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 SOUTHERN COUNTIES CIRCULATING LIBRARY. 
 
 ESTABLISHED 1832. 
 
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 CATALOGUES and TERMS SENT ON APPLICATION. 
 Subscriptions from Half-a-Guinea.
 
 
 ,
 
 HENRY GEORGE LIDDELL, D.D.
 

 
 HENRY GEORGE LIDDELL 
 
 D.D. 
 
 DEAN OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD 
 A MEMOIR 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. HENRY L. THOMPSON, M.A. 
 
 VICAR OF ST. MARY THE VIRGIN, OXFORD 
 SOMETIME STUDENT AND CENSOR OF CHRIST CHURCH 
 
 WITH PORTRAITS AND ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 LONDON 
 
 JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET 
 1899
 
 HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY
 
 PREFACE 
 
 THIS memoir has been compiled at the request 
 of Mrs. Liddell, and has had the advantage of her 
 constant encouragement. 
 
 Many friends of the late Dean have most kindly 
 contributed to the volume their recollections of his 
 life at various times and under different aspects. 
 Their contributions have, as far as possible, been 
 duly acknowledged. 
 
 The compiler of the memoir may himself claim, 
 without presumption, to write with an authority 
 based upon adequate knowledge. It was his good 
 fortune to be admitted to Westminster School by 
 Mr. Liddell in 1851. For four years he was under 
 him there, and rose to be a member of his Sixth 
 Form. From 1858 to 1877 he was a resident 
 student of Christ Church, and as undergraduate, 
 Tutor, and Censor, was brought into very varied 
 and often very intimate relations with the Dean. 
 The friendship which he was thus privileged to 
 enjoy extended over nearly half a century, and was 
 only ended by the Dean's death. 
 
 2066296
 
 vi Preface 
 
 The story of Dean Liddell's life, down to the year 
 1834, has been largely drawn from his letters to his 
 parents, and from a MS. autobiography which he 
 wrote in his old age for the instruction of his 
 children, but which unfortunately terminates at that 
 early date. 
 
 He was never a great letter- writer, and during 
 his long residence at Oxford, where he was able 
 to meet his chief friends in daily intercourse, his 
 correspondence was not voluminous. There exist, 
 however, a good many letters addressed to Robert 
 Scott and H. Halford Vaughan, which have been 
 courteously placed at the disposal of the writer, and 
 from which quotations have been freely made. Sir 
 Henry W. Acland, his oldest living friend, has 
 contributed many charming reminiscences ; and from 
 the letters written to him by Dr. Liddell, when both 
 had retired from active life, some interesting selec- 
 tions have been made. 
 
 The arrangement of the narrative is designedly 
 unmethodical, especially in that portion which deals 
 with the long period of his life as Dean. It has 
 bee'n thought best to mention subjects as they were 
 naturally suggested, rather than to arrange events 
 in a strict chronological sequence. 
 
 The writer desires to express his cordial thanks 
 to the many friends who have given advice and 
 help, and especially to the Rev. T. Vere Bayne, 
 his former colleague as Tutor and Censor, whose 
 uninterrupted residence at Christ Church for more 
 than fifty years has made him an almost final
 
 Preface \\\ 
 
 authority on all matters connected with its history 
 since 1848, and whose vigilant criticism has been 
 most kindly and most usefully applied to the revision 
 of the proof-sheets of a work in which he has taken 
 a very warm interest from the beginning. 
 
 Thanks are due to Mr. Ryman Hall for permission 
 to reproduce the crayon portrait by Mr. George 
 Richmond, R.A. 
 
 OXFORD, 
 April, 1899.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOLDAYS (1811-1829) i 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 LIFE AT CHRIST CHURCH (1830-46) 13 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 THE LEXICON \ . . . .... . . 65 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 HEADMASTERSHIP OF WESTMINSTER (1846-55) . . . 86 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 DEANERY OF CHRIST CHURCH (1855-91) .... 134 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 DEANERY OF CHRIST CHURCH (contintieef) . . . .166 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 DEANERY OF CHRIST CHURCH (continued} .... 231 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 HOME LIFE 249 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 RESIGNATION OF THE DEANERY AND AFTER-LIFE (1892-8) 265 
 
 INDEX "V 281
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PORTRAIT BY CRUIKSHANK To face p. 28 
 
 GEORGE RICHMOND, R.A. . . Frontispiece 
 
 G. F. WATTS, R.A. . . . .. To face p. 238 
 
 H. HERKOMER, R.A ,,265 
 
 THE CHAPLAINS' QUADRANGLE, CHRIST CHURCH . 16 
 
 THE MONSTER TT p. 75 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL IN 1813 . . . To face p. 149 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL (1856-1870) . ,,154 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL AFTER RESTORATION 158 
 
 THE GREAT QUADRANGLE FROM A DRAWING MADE 
 
 IN 1856 . . . . . ... 161 
 
 THE GREAT QUADRANGLE AFTER RESTORATION . 164 
 
 BLOTTING-PAPER SKETCHES BY DEAN LIDDELL 
 
 Between pp. 194 and 195 
 
 THE DEANERY, CHRIST CHURCH, FROM THE GARDEN To face p. 249 
 
 THE GATE IN CHRIST CHURCH CLOISTERS LEADING 
 
 TO DEAN LIDDELL'S GRAVE . . . 278
 
 
 THE LIFE 
 
 OF 
 
 HENRY GEORGE LIDDELL 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOLDAYS 
 
 HENRY GEORGE LIDDELL was born on February 
 6, 1811. He was the eldest child of the Rev. 
 Henry George Liddell, whose elder brother, Sir 
 Thomas Liddell of Ravensworth, was created Baron 
 Ravensworth at the coronation of George IV. 
 This peerage, advanced to an earldom in 1874, 
 was a revival of a barony created in 1745, which 
 became extinct in 1784. He was thus a member, 
 on his father's side, of an ancient and honourable 
 family of the county of Durham, and his mother, 
 Charlotte Lyon, was fourth daughter of the Hon. 
 Thomas Lyon, brother of the eighth Earl of 
 Strathmore. 
 
 He was born at Binchester, 'a good square 
 stone house placed on an eminence facing the 
 Bishop's Palace at Auckland, and distant from 
 
 B
 
 2 Childhood and Schooldays [CH. i 
 
 that town about a mile.' It belonged then to 
 the Lyon family, but was afterwards bought by 
 Bishop Van Mildert and pulled down. Here Mr. 
 Liddell and his wife lived, with his wife's brothers 
 and sisters, serving his first curacy in the adjoin- 
 ing parish of South church. He was soon promoted 
 to the benefice of Redmarshall, near Stockton, and 
 then to the Rectory of Boldon, a village on the 
 high road between Newcastle-on-Tyne and Sunder- 
 land. Boldon was thus the home of the family 
 during the childhood and boyhood of the future 
 Dean. He describes himself as a studious boy, 
 fond of the children's books of the day, such as 
 Mrs. Sherwood's and Miss Edgeworth's tales, Sand- 
 ford and Merton, Robinson Crusoe, and the Swiss 
 Family Robinson. 
 
 ' On my sixth birthday I was promised a great 
 honour and reward. My father took me up into 
 his study and inducted me into the mysteries of 
 the Eton Latin Grammar. I remember the day, 
 the place, and the fact as clearly as if it were 
 yesterday. I continued to make pretty good pro- 
 gress under his kind teaching; but I fear that as 
 I went on from day to day I did not regard the 
 honour so great as I did on the first day.' 
 
 At the early age of eight, as was usual in 
 those days, came the first great sorrow and separa- 
 tion in his life his transference from the bright 
 country home to the rough discipline of a private 
 school. He was sent with his younger brother 
 Thomas, who was but seven years old, to Bishop-
 
 CH. i] Private School 3 
 
 ton Grove, a house standing a little distance from 
 the road leading from Ripon to Studley Royal. 
 The school was kept by a Mr. Weidemann, a 
 choleric man and an indifferent teacher. 
 
 ' In the course of a long life, I have not es- 
 caped several sharp and severe sorrows, though 
 I have to thank God for blessings far exceeding 
 the sufferings. But I do not think that any sorrow 
 of youth or manhood equalled in intensity and 
 duration the blank and hopeless misery which 
 followed the wrench of transference from a happy 
 home to a school such as that which received 
 us in the summer of 1819. I remember, as if it 
 was yesterday, the sinking of heart, the sense of 
 desolation, the utter despair, the wish that I could 
 die on the spot, when my kind and loving father 
 parted with us in the Master's study, and passing 
 out of the green gate of the little garden in front 
 of the house, disappeared from sight. His heart, 
 as he told me afterwards, was as heavy as ours. 
 But we did not then know this.' 
 
 It was a rough place, with little kindness, un- 
 intelligent teaching, the frequent use of the cane, 
 and the inevitable bullying. 
 
 'We little boys were made to sit at the long 
 desks with our hands over our eyes ; and certain 
 big fellows, having needles fixed in little balls of 
 sealing-wax, blew these missiles through pea- 
 shooters, so as to pin our ears to our heads.' 
 
 In September 1823, at the age of twelve, Liddell 
 was entered at Charterhouse School, where he 
 
 B 2
 
 4 Childhood and Schooldays [CH. i 
 
 remained till 1829. The long journey from Boldon 
 occupied four days. His description of the school 
 as it then was is worth recording, for at that 
 time, under the famous Headmaster Dr. Russell, 
 it occupied a leading position among English 
 Public Schools, and in numbers nearly equalled 
 Eton. On the night after his arrival in London, 
 his cousin, Robert Liddell, afterwards the well- 
 known Vicar of St. Paul's, Knightsbridge, took 
 him to Mr. Watkinson's house in Charterhouse 
 Square. 
 
 ' Here I was turned into the ' Long Room/ 
 a low, dark, dirty apartment, measuring (I should 
 think) about 70 feet by 15, with an excrescence 
 at the upper end, added to accommodate in- 
 creasing numbers of boys. Here we breakfasted, 
 dined, and supped; and this was our only sitting- 
 room. The upper boys had cupboards between 
 the windows, and a sort of table-desk in front of 
 each cupboard, so that the doors of the cupboards 
 being open they formed a sort of screen, and 
 enabled them to read and write in comparative 
 privacy. The lower boys sat on benches placed 
 along the dining tables, and while the upper boys 
 were at work were compelled, on pain of prompt 
 punishment, to keep absolute silence. The upper 
 fire was reserved for the upper boys. At the 
 lower end was another fire, to which the lower 
 boys were allowed to go ; but the little fellows 
 did not see much of it. Each boy had a small 
 locker of two shelves, in which he kept his books 
 and whatever else he chose. . . . The only place 
 we had to wash in was a narrow room, with
 
 CH. i] At Charterhouse 5 
 
 leaden troughs on either side, and cocks to supply 
 water, which was caught in small leaden or pewter 
 basins. Unless we found our own towels, we had 
 nothing wherewith to dry ourselves but a long 
 roller-towel behind the door. Considering that 
 London was not much cleaner than it is to-day, 
 it must not be wondered at if we boys, especially 
 the little ones, were not remarkable for cleanli- 
 ness. On Saturday and Sunday, however, when we 
 went out to visit friends, we managed to make our- 
 selves tolerably smart. I really wonder how this was 
 achieved ; the circumstances were not favourable. 
 
 ' The bedrooms were small and crowded. In 
 the room in which I was placed there were five 
 beds, with not much space round them. Next 
 
 me was a fellow named , who became the 
 
 plague of my life. He delighted in teasing and 
 vexing me in every way he could. One morning 
 I woke and found my hair sticking to the pillow. 
 Getting it loose, I found the whole pillow soaked 
 with blood, and there was a boot (of the kind 
 in those days called Bluchers) lying near my head. 
 
 It turned out that I had been snoring, and had 
 
 thrown his boot at me and hit me on the nose. 
 However, it could not have been much of a blow, 
 as it failed to wake me. I suppose it stopped 
 my snoring. 
 
 ' I do not retain so vivid a recollection of my 
 early days at Charterhouse as of Bishopton. I 
 only know I detested both. One of my letters 
 preserved by my dear father is, after three years' 
 experience, dated " Beastly Charterhouse." 
 
 ' Dr. Russell was a revolutionary schoolmaster. 
 He introduced what was called the " Bell and
 
 6 Childhood and Schooldays [CH. i 
 
 Lancaster system " into the school ; that is, the 
 lessons were taught in the lower Forms by boys, 
 and heard by the Masters. In order to rise from 
 one Form to another, except in the lowest and the 
 highest Forms, a boy had to serve as Praepositus 
 or teacher of a Form for, I think, six weeks ; 
 and, as I have said, the Master came round and 
 heard the lesson as it had been prepared under 
 the direction of the boy-teacher, who was also 
 responsible for the order and good conduct of the 
 Form during school-hours. It was a system devised 
 to save expense in Masters, and no doubt it was 
 not without advantage to the teaching boys, though 
 the benefit received by the taught was doubtful. 
 But to a boy who was not physically strong, the 
 office was a sore burthen ; and to those who were 
 not mentally strong, it was a waste of time both to 
 themselves and to their Form. I served as Prae- 
 positus, I think, three times, and hated it extremely. 
 One of the Masters, Andrew Irvine, a Scotsman 
 (afterwards incumbent of a parish in Leicester, 
 I think, and a notable preacher), used to go about 
 the school roaring at the luckless Praepositi. 
 " Liddell," I remember him shouting to me, " you're 
 as saft as butter ! " . . . Every half-hour the Form 
 was required to stand up, for change of posture, 
 for a quarter of an hour (I think these were the 
 appointed times). Old Watkinson Watkey, we 
 called him came by and said, " Liddell, why is 
 not your Form standing ? " "I beg pardon, Sir," I 
 said, " I did not observe the time." " You, Sir," 
 he shouted, "you not know the time ! You, who 
 make more show with your watch than any boy 
 in the school ! " This was in allusion to a crimson
 
 CH. i] Dr. Russell's Teaching 7 
 
 silk watch-guard, which passed round my neck, 
 and after meandering over my waistcoat was 
 attached to the watch in the pocket. Rough 
 treatment of this sort was not calculated to en- 
 courage shy or timid boys. 
 
 ' When we got into the upper school, consist- 
 ing of the two head Forms, one was delivered 
 from this servitude of teaching. But Russell's 
 tongue (he heard the lessons of these Forms himself) 
 was not always under control. Many of us had 
 a rough time of it even there. Once, I remember 
 (I know not on what occasion), he told me " I was 
 as lazy as I was long, and should bring down my 
 father's grey hairs with sorrow to the grave." 
 I was no doubt somewhat listless, having out- 
 grown my strength, but I hardly deserved this 
 reproach. It certainly did me no good. ... It was 
 long before I shook this listlessness off, if indeed 
 I have ever done so. Canning used to apply to 
 me the words in Tennyson's Miller s Daughter, 
 
 "To be the long and listless boy, 
 Late-left an orphan of the Squire," 
 
 though the last line certainly was inapplicable. 
 
