Chapter 9

“The humble petition of the ladies, who are all ready to be eaten up with the spleen,To think they are to be cooped up in the Chancel, where they can neither see nor be seen,But must sit in the dumps by themselves, all stew’d and pent up,And can only peep through the lattice, like so many chickens in a coop;Whereas last Commencement the ladies had a gallery provided near enough,To see the heads sleep, and the fellow-commoners take snuff.”

“How he could have delivered it in so sacred a place as St. Mary’s,” says Dyer, “is matter of surprise (though they say, good fun, like good coin, is current any where.”) It is pleasant to see a grave man descend from his heights, as Pope says, “to guard the fair.” Though nobody could probably be much offended at the time, unless the Vice-Chancellor, whom, if we understand the writer’s meaning, he callsan old woman, when he says—

“Such cross ill-natured doings as these are, even a saint would vex,To see a Vice-Chancellor so barbarous to one of his own sex.”

But the Doctor had

As is further illustrated by the celebrated Mr. Jones, of Welwyn, who calls him “a very ingenious person.” “At the public Commencement of 1713,” he says, “Dr. Greene (Master of Bene’t College, and afterwards Bishop of Ely) being then Vice-Chancellor, Mr. Long was pitched upon for the tripos performance: it was witty and humorous, and has passed through divers editions. Some who remembered the delivery of it, told me, that in addressing the Vice-Chancellor (whom the University wags usually styledMiss Greene,) the tripos-orator, being a native of Norfolk, and assuming the Norfolk dialect, instead of saying DomineVice-Cancellarie, did very audibly pronounce the words thus,—DominaVice-Cancellaria; which occasioned a general smile in that great auditory.” I could recollect several other

Of his, if there were occasion, adds Mr. Jones: but his friend, Mr. Bonfoy, of Ripon, told me this little incident:—that he, and Dr. Long walking together in Cambridge, in a dusky evening, and coming to a shortpostfixed in the pavement, which Mr. B., in the midst of chat and inattention, took to be a boy standing in his way, he said in ahurry, “Get out of my way, boy.” “That boy, sir,” said the Doctor, very calmly and slily, “is apost boy, who turns off his way for nobody.”

George the Second is said, like his father, to have had a strong predilection for his continental dominions, of which his ministers did not fail, occasionally, to take advantage. A residentiary of St. Paul’s cathedral happening to fall vacant, Lord Granville was anxious to secure it for the learned translator of Demosthenes, Dr. John Taylor, fellow of St. John’s College, Cambridge. The King started some scruples at first, but his Lordship carried his point easily, on assuring his Majesty, which was the fact, that “the Doctor’s learning wascelebrated all over Germany.”

The learned prelate, at whose expense the rector’s lodgings were built at Lincoln College, Oxford, is commemorated by his rebus, abeaconand atun, which may still be traced on the walls.

Founder of Jesus College, Cambridge, and Bishop of Ely, eitherrebusedhimself, or wasrebusedby others, in almost every conspicuous part of his College, by acock perched upon a globe. On one window is a cock with a label from its mouth, bearing the inscription, Εγω ειμι αλεκτωρ: to which another opposite bravely crows, says Cole, Οντως και εγω:

“I am a cock!” the one doth cry:And t’other answers—“So am I.”

There is a plate of him at the head of his celebrated Sermon,printed by Pynson, in 1498, with a cock at each side, and another on the first page. The subject of the discourse is the crowing of the cock when Peter denied Christ.

