Chapter 6

“Better to search in fields for wealth unbought,Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught.”

The same Ralph relates a humorous anecdote of

The Doctor, says Ralph, was as good a punch as he was a physician, and after he settled at Uxbridge, in the latter character, where he first opened hismedical budget, with the proceeds of his Fellowship at King’s College alone to depend on, Ralph took advantage of a stay in London to ride over to see his old college chum and fellow-punster, and reached hisdomusin the Doctor’s absence. Ralph’s wig was the worse for a shower of rain he had rode through, and, taking it off, desired the Doctor’s man, William, to bring him his master’sold grizzleto put on, whilst he dried and put a dust of powder into his. But ere this could be accomplished, the Doctor returned, as fine as may be, in hisbest tye, kept especially for visiting his patients in. As soon as mutual greetings had passed, “Why, zounds, Ralph,” exclaimed the Doctor, “what a cursed wig you have got on!” “True,” said Ralph, taking it off as he spoke, “it is a bad one, and if you will, as I have another with me, I will toss it into the fire.” “By all means,” said the Doctor, “for, in truth, it is a verycaxon,” and into thefirewent the fry. The Doctor now began to skin his legs, and calling his man, William, “Here,” said he, taking off his tye, “bring me my old wig.” “Mr. Thicknesse has got it, said William. “And where is it, Ralph,” said the Doctor, turning upon his visiter. “Burnt, as you desired; and this illustrates the spirit of all mankind,”said Ralph; “we can see the shabby wig, and feel the pitiful tricks of our friends, overlooking the disorder of our own wardrobes. As Horace says, ‘Nil habeo quod agam;’—‘mind every body’s business but your own.’” Talking ofgunpowderreminds me of

All who know anything of either Oxford or Cambridge scholars, know well enough, that theirmannersare not onlywell preservedat all seasons, but that when they are in a humour for sporting, it is of very little consequence whether other folk preserve their manners or not. When the late eccentric Joshua Waterhouse, B. D. (who was so barbarously murdered a few years since by Joshua Slade, in Huntingdonshire,) was a student of Catherine Hall, Cambridge, of which he became a Fellow, he was a remarkably strong young man, some six feet high, and not easily frightened. He one day went out to shoot with another man of his college, and his favourite dog, Sancho, had just made his first point, when a keeper came up and told Joshua to take himself off, in no very classic English. Joshua therefore declined compliance. Upon this our keeper began to threaten. Joshua thereupon laid his gun aside, and coolly began taking off his coat (or, as the fancy would say, topeel,) observing, “I came out for a day’s sport, and a day’s sport I’ll have.” Upon which our keeper shot off, leaving Joshua in possession of the field, from which he used to boast he carried off a full bag. At another time

Gamesomely inclined, were driving,tandem, for the neighbourhood of Woodstock, when passing a stingy oldcur, yclept a country gentleman, who had treated some one of the party ashabbytrick, a thought struck them that now was the hour for revenge. They drove inbang upstyle to the front of the old man’s mansion, and coolly told the servant, that they had just seen his master, who had desired them to say, that he was to serve them up a good dinner and wine, and in the meantime show them wherethe most game was to be found. This was done, and after aroaringday’s sport, and a full gorge of roast, baked and boiled, washed down with the best ale, port and sherry, the old boy’s cellar could furnish, they made Brazen-nose College, Oxon, 8,p.m., much delighted with the result, and luckily the affair went no further, at the time at least.

