two Fellows and two Scholars.
[67] Ibid., pp. 57-61. The endowment provided for the erection of
lodgings for the Periam Fellow and Scholars, and the foundress’s name
is still remembered in connection with one of the buildings of the
College.
[68] The College benefactors, down to John Warner, are enumerated by
Wood, _Colleges and Halls_, pp. 75-80.
[69] _Scotland and Scotsmen in the Eighteenth Century_, from the MSS.
of John Ramsay of Ochtertyre (ed. A. Allardyce, 1888), ii. 307 note.
[70] See above, pp. 26 f., 37.
[71] Savage, p. 77; Wood, _Colleges and Halls_, p. 99.
[72] _Life_, p. 143.
[73] Savage, p. 68.
[74] See an account of them by the Rev. C. H. Grinling in the
_Proceedings of the Oxf. Archit. and Hist. Society_, new series, iv.
137-140. The windows in their original situation are described by
Savage, pp. 77 f., and Wood, _Coll. and Halls_, pp. 100-102.
[75] Wood’s _Coll. and Halls_, p. 88, and _City of Oxford_, ed. A.
Clark, i. (1889) 634 note 8.
[76] Savage, pp. 61, 79-81; cf. Wood’s _City of Oxford_, i. 372.
[77] P. V[ernon], _Oxonium Poema_, 18.
[78] Wood, _Coll. and Halls_, p. 87, with Gutch’s note.
[79] See Wood, p. 99, and the plan in W. Williams’ _Oxonia Depicta_
[1732].
[80] _Reg. Univ._, i. (ed. Boase), pref., p. xxiii.
[81] _Reg. Univ._, ii. (ed. Clark) pt. ii. pp. 30, 31.
[82] Gutch, _Collect. curiosa_ (Oxford, 1781), i. 200.
[83] _Reg. Univ._, ii. pt. ii. 412.
[84] Wood, _Hist. and Antiqq._ ii. 365.
[85] In these last two totals Commoners of more than four years’
standing have been omitted. The lists in the Calendar are moreover
always slightly in excess of the truth, since they take no account of
occasional non-residence. An unofficial census taken by the _Oxford
Magazine_ of 4 February, 1891, gives the number of undergraduates in
residence as 158.
[86] Savage, pp. 119-121; Evelyn, _Memoirs_ (ed. W. Bray, 1827), i. 13
f.
[87] See above, p. 42.
[88] Savage, pp. 85 f.; _Calendar of State Papers_, Domestic Series,
1623-1625 (1859), p. 383.
[89] Heylin, p. 215.
[90] _Memoirs_, i. 12-16.
[91] Gutch, _Collect. cur._, i. 227; Wood’s _Life_, p. 14 note, where
the editor observes that the College retained a chalice of 1614.
[92] _Register of the Visitors_ (ed. M. Burrows, Camden Society, 1881),
pp. 167, 188, and introd. pp. cxxv, cxxvi.
[93] See the list, ibid., pp. 478 f., and the references there given.
[94] Riley (p. 444) dismisses this book as “a vapid and superficial
production”; but there is little doubt that Savage had the assistance
in it of no less an antiquary than Anthony Wood. See his _Life_, pp.
104-108, 143 f., 157. When Wood speaks disparagingly of Savage, it must
be remembered that he had himself proposed to write a work on a similar
plan: _Athen. Oxon._ (ed. Bliss, 1817), iii. 959.
[95] _Reg. of Visit._, p. 4.
[96] _Athen. Oxon._, iii. 1154.
[97] _Letters_, pp. 12 f.
[98] The sign of the house is understood to have been a double-headed
eagle.
[99] Dr. Bathurst, President of Trinity, Vice-Chancellor, 1673-1676.
[100] _Letters_, pp. 13 f., under date 23 August, 1674.
[101] _Life of Ralph Bathurst_ (1761), p. 203.