 ' One of Dr. Russell's rules was to constitute 
 a Form between the Sixth and Fifth (or, as he would 
 say, the First and Second), which he called the 
 Emeriti, i. e. those who had served their time in 
 lower Forms, and were entitled to be placed in 
 the Sixth as vacancies occurred. Before joining 
 the Emeriti, we were obliged to learn all the Odes 
 and Epodes of Horace by heart, and to be able 
 without book to translate them and answer all 
 questions grammatical, geographical, and historical. 
 I achieved this task, but with much labour ; for
 
 8 Childhood and Schooldays [CH. i 
 
 I never had that facility which many others have 
 of retaining in memory the actual words of poets 
 or others. However, I succeeded at last in satisfy- 
 ing the Doctor. Then came a time of blissful 
 ease and indolence. The Emeriti were supposed 
 to learn the same lessons as the Sixth. They 
 were, however, seldom called on to exhibit their 
 knowledge, but were expected to sit in rapt atten- 
 tion, drinking in the wisdom displayed by the head 
 Form, corrected as it was and amplified by the 
 Master's turgid style. It needed, one would have 
 thought, no great knowledge of boy-nature to 
 predict the consequences. We did not trouble 
 ourselves to prepare the lesson ; and when, on 
 very rare occasions, we were called on to produce 
 what we had learnt, or were supposed to have 
 learnt, great was the consternation, grievous the 
 display of ignorance, and vehement the wrath of 
 the Doctor. 
 
 ' Before I rose to a place in this curious Form, 
 it was my lot to sit next W. Makepeace Thackeray. 
 He never attempted to learn the lesson, never 
 exerted himself to grapple with the Horace. We 
 spent our time mostly in drawing, with such skill 
 as we could command. His handiwork was very 
 superior to mine, and his taste for comic scenes 
 at that time exhibited itself in burlesque repre- 
 sentations of incidents in Shakespeare. I remember 
 one Macbeth as a butcher brandishing two blood- 
 reeking knives, and Lady Macbeth as the butcher's 
 wife clapping him on the shoulder to encourage 
 him. Thackeray went to Cambridge, and I never 
 met him after we left school till I went to 
 Westminster as Headmaster in 1846. After
 
 CH. i] Religious Teaching 9 
 
 that he often used to join Mrs. Liddell and myself 
 when riding in Rotten Row. On one occasion 
 he turned to her and said : " Your husband ruined 
 all my prospects in life; he did all my Latin 
 verses for me, and I lost all opportunities of 
 self-improvement." It is needless to add that this 
 was a pure fiction I had trouble enough to do 
 my own verses. At this time Vanity Fair was 
 coming out in monthly parts in its well-known 
 yellow paper covers. He used to talk about 
 it, and what he should do with the persons. 
 Mrs. Liddell one day said, " Oh, Mr. Thackeray, 
 you must let Dobbin marry Amelia." " Well," he 
 replied, " he shall ; and when he has got her, he 
 will not find her worth having." . . . 
 
 ' As to religious instruction, we were not better 
 off than boys in most of the schools of those 
 days. On Sundays, an hour before church, we 
 were assembled in the great schoolroom, and were 
 called on to read parts of the Bible, each boy in 
 his turn taking a single verse. The Doctor was 
 very particular in requiring due emphasis to be 
 laid on words and phrases, chiefly (I remember) 
 by means of a pause before and after the word 
 or phrase to be emphasized. Woe betide him 
 who failed to read distinctly and make the proper 
 pauses. The Doctor roared at him, just as in 
 a lesson from Euripides or Cicero. I remember 
 I used to count the verses and the boys above 
 me, to see which verse would fall to my lot, and 
 carefully studied how to read it with due attention 
 to the prescribed rules. Generally, I succeeded 
 pretty well. Sometimes, however, a boy read so 
 badly that the next to him had to read the verse 
 
 c
 
 io Childhood and Schooldays [CH. i 
 
 again. This put my calculation out, and I learnt 
 as a precaution to study one or two verses pre- 
 ceding that which would properly come to me. It 
 was not a bad lesson in reading, but had not 
 much of religion in it. ... 
 
 ' When I was about fifteen years of age, I was 
 confirmed with others by Bishop Blomfield. His 
 charge to us boys was most impressive. I re- 
 member well the effect it had on myself, and the 
 earnestness with which I prayed for help, and 
 the good resolutions I formed. Many of these 
 impressions were blurred and destroyed in the 
 course of ordinary school life, but some re- 
 mained and exerted an influence over all my days. 
 Charterhouse, indeed, at that time, in common 
 with most other schools, was not a place to foster 
 religious impressions or to bring out the best part 
 of a boy's nature. I believe I passed through the 
 ordeal with less scathe than many others. I am 
 sure that my aspirations rose to a higher level 
 than they attained at the wretched Yorkshire 
 school, from which I passed to the great London 
 school. Thank God, these things are better 
 now. . . . 
 
 ' In July or August, 1829, I left Charterhouse. 
 Never did pilgrim departing from an inhospitable 
 mansion shake the dust from off his feet with 
 more hearty satisfaction than I did on quitting the 
 noble foundation of old Thomas Sutton. It grieves 
 me now, when I see how differently boys regard 
 their old schools, to think how cordially I hated 
 both my own places of education. I do not think 
 it was entirely my own fault. What I have written 
 above may in some degree justify my feelings.
 
 CH. i] End of School Life 1 1 
 
 But I was too happy at home to have loved any 
 school. 
 
 ' I left Charterhouse a fair grammar scholar, but 
 with very little classical reading. Russell's teaching 
 did not favour extensive acquirement. Four or 
 five Greek plays, with Person's notes, two or three 
 books of the Iliad, a little Pindar, Cicero's Offices 
 and some of his Orations, with some few additions, 
 constituted the bulk of what we read in school. 
 But we learnt by heart all the Odes and Epodes of 
 Horace (as I have before said), and the Georgics of 
 Virgil, for which I am, and have been, always grate- 
 ful. We also read most of the Satires and Epistles. 
 But Greek Prose was almost untrodden ground. 
 Herodotus and Thucydides were known only by 
 name. I do not recollect having read any Greek 
 Prose, except Plato's Apology. On the other hand, 
 I devoured a large quantity of English Literature ; 
 and having at that time a tolerably retentive 
 memory, I amassed a good deal of general infor- 
 mation/ 
 
 The few letters which help to illustrate this 
 period of Liddell's life are mostly written to his 
 father, his constant correspondent. He left 
 Charterhouse a tall thin lad, having somewhat 
 overgrown his strength. He had, as he describes, 
 been well trained there in Greek and Latin, 
 although within a narrow range of authors, and 
 had read a good deal of general literature. Of 
 Mathematics he was as ignorant as the average 
 schoolboy ; but the instruction of his father's 
 Curate soon made up the deficiency, and when 
 
 c 2
 
 12 Childhood and Schooldays 
 
 he began residence at Oxford he had already 
 gained some acquaintance with Differential Calculus 
 and Analytical Geometry. 
 
 It was delightful beyond measure to exchange 
 smoky London for the country home in the north. 
 That home was indeed no longer at Boldon, his 
 father having recently accepted the living of 
 Whickham, a village two miles from Ravensworth. 
 It may seem strange that school life had no 
 pleasing memories for him ; but he was of 
 a somewhat shy and reserved disposition, of 
 studious habits and tastes, not ready to make 
 many friends, and with his dearest thoughts and 
 affections centred in his home. And a home so 
 far distant from London had not been easily 
 accessible. The journey by coach occupied a long 
 while and cost several pounds. It was therefore 
 usual for Liddell to spend the shorter holidays, 
 at Christmas and Whitsuntide, with his aunts at 
 Bath, or at Shotesham Rectory in Norfolk with 
 his aunt, Mrs. J. Fellowes. No wonder then that 
 home visits were exceptionally dear, and that the 
 prospect of spending nearly a year with his family, 
 in the interval between school and college, was 
 eagerly welcomed.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 LIFE AT CHRIST CHURCH, 1830-1846 
 
 SHORTLY before leaving Charterhouse in the 
 summer of 1829, Liddell went to Oxford, in order 
 that he might be entered on the books of Christ 
 Church. He was matriculated on May 9. The 
 Dean at that time was Dr. Samuel Smith, who 
 two years later exchanged the Deanery with Dr. 
 Gaisford for the Golden stall at Durham. The 
 Senior Censor was Thomas Vowler Short, after- 
 wards Bishop of St. Asaph. 
 
 The matriculation completed, Liddell returned 
 to Charterhouse, and when the summer holidays 
 came, he travelled home, and waited there for 
 a summons into residence at the University. This 
 never came, and after Easter, 1830, it was thought 
 expedient to send him up to Oxford. He was 
 unable at first to secure rooms in college, and for 
 a fortnight lived at the Mitre Hotel, attending 
 Chapel, Lectures, and Hall dinner. He ultimately 
 was assigned small rooms in the now demolished 
 Chaplains' Quadrangle.
 
 14 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 ' So began my life at Christ Church. I felt very 
 solitary. Not a single man in college did I know, 
 except Andrew Dunlop, an old Carthusian. When 
 there was a knock at the door, I looked longingly 
 for the person entering, hoping that some one had 
 taken compassion upon me. I was very shy, and 
 it was a kind of penance to go into Chapel or Hall 
 under the eyes of the old stagers . . . and I got into 
 the habit of going in early that I might avoid the 
 supposed inquisition of strange eyes. In Lecture 
 I felt more at ease. My Tutor, Robert Biscoe, soon 
 discovered that I took pains in preparing my work, 
 and used to appeal to me to correct the errors or 
 ignorances of some of the other men. ... In Lecture 
 I was now first introduced to the intricacies of 
 Thucydides, and was fain to have recourse to 
 Hobbes' translation, which however was nearly as 
 difficult as the Greek. It was the first time in my 
 life that I had ever used a " Crib," and I do not 
 remember that I ever indulged in another such 
 assistance till I had to grapple with the Rhetoric 
 and Ethics of Aristotle. 
 
 * I returned to Christ Church, of course, after the 
 Long Vacation. Soon after we met, my Tutor 
 intimated to me that there was to be an Election 
 to Bishop Fell's Exhibitions, and that I was to be 
 a candidate. One of the conditions for election 
 was one year's previous residence. Now I had 
 only resided for the two short Summer Terms, and 
 a few days of the Michaelmas Term. How this 
 difficulty was got over, I know not. But I was 
 admitted as a candidate, and was duly elected, to 
 the great joy of myself and my parents. I remember 
 I went down on my knees and thanked God that
 
 CH. n] Nominated to Studentship 15 
 
 I had been enabled to relieve my father of some 
 portion of the expense of my education, though, as 
 I remarked in my letter announcing the fact, ".40 
 a year is poor interest for all the money you have 
 spent on me." 
 
 'On December 15 of the same year I wrote: " My 
 dear father and mother : Never did I take up my pen 
 with more pleasure than I do now to tell you that 
 I have this day received intimation from the Dean 
 that I am to be a Student. After Collections he 
 called me up and said that Dr. Dowdeswell [a non- 
 resident Canon] had most kindly allowed him to 
 nominate a Student for him ; and that he was most 
 glad that he had an opportunity of showing his 
 entire satisfaction with my conduct since I had 
 become a member of Christ Church." To explain 
 this, I may notice that in those days the Dean and 
 Canons in rotation nominated young men to Student- 
 ships. In many cases these nominations were mere 
 matters of favour, and were bestowed on the sons 
 of Canons, or some other of their relations and 
 friends, without regard to merit. But the Dean 
 and some of the Canons had begun of late to 
 nominate Commoners of the House on the recom- 
 mendation of the Censors and Tutors, and to such a 
 recommendation my appointment was due. Robert 
 Scott, Fellow and then Master of Balliol, was one of 
 the batch of Students appointed at the same time ; 
 and he also was recommended for merit : the rest 
 all, I believe, owed their nomination to favour and 
 interest. Mr. Gladstone had been appointed two 
 years before, just before he took his degree better 
 late than never. 
 
 ' After I became Student I .had not to complain of
 
 1 6 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 solitariness. Our Mess in Hall was a pleasant one, 
 and I had to resist, rather than seek, invitations. . . . 
 I was elected to the Union Debating Society, and 
 heard Gladstone make his last speech there, against 
 the Reform Bill. He struck me as equally fluent 
 and able as a speaker as in future times. Of course 
 his knowledge was more limited and his experience 
 less ; but in copiousness of language, ease in delivery, 
 and lucidity of arrangement there was nothing to 
 desire. 
 
 'In the summer of 1831, the old Dean, Samuel 
 Smith, exchanged his Deanery for a Prebendal Stall 
 at Durham, with Thomas Gaisford, Professor of 
 Greek at Oxford ; and on our return in October 
 we found the new Dean in possession. The ex- 
 change was, I believe, effected by Bishop van Mildert 
 of Durham, whose niece (Miss Douglas) Gaisford 
 had married. I do not remember that the change 
 of rulers was much felt, and I find no notice of the 
 matter in my letters. 
 
 ' In January 1832, I reached Oxford a day late, 
 and was hauled up before old Gaisford on Monday 
 morning, though in very good company, there being 
 about forty others in the same scrape with myself. . . . 
 When I began to apologize and excuse myself for 
 not having been back in time, my set oration was 
 cut short by Daniel Veysie, the Censor, who ex- 
 claimed : " Well, Mr. Dean, perhaps you will not 
 notice Mr. Liddell's absence this time, as I believe 
 it is the first time he has ever missed being back 
 in time." Of course I was a man of too much 
 politeness to contradict the reverend gentleman's 
 assertion ; but the real fact is, I never was back 
 to the day from the time I became a resident
 
 
 
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 Q .- 
 
 s *
 
 CH. ii] The 'Ten Tribes' 17 
 
 member of Christ Church. This is a sad con- 
 fession. I hope it will not come to the ears of 
 Christ Church undergraduates.' 
 
 In 1832 Liddell became one of the original 
 members of a club which, from its consisting of 
 ten members, and meeting at the house of Tribe 
 the tailor, opposite Tom gate, was called the ' Ten 
 Tribes ' ; to which was added ' and little Benjamin 
 their ruler,' Benjamin Harrison being the President. 
 Of the ten original members, five were Bachelors of 
 Arts and five undergraduates. The list, as given 
 by Liddell, is worthy of record. The five Bachelors 
 were Charles Wordsworth (afterwards Bishop of 
 St. Andrews), Walter Kerr Hamilton (afterwards 
 Bishop of Salisbury), and Benjamin Harrison (after- 
 wards Archdeacon of Maidstone) these three had 
 taken first classes in Classics ; the remaining two 
 were Henry Denison (afterwards Fellow of All 
 Souls), who had taken a Double First, and Henry 
 Anthony Jeffreys, a First-class man in Mathematics 
 (afterwards Vicar of Hawkhurst). Jeffreys outlived 
 all the rest, and died a few months after the Dean. 
 