The celebrated founder of Queen’s College, Oxford, who was a native of Cumberland, and confessor to Philippa, Queen of Edward the Third, gave the College, for its arms, three spread eagles; but a singular custom, according to arebus, has been founded upon the fanciful derivation of his name, fromaiguille, needle, andfil, thread; and it became a commemorative mark of respect, continued to this day, for each member of the College to receive from the Bursar, on New Year’s Day, a needle and thread, with the advice, “Take this and be thrifty.” “These conceits were not unusual at the time the College was founded,” says Chalmers, in his History of Oxford, “and are sometimes thought trifling, merely because we cannot trace their original use and signification. Hollingshed informs us, that when the Prince of Wales, afterwards Henry the Fifth, who was educated at this College, went to Court in order to clear himself from certain charges of disaffection, he wore a gown of blue satin, full of oilet holes, and at every hole a needle hanging by a silk thread. This is supposed to prove at least, that he was an academician of Queen’s, and it may be conjectured that this was the original academical dress.” The same writer says, the Founder ordered that the Society should “be called to their meals by the sound of the trumpet (a practice which still prevails, as does a similar one at the Middle Temple, London,) and the Fellows being placed on one side of the table in robes of scarlet (those of the Doctor’s faced with black fur,) were to oppose in philosophy the poor scholars, who, in token of submission and humility, kept on the other side. As late as the last century the Fellows and Taberders used sometimes to dispute on Sundays and holidays.

In an arched recess of the ante-chapel of St. John’s College, Cambridge, is the tomb of the celebrated Dr. HughAshton, who took part with the famous Bishop Fisher (beheaded by Henry the Eighth) in the erection of the buildings of that learned foundation, and was the second Master of the Society. His tomb, as Fuller observes, exhibits “the marble effigy of his body when living, and the humiliating contrast of his skeleton when dead, with the usual conceit of the times, the figure of anash treegrowing out of atun.”

Dyer records of the learned contemporary and antiquarian coadjutor of the late Bishop of Cloyne, the Rev. Mr.Leman, a descendant of the famous Sir Robert Naunton, Public Orator at Cambridge, and a Secretary of State, that “his drawing-room was painteden frescowith the scenery aroundLake Leman.”

The same relates of himself, that, one day looking at some caricatures at a window in Fleet-street, Peter Pindar (Dr. Wolcot,) whom he knew, came up to him. “There, sir,” said Mr. Dyer to the Doctor, pointing to thecaricatures, “is something inyourway.” “And there is something inyourway,” rejoined the Doctor, pointing to some of the ladies of thepavewho happened to be passing. Peter was sure to pay in full.

Have ever been a grievous source of disquietude to both Oxonians and Cantabs. Tom Randolph, the favourite son of Ben Johnson, made them the subject of his muse. But in no instance, perhaps, have the race been so completely put to the blush, “couleur de rose,” as by the following

The man who not a farthing owes,Looks down with scornful eye on thoseWho rise by fraud and cunning;Though in thePig-markethe stand,With aspect grave and clear-starched band,He fears no tradesman’s dunning.

II.

He passes by each shop in town,Nor hides his face beneath his gown,No dread his heart invading;He quaffs the nectar of theTuns,Or on a spur-gall’d hackney runsTo London masquerading.

III.

What joy attends a new-paid debt!OurManciple[10]I lately met,Of visage wise and prudent;I on the nail mybattelspaid,The master turn’d away dismay’d,Hear this eachOxfordstudent!

IV.

With justice and with truth to traceThe grisly features of his face,Exceeds all man’s recounting;Suffice, he look’d as grim and sourAs any lion in the Tower,Or half starved cat-a-mountain.

A phiz so grim you scarce can meet,In Bedlam, Newgate, or the Fleet,Dry nurse of faces horrid!NotBuckhorsefierce, with many a bruise,Displays such complicated huesOn his undaunted forehead.

VI.

Place me on Scotland’s bleakest hill,Provided I can pay my bill,Stay ev’ry thought of sorrow;There falling sleet, or frost, or rain,Attack a soul resolved, in vain—It may be fair to-morrow.

VII.

ToHaddingtonthen let me stray,And takeJoe Pullen’s treeaway,I’ll ne’er complain of Phœbus;But while he scorches up the grass,I’ll fill a bumper to my lass,And toast her in a rebus.

[10]Churton says, in his Lives of the Founders of Brazenose College, Oxford, that “Manciples, the purveyors general of Colleges and Halls, were formerly men of so much consequence, that, to check their ambition, it was ordered by an express statute, that no Manciple should be Principal of a Hall.”