“Soon after the death of my father,” says this learned prelate, in his Autobiography, published in 1816, “I was sent to the university, and admitted a sizer of Trinity College, Cambridge, on the 3d of November, 1754. I did not know a single person in the university, except my tutor, Mr. Backhouse, who had been my father’s scholar, and Mr. Preston, who had been my own school-fellow. I commenced my academic studies with great eagerness, from knowing that my future fortune was to be wholly of my own fabricating, being certain that the slender portion which my father had left to me (300l.) would be barely sufficient to carry me through my education. I had no expectations from relations; indeed I had not a relative so near as a first cousin in the world, except my mother, and a brother and sister, who were many years older than me. My mother’s maiden name was Newton; she was a very charitable and good woman, and I am indebted to her (I mention it with filial piety) for imbuing my young mind with principles of religion, which have never forsaken me. Erasmus, in his little treatise, entitledAntibarbarorum, says, that the safety of states depend upon three things,a proper or improper education of the prince, upon public preachers, and upon school-masters; and he might with equal reason have added,upon mothers; for the code of the mother precedes that of the school-master, and may stamp upon therasa tabulaof the infant mind, characters of virtue and religion which no time can efface. Perceiving that the sizers were not so respectfully looked upon by the pensioners and scholars of the house as they oughtto have been, inasmuch as the most learned and leading men of the university have even arisen from that order (Magister Artis ingenique largitor venter,) I offered myself for a scholarship a year before the usual time of the sizers sitting, and succeeded on the 2nd of May, 1757. This step increased my expenses in college, but it was attended with a great advantage. It was the occasion of my being particularly noticed byDr. Smith, the master of the college. He was, from the examination he gave me, so well satisfied with the progress I had made in my studies, that out of the sixteen who were elected scholars, he appointed me to a particular one (Lady Jermyn’s) then vacant, and in his own disposal; not, he said to me, as being better than other scholarships, but as a mark of his approbation; he recommendedSaunderson’s Fluxions, then just published, and some other mathematical books, to my perusal, and gave, in a word, a spur to my industry, and wings to my ambition. I had, at the time of my being elected a scholar, been resident in college two years and seven months, without having gone out of it for a single day. During that period I had acquired some knowledge of Hebrew, greatly improved myself in Greek and Latin, made considerable progress in mathematics and natural philosophy, and studied with much attention Locke’s works, King’s book on the Origin of Evil, Puffendorf’s TreatiseDe Officio Hominis et Civis, and some other books on similar subjects; I thought myself, therefore, entitled to some little relaxation. Under this persuasion I set forward, May 30, 1757, to pay my elder and only brother a visit at Kendal. He was the first curate of the New Chapel there, to the structure of which he had subscribed liberally. He was a man of lively parts, but being thrown into a situation where there was no great room for the display of his talents, and much temptation to convivial festivity, he spent his fortune, injured his constitution, and died when I was about the age of thirty-three, leaving a considerable debt, all of which I paid immediately, though it took almost my all to do it. My mind did not much relish the country, at least it did not relish the life I led in that country town; the constant reflection that I wasidling away my timemixed itself with every amusement, and poisoned all the pleasures I had promised myself from the visit; I therefore took a hasty resolution of shortening it, and returned to college in the beginning of September, with a determined purpose to make myAlma Materthe mother of my fortunes.That, I well remember, was the expression I used to myself, as soon as I saw the turrets of King’s College Chapel, as I was jogging on a jaded nag between Huntingdon and Cambridge. I was then only aJunior Soph; yet two of my acquaintances, the year below me, thought that I knew so much more of mathematics than they did, that they importuned me to become their private tutor. I undoubtedly wished to have had my time to myself, especially till I had taken my degree; but the narrowness of my circumstances, accompanied with a disposition to improve, or, more properly speaking, with a desire to appear respectable, induced me to comply with their request. From that period, for above thirty years of my life, and as long as my health lasted, a considerable portion of my time was spent in instructing others without much instructing myself, or in presiding at disputations in philosophy or theology, from which, after a certain time, I derived little intellectual improvement. Whilst I was an under-graduate, I kept a great dealof what is calledthe best company—that is, of idle fellow-commoners, and other persons of fortune—but their manners never subdued my prudence; I had strong ambition to be distinguished, and was sensible that wealth might plead some excuse for idleness, extravagance and folly in others; the want of wealth could plead more for me. When I used to be returning to my room at one or two in the morning, after spending a jolly evening, I often observed a light in the chamber of one of the same standing with myself; this never failed to excite my jealousy, and the next day was always a day of hard study. I have gone without my dinner a hundred times on such occasions. I thought I never entirely understood a proposition in any part of mathematics or natural philosophy, till I was able, in a solitary walk,obstipo capite atque ex porrecto labello, to draw the scheme in my head, and go through every step of thedemonstration without book, or pen and paper. I found this was a very difficult task, especially in some of the perplexed schemes and long demonstrations of the twelfth Book ofEuclid, and inL’Hôpital’sConic Sections, and inNewton’sPrincipia. My walks for this purpose were so frequent, that my tutor, not knowing what I was about, once reproved me for being a lounger. I never gave up a difficult point in a demonstration till I had made it outproprio marte; I have been stopped at a single step for three days. This perseverance in accomplishing whatever I undertook, was, during the whole of my active life, a striking feature in my character. But though I stuck close to abstract studies, I did not neglect other things; I every week imposed upon myself a task of composing a theme or declamation in Latin or English. I generally studied mathematics in the morning, and classics in the afternoon; and used to get by heart such parts of orations, either in Latin or Greek, as particularly pleased me. Demosthenes was the orator, Tacitus the historian, and Persius the satirist whom I most admired. I have mentioned this mode of study, not as thinking there was any thing extraordinary in it, since there were many under-graduates then, and have always been many in the University of Cambridge, and, for aught I know, in Oxford, too, who have taken greater pains. But I mention it because I feel a complacence in the recollections of days long since happily spent,hoc est vivere bis vita posse priori frui, and indulge in a hope, that the perusal of what I have written may chance to drive away the spirit of indolence and dissipation from young men; especially from those who enter the world with slender means, as I did. In January, 1759, I took my Bachelor of Arts’ degree. The taking of this first degree is a great era in academic life; it is that to which all the under-graduates of talent and diligence direct their attention. There is no seminary of learning in Europe in which youth are more zealous to excel during the first years of their education than in the University of Cambridge. I was the second wrangler of my year. In September, 1759, I sat for a Fellowship. At that time there never had been an instance of a Fellow being electedfrom among the junior Bachelors. The Master told me this as an apology for my not being elected, and bade me be contented till the next year. On the 1st of October, 1760, I was elected a Fellow of Trinity College, and put over the head of two of my seniors of the same year, who were, however, elected the next year. The old Master, whose memory I have ever revered, when he had done examining me, paid me this compliment, which was from him a great one:—‘You have done your duty to the College; it remains for the College to do theirs to you.’ I was elected the next day, and became assistant tutor to Mr. Backhouse in the following November.” Every body knows his subsequent career embraced his appointment to the several dignified University offices of Tutor, Moderator, Professor of Chemistry, and Regius Professor of Divinity, and that he died Bishop of Llandaff. I may here, as an apposite tail piece, add from Meadley’s Life of that celebrated scholar and divine,

