schooles' were 'very good.' 'Philosophy disputations in Lent time, -frequent in the Greek tongue; _coursing_ very much, ending alwaies in -blowes,' which Wood considers scandalous; but at least it shows the -serious spirit of the disputants. But a University can always be -trusted to temper the biting wind of oppressive regulations to its shorn -alumni; and there can be no doubt that the comparative slackness and -sleepiness of the eighteenth century--a somnolence which it is easy to -exaggerate, but impossible altogether to deny--must have tended to wear -the sharp corners off the academic curriculum. Indications that this -was so are not wanting. After all, there must have been many ways of -avoiding originality in a disputation. A writer in 'Terrae Filius' -(1720) states the case as follows:-- - - -'All students in the University who are above one year's standing, and -have not taken their batchelor' (of arts) 'degree, are required by -statute to be present at this awful solemnity' (disputation for a -degree), 'which is designed for a public proof of the progress he has -made in the art of reasoning; tho' in fact it is no more than a formal -repetition of a set of syllogisms upon some ridiculous question in -logick, which they get by rote, or, perhaps, only read out of their -caps, which lie before them with their notes in them. These commodious -sets of syllogisms are call'd strings, and descend from undergraduate to -undergraduate, in regular succession; so that, when any candidate for a -degree is to exercise his talent in argumentation, he has nothing else -to do but to enquire amongst his friends for a string upon such-and-such -a question.' - - -So, even in the early part of the present century, reverend persons -proceeding to the degree of D.D. have been known to avail themselves of -a thesis (or written harangue on some point of theology) not compiled by -their unaided exertions, but kept among the archives of their college -and passed round as occasion might require. If mature theologians have -reconciled this with their consciences in the nineteenth, what may not -have been possible to an undergraduate in the eighteenth century? Also, -the functionary who stood in the place of the modern examiner was a very -different kind of person from his successor--that incarnation of cold -and impassive criticism; collusion between 'opponent' and 'respondent' -must have been possible and frequent; and so far had things gone that -the candidate for a degree was permitted to choose the 'Master' who was -to examine him, and it appears to have been customary to invite your -Master to dinner on the night preceding the final disputation. Witness -'Terrae Filius 'once more:-- - - -'Most candidates get leave .... to chuse their own examiners, who never -fail to be their old cronies and toping companions.... It is also well -known to be the custom for the candidates either to present their -examiners with a piece of gold, or to give them a handsome -entertainment, and make them drunk, which they commonly do the night -before examination, and some times keep them till morning, and so -adjourn, cheek by jowl, from their drinking-room to the school, where -they are to be examined.' - - -The same author adds: 'This to me seems the great business of -_determination_: to pay money and get drunk.' - -Vicesimus Knox, who took his B.A. degree in 1775, is at pains to -represent the whole process of so-called examination as an elaborate -farce. 'Every candidate,' he says, 'is obliged to be examined in the -whole circle of the sciences by three masters of arts, of his own -choice.' Naturally, the temptation is too much for poor humanity. 'It -is reckoned good management to get acquainted with two or three jolly -young masters and supply them well with port previously to the -examination.' _Viva voce_ once put on this convivial footing, it is not -surprising that 'the examiners and the candidate often converse on the -last drinking bout, or on horses, or read the newspapers, or a novel, or -divert themselves as well as they can till the clock strikes eleven, -when all parties descend, and the _testimonium_ is signed by the -masters.' Under such circumstances it is obvious that the provisions of -Archbishop Laud might be shorn of half their terrors. Even at an earlier -period other methods of evasion were not wanting. As early as 1656, -orders were made 'abolishing' the custom of candidates standing treat to -examiners. In the statute which still prescribes the duties of the -_clericus universitatis_, there is a clause threatening him with severe -penalties--to the extent of paying a fine of ten shillings--should he so -far misuse his especial charge, the University clock, as to 'retard and -presently precipitate the course' of that venerable time-piece, 'in such -a manner that the hours appointed for public exercises be unjustly -shortened, to the harm and prejudice of the studious.' Moreover, we -read in Wood that notice of examination was given by 'tickets stuck up -on certaine public corners, which would be suddenly after taken downe' -by the candidate's friends. To such straits and to such unworthy shifts -could disputants be reduced by mere inability to find matter. - -It has been said that attendance at professorial lectures was -theoretically obligatory; but it is hardly necessary to point out that -even serious students have occasionally dispensed with the duty of -attending lectures; and it is more than whispered there have been -occasions in recent centuries when it was not an audience only that was -wanting. There are, of course, instances of both extremes. Rumour -tells of a certain professor of anatomy, who, lacking a quorum, bade his -servant 'bring out the skeleton, in order that I may be able to address -you as "gentle*men*;"' but all professors have not been so -conscientious. Gibbon goes so far as to assert that 'in the University -of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have for these many -years given up altogether the pretence of teaching,' and the Reverend -James Hurdie does not much improve the matter, when he prepares to -refute the historian's charge in his 'Vindication of Magdalen College.' -So far as the College is concerned, the reverend gentleman has something -of a case; but his defence of the University is not altogether -satisfying. Some of the professors, no doubt, do lecture in a -statutable manner. But 'the late noble but unfortunate Professor of -Civil Law began his office with reading lectures, and only desisted for -want of an audience' (a plausible excuse, were it not that some -lecturers seem to have entertained peculiar ideas as to the constitution -of an audience). 'Terrae Filius' has a story of a Professor of Divinity -who came to his lecture-room, found to his surprise and displeasure, a -band of intending hearers, and dismissed them straightway with the -summary remark: 'Domini, vos non estis idonei auditores!' 'The present -Professor, newly appointed (the author has heard it from the highest -authority), means to read.' Moreover, 'the late Professor of Botany at -one time _did_ read.' In fact, as the 'Oxford Spy' observes in 1818:-- - - 'Yet here the rays of Modern Science spread: - Professors are appointed, lectures read. - If none attend, or hear: not ours the blame, - Theirs is the folly--and be theirs the shame.' - -It is evident that professorial lectures were not a wholly unbearable -burden. - -'It is recorded in the veracious chronicle of Herodotus that Sandoces, a -Persian judge, had been crucified by Darius, on the charge of taking a -bribe to determine a cause wrongly; but while he yet hung on the cross, -Darius found by calculation that the good deeds of Sandoces towards the -king's house were more numerous than his evil deeds, and so, confessing -that he had acted with more haste than wisdom, he ordered him to be -taken down and set at large.' - -[Illustration: _THE LIBRARY, MERTON COLLEGE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp._] - -So when the Universities are at last confronted with that great Day of -Reckoning which is continually held over their heads by external -enemies, and which timorous friends are always trying to stave off by -grudging concessions and half-hearted sympathy with Movements; when we -are brought to the bar of that grand and final commission, which is once -for all to purge Oxford and Cambridge of their last remnants of -mediaevalism, and bring them into line with the marching columns of -modern Democracy; when the judgment is set and the books are opened, we -may hope that some extenuating circumstances may be found to set against -the long enumeration of academic crimes. There will be no denying that -Oxford has been the home of dead languages and undying prejudice. It -will be admitted as only too true that Natural Science students were for -many years compelled to learn a little Greek, and that colleges have not -been prepared to sacrifice the greater part of their immoral revenues to -the furtherance of University Extension; and we shall have to plead -guilty to the damning charge of having returned two Tory members to -several successive Parliaments. All this Oxford has done, and more; -there is no getting out of it. Yet her counsel will be able to plead in -her favour that once at least she has been found not retarding the rear, -but actually leading the van of nineteenth-century progress; for it will -hardly be denied that if the Universities did not invent the Examination -System, at least they were among the first to welcome and to adapt it; -and that if it had not been for the development of examinations, -qualifying and competitive, at Oxford and Cambridge, the ranks of the -Civil Service would have continued for many years longer to be recruited -by the bad old method of nomination (commonly called jobbery and -nepotism by the excluded), and society would, perhaps, never have -realised that a knowledge of Chaucer is among the most desirable -qualifications for an officer in Her Majesty's Army. Here, at least, the -Universities have been privileged to set an example. - -The Oxford examination system is practically contemporaneous with the -century; the first regular class list having been published in 1807. -The change was long in coming, and when it did come the face of the -University was not revolutionised; if the