A Cambridge wag who was skilled in the science of electricity, as well as in the art ofticking, having got in pretty deep with his tailor, who was continuallydunninghim for payment, resolved to give snip “a settler,” as he said, the next time he mounted his stairs. He accordinglychargedhis electrifying machine much deeper than usual, and knowing pretty well the time of snip’s approach, watched his coming to the foot of the stairs where hekept, and ere he could reach the door, fixed theconductorto thebrass handle. The tailor having long in vain sought occasion to catch him with hisouterdoor notsported, was so delighted at finding it so, that, resolving not to lose time, he seized the handle of theinnerdoor, so temptingly exposed to view, determining to introduce himself to his creditorsans ceremonie. No sooner, however, did his fingers come in contact with it than theshockfollowed, so violent, that it stunned him for an instant: but recovering himself, he bolted as though followed, as the poet says, by “ten thousand devils,” never again to return.

Gray’s letters, and Bishop Warburton’s polemical writings, show, that in more respects than one they were gifted with a like temperament: but in the following instances they form a contrast to each other. In the library of the British Museum is an interesting letter occasioned by the death of the Rev. N. Nicholls, LL.B., Rector of Loud and Bradwell, in Suffolk, from the pen of the now generallyacknowledged author of “The Pursuits of Literature,” J. T. Mathias, M.A., in which he says, that shortly after that elegant scholar, and lamented divine, became a student of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, at the age of eighteen, a friend introduced him to Gray, the poet, at that time redolent with fame, and resident in Peter-House, to speak to whom was honourable; but to be admitted to his acquaintance, or to his familiarity, was the height of youthful, or indeed of any ambition. Shortly after this, Mr. N. was in a company of which Mr. Gray was one; and, as it became his youth, he did not enter into conversation, but listened with attention. The subject, however, being general and classical, and as Mr. Nicholls, even at that early period, was acquainted not only with the Greek and Latin, but with many of the best Italian poets, he ventured, with great diffidence, to offer a short remark, and happened to illustrate what he had said by an apposite quotation from Dante. At the name of Dante, Mr. Gray suddenly turned round to him and said, “Right: but have you read Dante, sir?” “I have endeavoured to understand him,” replied Mr. N. Mr. Gray being much pleased with the illustration, and with the taste which it evinced, addressed the chief of his discourse to him for the remainder of the evening, and invited him to his rooms in Pembroke Hall; and finding him ready and docile, he became attached to him and gave him instruction in the course of his studies, to which, adds Mr. Mathias, “I attribute the extent and value of his knowledge, and the peculiar accuracy and correct taste which distinguished him throughout life, and which I have seldom observed in any man in a more eminent degree.” And I wish every young man of genius might hear and consider, observes Mr. M., commenting upon an incident so honourable to all parties, “the

With modesty and propriety, in the highest, I mean the most learned and virtuous company.” What a different spirit was evinced, in the following incident, by that great polemical writer, Bishop Warburton: but it happily originated

Which were the production of Thomas Edwards, an Etonian and King’s College man, where he graduated M.A. in 1734, but missing a fellowship, turned soldier. After he had been some time in the army, says a writer in the Gentleman’s Magazine, for 1779, it so happened that, being at Bath, after Mr. Warburton’s marriage to Mr. Allen’s niece, he was introduced at Prior Park,en famille. The conversation not unfrequently turning on literary subjects, Mr. Warburton generally took the opportunity of showing his superiority in Greek, not having the least idea that an officer of the army understood anything of that language, or that Mr. Edwards had been bred at Eton; till one day, being accidentally in the library, Mr. Edwards took down a Greek author, and explained a passage in it in a manner that Mr. Warburton did not approve. This occasioned no small contest; and Mr. Edwards (who had now discovered to Mr. Warburton how he came by his knowledge) endeavoured to convince him, that he did not understand the original language, but that his knowledge arose from French translations. Mr. Warburton was highly irritated; an incurable breach took place; and this trifling altercation (after Mr. Edwards had quitted the army and was entered of Lincoln’s Inn) producedThe Canons of Criticism.