In the year 1795, during one of his visits to Cambridge, Dr. Paley, in the course of a conversation on the subject, gave the following account of the early part of his own academical life; and it is here given on the authority and in the very words of a gentleman who was present at the time, as a striking instance of the peculiar frankness with which he was in the habit of relating adventures of his youth. “I spent the two first years of my under-graduateship (said he) happily, but unprofitably. I was constantly in society where we were not immoral, but idle and rather expensive. At the commencement of my third year, however, after having left the usual party at rather a late hour in the evening, I was awakened at five in the morning by one of my companions, who stood at my bedside and said, ‘Paley, I have been thinking what a d—d fool you are. I could do nothing, probably, were I to try, and can afford the life I lead: you can do every thing, and cannot afford it. I have had no sleep during the whole night on account of these reflections, and am now come solemnly to inform you, that, if you persist in yourindolence, I must renounce your society.’ I was so struck (continued Paley) with the visit and the visiter, that I lay in bed great part of the day and formed my plan: I ordered my bed-maker to prepare my fire every evening, in order that it might be lighted by myself; I rose at five, read during the whole of the day, except such hours as chapel and hall required, allotting each portion of time its peculiar branch of study; and, just before the closing of gates (nine o’clock) I went to a neighbouring coffee-house, where I constantly regaled upon a mutton-chop and a dose of milk punch: and thus on taking my bachelor’s degree, I becamesenior wrangler.” He, too, filled the trustworthy and dignified office of Tutor of his College, and deserved, though he did not die in possession of, a bishopric.

I rise about nine, get to breakfast by ten,Blow a tune on my flute, or perhaps make a pen;Read a play till eleven, or cock my laced hat;Then step to my neighbours, till dinner, to chat.Dinner over, toTom’s, or toJames’sI go,The news of the town so impatient to know,WhileLaw,LockeandNewton, and all the rum race,That talk of their nodes, their ellipses, and space,The seat of the soul, and new systems on high,In holes, as abstruse as their mysteries, lie.From the coffee-house then I to Tennis away,And at five I post back to my College to pray:I sup before eight, and secure from all duns,Undauntedly march to theMitreorTuns;Where in punch or good claret my sorrows I drown,And toss off a bowl “To the best in the town:”At one in the morning I call what’s to pay,Then home to my College I stagger away;Thus I tope all the night, as I trifle all day.

