“In the first term, inSallustand theCharacters of Theophrastus.“In the second Term, in the first six books of Virgil’sAeneisand the first three books of Xenophon’sAnabasis.“In the third Term, in the last six books of theAeneisand the last four books of theAnabasis.“In the fourth Term, in the Gospels of St Matthew and St Mark, on which sacred books the persons examined are always called upon to produce a collection of observations from the best commentators.
“In the first term, inSallustand theCharacters of Theophrastus.
“In the second Term, in the first six books of Virgil’sAeneisand the first three books of Xenophon’sAnabasis.
“In the third Term, in the last six books of theAeneisand the last four books of theAnabasis.
“In the fourth Term, in the Gospels of St Matthew and St Mark, on which sacred books the persons examined are always called upon to produce a collection of observations from the best commentators.
Larger Image
The Original Entrance to the Cloisters at Magdalen.
“During hissecondyear, the Undergraduate must make himself a proficient—
“In the first Term, in Cæsar’sCommentaries, and the first six books of Homer’sIliad.“In the second Term, inCicero de Oratore, and the second six books of theIliad.“In the third Term, inCicero de Officiisand theDion Hal. de structura Orationis.“In the fourth Term, in the gospels of St Luke and St John, producing a collection of observations from commentators as at the end of the first year.
“In the first Term, in Cæsar’sCommentaries, and the first six books of Homer’sIliad.
“In the second Term, inCicero de Oratore, and the second six books of theIliad.
“In the third Term, inCicero de Officiisand theDion Hal. de structura Orationis.
“In the fourth Term, in the gospels of St Luke and St John, producing a collection of observations from commentators as at the end of the first year.
“During histhirdyear he must make himself a proficient—
“In the first Term, in the first six books of Livy and Xenophon’sCyropaedia.“In the second Term, in Xenophon’sMemorabilia, and in Horace’s Epistles and Art of Poetry.“In the third Term, inCicero de natura Deorum, and in the first, third, eighth, tenth, thirteenth and fourteenth of Juvenal’sSatires.“In the fourth Term, in the first four epistles of St Paul, producing collections as before.
“In the first Term, in the first six books of Livy and Xenophon’sCyropaedia.
“In the second Term, in Xenophon’sMemorabilia, and in Horace’s Epistles and Art of Poetry.
“In the third Term, inCicero de natura Deorum, and in the first, third, eighth, tenth, thirteenth and fourteenth of Juvenal’sSatires.
“In the fourth Term, in the first four epistles of St Paul, producing collections as before.
“During hisfourthand last year he must make himself a proficient—
“In the first Term, in the first six books of the ‘Annals of Tacitus,’ and in theElectraof Sophocles.“In the second Term, in Cicero’s ‘Orations’ against Catilina, and in those of Ligarius and Archias; and also in those Orations of Demosthenes which are contained in Mounteney’s edition.“In the third Term, in the ‘Dialogues’ of Plato published by Dr Forster, and in theGeorgicsof Virgil.“In the fourth Term, in the remaining ten Epistles of St Paul and the Epistles general, producing collections as before.”
“In the first Term, in the first six books of the ‘Annals of Tacitus,’ and in theElectraof Sophocles.
“In the second Term, in Cicero’s ‘Orations’ against Catilina, and in those of Ligarius and Archias; and also in those Orations of Demosthenes which are contained in Mounteney’s edition.
“In the third Term, in the ‘Dialogues’ of Plato published by Dr Forster, and in theGeorgicsof Virgil.
“In the fourth Term, in the remaining ten Epistles of St Paul and the Epistles general, producing collections as before.”
The above is undoubtedly a little programme guaranteed to keep the average Undergraduate fairly busy in the use of midnight oil. But—how odd it is that there is ever a “but”—the excited vindicator rather spoilt matters and lessened the terrors of the programme by stating in his preliminary paragraph that only those Dons were present “who may please to attend!” Having digested already some few facts concerning the habits and hobbies of the eighteenth-century Don, as well as the liberty accorded to gentlemen commoners, there is no need to waste sympathy on “every individual Undergraduate” of Magdalen. He merely lowered the right eyelid, tapped the left nostril with the left index digit and “obtained leave to return to his friends in any Vacation,” with the greatest ease and speed and the most cordial of farewells to the President, Vice-President, Deans, and any of the Fellows who cared to attend.
’VARSITY LITERATURE
Present-day ineptitude—Jackson’sOxford Journal—Domestic intelligence—Election poems—Curious advertisements—Superabundance of St John’s editors—Terrae Filius.
Present-day ineptitude—Jackson’sOxford Journal—Domestic intelligence—Election poems—Curious advertisements—Superabundance of St John’s editors—Terrae Filius.