alteration contained, as it -undoubtedly did, the germs of a revolution which was to extend far -beyond academic boundaries, it bore the aspect of a most desirable but -most moderate reform. Instead of obtaining a degree by the obsolete -process of perfunctory disputation, ambitious men were invited to offer -certain books (classical works for the most part), and in these to -undergo the ordeal of a written and oral examination; the oral part -being at that time probably as important as the other. Sudden and -violent changes are repugnant to all Englishmen, and more especially to -the rulers of Universities, those homes of ancient tradition; and just -as early railways found it difficult to escape from the form of the -stage-coach and the old nomenclature of the road, so the new Final -Honour School took over (so to speak) the plant of a system which it -superseded. _Viva voce_ was still (and is to the present day) -important, because it was the direct successor of oral disputation. The -candidate for a degree had obtained that distinction by a theoretical -argument with three 'opponents' in the Schools; so now the opponents -were represented by a nearly corresponding number of examiners, and the -_viva voce_ part of the examination was for a long time regarded as a -contest of wit between the candidate and the questioner. Nor did the -race for honours affect the great majority of the University as it does -at present. It was intended for the talented few: it was not a matter -of course that Tom, Dick, and Harry should go in for honours because -their friends wished it, or because their college tutor wished to keep -his college out of the evening papers. Candidates for honours were -regarded as rather exceptional persons, and a brilliant performance in -the Schools was regarded as a tolerably sure augury of success in life: -a belief which was, perhaps, justified by facts then, but which--like -most beliefs, dying hard--has unfortunately survived into a state of -society where it is impossible to provide the assurance of a successful -career for all and each of the eighty or hundred 'first-class' men whom -the University annually presents to an unwelcoming world. - -[Illustration: _READING THE NEWDIGATE. Drawn by T, H. Crawford._] - -However small its beginnings it was inevitable that the recognition of -intellect should exercise the greatest influence--though not immediately -and obviously--on the future of the University. _La carriere_ once -_ouverte aux talents_--the fact being established and recognised that -one man was intellectually not only as good as another, but a deal -better--colleges could not help following the example set them; the -first stirrings of 'inter-collegiate competition' began to be felt, and -after forty years or so (for colleges generally proceed in these and -similar matters with commendable caution, and it was only the earlier -part of the nineteenth century after all) began the gradual abolition of -'close' scholarships and fellowships--those admirable endowments whereby -the native of some specified county or town was provided with a -competence for life, solely in virtue of the happy accident of birth. -To disregard talent openly placarded and certificated was no longer -possible. The most steady-going and venerable institutions began to be -reanimated by the infusion of new blood, and to be pervaded by the -newest and most 'dangerous' ideas. - -Nor were the outside public slow to avail themselves after their manner -of the changed state of things. The possessor of a University degree -has at all times been regarded by less fortunate persons with a kind of -superstitious awe, as one who has lived in mysterious precincts and -practised curious (if not always useful) arts, and at first the title of -'Honourman,' implying that the holder belonged to a privileged -few--_elite_ of the _elites_--whom a University, itself learned, had -delighted to honour for their learning, could inspire nothing less than -reverence. Also the distinction was a very convenient one. The public -is naturally only too glad to have any ready and satisfactory -testimonial which may help as a method of selection among the host of -applicants for its various employments; and here was a diploma signed by -competent authorities and bearing no suspicion of fear or favour. -Presently the public began to follow the lead of Oxford and Cambridge, -and examine for itself, but that is another story: schoolmasters more -especially have always kept a keen eye on the class list. So an -intellectual distinction comes in time to have a commercial price, and -this no doubt has had something (though, we will hope, not everything) -to do with the increase in the number of 'Schools' and the growing -facilities for obtaining so-called honours. But it is needless to -observe that the multiplication of the article tends to the depreciation -of its value. The First-class man, who was a potential Cabinet Minister -or an embryo Archbishop at the beginning of the century, is now capable -of descending to all kinds of employments. He does not indeed--being -perhaps conscious of incapacity--serve as a waiter in a hotel, after the -fashion of American students in the vacation, but he has been known to -accept gratefully a post in a private school where his tenure of office -depends largely on the form he shows in bowling to the second eleven. - -Here in Oxford, though we still respect a 'First,' and though perhaps -the greater part of our available educational capacity is devoted to the -conversion of passmen into honourmen, there are signs that examinations -are no longer quite regarded as the highest good and the chief object of -existence. It is an age of specialism, and yet it is hard to mould the -whole University system to suit the particular studies of every -specialist. Multiply Final Schools as you will, 'the genuine student' -with one engrossing interest will multiply far more quickly; and just as -the athlete and non-reading man complains that the schools interrupt his -amusements, the man who specialises on the pips of an orange, or who -regards nothing in history worth reading except a period of two years -and six months in the later Byzantine empire, will pathetically lament -that examinations are interrupting his real work. Are men made for the -Schools, or the Schools for men? It is a continual problem; perhaps -examinations are only a _pis aller_, and we must be content to wait till -science instructs us how to gauge mental faculty by experiment without -subjecting the philosopher to the ordeal of Latin Prose, and the 'pure -scholar' to the test of a possibly useless acquaintance with the true -inwardness of Hegelianism. After all it is the greatest happiness of -the greatest number that has to be considered, and the majority as yet -are not special students. Moreover, there are various kinds of -specialists. If 'general knowledge' (as has been said) is too often -synonymous with 'particular ignorance,' it is equally true that -specialism in one branch is sometimes not wholly unconnected with -failure in another. - -[Illustration: _A DANCE AT ST. JOHN'S. Drawn by T. Hamilton Crawford, -R.W.S._] - -It was the severance of another link with the past when the scene of -examinations was transferred from the 'Old Schools'--the purlieus of the -Sheldonian and the Bodleian--to a new and perhaps unnecessarily palatial -building in the High Street, which is as little in keeping with the -dark, crumbling walls of its neighbour, University College, as the -motley throng of examinees (_pueri innuptaeque puellae_) is out of -harmony with the traditions of an age which did not recognise the -necessity of female education. We have changed all that, and possibly -the change is for the better, for while the atmosphere which pervaded -the ancient dens now appropriated to the use of the great library was -certainly academic, and was sometimes cool and pleasant in summer, the -conditions of the game became almost intolerable in winter. Unless he -would die under the process of examinations like the Chinese of story, -the candidate must provide himself with greatcoats and rugs enough (it -was said) to hide a 'crib,' or even a Liddell and Scott, for the -proximity of the Bodleian forbade any lighting or warming apparatus. -But in the new examination schools comfort and luxury reign; rare -marbles adorn even the least conspicuous corners, and the only survivals -of antiquity are the ancient tables, which are popularly supposed to be -contemporaneous with the examination system, and are bescrawled and -bescratched with every possible variety of inscription and -hieroglyphic--from adaptations of verses in the Psalms to a list of -possible Derby winners--from a caricature of the 'invigilating' examiner -to a sentimental but unflattering reminiscence of one's partner at last -night's dance. Here they sit, a remarkable medley, all sorts, -conditions, and even ages of men, herded together as they probably never -will be again in after-life: undeserving talent cheek by jowl with -meritorious dulness; callow youth fresh from the rod of the -schoolmaster, and mature age with a family waiting anxiously outside; -and a minority of the fairer sex, whose presence is rather embarrassing -to examiners who do not see their way to dealing with possible hysteria. -And in the evening they will return--if it is Commemoration week; the -venerable tables will be cleared away, and the 'Scholae Magnae Borealis -et Australis' will be used for the more desirable purpose of dancing. -Is it merely soft nothings that the Christ Church undergraduate is -whispering to that young lady from Somerville Hall, as they 'sit out' -the lancers in the romantic light of several hundred Chinese lanterns? -Not at all; they are comparing notes about their _viva voce_ in history. - - - - -V--UNIVERSITY JOURNALISM - - - 'I only wish my critics had to write - A High-class Paper!' - _Anon._ - -The business of those who teach in the Universities is to criticise -mistakes, and criticism of style has two results for the master and the -scholar. It may produce that straining after correctness in small -matters which the cold world calls pedantry; and in the case of those -who are not content only to observe, but are afflicted with a desire to -produce, criticism of style takes the form of parody or imitation; for