 Of the undergraduate members, all were subse- 
 quently distinguished. They were Francis H . Doyle, 
 afterwards Sir Francis (Fellow of All Souls and 
 Professor of Poetry) ; Stephen Denison (Scholar 
 of Balliol and Fellow of University College) ; Henry 
 Halford Vaughan (Fellow of Oriel and Regius Pro- 
 fessor of Modern History) ; James Ramsay (after- 
 wards Marquess of Dalhousie and Governor-General 
 of India) ; and Liddell himself. All were members 
 
 D
 
 1 8 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 of Christ Church, except Stephen Denison. The 
 club met of an evening after Hall dinner, for wine 
 and talk, but so moderate were their habits that 
 the ten members consumed, in four nights, less than 
 four bottles of wine. 
 
 The life of an undergraduate of studious tastes, 
 busily engaged in reading for honours, was not likely 
 to be full of incident. Liddell enjoyed the com- 
 panionship of a few chosen friends, among whom 
 were Canning, the future Governor-General, and 
 Lord Lincoln, afterwards Duke of Newcastle, in 
 addition to those already mentioned. Fifteen months 
 before the time of examination he had read through 
 all his prescribed books, and had every reason to 
 look forward hopefully to the result. 
 
 ' But,' he writes, ' I fear there will be a good deal 
 to do yet. For though I have, it seems, gone through 
 all the regular books, yet there remains behind 
 a world of volumes explanatory and illustrative of 
 them, which it would be highly advantageous, if not 
 absolutely necessary, to know. However, it is satis- 
 factory to know that the line of road is cut, and that 
 now there is nothing to do but to lay down the stones 
 and get them well beaten in.' 
 
 He determined to forgo the delights of a visit to 
 his home in the Long Vacation, and was anxious 
 to be allowed to remain at Oxford, if only the Dean 
 would grant permission. He urged his father to 
 state his case to the Bishop of Durham, and get him 
 to intercede with the ' Old Bear/ as he called the 
 Dean. But Gaisford was obdurate. The difficulty,
 
 CH. n] Reading for Honours 19 
 
 however, was met by a kind invitation from Augustus 
 Page Saunders, who up to that time had been 
 Mathematical Tutor at Christ Church, and was now 
 just elected to the Headmastership of Charterhouse. 
 Saunders held the Curacy of Cuddesdon, a living 
 then attached to the See of Oxford, and he invited 
 Liddell to spend the summer months with him there, 
 together with three other Christ Church men, Bruce 
 (afterwards Lord Elgin), Lincoln, and Canning. On 
 the departure of Saunders for his school work in 
 September, George Anthony Denison took his place 
 as Curate, and the invitation was extended to the 
 close of the Long Vacation. It was a happy and 
 profitable time. 
 
 ' We keep very steady to our reading, average 
 nine hours per diem, cricket and bathing in the 
 intervals. I am improving immensely in water 
 transactions, take running headers, jump over vast 
 bushes into the water, &c. ; and at cricket dare look 
 at the ball without shutting mine eyes. We had 
 a match with the " clods " the other day, in which 
 I played, and to my own and other people's astonish- 
 ment smote the ball with most wonderful " vis," and 
 added some dozen to the score.' 
 
 Denison was a delightful host. Many years after- 
 wards Liddell writes of him : 
 
 1 In those days he was, I might say, a radical 
 reformer, and took in the Westminster Review. 
 I remember the glee with which he sketched 
 a picture of himself being sent down as a Commis- 
 sioner to inquire into the state of the University 
 
 D 2
 
 2O Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 of Oxford, summoning Dean Gaisford to appear 
 before him. " Take a seat, Sir," he would affably 
 say, "and attend to the questions I am about to 
 ask." Quantum mutatus ! ' 
 
 At Christmas, 1832, Liddell allowed himself a short 
 holiday at home, partly perhaps that he might see 
 his father's new abode at Easington, a parish* situated 
 about two miles from the sea, on the high road 
 between Sunderland and Stockton, in a bleak posi- 
 tion, its church serving as a landmark to seamen. 
 This was his father's home till he gave up clerical 
 work. 
 
 With the year 1833 the Final Examination was 
 drawing perilously near. The beginning of June 
 was the fatal time. In January of that year he 
 writes : 
 
 ' Reading is not going on as well as I could wish. 
 Thank God I am perfectly well, and shall have no 
 excuse to offer on the ground of health. Canning 
 is going on pretty well too. He comes to breakfast 
 with me every morning before Chapel, which is 
 a wonderful effort of voluntary exertion on the part 
 of two men who, I believe, love their beds as sincerely 
 as any of God's creatures, except perhaps that abso- 
 lute dormouse, my brother Charlie/ 
 
 It is interesting to note that, as a recreation in 
 the intervals of hard work, Canning, Vaughan, and 
 Liddell used to read together the early poems of 
 Tennyson. In a letter addressed to the present 
 Lord Tennyson in October, 1897, Liddell writes: 
 
 ' I have been reading, as many more are doing,
 
 CH. n] Doiible First Class 21 
 
 your memoir of your father with intense interest. 
 Will you allow me a word or two ? In vol. i. p. 206 
 Dean Bradley seems to claim the merit of being the 
 first to introduce your father's poems into Oxford. 
 This claim appears to refer to 1842. I must, for 
 the honour of a few Oxford men, be allowed to put 
 in an earlier claim. In June 1833, three Christ 
 Church men took their degree. They were reading 
 hard, and met every evening for an hour for tea and 
 recreation. The recreation consisted in reading aloud 
 the poems published in 1830 and 1833. I have 
 the two thin volumes before me, and looking them 
 over remember our especial delight in Mariana, 
 The Arabian Nights, Oriana, The Lady of Shalott, 
 The May Queen, &c., but especially in The Lotos 
 Eaters! [The three young men's names are then 
 given.] ' Nor were we the only Oxford men who 
 were thus early devoted to your father's works. 
 I may mention Doyle, afterwards Sir Francis, who 
 said to me after the appearance of the Idylls, "If 
 Milton could read Guinevere it would make him pale 
 with jealousy"/ 
 
 The result of the examination satisfied Liddell's 
 most sanguine hopes. He gained a Double First 
 Class. On June 15 he wrote to his father : 
 
 ' I have to announce my final success, for which 
 most devoutly do I thank Heaven, and under that 
 your kindness and care of me in so providing for 
 my well-being now and of old.' 
 
 It was a brilliant Class List, containing, besides 
 Liddell, four other Christ Church men, Canning, 
 W. E. Jelf, R. Scott, and H. H. Vaughan ; Jackson
 
 22 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 of Pembroke, afterwards Bishop of London, and 
 R. Lowe of University, afterwards Viscount Sher- 
 brooke. Liddell was the only Christ Church man 
 who achieved the distinction of a Double First 
 Class, his great friend Canning being in the Second 
 Class in Mathematics. 
 
 ' I was anxious to start at once for Easington, 
 knowing well the real pleasure I should communicate 
 to my parents and the delight I should myself enjoy. 
 But Saunders was very anxious to parade a Double 
 First Charterhouse man to his boys, in hopes of 
 exciting them to do likewise. I at once consented, 
 being, as I said, " bound to do all in my power " to 
 assist him, after all that he had done for me. 
 Accordingly I went, asked for a holiday for the 
 school, and dined with the masters in Brook Hall. 
 My health was proposed, and I had to return thanks. 
 It was the first speech I ever made, and I should 
 not have been sorry if it had been the last. Oratory 
 was not, is not, my forte/ 
 
 Then came the well-earned rest of the Long 
 Vacation ; a time spent partly at Easington, and 
 partly in Scotland in company with his cousin, the 
 Hon. Henry T. Liddell, afterwards first Earl of 
 Ravensworth. Edinburgh, a city which he had not 
 seen since he was twelve years old, won his un- 
 stinted admiration. 
 
 * I am now/ he writes, ' in the queen of cities, the 
 modern Athens, the most beauteous of the beautiful ; 
 the but words fail me when I attempt to express 
 the extreme admiration I feel for all around me.
 
 CH. ii] V aca ti on i n Scotland 23 
 
 It is in sooth a glorious place. I could spend hours 
 in gazing on the magnificent views which present 
 themselves at every turn. . . . Whether I go to Rome 
 or Naples or Athens or Constantinople, never shall 
 I see a city so noble as is this.' 
 
 From Edinburgh they went to Invercauld, and 
 thence to Blair Athol, where they were hospitably 
 received by Lady Glenlyon, mother of the young 
 Duke of Athol. Here Liddell killed his first stag. 
 
 ' One incident I must record,' he writes to his 
 father, ' inasmuch as therein is contained a triumph 
 little inferior to those which I once had the pleasure 
 of conveying to you by letter from Oxford. With 
 my own hand, and the gun of the Hon. H. T. Liddell, 
 of Eslington House, did I slaughter a noble hart. 
 His horns are not remarkable, but I am resolved 
 to perpetuate the memory of so great a triumph by 
 carrying off his head, the which I shall hope to show 
 you. The deer shooting here is much harder work 
 than at Invercauld; for the deer are so numerous, 
 and congregate in herds so large, that it is impossible 
 to stalk them quietly and calmly; they are generally 
 found below you, under the summit of a very steep 
 hill ; then you run full tilt down upon them, among 
 stones huge and rough and loose, till you arrive at 
 a ledge over which you look, and behold the most 
 magnificent sight in the world, a hugeous herd of 
 red-deer, who, the moment you come in sight, look 
 up, give a snuff, and off they gallop. It is not much 
 in favour of shooting that you have had this run, 
 for it cannot be expected that your head and eye 
 can be very steady after such a feat, for the run is 
 sometimes, in the case of novices, about a mile.
 
 24 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 The old hands run nearly all day. My deer was 
 achieved after a run of about a quarter of a mile, 
 and I fired off my arm without a rest. . . . The sport 
 is grand. Nothing I ever saw equal to it V 
 
 In October 1833, Liddell returned to Oxford. His 
 future was now assured. More than three years 
 before his tutor, Robert Biscoe, had sounded him as 
 to his intentions of staying up and becoming a tutor, 
 and he had answered that, though he had not even 
 dared to hope for a studentship, and had never 
 considered any consequences of such an event, he 
 had not the slightest objection to embracing such 
 a career. Now, after his brilliant success in the 
 Schools, a tutorship would as a matter of course be 
 offered him in due time ; in the meanwhile there 
 was a delightful interval, to be spent in equipping 
 himself more completely for his future work. The 
 Dean gave him kind counsel. 
 
 'He recommends me to recover all my French 
 and proceed with German, accompanying this advice 
 with a recommendation to pursue my classical 
 studies, to verse myself in Divinity, and not 
 neglect my scientific pursuits. He added that 
 what leisure time I had would be fully occupied 
 by keeping pace with the reading of the day, with- 
 out which no gentleman can go into society.' 
 
 Some time later the Dean took advantage of 
 Liddell's German knowledge by asking him to trans- 
 
 1 It should be mentioned that this method of stalking in Athol 
 Forest, now obsolete, is described in Scrope's Deerstalking, published 
 in 1839.
 
 CH. n] Return to Oxford 25 
 
 late for his use Godfrey Hermann's Review of 
 Gottling's Hesiod. Gaisford himself had never learnt 
 German. He is said indeed to have visited the 
 continent only once, when he made an expedition to 
 Leyden to consult some MSS. Here he became 
 acquainted with sundry Professors ; and it happened 
 on one occasion that one of these learned men made 
 a slip in some metrical rule. Gaisford interposed, 
 and poured forth (in Latin) a flood of learning 
 from Hephaestion and other Greek authors on 
 metres. The Dutch Professor held up his hands 
 and exclaimed : ' O vir magnae profecto sapientiae, 
 si tarn in rebus quam in verbis incaluisses /' 
 
 There is no period of academic life more profit- 
 able and agreeable than the time immediately 
 succeeding the struggle of the Honour Schools. 
 The drudgery of work is over ; one's own tastes 
 may be pursued without misgivings; the methods 
 of study acquired by the discipline of the Schools 
 may now be applied on an extended scale ; the 
 mind has been enriched, and strengthened for 
 further efforts. Moreover, Liddell had good friends 
 among his brother students to foster his intel- 
 lectual growth : among them H. A. Jeffreys, 
 a brilliant mathematician and a man of singular 
 beauty of character, ' rS>v ^ety iS^v longe optimus,' 
 as Liddell described him some years afterwards, and 
 Robert Scott, one of the most fastidious scholars of 
 his time. Scott and Liddell had been appointed by 
 the Dean to the post of Sub-Librarian, and had thus 
 constant access to the splendid collection of books, 
 
 E
 
 26 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 pictures, and engravings contained in the College 
 Library. In making the appointment Gaisford ad- 
 vised Liddell to make himself well acquainted with 
 the contents of the Library, referring with much 
 gusto to the motto he had seen over Bishop Cosin's 
 Library at Durham : Nosse bonos libros non minima 
 pars est bonae eruditionis. This phrase Liddell used 
 in after-days to quote when himself appointing 
 young students to the same honourable post. He 
 also spent some time with private pupils ; among 
 them was Viscount Leveson, afterwards Earl Gran- 
 ville. He describes him as 
 
 ' A very nice fellow, a great friend of Canning's, 
 though, I fear, inexorably idle. But he has to 
 work for his bread, and I hope he may reform. 
 He is to be, if possible, a Diplomatist. When 
 he came up to Christ Church, Canning said to 
 him, " Leveson, your mind is like a garden that 
 has been left without cultivation, and the only 
 wonder is there are so few weeds in it." At that 
 time he had such an objection to work that I 
 used (with his consent) to lock him into my study, 
 so that he could not get out without my leave, 
 nor could any idle friends come in to disturb him. 
 I carried him successfully through his examin- 
 ations, and he remained my kind friend to the 
 end of his life.' 
 
 His letters show him hard at work at classics, 
 French, and German ; and having now made up 
 his mind to enter Holy Orders, he was studying 
 Divinity, and attending the lectures of the Regius 
 Professor, Dr. Burton. The works of Bull and
 
 CH. ii] Appointed Tutor 27 
 
 Waterland, the gift of Lord Ravensworth in com- 
 memoration of his Double First, served as the 
 first instalment of his Theological library. At the 
 Gaudy of 1834 he delivered the Commemoration 
 Speech, celebrating Archbishop Dolben. Rewrote 
 for the Latin Essay on ' The Administration of 
 the Roman Provinces/ but was beaten by Scott. 
 There was a question of his standing for a 
 Fellowship at Merton and at Balliol, where the 
 emoluments were higher than at Christ Church, 
 and the position in some important respects more 
 dignified. He was also tempted by an offer to 
 pursue researches in Asia Minor, in succession to 
 Mr. Pashley, who had accompanied one of H.M.'s 
 frigates which was exploring those coasts. This 
 offer he was strongly inclined to accept, but he 
 was dissuaded by the Dean and Dr. Pusey ; and 
 in the end remained quietly at Christ Church, till 
 the time should come when a Tutorship would fall 
 to him. His vacations were spent in various places. 
 At Easter, 1835, ne visited Cambridge with his 
 friend Charles Wordsworth, stayed at the Lodge at 
 Trinity, and saw ' the celebrated Fellows of Trinity, 
 Sedgwick, Whewell, Peacock, and Thirl wall.' In 
 the Long Vacation of that year he spent some 
 weeks at Heidelberg, in company with H. Halford 
 Vaughan, and worked hard at German ; visiting on 
 his way home the chief beauties of the Rhine. 
 