There is some indefinable element in the atmosphere of Oxford which has always excited an itch for writing. The sister university can, of course, point to many sons whose names stand high in the literary firmament, but they do not amount to a tithe of the number of great writers who have passed through Oxford. Oxford may be the home of lost causes, but she is also the cradle for infant pens. Generations of pens splutter their first incoherencies behind the comparative shelter of the city walls through which the harsh criticism of maturer writers cannot penetrate. In stilted phraseology and doubtful grammar they cover numberless sheets with emotional outpourings. There may be future literary geniuses hidden among them, but from those early imitative strivings it is difficult to single out even one. They are novices who humbly apprentice themselves to the profession of letters. From time to time some quite brilliant piece of work throws up more vividly the amateurishness of the rest. Such meteoric flashes are, however, rare, and thus the general standard does not rise above mediocrity. It is because all Undergraduate pens are very young and inexperienced that the present-day ’varsity papers can make no claim to literary distinction. To their credit be it said that they do not. They are content to remain just ’varsity papers—which is synonymous with saying that they are either tediously over-academic or peculiarlyinane; that their light articles are excellent imitations of the halfpenny comic papers, that their serious efforts are most praiseworthy for their capacity for inflicting boredom, and that their editorials border upon the inept.
It is not an unknown thing for a present-day Undergraduate paper, which is supposedly conductedbyUndergraduatesforUndergraduates to be owned and financed by a local tradesman. He, being thus in supreme command, maintains a private blue pencil, and, obsessed by the idea that because he sells pens and inks he is therefore a man of parts and literary consideration, rules the poor devil of an Undergraduate editor with a rod of iron. What is the result? It is that the average ’varsity paper is composed of childish leaders edited by the financier; a series of vastly foolish and unentertaining remarks which may or may not have been heard in the Broad; pages of notes which are half-frightened comments on the week’s doings written invariably by critics who have not sufficient pluck to say that they consider the person or thing under criticism to be either thoroughly bad or supremely excellent; a mawkish account of the speeches delivered in the Union Society’s Debates, written with the condescending patronage of the old stager, by some self-satisfied ex-official, himself a thoroughly bad speaker and so totally unqualified to criticise; a collection of dramatic criticisms of the bi-weekly pieces at the New Theatre, scribbled by some musical comedy enthusiast who, in addition to a total ignorance of the drama, has been warned by the financier of the paper to say nice things however bad the play or the acting in order to secure free seats from the theatre; and, lastly, a fulsome and objectionably personal article which purports to be a biography of a well-known Oxford man.
Perhaps under these Gilbertian conditions it is no wonder that the literary efforts of Georgian times put those of the present to shame.In the eighteenth century university journals were at least independent. They looked for no pecuniary assistance from local ironmongers or haberdashers. The consequence is that although the contributors were beginners whose efforts were the result of the itch for writing brought on by that indefinable element which was in the atmosphere of Oxford then as now, their work was unhampered by any outside considerations. The literary standard was not of the highest order. How could it be when the writers were lads varying from eighteen to twenty years of age? It was, however, higher than that of to-day. On turning over the various ’varsity papers of two centuries ago, an uncomfortable sensation of that most unusual emotion—humility—inevitably results, because there is undoubtedly found in them much that is witty, fearless, original, vivid, and entertaining.
In those days the editor drew up a scheme for running his paper, and adhered to it in defiance of Don and man. Now, however, in his frantic efforts to keep life in his moribund sheet, the editor does not see that his copy is good and worth printing, copy guaranteed to sell largely. That is not the idea. The only way to secure financial soundness is, he finds, to pander to the advertisers by the shifty method of writing puffs for cigarettes, soaps, wines, and so on, in a column which bears a disguised and misleading heading, and which is an insult to the intelligence of his youngest reader.
In analysing the university journals of the eighteenth century I will begin with the year 1753, when the inhabitants of Oxford and the surrounding counties were enlivened by Jackson’sOxford Journal. As to its make-up the editor announced that, “This paper will be more complete than any that has hitherto appeared in this Part of the Kingdom. For besides the Articles of News, Foreign and Domestic, in which we shall endeavour to surpass every other Paper, our Situationwill enable us to oblige our readers with a particular account of every Transaction relating to the present Opposition in Oxfordshire, as also with a Variety of curious Pieces in Prose and Verse, on both sides of the Question; which no other Paper can procure.” Having made this declaration of hismodus operandiJackson adhered to it rigidly and fully. His columns of foreign news were stocked with items of note and interest. Foreign politics, wars, rumours of wars, agricultural depressions or rises were all included, and came from the uttermost parts of the earth. The domestic intelligence covered the movements of the King and royal family, meetings of celebrated London societies, and chatty descriptions of assaults and batteries. In one issue there was a sporting account of how “a young man ran from Queen Street, Cheapside, to Hornsey Wood, and back again, in one Hour and four minutes.” The next paragraph related that “the same Morning was found drowned in the River, William Andrew, a Master Taylor in Spital Fields. His watch and Money, with two Rings on his Finger, were found upon him.” This little tragedy was immediately followed by an incident of comedy which occurred in the London streets.
“Between Five and Six o’clock on Sunday Evening an uncommon Scheme was put in Execution by a Gang of Pickpockets in St James’s Park. A Person very well dressed fixing himself with great Attention, as tho’ he saw something particular in the Air, occasioned a Number of People to enquire the Reason and join in the Speculation, when he asserted he saw a very bright Star; and while he was busy in pointing out the Constellation to the Spectators several of them lost their handkerchiefs, but the Star gazer got off.”
