Oxford Days. Frederic Edward Weatherly
meant to reside, and was one of the first to call on the Dean. That gentleman received him courteously; told him he had done very fairly in the examination; hoped he would read hard and be steady; asked him his name, age, father’s name, residence, and profession, and various other particulars, all of which he entered in a book; received his caution-money (30l.), and told him to ask the Porter the staircase and number of the rooms allotted to him.
“Be here,” he added, as Frank was leaving, “at a quarter to ten to-morrow morning, that I may take you before the Vice-Chancellor.”
At the Porter’s advice, Frank took a cab and drove to the “Clarendon,” paid his bill, got his luggage together, and drove back to college. By this time the Porter had the list of the newly-allotted rooms.
“Yours are No. 5, sir, three-pair right.”
Frank stared.
“No. 5 over the doorway, sir,” he then explained, pointing across the quadrangle to a doorway, over which Frank discerned the wished-for number; “three flights o’ stairs; the rooms on the right hand. No. 5, three-pair right—that’s how we call it. You’ll find your scout there. You’re too late for dinner. The hall-bell went twenty minutes ago.”
Frank crossed the quadrangle, climbed the stairs, and found his rooms. They were neither large, nor particularly clean, as regarded paper and paint; and the carpets and coverings were decidedly dingy. But they were his rooms, and he was an Oxford man! and that was his scout bustling in from the rooms opposite to welcome him. After a little conversation, the fact of his ownership became still more apparent, for the scout proceeded to show him a collection of glass and china and household implements, on the merits and absolute necessity of which he enlarged. The mere transfer of glass and china supplies a nice little addition to the scout’s perquisites. The articles are, in the first instance, purchased by some undergraduate who prefers his own choice to what his scout has ready to offer him. He, on leaving his rooms, bequeaths them to his scout. Custom is so tyrannical in Oxford. The scout sells the articles to the next tenant, who, in his turn, bequeaths them to the same willing legatee, when again they are sold to the new-comer. How long this goes on it is hard to say. Sometimes the smooth course is interrupted by some strong-minded undergraduate, who, ignoring custom, takes his effects with him when he leaves. The little bill was as follows:—
Shortly afterwards, as Frank was unpacking, a youth of most obsequious manners arrived, carrying a cap and gown for the Freshman, who received them with a murmur of gratified pleasure, making no inquiries about the cost or who had given the order; considering that, of course, what was thus sent must be en règle. The bill arrived within a week, with a polite intimation that payment was not requested, and an invitation to inspect the stock of the obliging tailors.
Three years later, when pressed by duns and threatened with proceedings in the Vice-Chancellor’s Court, Frank remembered these gentle disclaimers of any wish for payment.
What with talking to his scout and unpacking, nine o’clock soon arrived: the hour when the kitchen and buttery were opened for supper. William suggested that his master would like some supper, and in a short time supper was brought.
“I shan’t eat all that,” expostulated Frank, when he saw the plateful of meat and lumps of bread and butter.
“Only one ‘commons,’ sir,” replied William.
Frank said nothing, but saw distinctly that the standard called “one commons,” for which his father would have to pay daily through his three or four years, was based on the principle that “what is ordered for one should be enough for two.” However, he enjoyed his supper; and so did the scout, who carried home his share, with similar portions from the other six rooms on the staircase to which it was his duty to attend.
The following morning, duly attired in cap and gown, with white tie and black coat at William’s suggestion, Frank betook himself to the Dean’s rooms. There he met the four other Freshmen who had “passed” with him, was asked if he had his fee ready, and then conducted in a sheepish, silent procession, headed by the Dean, to the Vice-Chancellor. There were several groups of Freshmen standing with their respective Deans, Vice-Principals, or other college officials. Then they were all told to write their names in a book in Latin—a novel though not difficult feat, which Frank, with the assistance of his Dean, accomplished.
“Ross, Franciscus, filius Armigeri, è collegio S. Pauli.”
He then handed in his fee, 2l. 10s., and received in return a little piece of blue paper, the certificate of matriculation, together with a copy of the University statutes. The Vice-Chancellor addressed them all in a short Latin formula; and when this was over, Frank had time to read the document, which ran thus:—
“Quo die comparuit coram me Franciscus Ross, è Coll. S. Pauli, Arm. Fil. et admonitus est de observandis statutis hujus Universitatis et in matriculam Universitatis relatus est.
He was now fully matriculated, and amenable to all the details of University discipline. At six o’clock he dined in Hall—his first dinner—not without the usual blunder of seating himself at a table appropriated to undergraduates at least two years his seniors; and at eight went to chapel—the hour being changed on first nights in term from half-past five to eight, to enable men from distant homes to put in an appearance. The chapel was very much crowded, Paul’s having considerably outgrown its accommodation; but it was only on first nights that the inconvenience was felt, for as it was not necessary to attend service more than four times in the week, all the men were never there together.
Coming out, he met several old school-fellows, and the senior of them carried them all off to his lodgings in Holywell Street, where over wine and pipes they sat chatting till past ten o’clock; Frank, for the most part, listening without saying much, for he was but a Freshman, and this his first pipe.
When he got back to Paul’s he found the gates locked; but as he had read “Verdant Green” very carefully, he did not think it necessary to apologize to George for giving him the trouble of opening. He knew that “knocking in” before eleven o’clock only meant twopence in his weekly “battels.”5
That night, when he got into bed, though he did not feel quite a “man,” he felt conscious of having undergone some considerable change since he left home on Tuesday morning.
CHAPTER II
AN OXFORD SUNDAY
On Sunday morning he woke to the words that, without the slightest variation in time or tone of delivery, called him daily for the three years that he resided in college—“Half-past seven, sir! Do you breakfast in?”
This was the scout’s gentle hint that chapel service was within half an hour, and his form of inquiry whether his young master intended breakfasting in his own rooms or was going elsewhere for the meal.
Frank, when he fully realized the meaning, answered “Yes,” and with a freshman’s energy jumped out of bed, and was dressed before the chapel bell began to ring. Hurrying down-stairs, in fear of being late, he was stopped by William, with the suggestion that there was “no call to go yet, till the bell began to swear!”
This elegant expression, Frank learnt, is applied to the quickened and louder ringing of the bell for the five minutes immediately preceding service. He found, not many days after, that it was quite possible, by the aid of an Ulster, and postponement of ablutions, to get to chapel in time if he slept till the “swearing” began.
There were not so many men present as on the previous evening. The Master and Fellows wore surplices and hoods; the Scholars, being undergraduates, surplices and no hoods; the commoners, black gowns. The few—apparently senior men—who wore black gowns of longer and ampler make than the commoners,
College bills.