That munificent prelate and Oxonian, Dr. Shute Barrington, sixth son of the first Viscount, and the late Bishop of Durham, a prelate, indeed, whose charities were unbounded, was so conscientious in the discharge of his functions, that he personally examined all candidates for Holy Orders, and, however strongly they might be recommended, rejected all that appeared unworthy of the sacred trust. On one occasion, a relative, relying for advancement upon his patronage, having intimated a desire to enter theChurch, the Bishop inquired with what preferment he would be contented. “Five hundred pounds a year will satisfy all my wants,” was the reply. “You shall have it,” answered the conscientious prelate: “not out of the patrimony of the Church, but out of my private fortune.” The same Bishop gave the entire of 60,000l.at once, for founding schools, unexpectedly recovered in a lawsuit; and amongst other persons of talent, preferred Paley to the valuable living of Bishop Wearmouth, unsolicited and totally unknown to him, save through his valuable writings.

Is recorded of the celebrated Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, the Rev. James Scott, M. A., better known as Anti-Sejanus, who acquired extraordinary eminence as a pulpit orator, both in and out of the University. He frequently preached at St. Mary’s, where crowds of the University attended him. On one occasion he offended the Undergraduates, by the delivery of a severe philippic against gaming; which they deeming a work of supererogation, evinced their displeasure byscrapingthe floor with their feet (an old custom now scarcely resorted to twice in a century.) He, however, severely censured them for this act of indecorum, shortly afterwards, in another discourse, for which he selected the appropriate text, “Keep thy feet when thou goest to the House of God.”

It is not surprising that our distinguished philosophers and mathematicians have rarely evinced much knowledge of men and manners, or of the ordinary circumstances of life, since they are so much occupied in telling “the number of the stars,” in tracing the wonders of creation, or in balancing the mental and physical powers of man. Our illustrious Cantab, Bacon, says his biographer, was cheated by his servants at the bottom, whilst he sat in abstractionat the top of his table; and he of whom Dr. Johnson said (the great and goodNewton,) that had he lived in the days of ancient Greece, he would have been worshipped as a deity; of whom, too, the poet wrote—

“Nature and Nature’s laws lay hid in night,God said, ‘LetNewtonbe,’ and all was light,”

Caused a smaller hole to be perforated in his room door, when his favourite cat had a kitten, not remembering that it would follow puss through the larger one. Another more modern and less distinguished but not less amiable Cantab, who wasSenior Wranglerin his year, one day inquired—

Another distinguishedSenior Wrangler, Professor and divine, occasionally amuses his friends by rehearsing the fact, that once, having, to preach in the neighbourhood of Cambridge, he hired a blind horse to ride the distance on, and his path laying cross a common, where the road was but indistinctly marked, he became so absorbed in abstract calculations, that, forgetting to guide his steed aright, he and the horse wandered so far awry, that they tumbled “head over heels,” as the folks say, upon a cow slumbering by the way side.On dit, the same Cantab was one morning caught over his breakfast-fire with an egg in his hand, to minute the time by, and his—

When he went in for A.B. his naturaldiffidenceprevented his doing much in the first four days of the Senate House examination, and he was consequentlybracketted low: but rallying his confidence, he challenged all the men of his years, and wasSenior Wrangler. This incident caused him to be received with rapturous applause, upon his being presented to the Vice-Chancellor for his degree, on the following Saturday. A few days after he is said to have been in London, and entered one of the larger theatres at the same instant withRoyaltyitself:—the audience rose with one accord, and thunders of applause followed!“This is too much,” said our Cantab to his friend, modestly hiding his face in his hat, having, in thesimplicityof his heart, taken thehuzzas and clapsto be animprovededition of the Senate House. Another Cantab, who was also a Senior Wrangler, and guilty of many singularities, as well as some follies, one who hasunjustlyheaped reproach on the head of hisAlma Mater(see his “Progress of a Senior Wrangler at Cambridge,” in the numbers of the defunct London Magazine,) had the following quaternion posted on his room door in Trinity:—

“King Solomon in days of old,The wisest man was reckon’d:I fear as much cannot be toldOf Solomon the Second.”