Jackson’s news columns were every bit as full in comparison as the London papers to-day. With politics, too, he dealt very fully. In a short and pithy editorial, however, he assured his readers that his ownpolitical views did not count—he was merely running the paper. This, odd as it may seem, was sound diplomatic policy, because in those days, with ever-changing party feeling, it was a mere matter of five minutes to issue an injunction, stop the press, and confiscate the whole plant. Devoted as he was to political interest Jackson printed many of the promised “curious Pieces of Prose and Verse.”
“Receipt to make a Vote.“By the cook of Sir J. D——d.“Take a Cottager of Thirty shillings a Year, tax Him at Forty; Swear at Him; Bully Him; take your business from Him; Give Him your business again; make Him drunk; Shake Him by the Hand; Kiss his Wife, and he is an Honest Fellow.“N.B.—The above Cook will make Affidavit before any Justice of the Peace, that this Receipt has been try’d on the Body of Billy S—— and several others in the Neighbourhood of K—rtle—n, and never failed of Success.”
“Receipt to make a Vote.
“By the cook of Sir J. D——d.
“Take a Cottager of Thirty shillings a Year, tax Him at Forty; Swear at Him; Bully Him; take your business from Him; Give Him your business again; make Him drunk; Shake Him by the Hand; Kiss his Wife, and he is an Honest Fellow.
“N.B.—The above Cook will make Affidavit before any Justice of the Peace, that this Receipt has been try’d on the Body of Billy S—— and several others in the Neighbourhood of K—rtle—n, and never failed of Success.”
The other political contribution took the form of an election song, the sort of thing that the Undergraduates of those times would seize upon and parade the streets of the university, chanting right lustily in gangs.
“ADVICE TO FREEHOLDERS.“Ye honest Freeholders, bestir all your stumps;For all now depends upon who turns up Trumps.Be sure that you chuseNeither Placemen nor Jews.Nor such as are likely their trust to abuse.To the devil you’re sold if the Conj’rer prevails;If Israel’s Black Seed, beware of your Tails.Chorus.“Alas! that poor Britons should lose for their SinsTheir Liberties, Properties and their Fore-Skins.”
In addition to such contributions in prose and verse, the columns of the Journal were open to any keen correspondent who cared to air either his views or his grievances—an opportunity of which the fullest advantage was taken. In every issue urgent appeals and exhortations to voters and freeholders appeared over various names. The advertisement columns, such as they were, contained frequent announcements of the publication of political pamphlets addressed to the “Gentlemen, Clergy, and Freeholders of the country of Oxford.” These columns contained also the most curious hotch-potch of unexpected posts and requests, such as:
“To be drunk for by Candle,“At Will’s Coffee-House, in Oxford, on Wednesday next,“A LIVING,“Worth nearThirty Poundsper Annum, besides Surplice fees and other emoluments. None but True Blue Parsons to drink for it. Three Gentlemen with White Wigs and Red Faces are already entered.“N.B.—Very soon will be ate for at the same place, a tollerableCuracy, by those who never get a Dinner but of a Sunday. Codd and Oyster Sauce will be the Subject for this trial. Mr B—lst—ne is excepted against in both Cases as he will spoil Sport.”
“To be drunk for by Candle,
“At Will’s Coffee-House, in Oxford, on Wednesday next,
“A LIVING,
“Worth nearThirty Poundsper Annum, besides Surplice fees and other emoluments. None but True Blue Parsons to drink for it. Three Gentlemen with White Wigs and Red Faces are already entered.
“N.B.—Very soon will be ate for at the same place, a tollerableCuracy, by those who never get a Dinner but of a Sunday. Codd and Oyster Sauce will be the Subject for this trial. Mr B—lst—ne is excepted against in both Cases as he will spoil Sport.”
Another frequently-appearing notice was an advertisement of a booklet of advice to new-married persons, or the art of having beautiful children. This was surrounded by bills of races, cock fights, arrivals of new dancing masters, who addressed themselves to the nobility and gentry in and about Oxford, quack medicines and ointments which were a never-failing remedy for the itch, announced“by the King’s authority.N.B.—One box is sufficient to cure a grown person, and divided, is a cure for two children.”
For the rest it was the receptacle for articles of every nature from all and sundry. Warton left his antiquarian researches to afford himself a little relaxation by writing for it a version of Gray’sElegyup to date, or an appreciation of Ben Tyrell’s mutton pies. From the various coffee-houses Jackson received the wonderful effusions of the Bucks of the first head, sonnets to Sylvia’s eyelashes, poems in praise of Oxford ale, and even an occasional Latin verse. “Old Lochard, the newsman,” says J. R. Green in his delightful Oxford chapters, “who, bell in hand, hawked the Journal through the streets, owed to his college patrons not only the antiquated cane and rusty grizzle wig, which they had thrown by after ten years’ service of the tankard at buttery hatch, in return for quick despatches; but the merry rhymes that every Christmas drew a douceur from the tradesman, a slice of sirloin and a cup of October from the squire, or a dram from Mother Baggs.”[22]
In the Journal’s own war paean:—
“Each vast event our varied page supplies,The fall of princes or the rise of pies;Patriots and squires learn here with little costOr when a kingdom or a match is lost;Both sexes here approved receipts peruse,Hence belles may clean their teeth or beaux their shoes,From us informed Britannia’s farmers tellHow Louisburgh by British thunders fell;’Tis we that sound to all the Trump of Fame,And babes lisp Amherst’s and Boscawen’s name.All the four quarters of the globe conspireOur news to fill, and raise your glory higher.”