A certain Oxford D.D. at the head of a college, lately expected a party of maiden ladies, his sisters and others, to visit him from the country. They were strangers inOxford, therefore, like another Bayard, he was anxious to meet them on their arrival andgallantthem to his College. This, however, was to him, so little accustomedto do the polite to the ladies, an absolute event, and it naturally formed hisprimetopic of conversation for a month previously. This provoked some of the Fellows of his College toput a hoax upon him, the most forward in which was one Mr. H——, apuritanforsooth. Accordingly, a note was concocted and sent to the Doctor, in the name of the ladies, announcing, that theyhad arrived attheInn in Oxford. “The Inn!” exclaimed the Doctor, on perusing it; “Good God! how am I to knowtheInn?” However, after due preparation, off he set, in full canonicals, hunting for his belles andtheInn! The Star, Mitre, Angel, all were searched; at last, the Doctor, both tired and irritated, began to smell a rat! The idea of a hoax flashed upon his mind; he hurried to his lodgings, at his College, where the whole truth flashed upon him like anew light, and the window of his room being open, which overlooked the Fellows’ garden, he saw a group of them rubbing their hands in high glee, and the ringleader, Mr. H——, in the midst: he was so roused at the sight, that, leaning from the window, he burst out with—“H——! you puritanical son of a bitch!” It is needless to add, that the words, acting like a charm, quickly dissolved their council: but the Doctor, too amiable to remember what was not meant as an affront, himself afterwards both joined in and enjoyed the laugh created by the joke.

Is attributed to the non-juring divine, celebrated son of Oxon, and excellent English historian, Thomas Carte, who, falling under the suspicions of the Government, as a favourer of the Pretender, was imprisoned at the time the Habeas Corpus Act was suspended, in 1744. Whilst under examination by the Privy Council, the celebrated Duke of Newcastle, then minister, asked him, “If he were not a bishop?” “No, my Lord Duke,” replied Carte,“there are no bishops in England, but what are made by your Grace; and I am sure I have no reason to expect that honour.” Walking, soon after he was liberated, in the streets of London, during a heavy shower ofrain, he was plied with, “A coach, your reverence?” “No, honest friend,” was his answer, “this is not areignfor me to ride in.”

Cole says, in hisAthenæ Cant., that Horace Walpole latterly lived and died a Sceptic; but when a student at King’s College, Cambridge, he was of “a religious enthusiastic turn of mind, and used to go with Ashton (the late Dr., Master of Jesus College,) his then great friend, to pray with the prisoners in the castle.” Dyer gives the following poetical version of

In his Supplement, on DoctorsLong,Short, andAskew:—

What’s Doctor, and Dr., and Doctorwrit so?Doctor Long, Doctor Short, and DoctorAskew.

Bishop Porteus said of himself, when holding the See of Chester, that he “had not interest enough to command a Cheshire cheese.”

“For sophistry, such as you may call corrupt and vain,” says Wood, in the first volume of his Annals, “which we had derived from the Parisians, Oxford hath in ancient time been very famous, especially when many thousands of students were in her, equalling, if not exceeding, that university from whence they had it; a token of which, with its evil consequences, did lately remain,—I mean thequadragesimall exercises, which were seldom performed, or at leastfinished without the help of Mars. In the reign of Henry the Third, and before, the schools were much polluted with it, and became so notorious, that it corrupted other arts; and so would it afterwards have continued, had it not been corrected by public authority for the present, though in following times it increased much again, that it could not be rooted out. Some there were that wrote, others that preached against it, demonstrating the evil consequences thereof, and the sad end of those that delighted in it. Jacobus Januensis reports that one Mr. Silo, a Master of the University of Paris, and Professor of Logic, had a scholar there, with whom he was very familiar: and being excellent in the art of sophistry, spared not all occasions, whether festival or other day, to study it. This sophister being sick, and almost brought to death’s door, Master Silo earnestly desired him, that after his death he would return to him and give him information concerning his state, and how it fared with him. The sophister dying, returned according to promise, with his hood stuffed with notes of sophistry, and the inside lined with flaming fire, telling him, that that was the reward which he had bestowed upon him for the renown he had before for sophistry; but Mr. Silo esteeming it a small punishment, stretched out his hand towards him, on which a drop or spark of the said fire falling, was very soon pierced through with terrible pain; which accident the defunct or ghost beholding, told Silo, that he need not wonder at that small matter, for he was burning in that manner all over. Is it so? (saith Silo) well, well, I know what I have to do. Whereupon, resolving to leave the world, and enter himself into religion, called his scholars about him, took his leave of, and dismissed them with these metres:—

‘Linquo coax[3]ranis, cras[4]corvis, vanaque[5]vanis,Ad Logicam pergo, que mortis non timet[6]ergo.’

[3]Luxuriam scil. luxuriosis, vel potius rixas sophistis.

[4]Avaritiam scil. avaris.

[5]Superbiam pomposis.

[6]Religionem ubi bene viventi non timetur stimulus mortis.