[102] Gutch, _Collect. cur._, i. 195.
[103] The Master at this time was Good’s successor, John Venn, who
married “an ancient maid,” niece to the first Earl of Clarendon.
[104] W. D. Christie, _Life of Shaftesbury_ (1871), ii. 390-401.
[105] Riley, p. 451.
[106] _Reliqq. Hearn_, iii. 308.
[107] _Terrae Filius_, 1733 (2nd ed.), pp. 5f.
[108] J. R. M’Colloch, _Life of Dr. Smith_, prefixed to the _Wealth of
Nations_ (ed. Edinburgh, 1828), i. p. xvi.
[109] _Scotland and Scotsmen in the Eighteenth Century_, ii. 307 note.
[110] J. Pointer, _Oxoniensis Academia_ (1749), i. 11. Hearne mentions
a custom which had been given up at Merton since Wood’s time, but which
partially survived “at Brazenose and Balliol coll., and no where else
that I know of. I take the original thereof to have been a custom they
had formerly for the young men to say something of their founders and
benefactors, so that the custom was originally very laudable, however
afterwards turned into ridicule:” _Reliqq. Hearn_, iii. 76.
[111] R. Blacow, _Letter to William King_, 1755. The whole story is
told by Dr. G. B. Hill, _Dr. Johnson, his Friends and his Critics_
(1878), pp. 68-72.
[112] _Life and Correspondence_ (ed. C. C. Southey, 1849), i. 164, 170,
177, 203, 211 f., 215, 176 note.
[113] G. V. Cox, _Recollections of Oxford_ (1868), p. 191.
[114] Letter of 15 November 1807, in J. Veitch’s _Memoir of Sir W.
Hamilton_ (1869), p. 30.
[115] Letter of J. Traill, quoted, ibid., p. 44.
[116] Letter of G. R. Gleig, quoted, ibid., p. 53.
[117] _Discussions_, p. 750, quoted, ibid., p. 52.
[118] _Memoir_, p. 30.
[119] _Statutes_, pp. 38 f.
[120] Ibid., p. 39.
[121] W. Ward, _William George Ward and the Oxford Movement_ (1889),
pp. 429-431; cf. p. 343, &c.
[122] Quoted in Wood’s _City of Oxford_ (ed. A. Clark), i. 632. Cf. C.
Wordsworth, _University Life in the Eighteenth Century_ (1874), p. 161.
[123] The writer of this chapter is, of course, indebted to his own
_Memorials of Merton College_, published in 1885, in the Oxford
Historical Society’s series; but has revised afresh the results of his
former researches, with the aid of new materials.
[124] Subsequently called Cornwall Lane, from its proximity to the
Western College. It is now inclosed within the site of the College.
[125] From the _Life of Conant_, by his son.
[126] The “moderator” presided over the disputation, seeing that the
disputants observed the rules of reasoning, and giving his opinion on
the discussion, and on the arguments which had been advanced in it, in
a concluding speech.
[127] John Conybeare, Fellow of Exeter, 1710; Rector, 1730; Dean of
Christ Church, 1733; Bishop of Bristol, 1750.
[128] The pre-eminence of Merton, its conspicuous buildings, and its
wealth, seem to have distinguished it as “the College,” until it found
a rival in the “New College” of William of Wykeham.
[129] The seal at present in use is believed to be the original seal of
the College. The upper part represents the Annunciation; below under an
arcade is the kneeling figure of Adam de Brome. Round the edge is the
legend “Sy. Comune Domus Scholarium Beate Marie Oxon.”
The only other memorial of its foundation which the College possesses
is its founder’s cup, given to it, according to the College tradition,
by King Edward the Second; though an entry in the Treasurer’s accounts
recording the purchase in December 1493 for £4 18_s._ 1_d._, of a
standing gilt cup marked with E and S, and a cover to the same, is in
favour of its belonging to a later date.
