Every Oxford man regards with some degree of interest that goal of so many
of his walks, Joe Pullen's tree, on Headington Hill. So at least it was in
my time, now some thirty years since. Perhaps the following notices of him,
who I suppose planted it, or at all events gave name to it, may be
acceptable to your Oxford readers. They are taken from that most curious
collection (alas! too little known) the Pocket-books of Tom Hearne, vol.
liii. pp. 25-35., now in the Bodleian:
"Jan. 1, 1714-15. Last night died Mr. Josiah Pullen, A.M., minister of
St. Peter's in the East, and Vice-Principal of Magdalen Hall. He had
also a parsonage in the country. He was formerly domestick chaplain to
Bishop Sanderson, to whom he administered the sacrament at his death.
He lived to a very great age, being about fourscore and three, and was
always very healthy and vigorous. He was regular in his way of living,
but too close, considering that he was a single man, and was wealthy.
He seldom used spectacles, which made him guilty of great blunders at
divine service, for he would officiate to the last. He administered the
Sacrament last Christmas Day to a great congregation at St. Peter's,
which brought his illness upon him. He took his B.A. degree May 26,
1654. He became minister of St. Peter's in the East anno 1668, which
was the year before Dr. Charlett was entered at Oxford."--P. 25.
"Jan. 7, Friday. This day, at four in the afternoon, Mr. Pullen was
buried in St. Peter's Church, in the chapel at the north side of the
chancell. All the parishioners were invited, and the pall was held up
by six Heads of Houses, though it should have been by six Masters of
Arts, as Dr. Radcliffe's pall should have been held up by Doctors in
Physic, and not by Doctors of Divinity and Doctors of Law."--P. 32.
Dr. Radcliffe's funeral had taken place in the preceding month.
In Nichols's _Literary Anecdotes_, vol. iv. p. 181., is the following
epitaph of Pullen, drawn up by Mr. Thomas Wagstaffe:
"Hic jacet reverendus vir Josia Pullen, A.M. Aulae Magd. 57 annos vice
principalis, necnon hujusce ecclesiae Pastor 39 annos. Obiit 31^o
Decembris, anno Domini 1714, aetatis 84."
From the notice of Thomas Walden, in Johnson's _Lives of the Poets_, it
appears that Yalden was a pupil of Pullen. (See also Walton's _Life of
Sanderson_, towards the end.) I hope this may elicit some farther account
of a man whose name has survived so long in Oxford memory. {490}
As to the tree, I have some recollection of having heard that it had a few
years ago a narrow escape of being thrown down, sometime about the
vice-chancellorship of Dr. Symons, who promptly came forward to the rescue.
Was it ever in such peril? and, if so, was it preserved?