"Or wander down an ancient street
Where mingling ages quaintly meet,
Tower and battlement, dome and gable
Mellowed by time to a picture sweet."
A. G. BUTLER.
The group of buildings, shown in Plate XXV, is not only picturesque--
it also illustrates Oxford history from more than one point of view.
The apse of the Chapel of Queen's on the left belongs to a building
already spoken of, which is the most perfect example of a small
basilican church in Oxford. The church tower in the centre, though
itself dating from the fourteenth century, is the most modern part of
one of the oldest churches in Oxford, St. Peter in the East. The
crypt and the chancel of this church go back to the time of the
Conquest, and are probably the work of Robert d'Oili, to whom William
the Conqueror gave the city of Oxford; he was first an oppressor and
then a benefactor; in the former character, he built the castle keep,
still standing near the station; in the latter, he was the builder,
besides St. Peter, of the churches of St. Michael and of the Holy
Cross; parts of his work survive in all three.
The churchyard, at all events, of St. Peter in the East, deserves a
visit, lying as it does between the beautiful garden of New College
and the picturesque buildings of St. Edmund Hall.
Before this last foundation is spoken of, a word must be said as to
the road round which these three buildings are grouped--Queen's Lane.
It survives, almost unaltered, from Pre-Reformation Oxford, and,
winding as it does its narrow way between high walls, it is an
interesting specimen of the "lanes" which threaded mediaeval Oxford,
a city in which the High Street and, to a smaller extent, Cornmarket
Street were the only real thoroughfares; the rest of the city was a
network of narrow ways.
But from the historic point of view, the most interesting part of the
picture is its right side, where stand the buildings of St. Edmund
Hall. This is the only survival of the system of residence in the
earliest University, of the Oxford which knew not the college system.
Before the days of "pious founders," the students had to provide
their own places of residence, and very early the custom grew up of
their living together in "halls," sometimes managed by a non-academic
owner, but often under the superintendence of some resident Master of
Arts, who was responsible, not for the teaching, but, at any rate in
part, for the discipline of the inmates of his hall. These halls had
at first no endowments and no permanent existence; they depended for
their continuity on the person of their head. Gradually they became
more organized; but when once the college system had been introduced,
it tended, by its superior wealth and efficiency, to render the
"halls" less and less important. They lost even the one element of
self-government which they had once had, the right of their members
to elect their own Principal; this right was usurped by the
Chancellor. Hence, though five of the halls were surviving at the
time of the University Commission (of 1850), all of them but St.
Edmund Hall have now disappeared.
In theory, "hall" and "college" have much in common; one Cambridge
college indeed has retained the name of "hall," and two of the
women's colleges in Oxford have preferred to keep the old style. In
practice, their difference lies in the two facts that colleges are
wealthier, with more endowments, and that they are self-governing,
with Fellows who co-opt to vacancies in their own body and elect
their head. St. Edmund Hall has its head appointed by the fellows of
Queen's, with which institution it has long been connected.
[Plate XXV. St. Peter-in-the-East Church and St. Edmund Hall]
The origin of this hall is an unsolved problem: it derives its name
according to one theory from Edmund Rich, the last Archbishop of
Canterbury to be canonized, and probably the first recorded Doctor of
Divinity at Oxford. But this theory is very doubtful, and Hearne,
most famous of Oxford antiquarians, and probably the best known
member of St. Edmund Hall, did not believe it. In any case, most of
the buildings of the hall date long after St. Edmund, and belong to
the middle of the seventeenth century. Hearne himself is sufficient
to give interest to any foundation. He was a great scholar and a
careful editor of the early English Chroniclers in days when learning
was decaying in Oxford; even now his work as an editor is not
altogether superseded. But it is not to this that he owes his fame;
it is rather to the fact that he has high rank among the diarists of
England, and the first place among those of Oxford. For thirty years
(1705-1735) in which latter year he died, he poured into his diary
everything that interested him--scholarly notes, political rumours,
personal scandal, remarks on manners and customs. The 150 volumes
came into the possession of his fellow Jacobite, Richard Rawlinson,
the greatest of the benefactors of the Bodleian, and only now are
they being fully edited; ten volumes have been issued by the Oxford
Historical Society, and still there are a few more years of his life
to cover. As a specimen of Hearne's style may be quoted his remarks,
when the sermon on Christmas Day, 1732, was postponed till 11 a.m.
"The true reason is that people might lie in bed the longer. . . .
The same reason hath made them, in almost all places in the
University, alter the times of prayer, and the hour of dinner (which
used to be 11 o'clock) in almost every place (Christ Church must be
excepted); which ancient discipline and learning and piety strangely
decay." Hearne was critical rather of past history than of present-
day rumour; he records complacently (in 1706) that at Whitchurch,
when the dissenters had prepared a great quantity of bricks "to erect
a capacious conventicle, a destroying angel came by night and spoyled
them all, and confounded their Babel." Hearne would by no means have
approved of the Methodist principles of six members of his hall in
the next generation, who were expelled for their religious views
(1768). A furious controversy, with many pamphlets, raged over them,
and the Public Orator of the University wrote a bulky indictment of
them, which was answered by another pamphlet with the picturesque
title of "Goliath Slain." Pamphleteers were more free in their
language in those days than they are now.
The hall has always been a strong religious centre, and plays a very
useful part in the University--by giving to poor men, seeking Holy
Orders, a real Oxford education, based on the true Oxford principle
of community of life.