[130] The Hospital itself was also intended to be a place to which
members of the Society could remove, in case of sickness or pestilence,
into a purer air than that of Oxford.
[131] To enable the College to take these additional endowments, a
further license in mortmain to the extent of ten pounds a year was
granted, 14th March, 1327.
[132] See page 94.
[133] Hawkesworth was one of the first Fellows of Queen’s, nominated by
the original Statutes in 1341; but as the ground on which his election
was annulled is expressly stated to be its informality and not any
defect in the person chosen, he was probably also connected with the
College either as Fellow or ex-Fellow. He appears as acting on the
College behalf in 1341.
[134] It has been printed in the Oxford Historical Society’s
_Collectanea_, vol. i. p. 59.
[135] In Wood’s list, both Symon and Byrche are entered as of
University College; but there is little doubt that they both belonged
to Oriel.
[136] These two manors adjoin one another, but are entirely independent
and in distinct parishes; they appear, however, as held together at the
time of the Domesday Survey, and never to have parted company since
that date.
[137] In his account of this building Wood must for once have fallen
asleep, or he would not have suggested that the letters O. C. (Oriel
College) were inscribed by “the Saints, in honour of their great
Commander.” But such is the vitality of error that this absurd blunder
is copied without correction into every guide-book for Oxford, and
actually reappears in the note prefixed to a very careful account of
the Hospital, published by the Oxford Architectural Society.
[138] _I. e._ take this, and prosper. To “grow thrifty” in the sense
of to thrive seems to have been used in America as late as 1851, (Dr.
Smith’s Latin Dictionary, preface, p. vii.)
[139] _State Papers, Domestic_, Elizabeth xvii. p. 57. _Letter of
Francis and others to Cecill_, 11 May, 1561.
[140] See Carleton’s _Life of Gilpin_.
[141] On the election of Joseph Browne, who succeeded Provost Smith in
1756. See _Letters of Radcliffe and James_ (Oxford Historical Society,
ix.), p. xxiii.
[142] _I. e._ to an ecclesiastical benefice.
[143] See _State Papers, Domestic_, Elizabeth, vol. 271, 49, March,
1601.
[144] P. 129.
[145] Sir Richard Richards, 1776; Sir William Carpenter Rowe, 1827;
William Basil Tickell Jones, 1848; Thomas William Lancaster, 1809;
James Garbett, 1824; Adam Storey Farrar, 1852; Edward Feild, 1825;
Samuel Thornton, 1859; Robert Gaudell, 1845. The dates are of election
to Fellowship. Sir William Wightman, Justice of the Court of Queen’s
Bench, and Henry John Chitty Harper, Metropolitan of New Zealand, were
also on this foundation, but never Fellows.
[146] Those reading “Logic,” termed “sophistae.”
[147] “Artista,” a student (here probably a Master) in the faculty of
Arts.
[148] Students not yet advanced to the study of Logic.
[149] The study of theology began two years after the attainment of the
M.A. degree.
[150] See Tobie Matthew’s letter to Lord Burghley in _State Papers,
Addenda_, Elizabeth, xxxii. 89, Oct. 16, 1593, and Boast’s life in
_Dict. of Nat. Biog._
[151] Except to the grammar-boys at Merton, and the “poor boys” at
Queen’s.
[152] The following details are from Anstey’s _Munimenta Academica_,
pp. 241, _seqq._
[153] Anstey’s _Munimenta Academica_, p. 286.
[154] In the fifteenth century Cicero or a classical poet might be
substituted. Some other alternatives are omitted.
[155] See Wood’s _Annals_ (edit. Gutch), ii. p. 292; Ayliffe, ii. p.
316.
[156] See Professor Montagu Burrows’ delightful _Memoir of Grocyn_ in
the Oxford Historical Society’s _Collectanea_, vol. ii.