 In January 1836, he became Tutor. Thirteen 
 pupils were assigned to him, among whom were 
 the future Bishop Ryle, Charles T. Newton, and 
 
 E 2
 
 28 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 Henry W. Acland. The Earl of Wemyss (then 
 Mr. Charteris) was soon afterwards added to the 
 number. 
 
 ' I would gladly have waited a little,' he writes, 
 'for I had only just taken my M.A. degree, and 
 should have been glad of a space of time for 
 preparation. I wrote to my mother that I was 
 meditating over the air, tone, and gesture to be 
 assumed when my first Lecture enters the room, 
 all properly attired in academical costume, and 
 some of them perhaps more fit to lecture their 
 Tutor than to receive instruction from him.' 
 
 In April of the same year he again writes : 
 
 ' I have again assumed the tutorial chair, and 
 circles of reverential youths look to my nod, as 
 that of great wisdom. Moreover, I know not 
 whether they have been awed by my sternness at 
 Collections, or if dignity has insensibly accrued 
 to my person, but I find that these youths respect- 
 fully lift their caps from their heads when they 
 cross my path in the Quadrangle.' 
 
 He speaks of his own pupils as ' a very good 
 set who will keep all my wits at work.' And it 
 should be remembered that the duties of a College 
 Tutor in those days and indeed till much later 
 were not quite what they are in modern Oxford. 
 There was none of the sub-division of subjects 
 which is now (to the clear advantage of teacher 
 and learner) universally adopted. The College 
 Tutor was expected to guide and supervise the 
 whole of his pupils' work, and more or less to
 
 CH. n] Work as Tutor 29 
 
 read with them the chief ancient authors which 
 they were taking up, whether poets, philosophers, 
 historians, or orators. There were indeed on the 
 staff of Christ Church certain college officers, who 
 delivered formal courses of Lectures to the men of 
 each year the Catechist, the Rhetoric Reader, and 
 the Greek Reader : but these officers were Tutors 
 also ; and for the bulk of the instruction each Tutor 
 was almost solely responsible, so far as his own 
 pupils were concerned ; and if he was anxious to 
 do his best for them, his labours were very heavy 
 and covered a vast field. And the Tutor's re- 
 lation to his pupils was also, in theory at least, 
 of a more directly pastoral character than is now 
 the case. As a rule, the College Tutor of those 
 days was in Holy Orders ; for indeed all but 
 a few Fellowships or Studentships were ten- 
 able for any lengthened time only under this 
 condition. At Christ Church the first twenty 
 of the hundred and one Students were called 
 ' Theologi,' and were bound to be in Priest's Orders. 
 This restriction placed the tuition of a college 
 in the hands of clergymen, and a conscientious 
 Tutor would regard his position as involving the 
 discharge of sacred duties in safeguarding, as far 
 as possible, his pupils' career, and giving them help 
 in their religious life. 
 
 Liddell devoted himself heart and soul to his 
 new work ; and many of his early pupils, separated 
 from him by only a short interval in age, became 
 his close personal friends. His admirable scholar-
 
 3O Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 ship, his wide literary culture, and his refined 
 artistic tastes, all combined to interest and even 
 to fascinate them. It is now for the first time 
 that his letters speak much of art ; but he had 
 the hand and eye, as well as the enthusiasm, of 
 an artist, and his life-long friendship with Newton, 
 Acland, and Ruskin was founded in a large 
 measure upon the profound artistic sympathy 
 which then united them. Mr. Ruskin was not 
 indeed, strictly speaking, a pupil of Liddell's ; his 
 college Tutor was the Rev. W. L. Brown. But 
 they were drawn together, even in those early 
 days, by common artistic tastes and sympathies ; 
 and in his ' Praeterita ' Mr. Ruskin refers to 
 Liddell in words which deserve to be quoted : 
 
 ' There was one Tutor however, out of my 
 sphere, who reached my ideal, but disappointed 
 my hope then as perhaps his own, since : a 
 man sorrowfully under the dominion of the Greek 
 avd-yKr) the present Dean. He was, and is, one 
 of the rarest types of nobly-presenced English- 
 men, but I fancy it was his adverse star that 
 made him an Englishman at all the prosaic and 
 practical element in him having prevailed over 
 the sensitive one. He was the only man in Oxford 
 among the masters of my day who knew any- 
 thing of art ; and his keen saying of Turner 
 that " he had got hold of a false ideal " would 
 have been infinitely helpful to me at that time, 
 had he explained and enforced it. But I suppose 
 he did not see enough in me to make him take 
 trouble with me, and, what was much more
 
 CH. ii] Work as Tutor 31 
 
 serious, he saw not enough in himself to take 
 trouble, in that field, with himself.' 
 
 So anxious was Liddell to spare no pains to 
 make himself fit for his new duties that, when 
 the Long Vacation of 1836 came, he resolved to 
 spend almost the whole of it at Oxford. 
 
 ' I cannot say for certain,' he writes to his 
 mother, ' whether I shall visit you or not this 
 summer. Believe me, I should only be obeying 
 my inclination, if I were to stay the greater part 
 of the Long Vacation at home. But I must 
 fairly tell you, it appears to me incompatible 
 with my office in this place so to do. I have 
 much, very much, to learn to qualify myself for 
 the fit discharge of my Tutorial duties ; and 
 the only opportunity I have to make up deficien- 
 cies is during the vacations. I am sorry to say 
 that at home I cannot read with effect : I have 
 tried and it has failed. My duty therefore is to 
 stay in such places as will enable me to do so; 
 and the most congenial place is Oxford.' 
 
 As a matter of fact he did go home for a short 
 time ; but most of the Vacation was spent at 
 Oxford, and, from his account of his way of life, 
 well spent. 
 
 ' I have adopted a new style of life on the 
 advice, and backed by the example, of Talbot, 
 a student of Christ Church, and nephew of Lord 
 Fitzroy Somerset. I get up at six or a little 
 after and take a walk, sometimes diversified by 
 a bathe, before breakfast. The effect is ex- 
 cellent. I find myself able to sit at my books
 
 32 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 from 9.30 to 5 without inconvenience, and I 
 never was better. Indeed, so pleasing is the 
 quiet and peace which reign here, that I look 
 forward with great regret to the approach of Term, 
 when turbulent youths will once again break the 
 stillness of the academic groves.' 
 
 That stillness had indeed been rudely broken 
 in the preceding six months, by the din and 
 violence of the controversy connected with the 
 appointment of Dr. Hampden to the Regius Pro- 
 fessorship of Divinity. It is interesting to read 
 Liddell's account of the affair, and his judgment 
 on its merits. Dr. Burton's unexpected death had 
 caused the vacancy. 
 
 ' I had attended Dr. Burton's lectures in pre- 
 paration for my Ordination, and, in common with 
 others, felt the highest admiration and love for 
 him. Great interest was felt in his successor ; 
 for the appointment rested with Lord Melbourne, 
 who did not possess the confidence of Churchmen. 
 On Feb. 8, 1836, came a letter from his Lord- 
 ship, offering the chair to Dr. Hampden. The 
 Doctor was an Oriel man, who had become 
 Principal of St. Mary Hall. In a letter to my 
 father, I speak of him as a person well known 
 for the amiableness of his manner, and the 
 uprightness of his life (I might have added, for 
 his learning in Aristotelic philosophy), but who was 
 unhappily distinguished for very strange, undefined, 
 and almost unintelligible notions on Theological 
 subjects. Such were the self-confident opinions 
 of a young man of twenty-five years. I con-
 
 CH. n] Dr. Hampden 33 
 
 tinued : " On Tuesday, Pusey, Newman, and others 
 of that party assembled and prepared a memorial to 
 His Majesty, setting forth that they apprehended 
 danger to the Church by the appointment of 
 a Professor holding such opinions as appeared 
 in Dr. Hampden's theological works, more par- 
 ticularly in the Bampton Lectures for 1832. 
 This was signed by upwards of seventy M.A.s, 
 chiefly Tutors, and dispatched to the Archbishop 
 on the following night. On Wednesday the Heads 
 of Houses, roused by the energy of the Move- 
 ment party, called a meeting. To the horror 
 and surprise of the Doctors, the Principal of 
 St. Mary Hall himself appeared. ' Strange/ said 
 the Dean of Christ Church, ' very strange, 
 that you should be here, Mr. Principal : we have 
 met to talk of you. Do you mean to stay ? ' 
 ' I do,' was the reply. ' And to vote ? ' interposed 
 Shuttleworth (Warden of New College). ' I have 
 not made up my mind/ said Hampden. 
 
 ' " A very angry discussion followed, after which 
 certain propositions (I know not what) were put 
 to the vote. On the first two, Hampden was 
 left in a minority, himself taking no part. On 
 the third, the division was equal, whereupon Dr. 
 Hampden interposed, and by his vote turned the 
 decision of the august body in his own favour. 
 They separated in no good humour : and the 
 minority dispatched a private remonstrance to 
 Lord Melbourne, which his Lordship diplomati- 
 cally promised to give his attention to. After 
 this strong display of opinion, Hampden wrote 
 to Ministers offering to resign, if he inconveni- 
 enced them at all. This was on Thursday. On 
 
 F
 
 34 Life a t Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 Saturday, Newman put out a pamphlet entitled, 
 Elucidations of Dr. Hampderis Theological State- 
 ments, being a summary of his opinions on 
 various heads arranged in numbers, as I. Rule 
 of Faith. II. The Holy Trinity. III. The 
 Incarnation, &c., and each head copiously proved 
 by extracts from the Professor-elect's Bampton 
 Lectures, &c. As I said before, the statements 
 are very obscure ; in the hands of a Socinian 
 they might be stated as Socinian principles ; in 
 Dr. Hampden's probably they may all be shown 
 to be Church of England. But even this most 
 favourable statement of them will show how 
 improper a person he is to be Divinity Professor. 
 He would do no good, nor, I apprehend, much 
 harm ; for he is a man without eloquence, or any 
 moral power over men's minds, so far as appears : 
 so that the chief harm would be that the Pro- 
 fessorship would be entirely nugatory; all solid 
 meat would be taken out of men's mouths, and 
 dust blown into their eyes. Here the matter 
 rests. I did not sign the Masters' memorial, 
 because I conceived this proceeding to be uncon- 
 stitutional and irregular ; and the delay, if not 
 refusal, of the Archbishop to present it (for it 
 has not been presented), makes me think he takes 
 the same view. I see by to-day's paper that 
 Lord Melbourne has had an interview with the 
 King at Brighton ; and I am told that in a Minis- 
 terial paper has appeared a letter detailing the 
 proceedings in ' Golgotha.' As Shuttleworth is 
 very indignant at this letter, it is presumed the 
 statement is accurate, and therefore proceeds 
 from an eye-witness." '
 
 CH. n] 7 he Hampden Controversy 35 
 
 In May following he adds the sequel : 
 
 ' You want to hear more about Hampden, and 
 the statute which has been passed concerning him. . . 
 The University has withdrawn from him all she had 
 before entrusted, on her part, to the Professor, viz. 
 the appointment of Select Preachers, and the judging 
 on heresy, &c., in sermons preached by others ; 
 which, though in itself almost nugatory, yet amounts 
 to a strong vote of censure. I was very glad not to 
 have a vote, as I know not how I should have 
 exercised it. But pray most flatly contradict the 
 notion that the leaders of the business had any 
 political bias. I really and truly believe that if they 
 were asked to-morrow whether Lord Melbourne 
 or Sir Robert Peel was to hold office, they would 
 (supposing the thing depended on their word) decline 
 giving judgment. They were actuated simply by 
 what they judged a high duty, and believed they 
 would be betraying their trust if they did not use it. 
 Of course this is no defence of what they have done ; 
 that must stand or fall on its own merits ; but it 
 is a defence of their motives and wishes against such 
 shocking and unchristian attacks as that which has 
 appeared in the Edinburgh Review, and which (I am 
 shocked to say) is the production of a man for whom 
 I had a high respect and great admiration even 
 Dr. Arnold of Rugby *. Alas, poor human nature ! 
 What a miserable thing art thou, breaking forth and 
 
 1 In a letter to Vaughan he describes the famous scene in the 
 Theatre : ' Arnold came, saw, and of course did not conquer. I am 
 sorry to say that his physiognomy by no means counteracts the 
 extremely unpleasant notion I had been led to form of him from 
 the " Malignants " article. A more savage, truculent expression than 
 that day sate upon his brow, I think I never saw. He did not speak, 
 sate upon a benh retired, and withdrew early.' 
 
 F 2
 
 36 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 deforming and blotting over qualities and characters 
 that might adorn a higher race of beings. I hope 
 that, for the present at least, we are quiet again. 
 Dr. Hampden has issued notice of lectures without 
 as heretofore requiring a certificate from the Head 
 or Tutor of the respective colleges to which his 
 hearers may belong. The Bishops have taken 
 diverse lines. The Bishop of Exeter wrote long 
 ago to Exeter College (whence come most of his 
 candidates for Orders) saying that he would not 
 require attendance on either Professor's Lectures 
 (Regius or Margaret) ; college testimonials would 
 suffice. The Bishop of London told a Christ Church 
 man, who asked him whether of the twain he should 
 hear, that he would abide by the recommendation 
 of his college ; whereon the Dean refused to give 
 any such recommendation. So anomalous is our 
 present condition/ 
 
 To those who knew Liddell in later days, and 
 appreciated his attitude towards all religious con- 
 troversy, especially when introduced into academical 
 questions, the tone of these letters will appear some- 
 what surprising : but it is interesting to read his 
 own comment on them, when he perused them in 
 his old age. 
 
 ' Notwithstanding,' he writes, ' that the opinions 
 expressed in these letters savour something of 
 presumption, considering that they were written by 
 a young M.A., who had not yet the right to vote 
 in Convocation, I must say that on the whole they 
 are moderate and impartial. I see nothing for 
 a man of eighty-two to be ashamed of in them.' 
 ' The word " moderate," ' he adds, ' recalls to my
 
 CH. n] Newman and Halford Vaiighan 37 
 
 mind a little incident that must have occurred about 
 this time. My friend Vaughan, who had been 
 elected to a Fellowship at Oriel, was having tea 
 with Newman, who was anxious to enlist all the 
 younger Fellows in his cause. " Do you like your 
 tea strong ? " asked Newman. " No thank you," 
 said Vaughan, " rather weak than otherwise." " Ah, 
 I see," retorted Newman, " moderation in all things.'" 
 
 Liddell's attitude towards Dissenters was then 
 strangely different from what it afterwards became. 
 
 ' I hope/ he writes to Vaughan in 1834, ' you have 
 already signed a petition against admitting Dissenters 
 to the Universities. If not, you will find one either 
 at Rivington's or Hatchard's, whither instantly repair, 
 and enrol your name among all the good and wise 
 of the land/ 
 
 One more reference to Dr. Hampden's case may 
 be noted. About the middle of the ensuing Michael- 
 mas Term the new Professor took up his residence 
 in Christ Church. 
 