Are recorded of the famous Cantab and Etonian, the Rev. George Harvest, B. D., who was one day walking in the Temple Gardens, London, with the son of his patron, the great Speaker Onslow, when he picked up a curious pebble, observing he would keep it for his friend, Lord Bute. He and his companion were going toThe Beef-steak Club, then held in Ivy-lane. Mr. Onslow asked him what o’clock it was, upon which he took out his watch, and observed they had but ten minutes good. Another turn or two was proposed, but they had scarcely made half the length of the walk, when he coolly put the pebble into hisfob, and threw his watch into the Thames. He was at another time in a boat with the same gentleman, when he began to read a favourite Greek author (for, like Porson, his coat pockets generally contained a moderate library) with such emphasis and strange gesticulations, that

And he coolly stepped overboard to recover them, without once dreaming that it was notterra-firma, and wasfishedout with great difficulty. He frequently wrote a letter to one person, forgot to subscribe his name to it, and directedit to another. On one occasion he provided himself with three sermons, having been appointed to preach before the Archdeacon and Clergy of the district. Some wags got them, and having intermixed the leaves, stitched them together in that state, and put them into his sermon-case. He mounted the pulpit at the usual time, took his text, but soon surprised his reverend audience by taking leave of the thread of his discourse. He was, however, so insensible to the dilemma in which he was placed, that he went preaching on. At last the congregation became impatient, both from the length and the nature of his sermon. First the archdeacon slipped out, then the clergy, one by one, followed by the rest of the congregation; but he never flagged, and would have finished

Had not the clerk reminded him that they were the sole occupants of the lately-crowded church. He went down to Cambridge to vote for his Eton contemporary,

When the latter was candidate for the dignity of High-steward of the University, in opposition toPitt. His lordship invited him to dine with some friends at the Rose Inn. “Apropos, my lord,” exclaimed Harvest, during the meal, “whence do you derive your nick-name ofJemmy Twitcher?” “Why,” said his lordship, “from some foolish fellow.” “No, no,” said Harvest, “not from some, for every body calls you so;” on which his lordship, knowing it to be the favourite dish of his quondam friend, put a huge slice of plum-pudding upon his plate, which effectually stopped his mouth. His lordship has the credit of being the originator and first President of the Cambridge Oriental Club. He was also

Once passing a whole day at some game of which he was fond, he became so absorbed in its progress, that he denied himself time to eat, in the usual way, and ordered a sliceof beef between two pieces of toasted bread, which he masticated without quitting his game; and that sort of refreshment has ever since borne the designation ofa Sandwich. Parkes, in his Musical Memoirs, gives him the credit of

It happened, he says, that during a feast given to his lordship by the Corporation of Worcester, when he was First Lord of the Admiralty, a servant let fall a dish with a boiled neat’s tongue, as he was bringing it to table. The Mayor expressing his concern to his lordship, “Never mind,” said he, “it’s only alapsus linguæ!” which Witty saying creating a great deal of mirth, one of the Aldermen present, at a dinner he gave soon after, instructed his servant to throw down a roast leg of mutton, that he too might have his joke. This was done; “Never mind,” he exclaimed to his friends, “it’s only alapsus linguæ.” The company stared, but he begun a roaring laugh,solus. Finding nobody joined therein, he stopped his mirth, saying, that when Lord Sandwich said it, every body laughed, and he saw no reason why they should not laugh at him. This sally had the desired effect, and the company, one and all, actually shook their sides, and our host was satisfied.

In 1717, George I. and his ministers had contrived to make themselves so unpopular, that the badges of the disaffected, oaken boughs, were publicly worn on the 29th of May, and white roses on the birth-day of the Pretender, the 10th of June. Oxford, and especially the university, manifested such strong feelings, that it was deemed expedient to send a military force there: Cambridge, more inclined to the Whig principles of the court and government, was at the same time complimented with a present of books. Upon this occasion, Dr. Trapp, the celebrated Oxford poet and divine, wrote the following epigram:—

Our royal master saw, with heedful eyes,The wants of his two universities:Troops he to Oxford sent, as knowing whyThat learned body wanted loyalty;But books to Cambridge gave, as well discerningHow that right loyal body wanted learning.

Cambridge, as may be well supposed, was not backward in retorting: and an able champion she found in her equally celebrated scholar, physician, and benefactor, Sir William Blowne (founder of a scholarship and the three gold medals called after his name,) who replied to Dr. Trapp in the following quaternion:—

The king to Oxford sent a troop of horse,For Tories know no argument but force:With equal grace, to Cambridge books he sent,For Whigs allow no force but argument.