[157] A few Gentleman-commoners educated at Winchester had been
admitted to the College earlier. Among these, but only for a very
short time, was the Sir Henry Wotton who still lives in Izaac Walton’s
_Lives_.
[158] G. V. Cox, _Recollections of Oxford_ (1870), p. 50.
[159] These “Sunday pence” were paid in all Oxford parishes. In 1525
payment was disputed; and in the test case between Lincoln College,
as rector of All Saints church, and William Potycarye alias Clerke of
All Saints parish, payment was enforced under penalty of “the greater
excommunication.” Several tenements in Oxford continue to this day to
pay to their parish church quit-rents of 4_s._ 8_d._ representing these
old “Sunday pence.” Their owners have the satisfaction of knowing that
these tenements represent the most ancient holdings in Oxford.
[160] On 13th Dec., 1432, in the time of the first rector, the
celebrated Thomas Gascoigne gave twelve MSS. to the library.
[161] Mr. Maxwell Lyte, in his _History of the University of Oxford_,
has taken for the original the seventeenth century copy on the south
side of the quadrangle, which was put there by a married Head to cloak
his annexation of College rooms.
[162] In memory of this occasion the vine was probably planted which in
Loggan’s picture (1675) is seen spreading over the west front of the
hall; the successors of which in the chapel quadrangle and the kitchen
passage still in sunny years bear plentiful clusters.
[163] Robert Parkinson, _ut supra_. Rotheram’s arms are carved on the
north wall of this building. In the herald’s certificate of 1574, they
are given as “vert, three stags trippant two and one or.” They are
nowadays generally blazoned wrongly.
[164] The final deed of incorporation is dated 20th Nov., 1478.
[165] Among the rest Dagville’s Inn (now the Mitre), which was already
an ancient inn when Dagville inherited it from his uncle.
[166] The provocation was both wanton and fatuous. On 24th Aug., 1717,
Crewe began to execute in his lifetime the provisions of his will,
viz. to pay to the Rector £20 per annum, to each of the twelve Fellows
and to each of the four Chaplains £10 per annum, to the bible-clerk
and eight Scholars together £54 6_s._ 8_d._ per annum; and to each of
twelve Exhibitioners founded by him £20 per annum. On the 27th June,
1719, the Rectorship fell vacant; the Fellows asked Crewe to state who
he wished to succeed. He twice refused; but on being asked the third
time said, “William Lupton,” Fellow since 1698. On 18th July, 1719, the
Fellows, by nine votes to three, elected into the Rectorship not Lupton
but John Morley!
[167] In 1537 the full number of Rector, twelve Foundation and three
Darby Fellows is found; again in 1587; and again in 1595. In 1606 the
Visitor allows the number of Fellows to be twelve only, and thereafter
that number is never exceeded.
[168] Of the three persons nominated by Darby in 1538 as his first
Fellows, two, William Villers (his kinsman) and Richard Gill, were
undergraduates. One nomination of this kind was eminently unsuccessful;
Walter Pitts, nominated by the Visitor in 1568 to the Darby Fellowship
for Oxfordshire, was removed in 1573 because he had repeatedly
failed to get his degree. The Parliamentary Visitors in 1650 put
undergraduates into Fellowships in Lincoln College; one of these, John
Taverner, in 1652 was fined 13_s._ 4_d._, “for swearing two oaths, as
did appear upon testimony.”
[169] When the number of Fellowships was reduced by treating the
three Darby Fellowships not as additional to, but as taking the place
of three of, the Foundation Fellowships, the Stowe Fellowship was
substituted for one of the Lincoln county Fellowships, the other two
for two of the Lincoln diocese Fellowships. With this modification the
regulations about counties and dioceses were very faithfully observed
in elections to Fellowships, until these limitations were all swept
away by the Commission of 1854.
[170] The Visitor (John Williams, who had built the new chapel), in
1631, discontinued this (except the procession on All Saints day).
The procession on All Saints day has been discontinued under another
Visitor’s Order of 6th Feb., 1867.