 ' He appeared in chapel this morning (November 5) 
 for the first time, and, strange enough, the chapter 
 read for the second lesson was Acts xxiii the very 
 passage which had been applied by Arnold in the 
 Edinburgh Review to his " Persecutors." ' 
 
 Some years afterwards in 1843 Liddell was 
 again concerned with Dr. Hampden, in the then 
 famous but now forgotten suit of Macmullen v. 
 Hampden. A letter to his mother, dated Nov. 30, 
 1843, tells the tale as far as it relates to his own 
 share in it.
 
 38 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 ' Yesterday I had an occupation which I hope will 
 be the last of the kind that I shall ever have, 
 viz., to sit in judgment for nine mortal hours. 
 Dr. Hampden, the Regius Professor of Divinity, 
 has refused to take such steps as will enable a 
 Mr. Macmullen to take his degree of B.D., because 
 he thinks that Mr. Macmullen has (on his part) 
 taken a wrong course. Mr. Macmullen, not being 
 able to take his degree, is debarred from certain 
 advantages which would otherwise accrue to him 
 in his college (Corpus). And therefore he brings an 
 action for damages against Dr. Hampden. The cause 
 having been decided against Dr. Hampden in the 
 Vice-Chancellor's Court, an appeal was made to the 
 court above (called the Delegates of Appeals in 
 Congregation) to reverse the decision. Of these 
 Delegates seven in number I unluckily am one. 
 And yesterday we took our seats at ten, and sat 
 listening to legal arguments from Mr. Erie, one 
 of the first Barristers in Westminster Hall, on 
 Hampden's side, and Hope, a contemporary of my 
 own, against him, till seven o'clock in the evening, 
 with one quarter of an hour's interruption. A 
 pleasing variety to a studious life this, is it not ? 
 And now we have to plod through all these long- 
 winded arguments, looking up authorities, cases, 
 &c., &c., and hold conferences in order to make 
 up our minds how to give judgment. I hope we 
 shall do it right. But I fear we are quite as likely 
 to be wrong as right. However, we must do the 
 best we can. When any cases of appeal came 
 before the Duke of Manchester, when Governor 
 of Jamaica, he used to say, the moment the Counsel 
 began, " Stop sir, stop ! I affirm the judgment of the
 
 CH. n] George Marshall 39 
 
 Court below." " But, your Grace," began the horrified 
 Counsel. ..." I affirm it, with costs," interrupted 
 his Grace. I fear it will hardly do to follow this 
 summary and convenient course here.' 
 
 Among his pupils in this early stage of his tutorial 
 life was one who has lately passed away, and whose 
 memory will long be affectionately cherished by 
 very many Christ Church men, the saintly George 
 Marshall, afterwards Censor of Christ Church, and 
 in later life Rector of Milton. Marshall had just 
 come up from Charterhouse, and to Liddell's high 
 delight had won a college exhibition, the prelude, 
 in his case, to a distinguished academical career. 
 He was among the first fruits of Saunders' work 
 at Charterhouse. 
 
 1 1 hope and trust he will not fall off under my 
 care. He is a well-disposed, modest, clever lad, 
 and it would grieve me, I am sure, quite as much as 
 it could his nearest and dearest friends, to see him 
 go wrong. However, I hope that, humanly speaking, 
 there is very little chance of it. But I cannot help 
 feeling, more and more, how heavy a responsibility 
 rests upon me ; while, from the nature of the place, 
 one has much less power of interfering with a man's 
 acts and habits, than at school and elsewhere.' 
 
 These words will serve to illustrate the feelings 
 with which Liddell regarded his position as Tutor, 
 and with which he entered Holy Orders at Christ- 
 mas, 1836. His letters at this time dwell upon the 
 necessity of a season for thought and preparation 
 for ' so important, and for me so awful a change
 
 40 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 of life.' A few weeks before the Ordination he 
 writes in answer to his father : 
 
 ' Your letter was doubly welcome, both as coming 
 from those I love so dearly, and yet so much less 
 than in duty and gratitude I ought, as also by 
 reason of the principal topic it dwelt upon. Yes, 
 indeed, my dear father, I do want your prayers, 
 yours and my mother's, and of all that feel any 
 interest in me. The step I am going to take is 
 one of awful responsibility. Would I could feel 
 as deeply as it deserves the depth and breadth 
 of its importance ! But I am sorry to say that 
 my mode of life has a strong tendency to attach 
 my first thoughts to other subjects of a too worldly 
 kind ; and it often requires an effort to fix my mind 
 on that which ought to be if it could be the only 
 subject on which it delighted to dwell. However, 
 this cannot be. I am obliged to spend most of my 
 time in preparing lectures on alien subjects, and the 
 very week before I present myself for Ordination 
 will be spent amid the bustle and excitement of 
 a college examination. But I am sensible that 
 I cannot complain of this : all kinds of life must 
 have their peculiar temptations, and I doubt not but 
 that this of mine has its advantages, which, trans- 
 planted to another soil, I might miss just as much 
 as I do now the quiet and leisure which I should 
 desire for a season, to devote myself to the studies 
 and meditations immediately suited for my approach- 
 ing change of life. But still these temptations are 
 many and great, and therefore much need have I, as 
 I said before, that you and all of you should earnestly 
 intreat the Giver of all good gifts to support me by 
 His Grace, that I may not greatly fall. Mysterious
 
 CH. n] Ordination 41 
 
 dispensation, that the prayers of men, who cannot 
 save their own souls, should stand in stead others 
 besides themselves ! Yet, thank God, I feel and 
 believe that it is a very truth. In my prayers it 
 is that I can best know what a son's affection for 
 his parents, a brother's for his brothers and sisters, 
 is and ought to be. And you think of me then with 
 a more thorough love than otherwise ; you have 
 assured me that you do so. Thank you for that 
 assurance ; it has done me good. And so partly 
 while we feel that each perhaps at the same moment 
 is sending up prayers for the other, and so are 
 kindled to a higher and holier frame of mind 
 partly by recollecting that the Spirit hath said 
 how effectual shall be the fervent prayer of a 
 righteous man (O Lord, grant that I too may be 
 righteous !), we know that in some measure our 
 salvation depends on our mutual efforts, and so 
 our affections are not confined to this side the 
 grave, but stretch forward into the boundless realms 
 of Eternity.' 
 
 It is interesting to remember that this simple and 
 pathetic letter was written at a time when Newman 
 and Pusey were already exercising a mighty influence 
 over the religious thought of Oxford, and three 
 years and a half after Keble's Sermon on National 
 Apostasy. It may be inferred that Liddell was quite 
 untouched by that movement ; and indeed in the 
 letters preserved in his family scarcely a reference 
 to it can be traced. Newman was just ten years 
 his senior ; and ten years make a vast interval in 
 college life. Liddell's tastes were at no time eccle- 
 siastical. He was now busily occupied with his 
 
 G
 
 42 Life at Christ CJmrch [CH. n 
 
 pupils and his own studies ; and his leisure hours 
 were devoted to the improvement of his artistic 
 knowledge and skill. He always disliked contro- 
 versy ; and for the present was thoroughly contented 
 with the Church position as defined by the more 
 moderate school of English Divines. Yet he did 
 not wholly elude the magic of the great teacher. 
 In later years he would sometimes call up the 
 memories of those early days, and tell of his being 
 persuaded by Newman to undertake the translation 
 of some passages from the Fathers for publication. 
 ' I can show you what I did,' he said one day, and 
 took down some volumes from his library shelves. 
 Then, after a long and fruitless search, he shut the 
 books : ' Pshaw ! I cannot. I have entirely forgotten 
 which were the passages that I translated ! ' It would, 
 however, be a mistake to infer that Liddell was 
 untouched at the time by the influence of a 
 movement which swayed the whole religious life of 
 Oxford. He was an occasional attendant at the 
 meetings of Dr. Pusey's Theological Society : and 
 in a sermon preached at Christ Church in 1890 
 he recalled some memories of Newman as he had 
 known him. 
 
 ' Comparatively few persons now living,' he said, 
 ' can remember the days when Newman began to 
 influence academic life, and to be a power among us. 
 I am of that number. I was admitted to what I 
 considered a high honour, to some degree of inter- 
 course with the great theologian of Oriel, and I 
 undertook (at his request) to make one or two of
 
 CH. n] Estimate of Dr. Newman 43 
 
 the translations from ancient ecclesiastical documents 
 which appeared in the early numbers of the Library 
 of the Fathers l . 
 
 ' He exercised a sort of spell over the younger 
 men with whom he came in contact. This was 
 some half-century ago. What a vista to look back 
 through ! What changes have taken place in 
 thought and feeling, ecclesiastical, theological, philo- 
 sophical, scientific, political, social, in that half- 
 century ! It seems like a dream, a dream indeed 
 full of vivid recollections. It makes me look back 
 on the time when, with many others since departed, 
 I hung upon the sermons which he preached from 
 St. Mary's pulpit, or listened to those penetrating 
 discourses which he used to deliver on (I think) 
 Wednesday evenings in Adam de Brome's chapel. 
 Some of those hearers followed him without flinching, 
 however far he advanced from the teaching of that 
 Church in which he had been reared ; some, alarmed 
 by the manifest direction of his steps, drew back 
 and refused to listen any longer to his persuasive 
 accents. I need not attempt to enlarge on the 
 character of his intellect, the subtle charm of his 
 language, his lofty and self-denying purpose. . . . But 
 one thing I cannot but notice, that, whereas most 
 of those who leave the Church of their fathers, be 
 it the Church of this realm or another, prove to 
 be the bitterest enemies and the most active 
 opponents of that Church, Cardinal Newman 
 never followed that unworthy course. He had 
 convinced himself that there were things in our 
 
 1 They were really some passages from Ignatius, and form Nos. 1-12 
 of the ' Records of the Church,' to be found among the Tracts for the 
 Times. 
 
 G 2
 
 44 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 Church that he could not away with, and that he 
 should find in the Roman Church a satisfaction 
 and a cure. But he did not therefore, as the 
 manner of many is, assail us with acrimonious 
 criticism or contemptuous reproach ; and if at times 
 he replied to attacks somewhat sharply, he seemed 
 to do so in obedience to the imperious and inflexible 
 principles of his new mistress.' 
 
 In the same sermon he contrasts the style of 
 preaching of Cardinal Newman and Dr. Liddon, 
 whose death had just occurred. 
 
 ' Let me pause for a moment in order to say 
 a few words as to the preaching of the Cardinal 
 and Canon. My reminiscences may seem trivial 
 or superficial, but they are, I think, somewhat 
 characteristic. It has been my fortune to hear 
 both these great preachers, one in my earlier 
 years, one at a mature age. It. is difficult to say 
 which was the more impressive ; but it is certain 
 that the impressions were produced by means so 
 different as to be almost contrary. I seem to see 
 John Henry Newman, standing (to use a familiar 
 phrase) bolt upright in the pulpit, with spectacles 
 on nose, with arms as it were pinned to his side, 
 never using the slightest action except to turn over 
 the leaves of his sermon, trusting entirely for effect 
 to the modulation of a voice most melodious, but 
 ranging, I believe, through a very limited scale, 
 yet riveting the attention of his hearers as if 
 they were spell-bound. One sermon still dwells 
 in my memory with vivid force it was that on 
 the character of Saul the King. We marvelled 
 how so little apparent effort was followed by effects
 
 CH. n] The Martyrs^ Memorial 45 
 
 so great and permanent. Many who now hear me 
 must have seen our lost friend, Dr. Liddon, with no 
 less sweetness but much greater vehemence of voice 
 and tone, exerting himself to the utmost, with head 
 thrown back, with flashing eye, and such intense 
 energy of declamation, as left him at the close of 
 his discourse in a state of great exhaustion. The 
 earnestness of both these great teachers was the 
 same ; the thoughtfulness inspired by them was 
 equal. We may be proud that both were sons 
 of Oxford.' 
 
 The beauty of this extract will justify its inser- 
 tion : and it shows Liddell's appreciative estimate 
 of Newman's influence, an influence by which he 
 was never for a moment dominated. 
 
 But if there is little trace of his sympathy with 
 the Oxford movement, he gave but cold support 
 to the Evangelical protest against it. 
 
 'There is a project here,' he writes in 1838, 'to 
 put up a monument to the martyred Bishops, 
 Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer. There are and 
 will be many difficulties about it, arising from the 
 disturbed state of the theological opinion both 
 generally in the country and particularly at Oxford. 
 However, I hope the thing may be got successfully 
 forward. If so, when the architectural question of 
 what is to be comes to be discussed, I shall take 
 a very lively interest in the business.' 
 
 Then, and apparently not till then ! 
 In the years 1837-8, his pupil Acland was travel- 
 ling in the Mediterranean for his health. In a letter
 
 46 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 written to him at Athens, after giving a budget of 
 home news, Liddell adds : 
 
 ' But what can these Western turmoils have of 
 interest for you, who are now, I hope, enjoying the 
 pure air of Attica, and warming all your classical 
 associations by treading the ground which gave 
 them birth ? What would I give to be with you, 
 while you trace the long walls, and seek the 
 olives of Academus, and the white hill of Colonus, 
 and all those other places whose names are to us 
 as household words ! Now do, my dear Acland, 
 take pains, and make many (I need not &b& faithful) 
 sketches of that fair land, and gladden my eyes 
 with more representations of these spots which 
 I have sometimes fondly dreamed to look on, 
 but now can scarce expect to do so. Especially 
 will you make me a correct drawing of the 
 Temple of Nike" Apteros which they have lately 
 restored ? Also, will you find out what the rock 
 of the Acropolis is, and generally what is the 
 nature of the soil ? Lastly, the precise distances 
 of well-known points would be a very useful 
 thing to know. But it were endless to suggest 
 points on which you might give me information. 
 I should like to hear all and everything that you 
 observe.' 
 
 This extract serves as an instance of his relations 
 to his favourite pupils, and his enthusiasm for 
 ancient art. Lord Wemyss, in a letter to Mrs. 
 Liddell, adds a characteristic touch to the picture. 
 
 ' I regarded myself as the most fortunate of under- 
 graduates at Christ Church in being assigned to him
 
 CH. ii] Love of Art 47 
 
 as one of his pupils, and from the first we became 
 fast friends a friendship that, as you know, lasted 
 through life. Art was a great bond of sympathy 
 between us ; and I well recollect his handing to 
 me, to look at, an engraving of a Raphael picture. 
 This, when he handed it to me, I took hold of with 
 one hand, to his great consternation. He quickly 
 took it from me and said, " Never hold an engraving 
 with one hand, for then you mark and crumple it. 
 Always use two hands and hold it thus : one 
 hand near the top, on one side, the other near 
 the bottom on the opposite side." Need I say 
 that this lesson I have never forgotten, though 
 I fear the Classics he so well taught me are 
 things of the forgotten past ! ' 
 
 But Lord Wemyss ought not to have forgotten 
 them, for Liddell was an excellent Tutor. 
 