Which said story coming to the knowledge of certain Oxonians, about the year 1173 (as an obscure note which I have seen tells me,) it fell out, that as one of them was answering for his degree in his school, which he had hired, the opponent dealt so maliciously with him, that he stood up and spake before the auditory thus: ‘Profectò, profectò, &c.’ ‘Truly, truly, sir sophister, if you proceed thus, I protest before this assembly I will not answer; pray, sir, remember Mr. Silo’s scholar at Paris,’—intimating thereby, that if he did not cease from vain babblings, purgatory, or a greater punishment, should be his end. Had such examples been often tendered to them (adds Wood, with real bowels of compassion,) as they were to the Parisians, especially that which happened to one Simon Churney, or Thurney, or Tourney (Fuller says, Thurway, a Cornish man,) an English Theologist there (who was suddenly struck dumb, because he vainly gloried that he, in his disputations, could be equally for or against the Divine truth,) it might have worked more on their affections; but this being a single relation, it could not long be wondered at.” After theselogical marvels, Anthony gives us the following instance of

“Dr. Prideaux, when he resigned the office of Vice-Chancellor, 22nd July, 1626 (which is never done without an oration spoken from the chair in the convocation, containing for the most part an account of the acts done in the time of their magistrateship,) spoke only the aforesaid metres, ‘Linquo coax,’ &c., supposing there was more matter in them than the best speech he could make, frustrating thereby the great hopes of the Academicians of an eloquent oration.”

“Oxford hath been so famous for sophistry, and hath used such a particular way in the reading and learning it,” adds Wood, in treating of the schools, “that it hath often been styled—

So famous, also, for subtlety of logicians, that no placehath excelled it.” This great subtlety, however, would seem, in a degree, to have departed from our sister of Oxford in 1532, when, they say,

Took a journey to Cambridge, and challenged any to dispute with them there, in the public schools, on the two following questions:—“An jus Civile sit Medicina præstantius?” In English as much as to say,Which does most execution, Civil Law or Medicine?—a nice point, truly. But the other formed the subject of serious argumentation, and ran thus:—“An mulier condemnata, bis ruptis loqueis, sit tertio suspendenda?” Ridley, the Bishop and martyr, then a young man, student or Fellow of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, is said to have been one of the opponents on this interesting occasion, and administered theflagellæ linguæwith such happy effect to one of these pert pretenders to logic lore, that the other durst not set his wit upon him. The Oxford sophistry had so much

There, says Wood, that the purity thereof being lost among the scholars, “their speaking became barbarous, and derived so constantly to their successors, that barbarous speaking of Latin was commonly styled by many

‘Oxoniensis loquenti mos.’

The Latin of the schools, in the present day, is none of the purest at either University. A certain Cambridge Divine, a Professor, who was a senior wrangler, and is justly celebrated for his learning and great ability, one day presiding at an act in Arts, upon a dog straying into the school, and putting in for a share of the logic with a howl at the audience, the Moderator exclaimed, “Verte canem ex.” There have, however, been fine displays of pure Latinity in the schools of both; and it appears

At a very early period, not only in the art of logic itself,but in their manner of applying it: for in the beginning of 1517, says Wood, about the latter end of Lent (a fatal time for the most part to the Oxonians,) a sore discord fell out between the Cistercian and Benedictine monks, concerning several philosophical points discussed by them in the schools. But their arguments being at length flung aside, they decided the controversy by blows, which, with sore scandal, continued a considerable time. At length the Benedictines rallying up what forces they could procure, they beset the Cistercians, and by force of arms made them fly and betake themselves to their hostels. In fact, he says, by the use of logic, and the trivial arts, the Oxford sophists, in the time of Lent, broke the king’s peace, so that the University privileges were several times suspended, and in danger of being lessened or taken away. Through the corrupt use of it, “the Parva Logicalia, and other minute matters of Aristotle, many things of that noble author have been so changed from their original, by the screwing in and adding many impertinent things, that Tho. Nashe (in his book, ‘Have at you to Saffron Walden,’) hath verily thought, that if Aristotle had risen out of his grave, and disputed with the sophisters, they would not only have baffled him with their sophistry, but with his own logic, which they had disguised, and he composed without any impurity or corruption. It may well be said, that in this day they have done no more than what Tom Nashe’s beloved Dick Harvey did afterwards at Cambridge, that is to say,

With ass’s ears on his head,—a thing that Tom would ‘in perpetuam rei memoriam,’ record and never have done with. Wilson, in hisMemorabilia Cantabrigiæ, says of this said Tom Nash, that he was educated at St. John’s College, Cambridge, where he resided seven years, was at the fatal repast of the pickled herrings with the poet Green, and, in 1597, was either confined or otherwise troubled for a comedy onthe Isle of Dogs(extant in the MSS. of Oldys,) though he wrote but the first act, andthe players without his knowledge supplied the rest. He was a man of humour, a bitter satirist, and no contemptible poet; and more effectually discouraged and non-plused the notorious anti-prelate and astrologer, Will Harvey, and his adherents, than all the serious writers that attacked them. There is a good character of him, says Oldys, inThe return from Parnassus, or Scourge of Simony, which was publicly acted by the students of St. John’s, in 1606, wherein