Throughout almost the entire eighteenth century the editorial chairs of the different periodicals seem to have been filled for the most part by St John’s men. Terrae Filius appeared first in 1721 under the guidance of Nicholas Amhurst of St John’s. In 1789The Loiterers, a literary weekly, was launched before the public by James Austen of St John’s. His brother, H. T. Austen of the same college, materially assisted him by contributing a number of delightful imaginative articles. This paper was filially dedicated by the editor to the President and Fellows of his college, and ran successfully for two years. The present-day members have done their best to maintain the literary traditions of this college, for that nine days’ wonder, theTuesday Review, was edited and run by two rash men of St John’s.
Amhurst took it upon himself to fill the post of cat-o’-nine-tails to the University, and in his “secret history” lashed at everybody and thing that was not to his liking, or that seemed to him to constitute in any way an abuse. He discovered for himself, in all their abundance, the manifold troubles of an editor, but was not to be coerced or cajoled into anything that he did not consider fit and proper.
“In a work of this nature,” he wrote in the preface to the second edition of Terrae Filius, “it is very hard to please any, and impossible to please all. The different tempers and tastes of men cannot relish the same style or manner of writing any more than the same dish or the same diversion: fops love romances; pedants love jargon; the splenatic man delights in satire; and the gay courtier in panegyric; some are pleased with poetry; others with prose; some are for plain truths, and some for disguise and dissimulation. I was aware of this when I began, and, in my second paper, reserved to myself a liberty to be in what humour I pleased, and to vary my manner as well as my subject, hoping thereby to please most sorts of readers; but Iquickly found myself disappointed in my expectations, having often received, by the same post, complaints from some of my correspondents, that I was too grave for the character of Terrae Filius; and from others, that I affected levity too much for one who styled himself a reformer. In answer to both of the objections I shall beg my readers to consider that as, on one hand, it ought not to be expected that a man should keep his face upon the broad grin for half a year together; so, on the other, I cannot apprehend that it is at all necessary for a reformer to be a puritan, always in the dumps, and always holding forth with a dismal face and a canting tone:—
“‘... ridiculum acriFortis et melius magnas plerumque secat res.’
“... I can see nothing in it to repent of, but the want of sufficient abilities to treat a subject of such general importance in the manner which it deserves. But I hope the reader will excuse some imperfections, when he considers the nature of my stunted education, that I was allow’d to continue but three years at Oxford, and was not twenty-four years of age when I compleated this undertaking.”
In self-explanation Terrae Filius started off his campaign with sundry paragraphs calculated to make the authorities uneasy as to their own future safety, and to cause Undergraduates to champion him against them at all hazards.
“It has, till of late,” he explained, “been a custom, from time immemorial, for one of our family to mount the rostrum at Oxford at certain seasons, and divert an innumerable crowd of spectators, who flock’d thither to hear him from all parts, with a merry oration in the fescenine manner, interspersed with secret history, raillery, and sarcasm, as the occasions at the times supply’d him with matter. If a venerablehead of a college was caught snug a bed with his neighbour’s wife; or shaking his elbows on a Sunday morning; or flattering a prime minister for a bishopric; or coaxing his bedmaker’s girl out of her maidenhead; the hoary old sinner might expect to hear of it from our lay-pulpit the next Act. Or if a celebrated toast and a young student were seen together at midnight under a shady myrtle tree, billing like two turtle doves, to him it belonged, being a poet as well as an orator, to tell the tender story in a melancholy ditty, adapted to pastoral music.”
Claiming to follow the precedents established by his old-time predecessors, Terrae Filius set about showing up the scandalous old Heads, disguised in thinly-veiled names. As a consequence he was many times prohibited by Vice-Chancellors and preached down, and cordially loathed and execrated by all the college Heads and Fellows of his time, whom he attacked either directly or indirectly.
“Why should a poor Undergraduate,” he asked, “be called an idle rascal, and a good-for-nothing blockhead, for being perhaps but twice at chapel in one day; or for coming into college at ten or eleven o’clock at night; or for a thousand other greater trifles than these; whilst the grey-headed doctors may indulge themselves in what debaucheries and corruptions they please, with impunity, and without censure? Methinks it could not do any great hurt to the universities if the old fellows were to be jobed at least once in four or five years for their irregularities, as the young ones are everyday, if they offend.”