 ' I admired and loved him from my heart/ writes 
 another old pupil, the Rev. H. A. Harvey. ' His 
 mode of giving advice and instruction endeared 
 him to me. They were given in few, but telling 
 words. You felt that your sense and your honour 
 and your character as a Christian were appealed 
 to ; you were not coaxed or preached to. Some 
 thought him rude and haughty; he appeared to 
 me to be a good specimen of the //eyaXo^i/^oy, 
 the character in Aristotle which he evidently 
 admired. He used to instance it in Dr. Johnson. 
 I owe an immense deal to Liddell. He fired my 
 ambition, and he taught me to read the Greek 
 Testament regularly and " like a Christian," for he 
 had no idea of cramming for an examination. . . . 
 He was a great man for the text of books. At that
 
 48 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 time it was not customary for the Tutors to see 
 their pupils of an evening ; but Liddell did it, 
 at least with me, and would give me special help 
 then in any books in which he thought me behind- 
 hand. The example which he himself set of 
 industry was evidenced by the way in which we 
 used to find him working at his Lexicon. In the 
 interval between one Lecture and another he would 
 be found standing at his desk over his interleaved 
 copy of the first edition, correcting and amending 
 it. And that standing desk recalls his advice which 
 I have ever since treasured both in reading and 
 in writing : " Keep your books open, ready to be 
 returned to when you come back to work." ' 
 
 In the year 1838 he experienced a very heavy 
 sorrow, the first great bereavement of his life, in the 
 unexpected death of his sister Harriett, at the age 
 of eighteen. She was a singularly beautiful girl, 
 and had already attracted the love of one of Liddell's 
 most intimate friends, Stephen Denison, who has 
 been before mentioned as a member of the ' Tribes ' 
 club, and had, like his brother, attained high distinc- 
 tion at Oxford. Harriett Liddell had shown symptoms 
 of delicacy in the winter of 1837-8, but nothing 
 serious was apprehended ; and though, during the 
 early spring, she had been ailing and weak, plans 
 were being formed and discussed for a happy summer 
 tour on the continent. However, in the end of April, 
 a visit to London, and consultation with Sir James 
 Clarke, revealed the existence of very grave lung 
 mischief, and she grew worse so rapidly that she 
 sank to her rest before the end of the second week
 
 CH. n] Death of his Sister 49 
 
 of May. The blow, so sudden and so heavy, brought 
 out all that was deepest and tenderest in Liddell's 
 character. His letters show the poignancy of his 
 grief, the warmth of his affection, and his anxious 
 desire to comfort the mourners and the almost 
 broken-hearted Stephen Denison. He would not 
 have wished his words to be quoted. After the 
 funeral at Wimbledon he was obliged to return to 
 his Oxford duties, but 
 
 ' though I can get on pretty well when I have 
 a lecture, yet alone I find it impossible to collect 
 my thoughts and prevent them from straying to 
 other scenes and other times. ... I have resumed 
 my original intention of being ordained Priest on 
 next (Trinity) Sunday. Reading the Bible, I find, 
 is the only thing in which I can find lasting relief 
 just now, and I do not know any reason to put it off.' 
 
 And on the day of his Ordination he writes : 
 
 ' I have read your memoir of our beloved, not 
 with dry eyes not with dry eyes. I would set my 
 seal to the truth of every word of it. No parent's 
 fondness could exalt or magnify the gentle unassuming 
 virtues of that bright and lovely creature. It is a trite 
 saying, but the more I think of it, the more true 
 I think it in her case, that she was too good and 
 pure to remain among us. And earnestly did I raise 
 my mind in prayer, while I kneeled this day before 
 the Bishop, that I might by God's Holy Spirit be 
 enabled so to purify myself here on earth, and so 
 exalt my being while I am left here, that I may 
 be able of a truth " to put on Christ/' and be made 
 
 H"
 
 50 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 meet to see her once more face to face, and to dwell 
 with her never more to part' 
 
 The wound healed gradually ; and work at Oxford 
 went on quietly, strenuously, and successfully. The 
 great labour of his life, the Lexicon, had now made 
 considerable progress, and was the constant com- 
 panion of his spare hours. His duties as a Tutor 
 grew in interest and importance, as the number of 
 his pupils increased, and they requited the pains 
 bestowed upon them by acquitting themselves 
 brilliantly in the Schools. The excellence of his 
 College lectures is still remembered ; and Sir Henry 
 Acland tells of a petition made by those who 
 were attending his weekly lectures on the Acts of 
 the Apostles that he would break through the 
 customary rule, and give them every week some 
 additional lectures on the subject. After full con- 
 sideration he felt obliged to decline the request, on 
 the ground that his consent might seem to cast 
 a slur upon his brother Tutors. 
 
 His taste on all matters of Art, carefully trained 
 by congenial study, had by now gained a wider 
 appreciation ; he was recognized as an authority on 
 the subject in Oxford. 
 
 'I have lately,' he writes in Nov. 1839, 'had an 
 office conferred on me which pleased me, though 
 it is rather honourable than profitable. Mr. Taylor 
 (father of little Michael Angelo Taylor), some time 
 an Oxford Tutor and dignitary, left a sum of money 
 for building and endowing a College for the promo- 
 tion of modern languages and literature. This sum
 
 CH. n] College Lectiires 51 
 
 was paid on Michael Angelo's death. Also a Dr. 
 Randolph left some money to build a Picture and 
 Statue Gallery. The two are to be combined, and 
 one building erected for the two purposes one 
 building that is, as to outward appearance, though 
 within the two will be kept separate. Now the 
 University have desired a number of architects to 
 send in plans for competition, and have appointed 
 a Delegacy to decide on the best. I am one of the 
 said Delegacy. So you see the Liddell name 
 becomes connected with the Fine Arts on all sides. 
 Tell my father that Mr. Cockerell (an old school- 
 fellow of his) and Salvin, whom you know, I think, 
 have sent in far the best plans, architecturally, and 
 I do not doubt one of them will get the prize. But 
 Cockerell's will be far too expensive to execute. 
 I hope Salvin's may be managed. But do not say 
 anything about this. I ought not to talk of it.' 
 
 Professor Cockerell's design was, as is well known, 
 ultimately accepted. 
 
 As time went on, additional honours and duties 
 fell to his lot. In 1838, Gaisford had appointed 
 him Greek Reader in Christ Church, in the place 
 of Kynaston, who had been elected High Master 
 of St. Paul's. This involved the preparation of 
 lectures to be delivered to the whole of the first 
 year men. He was appointed, he writes, 
 
 ' above the head of one of my seniors, which, though 
 gratifying to me, will be more so to you probably. 
 For indeed, I had rather he had been appointed, 
 partly because I have quite enough to do, partly 
 because some little heart-burning may arise in con- 
 
 H 2
 
 52 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 sequence of the old boy's marked preference for me, 
 on this as well as on some other occasions.' 
 
 In 1842 he became Select Preacher for the first 
 time *, and during his tenure of that office he wrote 
 to his sister : 
 
 ' I have now preached both my sermons for the 
 Term before the University, not without applause. 
 I must tell you that the Dean told me he was very 
 much pleased with my second sermon : "Very much, 
 I liked it very much. I thought it a very excellent 
 composition." This is much from him, and I did 
 not in the least expect it. He did not hear my first, 
 he said. "He debarred himself from the pleasure 
 of hearing me, because of the badness of the day." 
 I suppose this will give you pleasure to hear, and 
 therefore I record it/ 
 
 A little later, in June 1844, he writes to his mother: 
 
 ' I preached my last University sermon yesterday. 
 I had great compliments. Gaisford and Dr. Hamp- 
 den, wonderful to relate, concur in their praises. 
 The subject was Unify, not Uniformity; an attempt 
 to persuade people to agree to differ, a rather delicate 
 subject ; but I am assured I handled the matter so 
 as not to appear a partisan, or to attack any persons 
 specially so the Dean says.' 
 
 He was naturally called upon to act as Public 
 Examiner; and in 1845 was elected White's 
 Professor of Moral Philosophy. In. the same year 
 
 1 Canon Ellacombe, who was examined by him for his B.A. 
 degree, heard his first University sermon. 'As he stood up he 
 looked the picture of firmness and almost defiance ; but I can re- 
 member the astonishment of the undergraduates when they saw 
 the evident nervousness of the man whom they so dreaded.'
 
 CH. n] Professor of Moral Philosophy 53 
 
 he became Censor ; and was also appointed by 
 Bishop Blomfield to the office of Whitehall Preacher. 
 In the following year he became Proctor. In 
 January 1846 he writes: 
 
 ' The Tutor next to me has a brother who has 
 turned Roman Catholic, and he is not quite clear of 
 suspicion ; so he has resigned his place, though he 
 declares that he has no intention of leaving the 
 Church. This throws all our arrangements into 
 confusion, and puts four new pupils into my hands, 
 so that in all I have no less than thirty-six. What 
 with the Professorship, and my Whitehall Sermons, 
 and lecturing these thirty-six, I shall have no easy 
 berth. And I fear with my Proctorship, an office 
 soon to come to me, it will be still worse.' 
 
 Of his work as Professor, Osborne Gordon, who 
 succeeded Liddell as Proctor, spoke with great 
 admiration in his Oratio Procuratoria. He men- 
 tioned the crowd of students who attended, and the 
 clearness with which the opinions of ancient Philo- 
 sophers were illustrated and explained in their 
 bearings on questions of modern days. Liddell 
 used to illustrate the Ethics by quotations from Jane 
 Austen's novels and other modern writings. 
 
 One more distinction must be recorded ; his 
 appointment in January 1846 as domestic Chaplain 
 to H.R.H. Prince Albert. On January 14 he wrote 
 to his sister : 
 
 ' You will be glad to hear that, on my return to 
 Oxford yesterday, I found a letter from Mr. G. 
 Anson, Secretary to Prince Albert, offering me the
 
 54 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 Prince's Chaplaincy vacated by the elevation of 
 Wilberforce to the Episcopal Bench. It is only an 
 Honorary appointment, i. e. there is no pay. Still it 
 is an honour, and the offer is conveyed in very hand- 
 some terms, for it speaks of my " eminent Academ- 
 ical and professional career" ; and says the Prince is 
 anxious to attach to his person " one who has kept 
 the even tenour of his way amid the perils by which 
 his path at Oxford was beset." So that I suppose 
 I may consider it as a sign that my name is not 
 unknown or unnoticed in high quarters. Also, Mr. 
 Anson was pleased to say that the Prince was anxious 
 that the appointment should not be merely nominal, 
 but that he wished sometimes to have personal com- 
 munication with his Chaplains, yet that the duties 
 would not be of such a kind as to infringe upon my 
 time/ 
 
 This appointment was the beginning of a gracious 
 friendship which ripened from year to year, as the 
 Prince learnt to appreciate more and more the sound 
 judgment and generous theological opinions of his 
 new Chaplain, He always showed cordial and 
 helpful sympathy with his subsequent work at 
 Westminster, paid frequent visits to the school, 
 and took a keen interest in the proposal for its 
 removal into the country, even visiting, in company 
 with the Headmaster, several sites which had 
 been suggested for its new home. The Queen, 
 it is not improper to state, shared her Consort's 
 feelings : their confidence in him was shown by 
 placing the Prince of Wales under his charge at 
 Oxford in 1859, as well as by many other marks
 
 CH. n] Whitehall Preacher 55 
 
 of Royal favour. In April 1846 he was for the 
 first time summoned to Windsor to preach before 
 the Court. 
 
 His sermons before the University and in the 
 Chapel Royal, Whitehall, attracted considerable 
 notice, from the grace of their diction, the dignity of 
 their delivery, and the calm and deliberate judgment 
 with which the fundamental truths of Theology were 
 brought into relation with the questions and needs 
 of the day. Liddell was never a popular preacher, 
 in the usual sense of the expression. He never 
 aimed at mere effect, he never studied to please his 
 audience, or engage their attention by rhetorical arts. 
 His language was always severely simple, but never 
 lacking stateliness and beauty. He was rarely, 
 if ' ever, controversial ; he desired to go beyond 
 controversy, and exhibit Divine Truth in a more 
 exalted relation. And at Whitehall, in those days, 
 an opportunity was afforded of speaking on weighty 
 topics to a congregation singularly well adapted to 
 encourage the preacher to put forth his very best. 
 It was customary for the Bishop of London, as Dean 
 of the Chapels Royal, to nominate two persons, one 
 from each of the old Universities, who held office 
 for a period of two years, and were responsible for 
 the bulk of the Sunday sermons. The Chapel was 
 the Banqueting Hall of the ancient Palace now 
 the United Services Museum fitted up, somewhat 
 incongruously, for Divine worship. A huge Royal 
 Pew faced the Pulpit, which was placed midway 
 along the Eastern side of the building, with reading
 
 56 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 desk and clerk's pew in front of it. There were 
 special sittings assigned to members of the two 
 Houses of Parliament, to Cabinet Ministers, and 
 the various Heads of Departments who occupied 
 official residences in Whitehall. Many distinguished 
 families also were then resident in that neighbour- 
 hood a district not as yet abandoned to clubs and 
 offices and had the privilege of seats in the Chapel ; 
 and the general public were not excluded. The 
 congregations, especially during the sessions of Par- 
 liament, were very large, and comprised many of the 
 foremost and ablest men of the day. Liddell was 
 fully equal to the task of preaching before so critical 
 an audience, and attracted great numbers to hear 
 him. He speaks more than once in his letters of 
 the large congregations many people standing 
 some even sent away ; of Peel and Canning among 
 his hearers ; and of requests by strangers to be 
 allowed to read the sermon just delivered. 
 
 Dean Boyle, in his Recollections, writes : 
 
 ' It was interesting to see Peel and some members 
 of his Government on Sundays at Whitehall Chapel, 
 listening attentively to the Oxford and Cambridge 
 preachers. H. G. Liddell, afterwards Dean of Christ 
 Church, preached once on the text " Stretch forth 
 thy hand." " One of the most remarkable sermons 
 I have ever heard," said Peel to a friend as he left 
 the Chapel ; and on my telling this to Mr. Packe, 
 then M.P. for Leicestershire (I think), he said, 
 " I daresay Sir Robert will put Liddell's name on 
 his Bishop's list ". '
 
 CH. n] Estimate of his Sermons 57 
 
 A comment in Liddell's handwriting adds : 
 
 1 1 am heartily glad Mr. Packe's prophecy was 
 
 not fulfilled. I hope I should have had resolution 
 
 enough to decline such an offer. I was quite unfit 
 to be a Bishop.' 
 