a -good parody or a good imitation of an author's manner is an -object-lesson in criticism. Hence it is that that same intolerance of -error which makes members of a University slow in the production of -really great works stimulates the genesis of ephemeral and mostly -imitative literature. The more Oxford concerns herself with literary -style, the more she is likely in her less serious moods to ape the -manner of contemporary literature. It all comes, in the first instance, -of being taught to copy Sophocles and travesty Virgil. Ephemeral -literature, then, at the Universities has always been essentially -imitative. In the last century, when it was the fashion to be -classical--and when as in the earlier poems of Mr. Barry Lyndon, 'Sol -bedecked the verdant mead, or pallid Luna shed her ray'--Oxonian minor -poets imitated the London wits and sang the charms of the local belles -under the sobriquets of Chloe and Delia, and academic essayists copied -the manner of the 'Spectator,' and hit off the weaknesses of their -friends, Androtion and Clearchus; and now that the world has come to be -ruled by newspapers, it is only natural that the style and the methods -of the daily and weekly press should in some degree affect the lighter -literature of Universities, and that not only undergraduates, who are -naturally imitative, but even dons, who might be supposed to know -better, should find themselves contributing to and redacting -publications which are conducted more or less on the lines of the 'new -journalism.' - -[Illustration: _THE RADCLIFFE. Drawn by Ernest Stamp._] - -Oxford has been slow to develop in this particular direction, and the -reasons are not far to seek. The conditions just now are exceptionally -favourable--that is, a _cacoethes scribendi_ has coincided with -abundance of matter to write about, but the organs of the great external -world naturally provide a model for the writer. But it is only recently -that these causes have been all together present and operative, and the -absence of one or more of them has at different times been as effectual -as the absence of all. In the early part of the present century there -can have been no lack of matter: University reform was at least in the -air, athletics were developing, the examination system was already in -full swing. But for some reason the tendency of the University was not -in the direction of the production of ephemeral or at least frivolous -literature. The pompous Toryism of University authorities seventy years -ago did not encourage any intellectual activity unconnected with the -regular curriculum of the student, and when intellectual activity began -to develop, it was rather on the lines of theological discussion--the -subjects were hardly fitted for the columns of a newspaper. At an -earlier date the Vice-Chancellor was interviewed by the delegate of an -aspiring clique of undergraduates, who wished to form a literary club -and to obtain the sanction of authority for its formation. He refused -to grant the society any formal recognition, on the ground that while it -was true that the statutes did not absolutely forbid such things, they -certainly did not specifically mention them; and the members of the -club--when it was eventually founded independent of the -Vice-Chancellarial auspices--were known among their friends as the -'Lunatics.' Such was the somewhat obscurantist temper of the University -about the year 1820; and we can imagine that the Vice-Chancellor, who -could find nothing in the statutes encouraging a debating society, would -not have looked with enthusiastic approbation on a newspaper designed to -discuss University matters without respect for authority. Even if he -had, it would have been hard to appeal to all sections of the community; -though there was certainly more general activity in the University than -formerly, the _gaudia_ and _discursus_ of undergraduates were matters of -comparatively small importance to their friends, and of none at all to -their pastors and masters. - -In the earlier part of the eighteenth century the conditions were -exactly reversed. To judge from the specimens that have survived to the -present day (and how much of our own lighter literature will be in -evidence 170 years hence?) there must have been plenty of 'available -talent.' It was an age of essayists. Addison and Steele set the -fashion for the metropolis: and as has been said before, Oxford -satirists followed at some distance in the wake of these giants. The -form of 'Terrae Filius' is that of the 'Tatler' and 'Spectator,' and the -'Oxford Magazine' of that day is largely composed of essays on men, -women, and manners; many are still quite readable, and most have been -recognised as remarkably smart in their day. Nor is it only in professed -and formal satire that the talent of the time displays itself. Thomas -Hearne of the Bodleian was careful to keep a voluminous note-book, -chronicling not only the 'plums' extracted by his daily researches from -the dark recesses of the library, but also various anecdotes, scandalous -or respectable, of his contemporaries; and one is tempted to regret that -so admirable a talent for bepraising his friends and libelling his -enemies should be comparatively _perdu_ among extracts from 'Schoppius -de Arte Critica,' copies of church brasses, and such-like antiquarian -lumber--the whole forming a 'Collection' only recently published for the -world's edification by the Oxford Historical Society. His -'appreciations' would have made the fortune of any paper relying for its -main interest on personalities, after the fashion which we are learning -from the Americans. 'Descriptions of his friends and enemies, such as -'An extravagant, haughty, loose man,' 'a Dull, Stupid, whiggish -Companion,' are frequent and free; and anecdotes of obscure college -scandal abound. We read how the 'Snivelling, conceited, and ignorant, -as well as Fanatical Vice-Principal of St. Edmund Hall .... _sconc'd_ -two gentlemen, which is a Plain Indication of his Furious Temper;' and -how 'Mr. ---- of _Christ Church_ last _Easter-day_, under pretence of -being ill, desired one of the other chaplains to read Prayers for him: -which accordingly was done. Yet such was the impudence of the man that -he appeared in the Hall at dinner!' - -[Illustration: _IN THE BODLEIAN. Drawn by Ernest Stamp._] - -As it was, however, those very collections which exhibit Hearne's -peculiar genius show us at the same time how impossible, even granting -the supposition to be not altogether anachronistic, a regular University -'News-letter' would have been. We talk now in a vague and, perhaps, -rather unintelligible fashion of 'University politics,' and in some way -contrive to identify Gladstonianism with a susceptibility to the claims -of a school of English literature, or whatever is the latest phrase of -progress--mixing up internal legislation with the external politics of -the great world. But in Hearne's time there were no University politics -to discuss. 'Their toasts,' says Gibbon of the Fellows of Magdalen -College, 'were not expressive of the most lively loyalty to the House of -Hanover,' and Hearne's interest in politics has nothing to do with the -Hebdomadal Council. When he speaks of 'our white-liver'd Professor, Dr. -----,' or describes the highest official in the University as 'old -Smooth-boots, the Vice-Chancellor,' it is generally for the very -sufficient reason that the person in question is what Dr. Johnson called -a 'vile Whig.' But Tory politics and common-room scandal and jobbery -apart, the University would appear to have slept the sleep of the -unjust. 'Terrae Filius' grumbles at the corrupt method of -'examination,' and 'The Student' is lively and satirical on the -peccadilloes and escapades of various members of society. But your -prose essayist is apt to be intermittent, and the publication that -relies mainly on him leans on a breaking reed; so that we can hardly be -surprised that the last-named periodical should eke out its pages with -imitations of Tibullus, to the first of which the Editor appends the -encouraging note, 'If this is approved by the publick, the Author will -occasionally oblige us with more _Elegies_ in the same style and -manner.' - -Now that every one is anxious to see his own name and his friend's name -in print, and that the general public takes, or pretends to take, a keen -interest in the details of every cricket-match and boat-race, a paper -chronicling University matters cannot complain of the smallness of its -_clientele_. Every one wants news. The undergraduate who has made a -speech at the Union, or a century for his college second eleven, wants a -printed certificate of his glorious achievements. Dons, and -undergraduates too, for that matter, are anxious to read about the last -hint of a possible Commission or the newest thing in University -Extension. Men who have gone down but a short time ago are still -interested in the doings of the (of course degenerate) remnant who are -left; and even the non-academic Oxford residents, a large and increasing -class, are on the watch for some glimpse of University doings, and some -distant echo of common-room gossip. Modern journalism appeals more or -less to all these classes; it cannot complain of the want of an -audience, nor, on the whole, of a want of news to satisfy it, and -certainly an Oxford organ cannot lack models for imitation, or awful -examples to avoid. It is, in fact, the very multiplicity of -contemporary periodicals that is the source of difficulty. A paper -conducted in the provinces by amateurs--that is, by persons who have -also other things to do--is always on its probation. The fierce light of -the opinion of a limited public is continually beating on it. Its -contributors should do everything a little better than the hirelings of -the merely professional organs of the unlearned metropolis; its leaders -must be more judicious than those of the 'Times,' its occasional notes a -little more spicy than Mr. Labouchere's, and its reviews a little more -learned than those of the 'Journal of Philology.' Should it fall short -of perfection in any of these branches, it 'has no reason for -existence,' and is in fact described as 'probably moribund.' Yet -another terror is added to the life of an Oxford editor: he _must_ be at -least often 