An elegant term, that is in equal request at the sister university, as well as amongst the coxcombs of the day, adds Wilson, though the members of St. John’s are celebrated for theoriginof the term “to cut,”—i. e.“to look an old friend in the face, and affect not to know him,” which is thecut direct. Those who would be more deeply read in this art, which has been greatly improved since the days in which it originated, will find it at large in theGradus ad Cantabrigiam.

It was a custom of Dr. Kettel, while President of Trinity College, Oxford (says Tom Warton, citing the MSS. of Dr. Bathurst, in his Appendix to his Life of Sir Thomas Pope,) “to attend daily theDISPUTATIONSin the college-hall, on which occasions he constantly wore a large black furred muff. Before him stood an hour-glass, brought by himself into the hall, and placed on the table, for ascertaining the time of the continuance of the exercise, which was to last an hour at least. One morning, after Cromwell’s soldiers had taken possession of Oxford, a halberdier rushed into the hall during this controversy, and plucking off our venerable Doctor’s muff, threw it in his face, and then, with a stroke of his halberd, broke the hour-glass in pieces. The Doctor, though old and infirm, instantly seized the soldier by the collar, who was soon overpowered,by the assistance of the disputants. The halberd was carried out of the hall in triumph before the Doctor; but the prisoner, with his halberd, was quickly rescued by a party of soldiers, who stood at the bottom of the hall, and had enjoyed the whole transaction.” It was in the grove of this college, during Monmouth’s Rebellion of 1685, that Sir Philip Bertie, a younger son of Robert Earl of Lindsay, who was a member of Trinity College, and had spoken a copy of verses in the theatre at Oxford, in 1683, to the Duke and Dutchess a York, &c., trained a company, chiefly of his own college, of which he was captain, in the militia of the university.

Says Warton, in Monmouth’s Rebellion. It reminds me of a curious anecdote concerning Smith’s famous Ode, entitledPocockius, which I give from MSS., Cod. Balland, vol. xix. Lit. 104:—“The University raised a regiment for the King’s service, and Christ Church and Jesus’ Colleges made one company, of which Lord Morris, since Earl of Abingdon, was captain, who presented Mr. Urry (the editor of Chaucer,) a corporal (serjeant) therein, with a halberd. Upon Dr. Pocock’s death, Mr. Urry lugged Captain Rag (Smith) into his chamber in Peckwater, locked him in, put the key in his pocket, and ordered his bed-maker to supply him with necessaries through the window, and told him he should not come out till he made

The sentence being irreversible, the captain made theOde, and sent it, with his epistle, to Mr. Urry, who thereupon had his release.” “The epistle here mentioned,” adds Tom, “is a ludicrous prose analysis of theOde, beginningOpusculum tuum, Halberdarie amplissime,” &c., and is printed in the fourth volume of Dr. Johnson’s English Poets, who pronounces itunequalledby modern writers. This same Oxonian, Smith, had obtained thesoubriquetof

By his negligence of dress. He was bred at Westminster School, under Doctor Busby; and it is to be remembered, for hishonour, “that, when at the Westminster election he stood a candidate for one of the universities, he so signally distinguished himself by his conspicuous performances, that there arose no small contention between the representatives of Trinity College in Cambridge, and Christ Church in Oxon, which of those two royal societies should adopt him as their own. But the electors of Trinity having a preference of choice that year, they resolutely elected him; who yet, being invited the same time to Christ Church, he chose to accept of a studentship there.”