Abuses of such a nature are long dead, and a Terrae Filius to-day would rapidly die of starvation by reason of the lack of matter. Then, however, he not only lived, but waxed fat on the news he ferreted out—rather in the manner of a leech applied to a festering sore. Advertisements to him meant nothing. They were unsought, and would havebeen refused if offered. He waspro bono publico, ever ready with advice, satire, criticism, explanation, and always humour. His pen was untiring in writing a subject up or down, according to its merits or demerits. Political, religious, academic, and social abuses were thrown on to the screen fearlessly. His paternal advice to freshmen, although written in a vein of biting irony, was, nevertheless exactly suited to the times, and, if followed unswervingly, must assuredly have been of vast assistance in coping with the wily, time-serving sculls and beer-swilling tutors. His advice as to their morale was penned with his tongue in his cheek; but in substance it was none the less straight and praiseworthy. His political views were consistent and very strenuous, and the opposition received a royal scourging from his stinging and lengthy lashes. His contempt for Smarts was only exceeded by his scorn for drink-soddened, incapable Fellows, and the scandalous manner in which they neglected the statutes and allowed everything to run to seed. His boldness in choice of subjects was unparalleled, the outspoken manner of setting them forth absolutely inimitable. The results achieved by his work must have been considerable, though to a large extent unperceived publicly, because a new leaf turned frankly and openly would have been an avowal of guilt on the part of the persons concerned. The proof that he was largely read lies in the fact that he was preached about in no measured terms in public pulpits, prohibited by various authorities, roasted by aggrieved parties in coffee- and ale-houses, and, in fact, was a household word on every one’s tongue.
A lengthy disquisition upon the way in which the truth was mangled, disguised, covered up, and turned about by priests, statesmen, and every “old libertine in authority” was followed by the ensuing declaration:—
“I, Terrae Filius, a free-thinker, and a free-speaker, highly incensedagainst all knavery and imposture, and not thinkingTruthsuch a terrible enemy to religion and good order, as it has been represented, do hereby declare war against all cheats and deluders, however dignified, or wheresoever residing; the fear of obloquy and ill-usage shall not deter me from this undertaking, nor shall any considerations rob me of the liberty of my own thoughts and my own tongue. In the pursuit of this design, I shall not confine myself to any particular method; but shall be grave and whimsical, serious or ludicrous, prosaical or poetical, philosophical or satirical, argue or tell stories, weep over my subject, or laugh over it, be in humour or out of humour, according to whatever passion is uppermost in my breast whilst I am writing.”
In token of this promise there stands the truth on every page, however bedded in satire, philosophy, poetry, or ridicule. He saw to it that his daily path was studded with nails, and in his passage he hit them each one on the head. As a result the pages of Terrae Filius are from cover to cover a source of immense joy. For an example of bold and delightful satire I cannot find a better instance than thene plus ultrain skits on the Poetical Club. Of course he gave the president and learned professors who composed it fictitious names, but it is palpable that those caricatured recognised themselves, and, if they had the least grain of humour in their compositions, they must have enjoyed it thoroughly. As, however, the question of their possessing a sense of humour is open to grave doubts—a fact proved by the very formation of the club and the secrecy of its doings—it is infinitely more likely that the club writhed under his well-pointed jibes and consigned the author to eternal perdition. Then, too, the bland and smiling manner in which he turned aside the violent pulpit denunciations of his hard-hit victims is exhilarating to a degree. He received, for instance, a letter from an anonymous friend (hidden behind the title“John Spy”) who sent him an account of the heated charges laid at his door by a certain grave college Head. Terrae printed the letter and smilingly pointed out the reasons of the man’s wrath in a tone of charming tolerance.
“You see, reader,” he said, “that I had no sooner undertaken this task but I raised a nest of holy wasps and hornets about my ears; an huge old drone, grown to an excessive bulk upon the spoils of many years, has thought fit, you see, to call me terrible names before his learned audience, at St Mary’s Church in Oxford; it is, it seems, an hellish attempt to bring about a reformation of the universities; and it is daring and impious in me to style myself a free-thinker and a free-speaker: poor man! poor man! What! art afraid I should tell tales out of school, how a certain fat doctor got his bedmaker with child, and play’d several other unlucky pranks? That would be daring and impious indeed. No, no, never fret thyself, man; I love a pretty woman myself, and I never desire any better usage in this world than as I do unto others to be done unto myself.”
Turning to politics, Terrae Filius summed up the attitude of the authorities in Oxford in one short paragraph—which was made a hundred times more severe by his assertion upon honour that religion received the same treatment at their hands.
“In politics my advice is the same as in religion—not to let your upstart reason domineer over you, and say you must obey this king or that king; or you must be of this party, or that party; instead of that, follow your leaders; observe the cue, which they give you; speak as they speak; act as they act; drink as they drink, and swear as they swear; comply with everything which they comply with; and discover no scruples which they do not discover.”
Upon a Whig and a Tory enquiring what was their exact position,he told them that one day the Whig might be safe and have things all his own way, but that the next the certainty of the Tory’s being uppermost was absolute. Finally he urged upon them that the only safe method of proceeding was to employ what are called nowadays the Winston tactics—one side one day, the other the next, according to one’s greater individual advantage.