 Up to this time Liddell's career had been 
 one of uninterrupted progress and well-deserved 
 success. He was among the foremost of the 
 Oxford Tutors : he had gained a Professorship, 
 and was discharging its duties admirably, attract- 
 ing many graduates and undergraduates to his 
 official lectures : he was becoming very favour- 
 ably known as a preacher : and the publication 
 of the Lexicon in the summer of 1843 had won 
 for him the grateful approbation of every Greek 
 scholar, and had already made " Liddell and Scott " 
 a name full of awful meaning to every school- 
 boy. **' 
 
 It is interesting to read the estimate formed 
 of him at this time by his very intimate friend 
 Stephen Denison, who writes to Mr. Thomas Lyon 
 Fellowes in May 1845 : 
 
 ' As I know that Henry Liddell has confided 
 to you a secret (which I need not further par- 
 ticularize) I cannot resist taking the opportunity 
 of half an hour's leisure to say how very great 
 an interest I take in his success, and how ex- 
 tremely anxious I am that his hopes should be 
 realized ; and as you are so closely connected 
 with the object of his attachment, I believe you 
 will not think me impertinent in saying a few words 
 
 I -
 
 58 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 about one of the dearest friends I have in the 
 world. I have known him so long, and been so 
 very intimate with him, and under such very 
 peculiar circumstances, that I believe no man is 
 better authorized to speak of him than myself. 
 ... I have now known him about fifteen years 
 as intimately as possible ; and I have always 
 noted him down in my mind as the most nearly 
 " blameless " man I ever knew ; the most generous, 
 kind-hearted, amiable fellow, with a delicacy of 
 feeling and taste almost too refined for the rough 
 work of everyday life. I need not speak to 
 you or to any one of his intellectual powers : they 
 are known to all the literary world. But I may 
 say that I know no one with such abilities and 
 learning who is at the same time so modest and 
 unpretending. If an amiable, excellent, very clever 
 and accomplished man, highly connected, belong- 
 ing to a delightful family, having innumerable 
 friends, enjoying a reputation both for talent and 
 excellence rarely attained so early in life, and 
 whose prospects of advancement and honours are 
 the fairest that can be : if such a man can make 
 a woman happy, Henry Liddell is the man.' 
 
 This letter refers to an event which took place 
 early in 1845, and which soon changed the course 
 of his life and formed the prelude to more than fifty 
 years of domestic happiness, his engagement to be 
 married to Miss Lorina Reeve. It would be un- 
 becoming to dwell at length upon this occurrence, 
 and all that it involved. It is enough to insist, in 
 passing, upon the fact that no estimate of Liddell's 
 character would be complete which did not take
 
 CH. n] Engagement to be married 59 
 
 into account the brightness and helpfulness of his 
 domestic life in all its relations ; his devotion to 
 his wife and children ; the close bond of deep 
 mutual affection ; the prominent place they occu- 
 pied in all his thoughts and plans of usefulness. 
 The love which hitherto had been centred in his 
 parents and brothers and sisters, now without 
 losing its old objects gathered new ones for its 
 exercise, and received in turn strength and stead- 
 fastness from them ; and, in the joys of an almost 
 ideally refined and charming home, was found a 
 consecration of all labour, and a resting-place of 
 all ambition. 
 
 ' Be not ambitious,' he writes just after receiving 
 the appointment to the Royal Chaplaincy, ' desire 
 not high place for me. We shall be far happier 
 in a private station with a competency than with 
 dignity and wealth. I feel it to be so from the 
 bottom of my heart. Cares, occupation, troubles, 
 business, all sorts of things will interfere with the 
 placid and happy enjoyments of life. . . . Freedom, 
 contentment, sufficiency that is what we want. 
 More than this is " vanity and vexation of spirit ".' 
 
 The immediate effect of his engagement was 
 a resolution to leave the work at Christ Church, 
 and to seek some sphere of activity which a wife 
 could share. The College would miss him much. 
 Gaisford, in his quaint way, told Dr. Bull that 
 ' he was going to sustain a great loss ; that he 
 found that love and lexicography were not incom- 
 patible.' Liddell had determined to resign his 
 
 I 2
 
 60 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 various offices at Oxford in the summer of 1846, 
 at the end of the academical year, and was dis- 
 cussing future plans, when the offer by Dean 
 Gaisford of the Headmastership of Westminster 
 brought a happy solution of the question. 
 
 The offer was not wholly unexpected. Dr. 
 Williamson's resignation of the Headmastership, 
 after eighteen years' service, was rumoured in the 
 spring of 1846, and the nomination of his successor 
 rested absolutely with the Dean of Christ Church. 
 It was not likely that, when the choice had 
 to be made, Gaisford would prefer any one to 
 Liddell, whose claims were conspicuous, and for 
 whom the Dean had already on many occasions 
 shown his high regard. He was known to be 
 engaged to be married, and to be seeking fresh 
 work. The offer came on May 5. 
 
 ' This morning, after Chapel, the Dean called 
 me to follow him to his house, and without many 
 words told me that he had determined to propose 
 to me to become Headmaster of Westminster. 
 He said he did not wish for an immediate answer, 
 for there would probably be several questions I 
 would wish to ask before I determined.' 
 
 The matter had indeed been already privately 
 discussed between Liddell and his friend Saunders 
 of Charterhouse, and inquiries about the condition 
 of the school and the chief difficulties to be faced 
 had been made of the Rev. T. W. Weare, a 
 brother student, then Under- master at Westminster, 
 who was most anxious to secure Liddell for his
 
 CH. n] Westminster School in 1846 61 
 
 new chief. There were many questions to be con- 
 sidered. The numbers of the school had fallen 
 of late to between seventy and eighty, and 
 its ancient prestige had greatly declined. The 
 neighbourhood of the school was bad ; parents 
 preferred country schools ; and for these and other 
 reasons it had come to pass that the College and 
 the boarding-houses were only partly filled. The 
 school, moreover, had no property of its own, but 
 was dependent on the Dean and Chapter for all 
 its funds beyond a few small statutory allowances ; 
 and all money spent upon improvements dimin- 
 ished their income. There were three boarding- 
 houses, Grant's, Benthall's, and Scott's ; but these 
 were not Chapter or school property. They be- 
 longed to private owners who had bought them 
 on speculation when the school was flourishing, 
 and could only be re-purchased at a considerable 
 price. In two of them, no master lived, and the 
 discipline was under very imperfect control. The 
 forty Queen's Scholars were lodged in the College, 
 and were more or less under the supervision of 
 the Under-master, who occupied the adjoining 
 house : but, as the Queen's Scholars were always 
 elected from the town boys, who, with the ex- 
 ception of a very few day boys, were the occupants 
 of the boarding-houses, it was clear that if the 
 College was to be in a satisfactory state, the condi- 
 tion of the boarding-houses must be first looked to. 
 The teaching staff, moreover, was very small 
 and ineffective. The Headmaster took the highest
 
 62 Life at Christ Church [CH. n 
 
 Forms, the Vllth and Vlth. The whole of the 
 Lower School was taught by the Under-master. 
 The intermediate Forms were in the hands of 
 three Ushers, two of whom were ' old stagers/ 
 
 'The Shell Usher' (writes Canon Rich, who 
 was Captain in Williamson's last days) ' was rather 
 a jolly old fellow, but he got very little out of 
 his Form ; and sham exercises were often given 
 up on the chance of their not being looked at. 
 The Usher of the Vth was certainly a clever man, 
 but I am not sure that he was a good teacher.' 
 
 There were no Class-rooms, except the Library, 
 where the Headmaster taught his boys. The 
 rest of the work was all done amid the publicity 
 and noise of the big schoolroom. In College there 
 was but one spacious chamber, the long Dormitory, 
 used day and night, for study and sleep, by the 
 forty Queen's Scholars. 
 
 It was clear that the new Headmaster would 
 have to make many changes, and offend many 
 prejudices, if he were to bring the school up to 
 a decent level. Liddell had a high conception of 
 efficiency, and a brilliant reputation to sustain, and 
 he was determined not to accept the Mastership 
 unless he came to some clear understanding with 
 the Dean and Chapter, and knew exactly what 
 to expect from them. Fortunately Dr. Buckland, 
 who had lately succeeded Samuel Wilberforce as 
 Dean of Westminster, was equally anxious to effect 
 improvements ; and as he was at this time still a 
 Canon of Christ Church, Liddell was able to consult
 
 CH. ii] Offered Westminster Headmastership 63 
 
 him at once, on the very day on which the Dean's 
 offer was made. 
 
 ' I met Buckland by appointment, and walked 
 three times round the meadow with him, discuss- 
 ing the whole subject. He told me freely all 
 that it was intended to do, and all that I might 
 expect from the Chapter. He said they were 
 going to make a thorough reform of the whole 
 management of the institution ; that means might 
 be devised for getting rid of two Ushers who 
 at present interfere with all prospects of improve- 
 ment ; that all Old Westminsters with whom he 
 had spoken the Archbishop of York, Lord Gran- 
 ville Somerset, &c. had expressed their hopes 
 that I should be appointed ; that Sir Robert Peel 
 and Sir James Graham both desired it ; and 
 that all Westminsters confessed that they had no 
 man of their own who could hope to restore the 
 College to its ancient glories. The present emolu- 
 ments are ^600 or ^700 a year. The house is 
 very good, he says, but no one can live in it 
 under ;i,ooo a year; and as the Dean himself 
 cannot keep a carriage, of course a Prebendary 
 cannot, nor the Master, unless he has a private 
 fortune.' 
 
 Liddell was naturally not without perplexity; if 
 he took the post, it would be necessary to have 
 a clear promise from the Chapter, as to ways and 
 means ; he would be obliged to supersede some of 
 the Ushers, a painful task ; and to get effective 
 control over the boarding-houses. But all this 
 was so far satisfactorily settled, or in the way of
 
 64 Life at Christ Church 
 
 settlement, that before the end of May he felt 
 himself able to write to his future wife : 
 
 ' I have seen Dean Buckland, and have accepted 
 the terms offered. It is now publicly known that 
 I am Archididascalus Westmonasteriensis elect. I 
 have been already congratulated by several Old 
 Westminsters with warm wishes for my success. . . . 
 And so, now, it is all settled, and a heavy weight 
 is off my mind, though I have taken a heavy yoke 
 upon my neck. At least, there will be some very 
 disagreeable work to begin with. But I have made 
 up my mind to begin in earnest, and go through 
 with it.' 
 
 At the close of the Summer Term he left Christ 
 Church. His marriage took place at the end of 
 July, and, after a short holiday in North Wales, he 
 settled down to his new and arduous task.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 THE LEXICON 
 
 THE Lexicon was the great work of Liddell's 
 life. It was begun while he and Robert Scott were 
 still Bachelors of Arts, perhaps as early as 1834. 
 After many years of arduous labour, it was published 
 in the summer of 1843. But that date marks the 
 completion of only the first stage in an undertaking 
 which was continued almost to the close of his life ; 
 the eighth edition being published, after careful 
 revision, in 1897. The Lexicon was his constant 
 companion in Term and in Vacation. His spare 
 moments were regularly devoted to the task of 
 revising, correcting, and enlarging its pages, and 
 bringing it up to the level of advancing scholarship. 
 For many years with Scott as his coadjutor, and then 
 for many years unaided, he continually endeavoured 
 to make the bulky volume as perfect as possible : 
 and to this unremitting care is due the permanent 
 success of the work. There has been no room for 
 a rival : it has never become out of date. 
 
 It cannot now be ascertained to what cause the 
 
 K
 
 66 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 book owed its origination. The simplest account 
 is that it was due to a request from Talboys, the 
 well-known Oxford publisher, for whose firm it was 
 undoubtedly at first undertaken. It is said that 
 Talboys first sounded Scott, who, after taking time 
 to consider the proposal, said that he would accept 
 it if Liddell would join with him. Talboys' death 
 led to its ultimate publication by the University 
 Press. There is, however, a tradition that the 
 authors were first encouraged to their task by 
 the suggestion of William Sewell, then Fellow of 
 Exeter and a leading Oxford Tutor, known after- 
 wards as Founder and third Warden of Radlev 
 
 j 
 
 College. Sewell is reported to have met Liddell 
 at a gathering of some Essay Club in Oxford, at 
 which the subject of Greek Lexicography was dis- 
 cussed, and to have urged him to undertake the 
 task of compiling a Greek-English Lexicon. Un- 
 doubtedly Sewell was well able to judge of the 
 ability of Liddell and Scott to perform such a work, 
 for he had but lately examined them both for their 
 Degree : and the need of a new Lexicon was 
 universally acknowledged. It is certain that Gais- 
 ford gave the writers constant encouragement : and 
 his own example would have been a powerful 
 incentive to the two young Students of Christ 
 Church. In a letter to Vaughan Liddell writes : 
 
 * Sewell thinks the Oxford mind is running too 
 much to pure Theology : if you think so too, and 
 also like him regret it, you will be glad to hear that 
 some of us are in all likelihood about to close an
 
 CH. in] Earlier Lexicons 67 
 
 engagement with Talboys for a Lexicon founded 
 chiefly on Passow; indeed I dare say it will be 
 nearly a translation. This sentence is rather 
 arrogant, for the "some of us," after all, is only 
 Scott and myself. At present you need say 
 nothing about it. The Dean encourages the 
 project very much, and has given us a number 
 of valuable hints.' 
 
 It is indeed a matter of surprise that such a 
 work had not already been done. We can scarcely 
 understand how without some such help the 
 average student in those days was able to fight 
 his way through Greek authors. Till a very few 
 years previously, there had been no such book as 
 a Greek-English Lexicon ; Greek was interpreted 
 to the English reader only through the medium 
 of the Latin tongue. One can still remember 
 Schrevelius, Hederic, and Scapula as the ultimate 
 authorities at school ; and formidable volumes they 
 were. Some poor attempts had been recently made 
 to provide a Greek-English Lexicon by Donnegan, 
 Dunbar, and Giles ; but none of these books was at 
 all adequate to the requirements of scholars : they 
 were unscientific in the treatment of words, and 
 suffered from lack of methodical arrangement, and 
 redundancy of English equivalents ; or else from 
 over-brevity. In Germany, however, a better type 
 of Lexicon had been published by F. Passow, based 
 upon the profound work of his elder colleague 
 Schneider. Schneider, who was Professor and 
 Chief Librarian at Breslau, .had, at the beginning 
 
 K 2
 
 68 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 of the century, issued a Greek-German Lexicon, 
 which he subsequently enlarged and improved. 
 This became the standard work in Germany. It 
 was a monument of industry and learning; but it 
 suffered from lack of methodical arrangement. It 
 was reserved for Passow, a pupil of Jacobs and 
 Hermann, and himself a Professor at Breslau, to 
 make use of the materials provided by Schneider, 
 and to exhibit them in orderly and instructive 
 arrangement. 
 
 ' His leading principle was to draw out, wherever 
 it was possible, a kind of biographical history of 
 each word, to give its different meanings in an 
 almost chronological order, to cite always the 
 earliest author in which a word is found thus 
 ascertaining, as nearly as may be, its original 
 signification and then to trace it downwards, 
 according as it might vary in sense and construc- 
 tion, through subsequent writers 1 .' 
 
 In order to carry out this plan, Passow spent his 
 first efforts upon Homer and Hesiod, and in sub- 
 sequent editions added an examination of the Ionic 
 prose of Herodotus; but his early death in 1833, 
 at the age of forty-six, prevented the completion 
 of a wider undertaking. 
 
 It was upon this work of Passow that the new 
 Oxford Lexicon was avowedly based : and in the 
 first three editions his name appeared on the title- 
 
 1 Quarterly Review, March 1835. From this article, and another 
 in March 1845, both, it is believed, from the pen of Mr. Fishlake, 
 much may be learnt about Greek lexicography.
 