[171] These two services were changed at the Reformation to a sermon;
the appointment of a preacher for this sermon was discontinued about
1750.
[172] The first of these sermons was assigned to the Rector by statute,
the second by custom.
[173] The earliest College duty assigned to John Wesley, after his
election to a Fellowship at Lincoln, was to preach the St. Michael’s
sermon on Michaelmas Day 1726.
[174] B.A. Fellows might not have theological works, but only works in
philosophy and logic.
[175] Rectors, suffering under the despotism of too efficient
Subrectors, have accused this officer of mis-spelling his alternative
title and regarding himself as _Co-rector_.
[176] The barber’s duties were at first to supply the clean shave, the
tonsure, and the close crop which became “clerks.” In later ages more
extravagant fashions in hair added to his labour. At the close of the
eighteenth century he had to dress for dinner the heads of all the
College in the pomp of powder and the vanity of queue. Beginning about
noon with the junior Commoner, he concluded with the senior Fellow
on the stroke of three, when the bell rang for dinner. The higher,
therefore, you were in College standing, the longer was the time
available for your morning walk, and the ampler the gossip of the day
with which you were entertained.
[177] If any one wishes a modern parallel, he may note how Oxford
became filled with Jacobites ejected from their country cures within
two or three years of the imposition of the Oath of Allegiance to
William and Mary.
[178] Their Catholic sympathies are evident from the Colleges to which
they made their benefactions. Neither in Lincoln College under John
Bridgwater, nor in Caius College under John Caius, was a young Romanist
in any danger of being converted to Protestantism.
[179] Several entries show that their position was inferior to that of
a Commoner, and involved menial service in College. In 1661 we have an
entry--“Whereas Henry Rose, a scholar, did lately officiate as porter,
and had no allowance for his pains,” he is to be excused the College
fee for taking B.A. In Feb. 1661-2 these Traps’ exhibitioners were
exempted from some College charges on consideration of their waiting at
the Fellows’ table.
[180] As “Commissary,” _i. e._ Vice-chancellor, of the University
from 1527 to 1532, Cottisford had been set to several painful pieces
of duty, in the discovery and arrest of Lutheran members of the
University. Thus in 1527 Thomas Garret was arrested by the Proctors and
imprisoned in Cottisford’s rooms: but his friends stole into College
when Cottisford, with the rest of the College, was in chapel at Evening
Prayers, and enabled him to effect his escape. This “Lollard’s” ghost,
oddly enough, was at one time supposed to haunt the gateway-tower.
[181] On only two other occasions is this silence broken; the next is
in 1633, when the register notes that the King was at Woodstock, and
that the Rector had forbidden undergraduates to go there; the latest
is a notice of the grief of the nation on the death of the Princess
Charlotte, and of the services in the College chapel on the day of her
funeral.
[182] There is some suspicion that about this time the Government had
a paid spy in College. In Sept. 1566 an Anthony Marcham, of Lincoln
College, writes to Cecil asking money, otherwise he will be unable to
stay on in Oxford (_Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series_).
[183] There is, of course, the usual legend that Rotheram built this
addition as “conscience-money” for his defalcations as Bursar.
[184] The Rotherams of Luton in Bedfordshire were descended from the
Archbishop’s brother, to whom he had bequeathed that estate.
[185] Baker’s _History of St. John’s, Cambridge_ (edit. Mayor), p. 208.
[186] The intrusive dog occurs several times in College orders.
The most noteworthy entry is perhaps that of 30th June, 1726:--“No
gentleman-commoner, or commoner, whether graduate or undergraduate,
shall keep a dog within the College. The Bursar is required to see that
all dogs be kept out of the Hall at meal-times.”
[187] Previously, the College meetings had been held in the Rector’s
lodgings.
[188] The rooms which Wesley occupied in College are said, by
tradition, to be those over the passage from the first quadrangle into
the chapel quadrangle.