Not that Cambridge was behind Oxford in supporting the unfortunate Charles the First, to whom the several colleges secretly conveyed nearly all their ancient plate; and Cromwell, in consequence, retaliated by confining and depriving numbers of her most distinguished scholars, both laymen and divines, many of whom died in exile: and the commissioners of parliament, with a taste worthy of the worst barbarians, caused many of the buildings to be despoiled of their architectural ornaments and exquisite pieces of sculpture and painted glass. It was at this time appeared the following celebrated poetic trifle, extant in the Oxford Sausage, known as

Written by Herbert Beaver, Esq., of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, when “Gaby” (as the then President, Dr. Shaw, is called, who had been a zealous Jacobite,) suddenly, on the accession of George the First, became a still more zealous patron of the interests of the House of Hanover.

WhenGabypossession had got of theHall,He took a survey of the Chapel and all,Since that, like the rest, was just ready to fall,Which nobody can deny.And first he began to examine the chest,Where he found an oldCushionwhich gave him distaste;The first of the kind that e’ertroubled his rest,Which nobody can deny.Two letters of Gold on this Cushion were rear’d;Two letters of gold once byGabyrever’d,But now what was loyalty, treason appear’d:Which nobody can deny.“J. R. (quoth the Don, in soliloquy bass)“See the works of this damnable Jacobite race!“We’ll out with the J, and put G in its place:”Which nobody can deny.And now to erase these letters so rich,For scissors and bodkin his fingers did itch,For Converts in politics gothorough-stich:Which nobody can deny:The thing was about as soon done as said,PoorJwas deposed andGreigned in his stead;Such a quick revolution sure never was read!Which nobody can deny.Then hey for preferment—but how did he stare,When convinced and ashamed of not being aware,ThatJstood forJennet,[11]forRaymondtheR,Which nobody can deny.Then beware, all ye priests, from hence I advise,How ye choose Christian names for the babes ye baptize,For ifGabydon’t like ’em he’ll pick out their I’s,Which nobody can deny.

[11]The benefactor who gave the college the Cushion.

Terræ Filius relates the following instance of

Mr. Carty of University College, and Mr. Meadowcourt of Merton College, Oxford (says this writer,) were suspended from proceeding to their next degree, in 1716, the first for a period of one, the second for a period of two years, the latter further, not to be permitted “to supplicate for his grace, until he confesses his manifold crimes, and asks pardonupon his knees, For breaking out to that degree of impudence(when the Proctor admonished him to go home from the tavern at an unseasonable hour,) as to command all the company, with a loud voice,to drink KingGeorge’shealth.” And, strange enough, persisting in his refusal to ask pardon, as required, he only ultimately obtained his degree by pleading theact of graceof the said King George, enacted in favour of those who had been guilty of treason, &c. These were, it appears, both Fellows of colleges, and with several others, who were likewise put in theBlack-book, were members of a society in Oxford, called

At a meeting of which it was that the king wastoasted.

Was one formed, in 1757, by theWranglersof that year, including the late Professor Waring; the celebrated reformer Dr. Jebb the munificent founder of the Cambridge Hebrew Scholarships; Mr. Tyrwhitt; and other learned men. It was calledThe Hyson Club, the entertainments being only tea and conversation. Paley, who joined it after he became tutor of Christ College, is thus made to speak of it by a writer in the New Monthly Magazine for 1825:—“We had a club at Cambridge, of political reformers; it was called the Hyson Club, as we met at tea time; and various schemes were discussed among us. Jebb’s plan was, that the people should meet and declare their will; and if the House of Commons should pay due attention to the will of the people, why, well and good; if not, the people were to convey their will into effect. We had no idea that we were talking treason. I was always an advocate forbraibery and corrooption: they raised an outcry against me, and affected to think I was not in earnest. ‘Why,’ said I, ‘who is so mad as to wish to be governed by force? or who is such a fool as to expect to be governed by virtue? There remains, then, nothing butbraibery and corrooption.’” No particular subjects were proposed for discussion at their meetings, but accident or the taste of individuals naturally led to topics, such as literary and scientific characters might freely discuss. At a meeting where the debate was on the justice or expediency of making some alteration in the ecclesiastical constitutionof the country, for the relief of tender consciences, Dr. Gordon, of Emmanuel College, late Precentor of Lincoln, vehemently opposed the arguments of Dr. Jebb, then tutor of Peter House, who supported the affirmative, by exclaiming, “You mean, Sir, to impose upon us a new church government.” “You are mistaken,” said Paley, who was present, “Jebb only wants to ride his own horse, not to force you to get up behind him.”