'funny;' he must endeavour in some sort to carry out the -great traditions of the 'Oxford Spectator' and the 'Shotover Papers;' -and as the English public is generally best amused by personalities, he -must be careful to observe the almost invisible line which separates the -justifiable skit from the offensive attack. Now, the undergraduate -contributor to the press is seldom successful as a humourist. He is -occasionally violent and he is often--more especially after the festive -season of Christmas--addicted to sentimental verse; but for mere -frivolity and 'lightness of touch' it is safer to apply to his tutor. - -It is a rather remarkable fact that almost all University -papers--certainly all that have succeeded under the trying conditions of -the game--have been managed and for the most part written, not by the -exuberant vitality of undergraduate youth, but by the less interesting -prudence of graduate maturity. It is remarkable, but not surprising. -Undergraduate talent is occasionally brilliant, but is naturally -transient. Generations succeed each other with such rapidity that the -most capable editorial staff is vanishing into thin air just at the -moment when a journal has reached the highest pitch of popularity. -Moreover, amateur talent is always hard to deal with, as organizers of -private theatricals know to their cost; and there is no member of -society more capable of disappointing his friends at a critical moment -than the amateur contributor to the press. Should the spirit move him, -he will send four columns when the editor wants one; but if he is not in -the vein, or happens to have something else to do, there is no promise -so sacred and no threat so terrible as to persuade him to put pen to -paper. If these are statements of general application, they are doubly -true of undergraduates, who are always distracted by a too great -diversity of occupations: Jones, whose power of intermittent satire has -made him the terror of his Dons, has unaccountably taken to reading for -the Schools; the poet, Smith, has gone into training for the Torpids; -and Brown, whose '_Voces Populi_ in a Ladies' College' were to have been -something quite too excruciatingly funny, has fallen in love in the -vacation and will write nothing but bad poetry. Such are the trials of -the editor who drives an undergraduate team; and hence it comes about -that the steady-going periodicals for which the public can pay a yearly -subscription in advance, with the prospect of seeing at any rate half -the value of its money, are principally controlled by graduates. No -doubt they sometimes preserve a certain appearance of youthful vigour by -worshipping undergraduate talent, and using the word 'Donnish' as often -and as contemptuously as possible. - -[Illustration: _SAILING ON THE UPPER RIVER. Drawn by L. Speed._] - -Nevertheless, there appear from time to time various ephemeral and -meteoric publications, edited by junior members of the University. They -waste the editor's valuable time, no doubt; and yet he is learning a -lesson which may, perhaps, be useful to him in after-life; for it is -said that until he is undeceived by hard experience, every man is born -with the conviction that he can do three things--drive a dog-cart, sail -a boat, and edit a paper. - - - - -VI--THE UNIVERSITY AS SEEN FROM OUTSIDE. - - - 'A man must serve his time to every trade - Save censure--critics all are ready made.' - _Byron._ - -It has been said that the function of a University is to criticise; but -the proposition is at least equally true that Oxford and Cambridge are -continually conjugating the verb in the passive. We--and more -especially we who live in Oxford, for the sister University apparently -is either more virtuous or more skilful in concealing her peccadilloes -from the public eye--enjoy the priceless advantage of possessing -innumerable friends whose good nature is equalled by their frankness; -and if we do not learn wisdom, that is not because the opportunity is -not offered to us. It is true that our great governing body, the -Hebdomadal Council, has hitherto preserved its independence by a prudent -concealment of its deliberations: no reporter has ever as yet penetrated -into that august assemblage; but whatever emerges to the light of day is -seized upon with avidity. Debates in Convocation or even in Congregation -(the latter body including only the resident Masters of Arts), although -the subject may have been somewhat remote from the interests of the -general public, and the number of the voters perhaps considerably -increased by the frivolous reason that it was a wet afternoon, when -there was nothing else to do than to govern the University--debates on -every conceivable subject blush to find themselves reported the next -morning almost in the greatest of daily papers; and perhaps the result -of a division on the addition of one more Oriental language to -Responsions, or one more crocket to a new pinnacle of St. Mary's Church, -is even honoured by a leading article. This is highly gratifying to -residents in the precincts of the University, but even to them it is now -and then not altogether comprehensible. Nor is it only questions -concerning the University as a whole which appeal to the external -public; even college business and college scandal sometimes assume an -unnatural importance. Years ago one of the tutors of a certain college -was subjected to the venerable and now almost obsolete process of -'screwing up,' and some young gentlemen were rusticated for complicity -in the offence. Even in academic circles the crime and its punishment -were not supposed to be likely to interfere with the customary -revolution of the solar system; but the editor of a London daily -paper--and one, too, which was supposed to be more especially in touch -with that great heart of the people which is well known to hold -Universities in contempt--considered the incident so important as to -publish a leading article with the remarkable exordium, 'Every one knew -that Mr. ----, of ---- College, would be screwed up some day!' Most of -the _abonnes_ of this journal must, it is to be feared, have blushed for -their discreditable ignorance of Mr. ----'s existence, not to mention -that leaden-footed retribution which was dogging him to a merited doom. - -[Illustration: _PORCH OF ST. MARY'S. Drawn by J. Pennell._] - -It is hardly necessary to say that in nine cases out of ten comment on -the proceedings of a learned University takes the form of censure: nor -are censors far to seek. There are always plenty of young men more or -less connected with the Press who have wrongs to avenge; who are only -too glad to have an opportunity of 'scoring off' the college authority -which did its best--perhaps unsuccessfully, but still with a manifest -intention--to embitter their academic existence; or of branding once for -all as reactionary and obscurantist the hide-bound regulations of a -University which did not accord them the highest honours. In these cases -accuracy of facts and statistics is seldom a matter of much importance. -Generally speaking, you can say what you like about a college, or the -University, without much fear of contradiction--provided that you -abstain from mere personalities. For one thing, the cap is always fitted -on some one else's head. It is not the business of St. Botolph's to -concern itself with an attack which is obviously meant for St. Boniface: -it is darkly whispered in the St. Boniface common-room that after all no -one knows what actually _does_ go on in St. Botolph's: and obviously -neither of these venerable foundations can have anything to do with -answering impeachments of the University and its financial system. -Moreover, even if the Dons should rouse themselves from their usual -torpor and attempt a defence, it is not very likely that the public will -listen to them: any statement proceeding from an academic source being -always regarded with the gravest suspicion. That is why 'any stick is -good enough to beat the Universities,' and there are always plenty of -sticks who are quite ready to perform the necessary castigation. - -Moreover, these writers generally deal with a subject which is always -interesting, because it is one on which every one has an opinion, and an -opinion which is entitled to respect--the education of youth. Any one -can pick holes in the University system of teaching and -examination--'can strike a finger on the place, and say, "Thou ailest -here and here,"'--or construct schemes of reform: more especially young -men who have recently quitted their Alma Mater, and are therefore -qualified to assert (as they do, and at times not without a certain -plausibility) that she has failed to teach them anything. - -That the British public, with so much to think about, should find time -to be diverted by abuse of its seats of learning, is at first a little -surprising; but there is no doubt that such satire has an agreeable -piquancy, and for tolerably obvious reasons. English humour is -generally of the personal kind, and needs a butt; a capacity in which -all persons connected with education have from time immemorial been -qualified to perform, _ex officio_ (education being generally considered -as an imparting of unnecessary and even harmful knowledge, and obviously -dissociated from the pursuit of financial prosperity, both as regards -the teachers and the taught): Shakespeare set the fashion, and Dickens -and Thackeray have settled the hash of schoolmasters and college tutors -for the next fifty years, at any rate. Schoolmasters, indeed, are -becoming so important and prosperous a part of the community that they -will probably be the first to reinstate themselves in the respect of the -public; but Dons have more difficulties to contend against. They have -seldom any prospect of opulence. Then, again, they suffer from the -quasi-monastic character of colleges; they have inherited some of the -railing accusations which used to be brought against monasteries. The -voice of scandal--especially feminine scandal--is not likely to be long -silent about celibate societies, and no Rudyard Kipling has yet arisen -to plead on behalf of Fellows that they - - 'aren't no blackguards too, - But single men in barracks, most remarkable like you.' - -Altogether the legend of 'monks,' 'port wine and prejudice,' 'dull and -deep potations,' and all the rest of it, still damages Dons in the eyes -of the general public. 