When our learned Oxonian, Dr. Johnson, was on his tour in the Hebrides, accompanied by Bozzy, as Peter Pindar has it, says an American writer, they had one day travelled so far without refreshment, that the Doctor began togrowlin his best manner. Upon this Bozzy hastened to a cottage at a distance, ordered a dinner, and was lucky in obtaining the choice of a roast leg of mutton and the Doctor’s favourite plum-pudding. Upon reaching the house, the appetite of the latter drove him into the kitchen to inspect progress, where he saw a boy basting the meat, from whose head he conceited he sawsomethingdescend, by the force ofgravity, into the dripping-pan. The meat was at length served up, and Bozzy attacked it with great glee, exclaiming, “My dear Doctor, do let me help you to some,—brown as a berry,—done to a turn.” The Doctor said he would wait for the pudding, chuckling with equal glee, whilst Bozzy nearly devoured the whole joint. The pudding at length came, done to a turn too, which the Doctor in his turn greedily devoured, without so much as asking Bozzy to a bit. After he had wiped his mouth, and begun to compose himself, Bozzy entreated to know what he was giggling about whilst he eat the mutton? The Doctor clapped his hands to both sides for support, as he told him what he saw in the kitchen. Bozzy thereuponbegun to exhibit sundry qualms and queer faces, and calling in the boy, exclaimed, “You rascal, why did you not cover your dirty head with your cap when basting the meat?” “’Cause mother took it to boil the pudding in!” said the urchin. The tables were turned. The Doctor stared aghast, stamped, and literally roared, with a voice of thunder, that if Bozzy ever named the circumstance to any one, it should bring down upon him his eternal displeasure! The following, not very dissimilar anecdote, is told of a Cantab, who was once out hunting till his appetite became as keen as the Doctor’s, and, like his, drove him to the nearest cottage. The good dame spread before him and his friend the contents of her larder, which she described as “ameatpie, made of odds and ends, the remnant of their own frugal meal.” “Any thing is better than nothing,” cried the half famished Cantab, “so let us have it—ha, Bob.” Bob, who was another Cantab, his companion, nodded assent. No sooner was the savoury morsel placed before him, than he commenced operations, and greedily swallowed mouthful after mouthful, exclaiming, “Charming! I never tasted a more delicious morsel in my life! But what have we here?” said he, as he sucked something he held in both hands; “Fish, as well as flesh, my good woman?” “Fish!” cried the old dame, as she turned from her washing to eye our sportsman, “why, Lord bless ye, i’ that bean’t our Billy’scomb!” The effect was not a little ludicrous on our hungry Cantab, whilst Bob’s “Haw! haw! haw!” might have been heard from the Thames Tunnel to Nootka Sound.

Why should we smother a good thing withmystifying dashes, instead of plain English high-sounding names, when the subject is of “honourable men?” “Recte facta refert.”—Horace forbid it! The learned Chancery Barrister, John Bell, K.C., “the Great Bell of Lincoln,” as he has been aptly called, wasSenior Wrangler, on graduating B.A., at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1786, withmany able competitors for that honour. He is likewise celebrated, as every body knows, for writing three several hands; one only he himself can read, another nobody but his clerk can read, and a third neither himself, clerk, nor any body else can read! It was in the latter hand he one day wrote to his legal contemporary and friend, the present Sir Launcelot Shadwell, Vice-Chancellor of England (who is likewise a Cantab, and graduated in 1800 at St. John’s College, of which he became a Fellow, with the double distinction of Seventh Wrangler and Second Chancellor’s Medallist) inviting him to dinner. Sir Launcelot, finding all his attempts to decipher the note about as vain as the wise men found theirs to unravel the Cabalistic characters of yore, took a sheet of paper, and havingsmearedit over with ink, he folded and sealed it, and sent it as his answer. The receipt of it staggered even the Great Bell of Lincoln, and after breaking the seal, and eyeing and turning it round and round, he hurried to Mr. Shadwell’s chambers with it, declaring he could make nothing of it. “Nor I of your note,” retorted Mr. S. “My dear fellow,” exclaimed Mr. B., taking his own letter in his hand, is not this, as plain as can be, “Dear Shadwell, I shall be glad to see you at dinner to-day.” “And is not this equally as plain,” said Mr. S., pointing to his own paper, “My dear Bell, I shall be happy to come and dine with you.”

In both Oxford and Cambridge the cooks are restricted to a certain sum each term, beyond which the college will not protect them in their demand upon the students. All else areextras, and are included in “sizings” in Cambridge; in Oxford the term is “to battel.” The head of a college in the latter university, not long since, sent for Mr. P——, one of his society, who hadbatteledmuch beyond the allowance; and after Mr. P—— had endeavoured to excuse himself on the ground of appetite, turning to the account, the Rector observed, “meatfor breakfast,meatfor lunch,meatfor dinner,meatfor supper,” andlooking up in the face of the dismayed student, he exclaimed, with his Welsh accent, “Christ Jesus! Mr. P——, what guts you must have.” This reminds me of

Now no more, who is said to have been a great gourmand, and weighed something less than thirty stone, but not much. At the college table, where our D.D. daily took his meal, in order that he might the better put his hand upon the dainty morsels, being very corpulent, he caused a piece to be scooped out, to give him a fair chance. His chair was also so placed, that his belly was three inches from the table at sitting down, and when he had eaten till he touched it, his custom was to lay down his knife and fork and desist, lest, by eating too much, any dangerous malady should ensue. A waggish Fellow of his college, however, one day removed his chair double the distance from the table, which the doctor not observing, began to eat as usual. After taking more than hisquantum, and finding that he was still an inch or two from thegoal, he threw down his knife and fork in despair, exclaiming, he “was sure he was going to die;” but having explained the reason, he was relieved of his fears on hearing the joke had been played him.