Discipline, like every thing else characteristic of our elder institutions, has for some years been fast giving way in our universities. Statutes are permitted to slumber unheeded, as not fitted to the presentadvancedstate of society; and in colleges where it would, as late as the beginning of the nineteenth century, have been almost a crime to have been seen in hall or chapel withouta white cravat on, scholars now strut in black ones, “unawed byimposition” or a fine. I can remember the time when this inroad upon decent appearance first begun, and when the Dean ofourcollege put forth his strong arm, and insisted on white having the preference. Men then used to wear their black till they came to thehall or chapeldoor, then take them off, and walk in with none at all, and again twist them round the neck, heedless whether the tie wereBrummellor not, on issuing forth from Prayers or Commons. Like the Whigs, they have by perseverance carried their point, and strut about in black, wondering what they shall next attempt.

That at the time Dr. W—— became Master of St. John’s College, Cambridge, the tutors used to oblige (and it was a custom for) the scholars to stand, cap in hand (if any tutor entered a court where they might be passing,) till the said tutor disappeared. This was so rigorously enforced,that the scholars complained to the new master, and he desired the tutors to relax the custom. This order they refused to comply with. Upon this the Doctor took down from a shelf a copy of theCollege Statutes, and coolly read to them a section, where the fellows of the same were enjoined to stand, cap in hand, till the master passed by, wherever they met him; and the Doctor, it is added, insisted upon its observance, on pain of ejection, till at length the tutors gave way.

Foote the comedian was, in his youthful days, a student of Worcester College, Oxford, under the care of the Provost, Dr. Gower. The Doctor was a learned and amiable man, but a pedant. The latter characteristic was soon seized upon by the young satirist, as a source whereon to turn his irresistible passion for wit and humour. The church at this time belonging to Worcester College, fronted a lane were cattle were turned out to graze, and (as was then the case in many towns, and is still in some English villages) the church porch was open, with the bell-ropes suspended in the centre. Foote tied a wisp of hay to one of them, and this was no sooner scented by the cattle at night, than it was seized upon as a dainty morsel. Tug, tug, went one and all, and “ding-dong” went the bell at midnight, to the astonishment of the Doctor, the sexton, the whole parish, and the inmates of the College. The young wag kept up the joke for several successive nights, and reports of ghosts, goblins, and frightful visions, soon filled the imagination of old and young with alarm, and many a simple man and maiden whisked past the scene of midnight revel ere the moon had “filled her horns,” struck with fear and trembling. The Doctor suspected some trick. He, accordingly, engaged the Sexton to watch with him for the detection of the culprit. They had not long lain hid, under favour of a dark night, when “ding-dong” went the bell again: both rushed from their hiding places, and the sexton commenced the attack by seizingthe cow’s tail, exclaiming, “’Tis a gentleman commoner,—I have him by the tail of his gown!” The Doctor approached on the opposite tack, and seized a horn with both hands, crying, “No, no, you blockhead, ’tis the postman,—I have caught the rascal by hisblowing-horn!” and both bawled lustily for assistance, whilst the cow kicked and flung to get free; but both held fast till lights were procured, when the real offender stood revealed, and the laugh of the whole town was turned upon the Doctor and his fellow-night-errant, the Sexton.