He dealt exhaustively with the peculiarly slack method of conducting, or rather the practical non-existence of, university examinations. On reading his account alone, it would very naturally be supposed that he was drawing the long bow, caricaturing the existing conditions out of all shape and possibility of recognition, and we laugh unreservedly. But further study of other writers’ criticisms of the times very quickly turns our smile into a gasp of amazement. Terrae Filius was not caricaturing. All his absurd and quite impossible relations of bribery and corruption were true. It is precisely the same with all his papers. He has wisely written them in the style of caricatures, and at times, no doubt, has indulged his humour overmuch; but, on going into his inimitable showings up of drinking and immoral Dons, political conflicts, university statutes, toasts, smarts, or any one of the innumerable subjects dissected by him, and then comparing his work with other eighteenth-century documents, one finds that Terrae Filius carried out his boast and kept to the truth.
Is there any man to-day who, at the age of twenty-four, has achieved such notoriety, done such brilliant work, and proved himself to be such a master of his craft?
’VARSITY LITERATURE (continued)
The Student—Cambridge included—Its design—The female student—Poem by Sir Walter Raleigh—Bishop Atterbury’s letter—The manly woman.
The Student—Cambridge included—Its design—The female student—Poem by Sir Walter Raleigh—Bishop Atterbury’s letter—The manly woman.
On the first day of January, 1750, there appeared the first number ofThe Student. The sub-title read:The Oxford Monthly Miscellany. For two years it ran successfully, and, at the beginning of the second, it was found that Cambridge took such an interest in its doings that the sub-title was enlarged. It then read:The Oxford and Cambridge Monthly Miscellany. In make-up it differed entirely from Terrae Filius, and contended to be a far more serious and high-minded journal, aiming not so much to amuse as to teach its readers. Thus it contained Latin prose and verse, religious discussions, essays, medical dissertations, and a carefully selected variety of lighter matter in English prose and verse. The tone of the work may be gathered from the sedate foreword to the public.
“In the course of this work particular care will be taken that nothing be inserted indecent or immoral, and as we are determined to give umbrage to no Person or Party, all political disputes and whatever is offensive to Good Manners will of consequence be avoided. Our design being only to promote learning in general, we shall not confine ourselves to any particular subject, but occasionally comprehend all the branches of polite literature. Each number will consist of such originals in Prose and Verse as we hope will prove agreeable to our readers. And tho’ we might with impunity comply with the commonpractice of preying indiscriminately on the labours of others, yet we shall not to our knowledge publish any thing that has been printed before, or without the consent of the respective authors: for the one we consider as a fraud upon the publick, and the other an invasion of private property. These considerations we presume will remove any prejudice which the Learned may conceive against our undertaking, and induce them not only to encourage, but assist us in the prosecution of it. And as we must necessarily depend on the publick for the Success of our work, we hope it will meet with their indulgence. No endeavours on our part shall be wanting to render it worthy their approbation; and we no longer desire their favour, than while we continue to deserve it.”
In the first number there were some five or six pages of Latin verse, a translation of the chorus at the end of the second act ofHecuba of Euripides, an elegy in imitation of Tibullus, an article on “Intellectual Pleasure”—the author of which was requested, in an editorial note, to favour the paper with his further reflections—the speech of John Fell, D.D., Bishop of Oxford, at his Triennial Visitation in the year 1685, an article entitled “Leaning of no Party,” and one or two lighter imaginative contributions, such as “The Speech of an Old Oak to an Extravagant Young Heir as He was going to be Cut Down,” and an “Address to an Elbow Chair Lately New Cloath’d.” As there were no advertisements to assist the editors with the printing bills, it speaks well for the literary taste of the period that the paper lived two full years—the period to which the editors limited themselves at the outset. Such a periodical at Oxford in the year of grace 1911 would prove to be a hopeless anachronism. It would arrive at a circulation of three copies per month—a free copy to the British Museum, another to the Bodleian,and the third to the editor’s mother. The Undergraduates might finger it casually on the bookshop counter, and the Dons read the first number on account of its novelty, but it would die a speedy death unless by the second issue the editor announced its coalition with the comic paper whose editor runs his motor-car on the earnings of butcher and express messenger boys.
One of the lighter features ofThe Studentwas a series of letters from Cambridge written by the female student. Her epistles were full of humour, and she poked fun at the Undergraduates quietly, and in a manner not wholly unlike Terrae Filius. Perhaps it is unfair to compare her efforts to those of Amhurst, because as he jested and quipped in every conceivable style and way, any one coming after him might be accused, quite unjustly, of plagiarism. That the female student was not guilty of any false modesty is easily to be seen from the account of herself in her preliminary letter; while the care with which the editors ofThe Studentguarded the decencies and the moralities ensured that she did not in any way cause a breach in them by her broad-minded and outspoken contributions. She began by claiming the student as a brother, a claim based upon her birth, education, and the whole conduct of her life. She asserted that she, too, was a student, having sounded the depths of philosophy and made greater progress “in academical erudition” than most of the Dons whose profound knowledge consisted in a “little cap with a short tuft and a large pompous grizzle wig.” She was born and brought up in Cambridge in the care of an aunt. Her studies were directed by a grave Fellow of a college. Her aunt was so fond of her that she was suffered to “give a loose to her passion for literature,” and the girl absorbed information from curling papers and the lids of wig-boxes. When she was seventeen her tutor died of a surfeitoccasioned by feeding too freely at a gaudy, and the secret at last came out that there had been a union between the Don and the aunt for nearly twenty years. The aunt became, therefore, a mother, and she produced documents to show that the Don’s possessions were hers. The result of the selling of the deceased’s effects did not raise the good woman to a condition of luxury.