'That's ---- College,' says the local guide to -his sightseers, 'and there they sits, on their Turkey carpets, -a-drinking of their Madeira, and Burgundy, and Tokay.' Such is, -apparently, the impression still entertained by Society. And no doubt -successive generations of Fellows who hunted four days a week, or, being -in Orders, 'thanked Heaven that no one ever took _them_ for parsons,' -did to a certain extent perpetuate the traditions of 'Bolton Abbey in -the olden time.' Well, their day is over now. If the Fellow _fin de -siecle_ should ever venture to indulge in the sports of the field, he -must pretend that he has met the hounds by accident; and even then he -risks his reputation. - -[Illustration: _IN EXETER COLLEGE CHAPEL. Drawn by E. Stamp._] - -It is always pleasant, too, to be wiser than one's erstwhile pastors and -masters. The pupil goes out into the great world; the teacher remains -behind, and continues apparently to go on in his old and crusted errors. -Outwardly the Universities do not change much, and it is easy to assume -that the habits and ideas of their denizens do not change either. Thus -it is that the young men of the 'National Observer,' coming back from a -Saturday-to-Monday visit to a university which they never respected and -are now entitled to despise, are moved to declare to the world the -complete inutility of what they call the Futile Don. 'He is dead,' they -say, 'quite dead;' and if he is, might not the poor relic of mortality -be allowed in mere charity to lie peacefully entombed in his collegiate -cloisters? Yet, after all, it is only among the great Anglo-Saxon race -that the profession of teaching is without honour; and even among us it -may be allowed that it is a mode of earning a pittance as decent and -comparatively innocuous as another. We cannot, all of us, taste the -fierce joys of writing for the daily or weekly press, and the -barrister's 'crowded hours of glorious life' in the law courts would be -more overcrowded than ever were not a few _faineants_ suffered to -moulder in the retirement of a university. Seriously, it was all very -well for the young lions of the Press to denounce the torpor of Dons in -the bad old days when colleges were close corporations--when Fellows -inherited their bloated revenues without competition, and simply because -they happened to be born in a particular corner of some rural district. -But now that nearly every First-class man has the chance of election and -would be a Fellow if he could, one is tempted to recall the ancient -fable of the sour grapes. Or at least the _esprits forts_ whom the -University has reluctantly driven out into the great world might be -grateful to her for saving them in spite of themselves from an existence -of futile incapacity. - -Probably as long as colleges exist in something like their present -form--until the People takes a short way with them, abolishes common -rooms and the Long Vacation, and pays college tutors by a system of -'results fees'--these things will continue to be said. Deans and Senior -Tutors will never escape the stigma of torpor or incapacity. That quite -respectable rhymester, Mr. Robert Montgomery (who, had he not been -unlucky enough to cross the path of Lord Macaulay, might have lived and -died and been forgotten as the author of metrical works not worse than -many that have escaped the lash), has left to the world a long poem--of -which the sentiments are always, and the rhymes usually, -correct--entitled 'Oxford.' He has taken all Oxford life for his -subject, Dons included; and this is how he describes the fate of College -Tutors:-- - - 'The dunce, the drone, the freshman or the fool, - 'Tis theirs to counsel, teach, o'erawe, and rule! - Their only meed--some execrating word - To blight the hour when first their voice was heard.' - -To a certain extent this is true in all ages. But there are worse things -than mere sloth: this is not the measure of the crimes charged against -college authorities. They--even such contemptible beings as they--are -said to have the audacity to neglect untitled merit, and to truckle to -the aristocracy. Every one knows Thackeray's terrible indictment of -University snobs: Crump, the pompous dignitary (who, to do him justice, -seriously thinks himself greater than the Czar of All the Russias), and -Hugby, the tutor grovelling before the lordling who has played him a -practical joke. Every one remembers how even the late Laureate gibbeted -his Dons--how - - 'One - Discussed his tutor, rough to common men. - But honeying at the whisper of a lord: - And one the Master, as a rogue in grain, - Veneer'd with sanctimonious theory.' - -No doubt Universities are not immaculate. There have been Tartuffes and -tuft-hunters there, as in the great world. No doubt, too, it was very -wrong to allow noblemen to wear badges of their rank, and take their -degrees without examination (although the crime was a lesser one in the -days before class-lists were, when even the untitled commoner became a -Bachelor by dark and disreputable methods); but these things are not -done any more. At this day there are probably few places where a title -is less regarded than at Oxford or Cambridge. It is true that rumour -asserts the existence of certain circles where, _ceteris paribus_, the -virtuous proprietor of wealth and a handle to his name is welcomed with -more effusion than the equally respectable, but less fortunate, holder -of an eleemosynary exhibition. But, after all, even external Society, -which regards tuft-hunting with just displeasure, does--it is -said--continue to maintain these invidious distinctions when it is -sending out invitations to dinner. The fact is that there are a great -many peccadilloes in London which become crimes at the University. - -Satire, however, does not confine itself to Dons: undergraduates come in -for a share of it too, though in a different way. When the novelist -condescends to depict the Fellow of a college, it is usually as a person -more or less feeble, futile, and generally _manque_. The Don can never -be a hero, but neither is he qualified to play the part of villain; his -virtues and his vices are all alike inadequate. If he is bad, his -badness is rarely more than contemptible; if he is good, it is in a -negative and passionless way, and the great rewards of life are, as a -rule, considered as being out of his reach. But with the undergraduate -the case is different. He--as we have said--is always in extremes: -literature gives him the premier _role_ either as hero or villain; but -it is as the villain that he is the most interesting and picturesque. -Satire and fiction generally describe him as an adept in vicious habits. -So sings Mr. Robert Montgomery, with admirable propriety:-- - - 'In Oxford see the Reprobate appear! - Big with the promise of a mad career: - With cash and consequence to lead the way, - A fool by night and more than fop by day!' - -Over and over again we have the old picture of the Rake's Progress which -the world has learnt to know so well: the youth absents himself from his -lectures, perhaps even goes to Woodstock (horrid thought!)--'Woodstock -rattles with eternal wheels' is the elegant phrase of Mr. -Montgomery--and, in short, plays the fool generally:-- - - 'Till night advance, whose reign divine - Is chastely dedicate to cards and wine.' - -[Illustration: _PARSON'S PLEASURE. Drawn by L. Speed._] - -The specimen student of the nineteenth century will probably survive in -history as represented in these remarkable colours, and the virtuous -youth of a hundred years hence will shudder to think of a generation so -completely given over to drunkenness, debauchery, and neglect of the -Higher Life generally. There is a _naivete_ and directness about -undergraduate error which is the easy prey of any satirist; and -curiously enough the public, and even that large class which sends its -sons to the Universities, apparently likes to pretend a belief that -youth is really brought up in an atmosphere of open and unchecked -deviation from the paths of discipline and morality. If Paterfamilias -seriously believed that the academic types presented to him in -literature were genuine and frequent phenomena, he would probably send -his offspring in for the London Matriculation. But he knows pretty well -that the University is really not rotten to the core, and that colleges -are not always ruled by incapables, nor college opinion mainly formed by -rakes and spendthrifts; and at the same time it gives the British Public -a certain pleasure to imagine that it too has heard the chimes at -midnight, although it now goes to bed at half-past ten--that it has been -a devil of a fellow in its youth. This fancy is always piquant, and -raises a man in his own estimation and that of his friends. - -[Illustration: Fencing] - -These little inconsistences are of a piece with the whole attitude of -the unacademic world towards the Universities. Men come down from -London to rest, perhaps, for a day or two from the labours of the -Session. They are inspired with a transient enthusiasm for antiquity. -They praise academic calm: they affect to wish that they, too, were -privileged to live that life of learned leisure which is commonly -supposed to be the lot of all Fellows and Tutors. Then they go away, -and vote for a new University Commission. - - - - -VII--DIARY OF A DON - - - 'Collegiate life next opens on thy way, - Begins at morn and mingles with the day.' - _R. Montgomery._ - -Half-past seven A.M.: enter my scout, noisily, as one who is accustomed -to wake undergraduates. He throws my bath violently on the floor and -fills it with ice-cold water. 