[189] This sermon, esquire-bedell G. V. Cox notes, was “two and a half
hours long,” and the sitting it out made a vacancy in the headship of a
College.
[190] Tatham’s broad Yorkshire dialect gave a tone of vigorous
rusticity to his speech.
[191] I understand that it was not destroyed, but passed into private
possession. The recovery, after so many years, of the Brasenose “brasen
nose” forbids Lincoln to despair of yet getting back its overseer.
[192] Throughout this chapter I must acknowledge my indebtedness to
Professor Burrows’ invaluable _Worthies of All Souls_. I must also
mention that both the Warden of All Souls and Professor Burrows have
been good enough to look through these pages, and have kept me from
many pitfalls. The Warden furnished me with much information in the
later pages of this chapter which would have been quite inaccessible
without his help.
[193] _Worthies_, p. 32.
[194] Capi-tolium. A horrible derivation!
[195] See page 226.
[196] The effigy on Richard Patten’s monument has been described as
showing the dress of a merchant; but there does not seem to be anything
in the costume which would indicate unmistakably the status of the
wearer. The monument, formerly in the old Church of All Saints at
Wainfleet, was removed to Oxford by the Society of Magdalen College to
preserve it from destruction on the demolition of the church, in 1820.
It is now placed in the little oratory on the north side of the choir
of the College chapel.
[197] This Hall is of course to be distinguished from the later society
of the same name, which was at first a dependency of Magdalen College,
and afterwards became a separate foundation.
[198] Another duty incumbent upon the members of the Hospital was the
preaching of a sermon _ad populum_ on St. John Baptist’s Day. This,
with certain other duties, was transferred to the College. The sermon
was at one time preached as a rule from the stone pulpit in the corner
of what is now called St. John’s Quadrangle; but the stone pulpit was
not always employed even in early times. Thus in 1495 there is a record
of a payment of 4_d._ to “four poor scholars” for bringing a pulpit
from New College for St. John Baptist’s Day, and taking it back again.
In the early part of the eighteenth century the sermon was preached
in the chapel if the day chanced to be wet; and what was then the
exception has become the rule.
[199] This name was given to the scholars who received half the
allowance given to Fellows. It appears to have been in current use at
the time when the founder’s statutes were drawn up.
[200] This priory, originally a dependency of St. Florence at Saumur,
was made “denizen” in 1396, before the alien priories were suppressed.
[201] An Augustinian Priory, founded by Peter des Roches, Bishop of
Winchester, in 1233. It was suppressed by Waynflete, after several
attempts had been made to reform it.
[202] Neither the benefaction of Henry VII. nor his annual
commemoration has any connection with the custom of singing a Latin
hymn on the Tower at sunrise on May-day. Two accounts of the origin of
this custom, which allege such a connection, have often been repeated
and sometimes confused: (1) That Mass was formerly said at an early
hour on May 1st upon the top of the Tower for Henry VII., and that the
hymn is a survival from this service. (2) That the sum paid by the
Rectory of Slymbridge to the College was intended for the maintenance
of the custom of singing on the Tower. Of the first of these accounts
it may be said that there is no evidence of any celebration of Mass on
the Tower (a thing _à priori_ highly improbable) at any time; and that
the hymn, which now forms part of the College “Grace,” is probably a
composition of the seventeenth century, and is certainly not part of
the Requiem Mass according to the rite of Sarum, or any other rite. Of
the second account it may be said that the deeds relating to Slymbridge
show clearly that the payment was not intended for this purpose, to
which it was never applied. The present custom of singing the hymn
from the “Grace” originated, it is believed, in the last century on
an occasion when the former custom of performing secular music on the
Tower was interrupted by bad weather. The hymn was probably chosen as a
substitute because the choir were perfectly familiar with its words and
music. The details of the ceremony as it is at present performed were
arranged about fifty years from the present time.