“However,” said the girl, “she resolved to continue at Cambridge on my account, and we lived together in a manner much genteeler than our fortune would afford. My person (which, by-the-bye, I took as much pains to cultivate as my mind) now began to be cried up as much as my parts. I was a charming, clever, sweet, smart, witty, pretty creature, in short, I was as much feared for my wit as ador’d for my beauty. From hence I had vanity to fancy I could have anybody I pleased, and had therefore resolved within myself to be run away with by a nobleman, or a baronet at least.”
But this witty, pretty creature unfortunately over-estimated her possibilities. The next ten years passed in a round of gaiety which took the form of courtship by no one under the rank of gentleman commoner. With the baronet in view, however, such mere mortals fell in their hundreds. Some she rejected “because a better might offer, some because they had too much sense; others because they had too little; this was too old, that too young,” and, in consequence, she was gradually deserted, as her physical charms waned, until at last her name was never mentioned “without the odious reproach of ‘she has been’ added to it.”
At the moment of writing this first letter she was compelled to work for her bread and the support of her mother. This she did with her pen, turning out poems and novels; being, as she informedThe Student, at present engaged in “composing sermons for abookseller, which he designs to sell for the MS. Sermons of an eminent divine lately deceased, warranted originals.”
The Student, liking the tone of her first letter, encouraged her to write further, and from time to time she sent in various articles, such as a scathing criticism of Academical Gallantry, in which she roundly chaffed all gownsmen for their bragging propensities and gallant follies, and gave an account of the various Dons and their habits who had laid vain siege to her heart, and a discussion on the sin of living single, and the fustiness of old maids—a plight in which she admitted herself to be, though not by “desire or inclination.”
In spite of the editorial desire to give umbrage to no person or party, certain of the Bucks seem to have considered her an unamusing, brazen creature, whose inclusion inThe Studentwas a sad mistake, for she received the following crushing letter from one of their number.
“—— Coll., Oxford,June 11, 1751.“Madam,—As the character I bear in this University is that of a profess’d critic-general on pamphlets, and as my opinion is look’d upon as infallible and oracular in a certain coffee-house frequented by Wits, where a subscription is carried on for raking together the dulness of the age, I think I may take the liberty (without being styled Prig, Fop, Witling, or Poetaster) of transmitting you my full and candid sentiments on your monthly productions. And first, Madam Student, with as much laconic politeness as possible, I beg leave to inform you that you pretend to that choice ingredient of good writing Humour, without having one syllable of it. In a word, Madam, if you have any Humour at all, it is that low species of it, never so much as heard of in Greece and Rome, originally invented by Tom Brown of blackguard memory, and now first revived by the Female Student.“This species (if it may call itself a species), I, myself, in right of the sublime critical character with which the sensible Men of our house have invested me, have christen’d Jack-Pudding Humour. To define it were utterly impracticable. However, thus much may be said of it, that it is made up of ill-breeding and ill-nature, and discovers a remarkable want of classical reading, and a relish for authors of true taste. It treats of subjects of a vague nature, and is (beside its Jack-pudding affinity) of a mere Jack-lanthorn nature, neither here nor there; in short, it is a topsy-turvy, rhapsodic, miscellaneous method of writing. But, to come to the point. What I would recommend to you is to leave off scribbling, and sit down seriously to sewing.“Why, Madam, you are nothing more than a bankrupt in beauty, a mere discarded toast! I assure you, Mrs Student, you have no more chance of getting reputation by your pen than you had of getting a husband by your person.—Yours,“Frank Fizz-Puff.”
“—— Coll., Oxford,June 11, 1751.
“Madam,—As the character I bear in this University is that of a profess’d critic-general on pamphlets, and as my opinion is look’d upon as infallible and oracular in a certain coffee-house frequented by Wits, where a subscription is carried on for raking together the dulness of the age, I think I may take the liberty (without being styled Prig, Fop, Witling, or Poetaster) of transmitting you my full and candid sentiments on your monthly productions. And first, Madam Student, with as much laconic politeness as possible, I beg leave to inform you that you pretend to that choice ingredient of good writing Humour, without having one syllable of it. In a word, Madam, if you have any Humour at all, it is that low species of it, never so much as heard of in Greece and Rome, originally invented by Tom Brown of blackguard memory, and now first revived by the Female Student.
“This species (if it may call itself a species), I, myself, in right of the sublime critical character with which the sensible Men of our house have invested me, have christen’d Jack-Pudding Humour. To define it were utterly impracticable. However, thus much may be said of it, that it is made up of ill-breeding and ill-nature, and discovers a remarkable want of classical reading, and a relish for authors of true taste. It treats of subjects of a vague nature, and is (beside its Jack-pudding affinity) of a mere Jack-lanthorn nature, neither here nor there; in short, it is a topsy-turvy, rhapsodic, miscellaneous method of writing. But, to come to the point. What I would recommend to you is to leave off scribbling, and sit down seriously to sewing.