'What kind of a morning is it?' No -better than usual: rain, east wind, occasional snow. _Must_ get up -nevertheless: haven't superintended a roll-call for three days, and the -thing will become a scandal. Never mind: one more snooze.... There are -the bells (Oh, those bells!) ringing for a quarter to eight. Ugh! - -Dress in the dark, imperfectly: no time to shave. Cap and gown -apparently lost. Where the ---- Oh, here they are, under the table. -Must try to develop habits of neatness. Somebody else's cap: too big. - -Roll-call in full swing in Hall: that is, the college porter is there, -ticking off undergraduates' names as they come in. Hall very cold and -untidy: college cat scavenging remnants of last night's dinner. -Portrait of the Founder looking as if he never expected the college to -come to this kind of thing. Men appear in various stages of dishabille. -Must make an example of some one: 'Really Mr. Tinkler, I must ask you to -put on something besides an ulster.' Tinkler explains that he is fully -dressed, opening his ulster and disclosing an elaborate toilet: -unfortunate--have to apologise. During the incident several men without -caps and gowns succeed in making their escape. - -Back in my rooms: finish dressing. Fire out, no hot water. This is -what they call the luxurious existence of a College Fellow. Post -arrives: chiefly bills and circulars: several notes from undergraduates. -'Dear Sir,--May I go to London for the day in order to keep an important -engagement.' Dentist, I suppose. 'Dear Mr. ----,--I am sorry that I was -absent from your valuable lecture yesterday, as I was not aware you -would do so.' 'Dear Sir,--I shall be much obliged if I may have leave -off my lecture this morning, as I wish to go out hunting.' Candid, at -any rate. 'Mr. ---- presents his compliments to Mr. ---- and regrets -that he is compelled to be absent from his Latin Prose lecture, because -I cannot come.' Simple and convincing. Whip from the Secretary of the -Non-Placet Society: urgent request to attend in Convocation and oppose -nefarious attempt to insert 'and' in the wording of Stat. Tit. Cap. LXX. -18. Never heard of the statute before. Breakfast. - -College cook apparently thinks that a hitherto unimpaired appetite can -be satisfied by what seems to be a cold chaffinch on toast. 'Take it -away, please, and get me an egg.' Egg arrives: not so old as chaffinch, -but nearly: didn't say I wanted a chicken. Scout apologises: must have -brought me an undergraduate's egg by mistake. Never mind; plain living -and high thinking. Two college servants come to report men absent last -night from their rooms. Must have given them leave to go down: can't -remember it, though. Matter for investigation. Porter reports -gentleman coming into college at 12.10 last night. All right: 'The -Dean's compliment's to Mr. ----, and will he please to call upon him at -once. 'Mr. ----'s compliments to the Dean, and he has given orders not -to be awakened till ten, but will come when he is dressed.' Obliging. - -Lecture to be delivered at ten o'clock to Honours men, on point of -ancient custom: very interesting: Time of Roman Dinner, whether at 2.30 -or 2.45. Have got copious notes on the subject somewhere: must read -them up before lecture, as it never looks well to be in difficulties -with your own MS.--looks as if you hadn't the subject at your fingers' -ends. Notes can't be found. Know I saw them on my table three weeks -ago, and table can't have been dusted since then. Oh, here they are: -illegible. Wonder what I meant by all these abbreviations. Never mind: -can leave that part out. Five minutes past ten. - -Lecture-room pretty full: two or three scholars, with air of superior -intelligence: remainder commoners, in attitudes more or less expressive -of distracted attention. One man from another college, looking rather -_de trop_. Had two out-college men last time: different men, too: -disappointing. Begin my dissertation and try to make abstruse subject -attractive: 'learning put lightly, like powder in jam.' Wish that -scholar No. 1 wouldn't check my remarks by reference to the authority -from whom my notes are copied. Why do they teach men German? Second -scholar has last number of the 'Classical Review' open before him. Why? -Appears afterwards that the 'Review' contains final and satisfying -_reductio ad absurdum_ of my theory. Man from another college asks if -he may go away. Certainly, if he wishes. Explains that he thought this -was Mr. ----'s Theology lecture. Seems to have taken twenty minutes to -find out his mistake. Wish that two of the commoners could learn to -take notes intelligently, and not take down nothing except the -unimportant points. Hope they won't reproduce them next week in the -schools. - -Ten fifty-five: peroration. Interrupted by entrance of lecturer for -next hour. Begs pardon: sorry to have interrupted: doesn't go, however. -Peroration spoilt. Lecture over: general sense of relief. Go out with -the audience, and overhear one of them tell his friend that, after all, -it wasn't so bad as last time. Mem., not to go out with audience in -future. - -Eleven o'clock: lecture for Passmen. Twelve or fifteen young gentlemen -all irreproachably dressed in latest style of undergraduate -fashion--Norfolk jacket and brown boots indispensable--and all inclined -to be cheerfully tolerant of the lecturer's presence _quand meme_, -regarding him as a necessary nuisance and part of college system. After -all there isn't so much to do between eleven and twelve. Some of them -can construe, but consider it unbecoming to make any ostentation of -knowledge. Conversation at times animated. 'Really, gentlemen, you -might keep something to talk about at the next lecture.' Two men appear -at 11.25, noisily. Very sorry: have been at another lecture: couldn't -get away. General smile of incredulity, joined in by the new arrivals -as they find a place in the most crowded part of lecture-room. Every -one takes notes diligently, and is careful to burn them at the end of -the hour. Translation proceeds rather slowly. Try it myself: difficult -to translate Latin comedy with dignity. Give it up and let myself -go--play to the gallery. Gallery evidently considers that frivolity on -the lecturer's part is inappropriate to the situation. 11.55: 'Won't -keep you longer, gentlemen.' - -Twelve: time to do a little quiet work before lunch. Gentleman who was -out after twelve last night comes to explain. Was detained in a -friend's room (reading) and did not know how late it was. In any case -is certain he was in before twelve, because he looked at his watch, and -is almost sure his watch is fast. Fined and warned not to do it again: -exit grumbling. No more interruptions, I hope..... Boy from the -Clarendon Press: editor wants something for the 'Oxford Magazine,' at -once: not less than a column: messenger will wait while I write it. -Very considerate. Try to write something: presence of boy embarrassing. -Ask him to go outside and wait on the staircase. Does so, and continues -to whistle 'Daisy Bell,' with accompaniment on the banisters -_obbligato_. Composition difficult and result not satisfactory: hope no -one will read it. Column nearly finished: man comes to explain why he -wants to be absent during three weeks of next term. _Would_ he mind -going away and calling some other time? Very well: when? Oh, any time, -only not now. This is what they call the leisure and philosophic calm -of collegiate life. - -Lunch in Common Room: cold, clammy, and generally unappetising. Guest -who is apparently an old member of the college greets me and says he -supposes I've forgotten him. 'Not at all: remember you quite well: glad -to meet you again.' Haven't the faintest idea what his name is: -awkward. Appears in course of conversation to be ex-undergraduate whom -I knew very well and did not like. Evidently regards me as a venerable -fossil: he himself has grown bald and fat and looks fifty, more or less: -suppose I must be about seventy or eighty. Vice-Principal wants to know -if I will play fives at two: yes, if he likes. No, by the way, can't; -have got to go and vote in Convocation. Don't know what it is about, but -promised to go: can't think why. Time to go. - -In the Convocation House. Very few people there, nobody at all -interested. Borrow Gazette and study list of agenda. Question on which -I promised to vote comes on late, all sorts of uninteresting matters to -be settled first: mostly small money grants for scientific purposes: -pleasant way of wasting three-quarters of an hour. My question here at -last: prepare to die in last ditch in defence of original form of -statute. Member of Hebdomadal Council makes inaudible speech, -apparently on the subject. No one else has anything to say: Council's -proposal, whatever it is, carried _nem. con_. No voting: might as well -have played fives after all: next time shall. - -Time for walk round the Parks: rain and mud. Worst of the Parks is, you -always meet people of houses where you ought to have called and haven't. -Free fight under Rugby rules going on between University and somewhere -else. Watch it: don't understand game: try to feel patriotic: -can't...... Meeting at four to oppose introduction of Hawaiian as an -optional language in Responsions. Not select: imprudent for a caucus to -transact business by inviting its opponents: people of all sorts of -opinions present. Head of House makes highly respectable speech, -explaining that while qualified support of reform is conceivable and -even under possible circumstances advisable, premature action is rarely -consistent with mature deliberation. Nobody seems to have anything -definite to suggest: most people move amendments. Safe to vote against -all of them: difficult to know how you are voting, however: wording of -amendments so confusing. All of them negatived: substantive motion -proposed: lost as well. Question referred to a Committee: ought to have -been done at first. Hour and a half wasted. Remember that I have cut -my five-o'clock pupil for second time running. Am offered afternoon -tea: thirsty, but must be off: man at half-past five. On the way back -meet resident sportsman in the High. Has been out with hounds and had -best twenty-five minutes of the season, in the afternoon, three miles -off. Might have been there myself if it hadn't been for Convocation: -hang Convocation! Never mind; satisfaction of a good conscience: shall -always be able to say that I lost best run of season through devotion to -duty. - -[Illustration: _LAWN TENNIS AT OXFORD. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -Six forty-five: pupils gone; dress for seven-o'clock dinner with friend -at St. Anselm's. Man comes to ask why he has been gated: explain: man -not satisfied. Gone, at any rate. Another man, asking leave to be out -after twelve. Five minutes to dress and walk a quarter of a mile. Wish -men wouldn't choose this time for coming to see one. Very late: dinner -already begun: no soup, thanks. Meaty atmosphere: noisy atmosphere at -lower end of Hall: undergraduates throw bread about. No one in evening -dress but myself. Distinguished guest in shape of eminent German -Professor: have got next him somehow: wish I hadn't: wears flannel shirt -and evidently regards me as a mere butterfly of fashion. Speaks hardly -any English: try him in German: replies after an unusual effort on my -part, 'Ich spreche nur Deutsch.' My command of the language evidently -less complete than I thought: or perhaps he only speaks his own patois. -Man opposite me Demonstrator at the Museum, who considers that the -University and the world in general was made for physiologists. - -Small party in Common Room, most of diners having to see pupils or -attend meetings. Will I have any wine? No one else drinks any and my -host is a teetotaller: 'No, thanks--never drink wine after dinner.' -Truth only a conventional virtue after all. Eminent Teuton would like -more beer, but has been long enough in England to know better than to -ask for it. Am put next to Demonstrator, who endeavours to give general -ideas of digestive organs of a frog, interpreting occasionally in German -for Professor's benefit: illustrates with fragments of dessert: most -interesting, I am sure. Nothing like the really good talk of an Oxford -Common Room, after all. Senior Fellow drinks whisky and water and goes -to sleep. Coffee and cigarettes: or will I have a weed? 'Thanks, but -must be off: man at nine...' Back in college: rooms dark: can't find my -matches and fall over furniture. - -Man comes to read me an essay. Know nothing about the subject: thought -he was going to write on something else. Essay finished: must say -something: try to find fault with his facts. Man confronts me with -array of statistics, apparently genuine: if so nothing more to say. -Criticise his grammar: man offended. Interview rather painful, till -concluded by entrance of nine-thirty man with Latin prose. Rather -superior young man, who considers himself a scholar. Suggest that part -of his vocabulary is not according to classical usage: proves me wrong -by reference to dictionary. Is not surprised to find me mistaken. Wish -that Higher Education had stopped in Board Schools and not got down to -undergraduates. - -Man at ten, with a desire to learn. Stays till near eleven discussing -his chances in the schools at great length. Presently comes to his -prospects in life. Would send me to sleep if he wouldn't ask me -questions. - -Eleven: no more men, thank goodness. Tobacco and my lecture for -to-morrow.... Never could understand why a gentleman being neither -intoxicated nor in the society of his friends, cannot cross the -quadrangle without a view-halloo... There he is again: must go out and -see what is going on. Quadrangle very cold, raining. Group of men -playing football in the corner: friends look on and encourage them from -windows above. As I come on the scene all disappear, with shouts: none -identified: saves future trouble, at all events. More tobacco and -period of comparative peace. Bedtime. - -Wish my scout wouldn't hide hard things under the mattress. - -Noise in quadrangle renewed: 'Daddy wouldn't buy me a Bow-wow,' with -variations.... Some one's oak apparently battered with a poker. _Ought_ -to get up and go out to stop it.... - - - - -VIII--THE UNIVERSITY AS A PLACE OF LEARNED LEISURE. - - - 'I had been used for thirty years to no interruption - save the tinkling of the dinner-bell and the chapel-bell.' - _Essays of Vicesimus Knox._ - -Standing with one foot in the Middle Ages and the other in a luxuriously -furnished 'Common Room'--such is Oxford life as summarised by a German -visitor, who appears to have been a good deal perplexed, like the outer -world in general, by the academic mixture of things ancient and modern, -and a host who wore a cap and gown over his evening dress. Certainly -the University is a strange medley of contraries. It never seems to be -quite clear whether we are going too fast or too slow. We are always -reforming something, yet are continually reproached with irrational -conservatism. Change and permanence are side by side--permanence that -looks as if it could defy time: - - 'The form remains, the function never dies,' - -and yet all the while the change is rapid and complete. Men go down, -and are as if they had never been: as is the race of leaves so is that -of undergraduates; and so transiently are they linked with the enduring -existence of their University, that, except in the case of the minority -who have done great deeds on the river or the cricket-field, they either -pass immediately out of recollection or else remain only as a dim and -distant tradition of bygone ages. An undergraduate's memory is very -short. For him the history of the University is comprised in the three -or four years of his own residence. Those who came before him and those -who come after are alike separated from him by a great gulf; his -predecessors are infinitely older, and his successors immeasurably -younger. It makes no difference what his relations to them may be in -after-life. Jones, who went down in '74, may be an undistinguished -country parson or a struggling junior at the Bar; and Brown, who came up -in '75, may be a bishop or a Q.C. with his fortune made; but all the -same Brown will always regard Jones as belonging to the almost forgotten -heroic period before he came up, and Jones, whatever may be his respect -for Brown's undoubted talents, must always to a certain extent feel the -paternal interest of a veteran watching the development of youthful -promise. So complete is the severance of successive generations, that it -is hard to see how undergraduate custom and tradition and College -characteristics should have a chance of surviving; yet somehow they do -manage to preserve an unbroken continuity. Once give a College a good -or a bad name, and that name will stick to it. Plant a custom and it -will flourish, defying statutes and Royal Commissions. Conservatism is -in the air; even convinced Radicals (in politics) cannot escape from it, -and are sometimes Tories in matters relating to their University. They -will change the constitution of the realm, but will not stand any -tampering with the Hebdomadal Council. Whatever be the reason--whether -it be Environment or Heredity--Universities go on doing the same things, -only in different ways; they retain that indefinable habit of thought -which seems to cling to old grey walls and the shade of ancient elms, -which the public calls 'academic' when it is only contemptuous, -explaining the word as meaning 'provincial with a difference' when it is -angry. - -[Illustration: _BOWLS IN NEW COLLEGE GARDEN. Drawn by Lancelot Speed._] - -There is the same kind of unalterableness about the few favoured -individuals to whom the spirit of the age has allowed a secure and -permanent residence in Oxford; a happy class which is now almost limited -to Heads of Houses and College servants. You scarcely ever see a scout -bearing the outward and visible signs of advancing years; age cannot -wither them, nor (it should be added) can custom stale their infinite -variety of mis-serving their masters. Perhaps it is they who are the -repositories of tradition. And even Fellows contrive to retain some of -the characteristics of their more permanent predecessors, whom we have -now learnt to regard as abuses. Hard-worked though they are, and -precarious of tenure, they are, nevertheless, in some sort imbued with -that flavour of humanity and _dolce far niente_ which continues to haunt -even a Common Room where Fellows drink nothing but water, and only dine -together once a fortnight. - -For times are sadly changed now, and a fellowship is far from being the -haven of rest which it once was, and still is to a few. Look at that old -Fellow pacing with slow and leisurely steps beneath Magdalen or -Christchurch elms: regard him well, for he is an interesting survival, -and presently he and his kind will be nothing but a memory, and probably -the progressive spirit of democracy will hold him up as an awful -example. He is a link with a practically extinct period. When he was -first elected _verus et perpetuus socius_ of his college--without -examination--the University of Oxford was in a parlous state. Reform was -as yet unheard of, or only loomed dimly in the distance. Noblemen still -wore tufts--think how that would scandalise us now!--and 'gentlemen -commoners' came up with the declared and recognised intention of living -as gentlemen commoners should. Except for the invention of the -examination system--and the demon of the schools was satisfied with only -a mouthful of victims then--Oxford of the forties had not substantially -changed since the last century--since the days when Mr. Gibbon was a -gentleman commoner at Magdalen College, where his excuses for cutting -his lectures in the morning were 'received with a smile,' and where he -found himself horribly bored by the 'private scandal' and 'dull and deep -potations' of the seniors with whom he was invited to associate in the -evening. Not much had changed since those days: lectures were still -disciplinary exercises rather than vehicles of instruction, and the -vespertinal port was rarely if ever interrupted in its circulation by -'the man who comes at nine.' Many holders of fellowships scarcely came -near the University; those who did reside were often not much concerned -about the instruction of undergraduates, and still less with -'intercollegiate competition.' Perhaps it was not their life's work: a -fellowship might be only a stepping-stone to a college living, when a -sufficiently fat benefice should fall vacant and allow the dean or -sub-warden to marry and retire into the country; and even the don who -meant to be a don all his days put study or learned leisure first and -instruction second, the world not yet believing in the 'spoon-feeding' -of youth. Very often, of course, they did nothing. After all, when you -pay a man for exercising no particular functions, you can scarcely blame -him for strictly fulfilling the conditions under which he was elected. -'But what do they do?' inquired--quite recently--a tourist, pointing to -the fellows' buildings of a certain college. 