Every Cantab of the nineteenth century must remember our friend Smith of the Blue Boar, Trinity Street, charioteer of that nowdefunctvehicle and pair which used to ply between Cambridge, New-market, and Bury St. Edmunds, and on account of itscelerity, and other marked qualities, was called “The Slow and Dirty” by Freshman, Soph, Bachelor, and Big-wig, now metamorphosed into a handsome four-in-hand, over which our friend Smith presides in a style worthy ofthe Club itself! He had one day, in olden time, pulled up at Botsham, midway between Newmarket and Cambridge, when there happened to be several Cantabs on the road, who were refreshing theirnags at the “self-same” inn, the Swan, at whichthe Slow and Dirtymade its daily halt. “Any passengers?” inquired Smith. “One inside,” said a Cambridge wag, standing by, whose eye was the moment caught by a young ass feeding on the nettles in a neighbouring nook. Having put his fellows up to the joke, Smith was invited in-doors and treated with a glass of grog; meanwhile, my gentleman with the long ears was popped inside the coach. Smith coming out, inquired after his passenger, whom he supposed one of his friends, the Cantabs, and learnt he was housed. “All right,” said Smith, and off he drove, followed quickly by our wag and party on horseback, who determined to be in at thedenouement. Smith had not made much way, when our inside passenger, not finding himselfin clover, popped his head out at one of the coach windows. The spectacle attracted the notice of manybipedsas they passed along; Smith, however, notwithstanding their laughter, “kept the even tenor of his way.” At Barnwell the boyshuzzaedwith more than their usual greetings, but still Smith kept on, unconscious of the cause. He no sooner made Jesus’ Lane, than crowds began to follow in his wake, and he dashed into the Blue-Boar yard witha tailmore numerous than that upon the shoulders of which Dan O’Connell rode into the first Reformed Parliament, Feargus included. Down went the reins, as the ostlers came to the head of his smokingprads, and Smith was in a moment at the coach door, with one hand instinctively upon the latch, and the other raised to his hat, when the whole truth flashed upon his astonished eyes, and Balaam was safely landed, amidst peals of laughter, in which our friend Smith was not the leastuproarious.

When Paley, in 1762, kept his act in the schools, previously to his entering the senate-house, to contend for mathematical honours, it was under the moderators, Dr. John Jebb, the famous physician and advocate of reform inchurch and state, and the learned Dr. Richard Watson, late Bishop of Llandaff.Johnson’s Questiones Philosophicæwas the book then commonly resorted to in the university for subjects usually disputed of in theschools; and he fixed upon two questions, in addition to his mathematical one, which to his knowledge had never before been subjects ofdisputation. The one wasagainst Capital Punishments; the otheragainst the Eternity of Hell Torments. As soon, however, as it came to the knowledge of the heads of the university that Paley had proposed such questions to the moderators, knowing his abilities, though young, lest it should give rise to a controversial spirit, the master of his college, Dr. Thomas, was requested to interfere and put a stop to the proceeding, which he did, and Bishop Watson thus records the fact in his Autobiography:—“Paley had brought me, for one of the questions he meant for his act,Æternitas pænarum contradicit Divinis Attributis! The Eternity of Hell Torments contrary to the Divine Attributes. I had accepted it. A few days afterwards he came to me in a great fright, saying, that the master of his college, Dr. Thomas, Dean of Ely, insisted on his not keeping on such a question. I readily permitted him to change it, and told him that, if it would lessen his master’s apprehensions, he might put a ‘non’ before ‘contradicit;’ making the question, The Eternity of Hell Tormentsnotcontrary to the DivineAttributes: and he did so.” In the following month of January he was senior wrangler.

And used to declare he could read no Latin author with pleasure but Virgil: yet when the members’ prize was awarded to him for aLatinprose essay, in 1765, which he had illustrated withEnglishnotes, he was, strange enough, though his disregard of the classics was well known, suspected of being the author of theLatin only. The reverse was probably nearer the truth. It is notorious that

And when, in 1795, he proceeded to D.D., after beingmade Sub-Dean of Lincoln, he, in the delivery of hisClerum, pronounced profŭgus profūgus, which gave some Cambridge wag occasion to fire at him the following epigram:—

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