“Why, Madam, you are nothing more than a bankrupt in beauty, a mere discarded toast! I assure you, Mrs Student, you have no more chance of getting reputation by your pen than you had of getting a husband by your person.—Yours,
“Frank Fizz-Puff.”
Whether this letter really caused the good lady to take up sewing in earnest it is impossible to say, but the fact remains that she was no more seen inThe Student—not even to the extent of an indignant feminine outburst against Mr Fizz-Puff.
Among the “never before” printed verses which the editor secured for his columns were some written by Sir Walter Raleigh at Winchester in 1603, as he lay under sentence of death. They were printed from a manuscript with due care to preserve the spelling exactly as it was. The editor, however, was in ignorance of the fact that they had already been published in 1608 in the second edition of Davison’sPoetical Rhapsody.
“Goe, soul, the bodyes gueste,Upon a thankless arrante,Fear not to touche the beste,The truth shall be thy warrante.Goe, since I needs must dye,And give them all the lye.“Goe, tell the court it glowse,And shines like painted woode;Goe, tell the church it showsWhat’s good, but does no good.If court and church replyeGive court and church the lye.”
The moribund knight pursued his muse to the thirteenth verse, giving everybody and everything the lie. The editor ofThe Student, undoubtedly with the idea of pandering to all tastes, was careful to place these verses in between a translation of a Latin epigram—
“I stole from sweet Gumming two kisses in play,But she from myself stole myself quite away;I grieve not I play’d, tho’ so cruel the sport;I’m more pleas’d than griev’d at the hurt.”
and an epistle in verse to Lord Cobham, written by Congrave, while in the very near neighbourhood, was—
“THE HERMAPHRODITE.“From the Latin“My mother, when she was with child of me,Consulted heav’n what gender I should be.Female, cried Mars; Apollo said, a Male;Neither, quoth Juno; both your judgments fail.My birth did prove the Goddess in the right;Nor boy, nor girl, but an Hermaphrodite.Again she ask’d them what my fate would be.One said a sword, another said a tree;Water a third, and they were right all three.For from a tree I fell upon my sword,Feet caught in boughs, head dangling in a ford.Man, Woman, Neither, I at last was found,Just as the Gods foretold, hang’d, stabb’d, and drown’d.”
A few numbers before that in which the coffee-house wit told the female student just precisely what he thought of her, the editor received a letter from another of these gentry at one of the coffee-houses. On behalf of all his brother Smarts, Mr Harry Didapper took it upon himself to offer a little friendly advice to the paper. He informed the editor thatThe Studentwas read with keen interest by them all, but that at times it indulged in boring and pompous articles which, however they pleased the editor himself, or the cultivated taste of his wig-maker, hosier and wine merchant, left them angry and disappointed. The Smarts wished to have no more abstract speculations and religious introspections. They wanted more brightness and humanity about the paper. Consequently in the next issue the editor published the following lamentation:—
“A RECEIPT FOR THE GOUT.“Oh Gout! the plague of rich and great!Thou cramping padlock of the feet!Oh Gout! thou puzzling knotty point!You nick man’s frame in every joint;You, like inquisitors of Spain,Rack, burn, and torture limbs to pain.First, miner-like, you work below,And sap man’s fortress by the toe....And what is worse, the wounded partFinds small relief from doctor’s art.Great Wilmot’s skill confounded standsWhen patient roars ... my toe! my hands!...’Tis said that bees, when raging found,Are charm’d to peace by tinkling sound;Shrill lullabies in nurse’s strainAsswage the froward bantling’s pain,When cutting teeth, or ill-plac’d pin,Molest the tender baby’s skin,So when Gout-humours throb and ache,The present soft prescription take.In elbow-chair majectick sitIn full high twinge, yet scorn to fret;Divert the pain with generous wine;Read news from Flanders and the Rhine;Hold up the toe like Pope of Rome;Forbear to scold, and swear, and fume;Let double flannel guard the part,To mitigate the dreadful smart;Wrap round the joint this harmless verse;And let dame Patience be your nurse.”
Would any doctor in these times prescribe wine as a remedy against gout? Whether the advice was sound or not, the Smarts appeared to have been appeased, for there came no further complaints as to the stodginess of the fare served up to them.
In the same number ofThe Studentthere appeared a letter from Bishop Atterbury to his son Obadiah, who was up at the House. How the editor procured it is not recorded, nor is it easy to see why he included it in his columns. It cannot have been vastly entertaining to a list of subscribers who devoted most of their time to ale and coffee-houses, or in dallying with Amaryllis in the shade of Merton Wall. It is greatly interesting to-day, however, as an example of what an eighteenth-century parent indicted to his son. The contrast between this letter and the replies one receives in 1911 in answer to one’s brief epistles written, mostly, solely in order to “touch the dad down for a bit” is not unstriking.