'Do?!!' replied the Oxford -cicerone--'do? ... why them's fellows!' But if there was inactivity, it -is only the more credit to the minority who really did interest -themselves in the work of their pupils. Not that the relation of -authorities to undergraduates was ever then what it has since -become--whether the change be for the better or the worse. Few attempts -were made to bridge the chasm which must always yawn between the life of -teacher and taught. Perhaps now the attempt is a little -over-emphasised; certainly things are done which would have made each -particular hair to stand on end on the head of a Fellow of the old -school. In his solemn and formal way he winked at rowing, considering -it rather fast and on the whole an inevitable sign of declining morals. -He wore his cap and gown with the anachronistic persistency of Mr. Toole -in 'The Don,' and sighed over the levity of a colleague who occasionally -sported a blue coat with brass buttons. Had you told him that within -the present century College Tutors would be seen in flannels, and that a -Head of a House could actually row on the river in an eight--albeit the -ship in question be manned by comparatively grave and reverend seniors, -yclept the Ancient Mariners--he would probably have replied in the -formula ascribed to Dr. Johnson: 'Let me tell you, sir, that in order to -be what you consider humorous it is not necessary that you should be -also indecent!' But there is a lower depth still; and grave dignitaries -of the University have been seen riding bicycles. - -All this would have been quite unintelligible to the youthful days of -our friend, whom we see leisurely approaching the evening of his days in -the midst of a generation that does not know him indeed, but which is -certainly benefited by his presence and the picture of academic repose -which he displays to his much-troubled and harassed successors: a -peaceful, cloistered life; soon to leave nothing behind it but a brass -in the College chapel, a few Common Room anecdotes, and a vague -tradition, perhaps, of a ghost on the old familiar staircase. Far -different is the lot of the Fellow _fin de siecle_; 'by many names men -know him,' whether he be the holder of an 'official' Fellowship, or a -'Prize Fellow' who is entitled to his emoluments only for the paltry -period of seven years. And what emoluments! Verily the mouth of -Democracy must water at the thought of the annual 'division of the -spoils' which used to take place under the old _regime_: spoils which -were worth dividing, too, in the days when rents were paid without a -murmur, and colleges had not as yet to allow tenants to hold at -half-a-crown an acre, lest the farm should be unlet altogether. But now -if a Prize Fellow receives his 200*l.* a year he may consider himself -lucky; and remember that if he is not blessed with this world's goods, -the grim humours of the last Commission at least allowed him the -inestimable privilege of marrying--on 200*l.* a year. After all, it is -not every one who receives even that salary for doing nothing. - -The 'official' variety of Fellow, or the Prize Fellow who chooses to be -a College Tutor, is a schoolmaster, with a difference. He has rather -longer holidays--if he can afford to enjoy them-and a considerably -shorter purse than the instructors of youth at some great schools. He -is so far unfortunate in his predecessors, that he has inherited the -reputation of the Fellows of old time. Everybody else is working: the -Fellow is still a useless drone. As a matter of fact, the unfortunate -man is always doing something--working vehemently with a laudable desire -to get that into eight weeks which should properly take twelve; or -taking his recreation violently, riding forty miles on a bicycle, with a -spurt at the finish so as not to miss his five-o'clock pupil; sitting on -interminable committees--everything in Oxford is managed by a committee, -partly, perhaps, because 'Boards are very often screens;' or sitting -upon a disorderly undergraduate. On the whole, the kicks are many, and -the halfpence comparatively few. He has the Long Vacation, of course, -but then he is always employed in writing his lectures for next term, or -compiling a school edition, or a handbook, or an abridgment of somebody -else's school edition or handbook, in order to keep the pot -boiling--more especially if he has fallen a victim to matrimony, and -established himself in the red-brick part of Oxford. It is true that -there is the prospect--on paper--of a pension when he is past his work, -but in the present state of College finances that is not exactly a vista -of leisured opulence. Altogether there is not very much repose about -_him_. College Tutors in these days are expected to work. It is on -record that a tourist from a manufacturing district on seeing four -tutors snatching a brief hour at lawn-tennis, remarked, 'I suppose -there's _another shift_ working inside?' Such are the requirements of -the age and the manufacturing districts. - -Nor are beer and skittles unadulterated the lot of the undergraduate -either--whatever the impression that his sisters and cousins may derive -from the gaieties of the Eights and 'Commem.' For the spirit of the -century and the 'Sturm und Drang' of a restless world has got hold of -the 'Man,' too, and will not suffer him to live quite so peacefully as -the Verdant Greens and Bouncers of old. Everybody must do something; -they must be 'up and doing,' or else they have a good chance of finding -themselves 'sent down.' I do not speak of the reading man, who -naturally finds his vocation in a period of activity--but rather of the -man who is by nature non-reading, and has to sacrifice his natural -desires to the pressure of public opinion acting through his tutor. -Perhaps he is made to go in for honours; but even if he reads only for a -pass, the schools are always with him--he is always being pulled up to -see how he is growing; or at least he must be serving his College in one -way or another--if not by winning distinction in the schools, by toiling -on the river or the cricket-field. Then he is expected to interest -himself in all the movements of the last quarter of the nineteenth -century; he must belong to several societies; he cannot even be properly -idle without forming himself into an association for the purpose. If he -wants to make a practice of picnicing on the Cherwell he founds a -'Cherwell Lunch Club,' with meetings, no doubt, and possibly an 'organ' -to advocate his highly meritorious views. An excellent and a healthy -life, no doubt! but yet one is tempted sometimes to fear that the loafer -may become extinct; and then where are our poets to come from? For it is -a great thing to be able to loaf well: it softens the manners and does -not allow them to be fierce; and there is no place for it like the -streams and gardens of an ancient University. If a man does not learn -the great art of doing nothing there, he will never acquire it anywhere -else; and it is there, and in the summer term, that this laudable -practice will probably survive when it is unknown even in Government -Offices. - -[Illustration: _COACHING THE EIGHT. By J. H. Lorimer._] - -For there is a season of the year when even the sternest scholar or -athlete and the most earnest promoter of Movements yields to the _genius -loci_; when the summer term is drawing to a close, and the May east -winds have yielded to the warmth of June, and the lilacs and laburnums -are blossoming in College gardens; when the shouting and the glory and -the bonfires of the Eights are over, and the invasion of Commemoration -has not yet begun. Then, if ever, is the time for doing nothing. Then -the unwilling victim of lectures shakes off his chains and revels in a -temporary freedom, not unconnected with the fact that his tutor has gone -for a picnic to Nuneham. Perhaps he has been rowing in his College -Eight, and is entitled to repose on the laurels of 'six bumps;' perhaps -he is not in the schools himself, and can afford to pity the -unfortunates who are. And how many are the delightful ways of loafing! -You may propel the object of your affections--if she is up, as she very -often is at this time--in a punt on that most academic stream, the -Cherwell, while Charles (your friend) escorts the chaperon in a dingey -some little distance in front; you may lie lazily in the sun in -Worcester or St. John's gardens, with a novel, or a friend, or both; you -may search Bagley and Powderhill for late bluebells, and fancy that you -have found 'high on its heathy ridge' the tree known to Arnold and -Clough. Or if you are more enterprising you may travel further afield -and explore the high beech woods of the Chiltern slopes and the bare, -breezy uplands of the Berkshire downs; but this, perhaps, demands more -energy than belongs to the truly conscientious loafer. - -[Illustration: _EVENING ON THE RIVER. Drawn by E. Stamp._] - -Well, let the idle undergraduate make the most of his time now; it is -not likely that he will be able to loaf in after-life. Nor (for the -matter of that) will his successors be allowed to take their ease here -in Oxford even in the summer, in those happy days when the University is -to be turned into an industrial school, and a place for the education no -longer of the English gentleman but the British citizen. Will that day -ever come? The spirit of the age is determined that it shall. But -perhaps the spirit of the place may be too much for it yet. - - - - - _London: Strangeways, Printers._ - - - - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ASPECTS OF MODERN OXFORD *** - - - - -A Word from Project Gutenberg - - -We will update this book if we find any errors. - -This book can be found under: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39525 - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one -owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and -you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission -and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in the -General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and -distributing Project Gutenberg(tm) electronic works to protect the -Project Gutenberg(tm) concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a -registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, -unless you receive specific permission. 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