The Spoon, in the words of Lord Byron’s Don Juan,

“—— The name by which we Cantabs please,To dub the last of honours in degrees,”

is the annual subject for University mirth, and if not thefountain, is certainly the veryfoundationof Cambridge University honours: withoutthe spoon, not a man in theTriposwould have aleg to stand upon: in fact, it would be a top without a bottom,minusthe spoon. Yet “this luckless wight,” says the compiler of the Cambridge Tart, is annually a universal butt and laughing-stock of the whole Senate-House. He is the last of those men who takehonoursof his year, and is called a “junior optime,” and notwithstanding his being superior to them all, the lowest of the Ὁι πολλοι, or Gregarious Undistinguished Bachelors, think themselves entitled to shoot their pointless arrows against the “wooden spoon,” and to reiterate the perennial remark, that, “wranglers” are born withgoldenspoons in their mouths; “senior optimes” withsilverspoons; “junior optimes” withwooden spoons, and the Ὁι πολλοι withleadenspoons in their mouths. It may be here, however, observed, that it is unjust towards theundistinguished bachelorsto say that “he (the spoon) is superior to them all.” He is generally a man who has read hard,id est, hasdone his best, whilst the undistinguished bachelors, it is well known, include many men ofconsiderable, even superior talents, but having no taste formathematics, have merely read sufficient to get a degree; consequentlyhave not done their best. The muse has thus invoked

When sageMathesiscalls her sons to fame,TheSenior Wranglerbears the highest name.In academic honour richly deckt,He challenges from all deserved respect.But, if to visit friends he leaves his gown,And flies in haste to cut a dash in town,The wrangler’s title, little understood,Suggests a man in disputation good;And those of common talents cannot raise,Their humble thoughts a wrangler’s mind to praise.Such honours to an Englishman soon fade,Like laurel wreaths, the victor’s brows that shade.No such misfortune has that man to fear,Whom fate ordains the last in fame’s career;His honours fresh remain, and e’en descendTo soothe his family, or chosen friend.And while he lives, hewieldsthe boasted prize,Whose value all can feel, the weak, the wise;Displays in triumph his distinguished boon,The solid honours of theWooden Spoon!

That many have borne off this prize who might havedone better, is well known too. One learned Cantab in that situation felt so assured of his fate, when it might have been more honourable, had he been gifted with prudence and perseverance, that on the morning when it is customary to give out thehonours, in the Senate House, in theirorder of merit, he provided himself with a largewooden spoon, and when there was a call from the gallery, for “the spoon” (for then the Undergraduates were allowed to express their likes and dislikes publicly, a custom nowsuppressed,) he turned the shafts of ridicule aside by thrusting the emblem of his honours up high over his head,—an act that gained him no slight applause. Another Cantab, of precisely the samegradeas to talent, who was second in theclassical triposof his year, gave a supper on the occasion of the spoon being awarded to him, which commenced withsoup, each man being furnished with aponderouswooden spoontolapit with. Another, now a Fellow of Trinity College, who more than once bore off thePorson prize, being in thisplace of honour, a wag nailed a largewooden spoonto his door. Hundreds of other tricks have been put uponthe spoon, next to whom are—

Which, said the great Bentley, in a sermon preached before the University of Cambridge, on the 5th of November, 1715, “is a known expression in profane authors, opposed sometimes, τοις σοφοις,to the wise, and ever denotes the most, and generally the meanest of mankind.” “Besides the mirth devoted character,” (the wooden spoon,) says the writer first quoted, there “are always a few, a chosen few, a degree lower than the Ὁι πολλοι, constantly written down alphabetically, who serve to exonerate the ‘wooden spoon,’ in part, from the ignominy of the day; and these undergo various epithets, according to their accidental number. If there was but one, he was calledBion, who carried all his learning about him without the slightest inconvenience. If there were two, they were dubbed theScipios; Damon and Pythias; Hercules and Atlas; Castor and Pollux. If three, they weread libitum, thethree Graces; or thethree Furies; the Magi; orNoah,Daniel, andJob. If seven, they werethe seven Wise Men; orthe Seven Wonders of the World. If nine, they were the unfortunateSuitors of the Muses. If twelve, they became theApostles. If thirteen, either they deserved a round dozen, or, like the Americans, should bear thirteen stripes on theircoat and arms. Lastly, they were sometimes styledconstant quantities, andMartyrs; or the thirteenth was designated theleastof theApostles; and, should there be a fourteenth, he wasunworthy to be called an Apostle!” An unknown pen has immortalized the Ὁι πολλοι, by the following—

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