 CH. in] Passows labours 69 
 
 page. But from the outset a vast amount of 
 additional work was found necessary. The Preface 
 to the first edition is now so little known that it 
 may be well to quote from it the authors' description 
 of the task which they undertook : 
 
 ' We at first thought of a translation of Passow's 
 work, with additions. But a little experience showed 
 us that this would not be sufficient. Passow indeed 
 had done all that was necessary for Homer and 
 Hesiod, so that his work has become a regular 
 authority in Germany for the old Epic Greek. But 
 he had done nothing further completely. For though 
 in the fourth edition he professes to have done 
 for Herodotus the same as for Homer, this is not 
 quite the case. He had done little more than 
 use Schweighauser's Lexicon which is an excellent 
 book, and leaves little of the peculiar phraseology 
 of Herodotus unnoticed, but is very far indeed from 
 being a complete vocabulary of the author. One of 
 us, accordingly, undertook to read Herodotus care- 
 fully through, adding what was lacking to the 
 margin of his Schweighauser. The other did 
 much the same for Thucydides. And between us 
 we have gone through the Fragments of the early 
 Poets, Lyric, Elegiac, &c., which were not in the 
 Poetae Minores of Gaisford ; as well as those of the 
 early Historic and Philosophic writers; and those of 
 the Attic, Tragic, and Comic Poets, which were 
 dispersed through Athenaeus, Stobaeus, &c. . . . 
 But besides all our own reading and collections, 
 we have made unfailing use of the best Lexicons 
 and Indexes of the great Attic writers Wellauer's 
 of Aeschylus, Ellendt's of Sophocles, Beck's of
 
 ^o The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 Euripides, Caravella's of Aristophanes, Ast's of 
 Plato, Sturz's of Xenophon, with Reiske's and 
 Mitchell's of the Attic Orators. The reader will 
 see by this that we have thrown our chief strength 
 on the phraseology of the Attic writers. We have 
 also sedulously consulted Bockh's Index to Pindar; 
 and for Hippocrates, who ought to be closely joined 
 with Herodotus, we have used Foesius' CEconomia, 
 with the references in the Index of the Oxford 
 Scapula. After the Attic writers, Greek under- 
 goes a great change ; which begins to appear 
 strongly about the time of Alexander. Aristotle's 
 language strikes us at once as something quite 
 different from that of his master Plato, though the 
 change of styles cannot be measured quite chrono- 
 logically : as, for instance, Demosthenes was con- 
 temporary with Aristotle ; yet his style is the purest 
 Attic. Here, as in painting, architecture, &c., there 
 are transition periods the old partly surviving, the 
 new just appearing. But the change is complete 
 in Polybius, with the later Historic writers, and 
 Plutarch. We have therefore not been anxious 
 to amass authorities from these authors, though we 
 have endeavoured to collect their peculiar words 
 and phrases. For Aristotle, we have used Sylburg's 
 Indexes, and those in the Oxford editions of the 
 Rhetoric and Ethics ; for Theophrastus, Schneider's 
 Index; for Polybius (of course) Schweighauser's 
 Lexicon; for Plutarch, Wittenbach's Index. Attic 
 phraseology revives more or less in Lucian ; but 
 for that reason most of his phrases have earlier 
 examples, though in some of his works (as the Verae 
 Historiae, Tragopodagra, Lexiphanes, &c.), many 
 new or rare words occur. We have taken them
 
 CH. in] Arrangement of the work 71 
 
 from Geel's Index to the edition of Hemsterhuis 
 and Reiz. But in these, and writers of a like 
 stamp, we have seldom been careful to add the 
 special reference, being usually content with giving 
 the name of the author. Another class of writers 
 belongs to Alexandria. We have not neglected 
 these. The reader will find the Greek of Theocritus 
 pretty fully handled ; and he will not turn in vain 
 to seek the unusual words introduced by the learned 
 Epic school of that city, Callimachus, Apollonius, &c., 
 or by that wholesale coiner Lycophron. We have 
 also been careful to notice such words as occur first, 
 or in any unusual sense, in the Alexandrian version 
 of the Old Testament, and in the New Testament. 
 We must not omit to mention, that in the first part, 
 viz., from B to K inclusive, we have been saved 
 much labour, and have very much enriched our 
 Lexicon, by consulting Hase and Dindorfs new 
 edition of Stephani Thesaurus. We only wish we 
 could have had their assistance for the whole.' 
 
 Such was the task undertaken by two young 
 men, who, though at the outset fairly at leisure, 
 soon found that they were able to devote to it 
 only those few hours of each day which could 
 be spared from other duties. Liddell, as we have 
 seen, became a College Tutor at the beginning 
 of 1836, and Scott won a Fellowship at Balliol 
 College in 1835, an< ^ after five years of residence 
 there accepted the College living of Duloe in 
 Cornwall, and settled down, as a married man, to 
 parochial work in that distant part of England. 
 He did not give up his share in the labour
 
 72 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 which they had jointly undertaken ; but the 
 separation rendered the work far less easy, and 
 a heavier portion of the burden was necessarily 
 thrown upon the partner resident in Oxford, within 
 reach of Oxford libraries and the Clarendon Press. 
 
 Passow had not only provided a solid foundation 
 for future workers, but he had also indicated 
 the true system on which a Lexicon should be 
 constructed; and among the many excellences 
 of the new Lexicon none was more remarkable 
 than its admirable and instructive arrangement. 
 Instead of the old and bewildering fashion of 
 grouping words, including compounds, under their 
 primitive forms (or forms supposed to be primitive), 
 a uniform alphabetical arrangement was adopted. 
 The uses of each word were traced from its sim- 
 plest and most rudimentary meaning to its various 
 derivative and metaphorical applications ; the steps 
 which connected these different shades of meaning 
 were clearly marked ; and each gradation was illus- 
 trated as far as possible historically, by apt quotations 
 from authors of successive dates *. For such a treat- 
 
 1 In a very interesting article in the Fortnightly Review of January 
 1899, Professor Max Miiller writes : 
 
 'The value of Liddell's Greek Dictionary consists in the consummate 
 sobriety of its author. There is never too much, and yet there is 
 hardly ever any essential meaning or any classical passage left out. 
 The various meanings assigned to each word seem to spring up in 
 regular succession, and we seldom find a Hysteron Proteron even 
 from a merely chronological point of view. Yet chronology is not the 
 only measure by which the stages or the growth of a word should be 
 determined, and the Dean's good sense has generally kept him on 
 the via media between a purely chronological and purely logical 
 arrangement of meanings.'
 
 CH. in] Qualifications needed for the work 73 
 
 ment of the language there were requisite not only 
 the guidance of a methodical and logical mind, and 
 a thorough knowledge of the principal Greek writers, 
 but also a perfect mastery of the English tongue, so 
 'as to select with readiness the appropriate renderings, 
 and to distinguish with nicety between the various 
 so-called synonyms. The illustrations chosen should 
 be sufficient, but not too numerous ; and so chosen 
 as to display the delicate transitions of signification. 
 To achieve this successfully, scholarship in the 
 fullest sense of the word was absolutely necessary, 
 together with a keen appreciation of idioms, of the 
 force of particles, and of those subtle distinctions 
 of phraseology with which Greek pre-eminently 
 abounds. To these high qualifications some 
 measure of philological and antiquarian knowledge 
 must be added ; and to accomplish the task, a dogged 
 perseverance, undaunted by delays and weariness. 
 Liddell, in one of his letters, expresses a longing for 
 the x a ^ K * vr *P' La of the grammarian Didymus, untired 
 by the drudgery of his monotonous toil. 
 
 The progress of the Lexicon is not often mentioned 
 in Liddell's correspondence; but occasional references 
 are found. He describes how Scott and he used to 
 meet in his rooms at the south-west corner of the 
 Great Quadrangle (Staircase in. 4) and work away 
 from seven till eleven each night, one holding the 
 pen, the other searching for authorities in books 
 and indexes which lay open on the table. On one 
 of these nights, in November 1838, Scott was late 
 in arriving, and excused himself on the plea that he 
 
 L
 
 74 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 had been engaged in the Fellowship election at 
 Balliol, and he added in a tone of satisfaction, ' We 
 have elected an undergraduate, by name Jowett.' 
 On another occasion Liddell writes : 
 
 ' The Lexicon has been in abeyance during Col- 
 lections, otherwise it has been going on reasonably 
 well ; but I rather shudder at the length of time it 
 imposes on us, more, certainly, than I had calculated 
 on. However, if we get through it, it will be 
 satisfactory to think (as I believe we shall have 
 good right to think) that we shall have performed 
 a very useful and much wanted work. But if any 
 one would appear who would undertake it, being 
 also competent thereto, I would not be loth to 
 resign my share, and make him a present of all 
 I have done hitherto.' 
 
 He resolutely gave up to the work all his Long 
 Vacations, with the exception of that which followed 
 his sister's death, and postponed his first visit to 
 Switzerland till after the publication of the book in 
 1843. As the printing advanced, the tie was closer ; 
 every page had to be carefully looked through and 
 every reference verified. In spite of the devoted 
 help of George Marshall, generously acknowledged 
 in the Preface, the labour was very severe. In 
 July 1842 he writes to Scott: 
 
 'You will be glad to hear that I have all but 
 finished Tl, that two-legged monster, who must in 
 
 ancient times have worn his legs a-straddle, 
 
 else he could never have strode over so enormous
 
 CH. Ill] 
 
 The monster 17 
 
 75 
 
 a space as he has occupied and will occupy in 
 Lexicons.' 
 
 He then draws a picture of the creature in human 
 form, and adds : 
 
 ' Behold the monster, as he has been mocking 
 my waking and sleeping visions for the last many 
 months/ 
 
 Later in the same Long Vacation he describes in 
 a letter to his sister his mode of life : 
 
 ' I get up at 5 every morning, work hard till 
 about 6.30 or 7, have a cup of coffee and bit of 
 bread, work hard till about n, have breakfast, 
 work hard till 2, go out with Vaughan or alone, 
 walking or skiffing, dine at 5, work a little at night, 
 and have tea (if any) with Vaughan, and go to bed 
 at 9.30. I have got through a good deal of work, and 
 hope that, as far as the Lexicon goes, I have broken 
 the neck of it. We are going merrily along, and 
 the printers, as well as myself, seem not a little 
 glad that we are nearer the end than the beginning.' 
 
 So the work gradually grew to its completion ; 
 and by the side of the larger Lexicon was being 
 
 L 2
 
 y6 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 prepared an abridgement for the use of schools, 
 which the Press for convenience sake desired to 
 print at the same time. This smaller volume was 
 entrusted wholly to the care of George Marshall, 
 who also took a heavy share of the laborious task 
 of verifying all passages quoted in the larger book. 
 Of the abridgement it is enough to quote the 
 emphatic testimony of the Quarterly Review that 
 it is ' by much the best manual for beginners that 
 has ever come from the press.' In the summer 
 of 1843 tne Lexicon was published. 
 
 'We send it forth,' wrote the authors in the 
 Preface, ' in the hope that it may in some wise 
 foster and keep alive the accurate study of the 
 Greek tongue ; that tongue which has been held 
 one of the best instruments for training the young 
 mind ; that tongue which, as the organ of Poetry 
 and Oratory, is full of living force and fire, abound- 
 ing in grace and sweetness, rich to overflowing ; 
 while for the uses of Philosophy it is a very model 
 of clearness and precision ; that tongue in which 
 some of the noblest works of man's genius lie 
 enshrined, works which may be seen reflected 
 faintly in imitations and translations, but of which 
 none can know the perfect beauty, but he who can 
 read the words themselves, as well as their inter- 
 pretation.' 
 
 ' We now dismiss our book,' they add at the 
 close of the Preface, ' with feelings of thankfulness 
 that we have had health and strength to bring 
 it to a close. We know well how far it is from 
 what it might be, from what we ourselves could 
 imagine it to be. But we hope that, by pains
 
 CH. in] Extracts from Preface 77 
 
 and accuracy, we have at least laid a good 
 foundation ; and we shall be ready to profit by 
 any criticisms that may be made upon it, whether 
 public or private. For the present we shall be 
 content if it shall in any sort serve that end of 
 which we spoke in the outset ; if, that is, it shall 
 tend to cherish or improve the accurate study 
 of the classical writers of Greece. We cannot 
 look for much more. For the writer of Dic- 
 tionaries, says Johnson in his Preface, has been 
 " considered not the pupil, but the slave of science, 
 the pioneer of literature, doomed only to remove 
 rubbish, and clear obstructions from the path 
 through which learning and genius press forward 
 to conquest and glory, without bestowing a smile 
 on the humble drudge that facilitates their pro- 
 gress." His labours have been compared to "those 
 of the anvil and the mine " ; or even worse, 
 
 Condendaque Lexica mandat 
 Damnatis, poenam pro poenis omnibus unam. 
 
 ' But our own great English Lexicographer, 
 who with his gloomy mind delighted to heap 
 reproaches upon himself, has himself also re- 
 moved much of that reproach by the noble work 
 which will carry his name wherever the English 
 tongue is spoken. And we at least are well 
 pleased to think that, if our book prove useful, 
 it has been our lot to follow, however humbly, 
 in the same career of usefulness that he chose 
 for his own.' 
 
 The Lexicon was received with the utmost favour, 
 and the demand for it exceeded the authors' expec- 
 tation. In 1845 Liddell reports that:
 
 j& The Lexicon [CH m. 
 
 ' Dindorf, a great German scholar, has written 
 a most complimentary letter to the chief printer, 
 saying that he now relinquishes all intentions of 
 undertaking a Greek-English Lexicon which he had 
 projected.' 
 
 But though so warmly and deservedly welcomed, 
 the work needed constant attention and unremitting 
 care in supervision, so that each successive edition 
 might mark a clear advance on the previous one. 
 Within nine months of the publication a second 
 edition was called for. This was issued in 1845, 
 a third in 1849; the fourth edition, in which the 
 name of Passow was omitted from the title-page, 
 was published in 1855 ; the two next editions were 
 in 1 86 1 and 1869. The seventh, embodying perhaps 
 the most important improvements of any, came 
 in January 1883; and in 1897, ten years after Scott's 
 death, and only a few months before Liddell himself 
 was called to his rest, the eighth edition was issued, 
 of the same bulk, and from the same plates, as the 
 previous edition, but containing many corrections, 
 and four pages of addenda and corrigenda l . Many 
 
 1 By the courtesy of the Delegates of the Clarendon Press, the 
 following information has been furnished as to the editions of the book. 
 
 The first edition was put to the press in March 1841, and was 
 published (3,000 copies) in 1843 at 42^. 
 
 The second edition (6,000 copies) in 1845, at the same price. 
 
 The third edition (6,000 copies) in 1849, at the same price. 
 
 The fourth edition (8,000 copies) in 1855, at 30^. 
 
 The fifth edition (10,000 copies) in 1861, at $is. 6d. 
 
 The sixth edition (15,000 copies) in 1869, at $6s. This was at the 
 time intended to be the final revision, and the number then printed 
 was calculated to last eleven years. 
 
 The seventh edition was revised by Liddell alone, and came out
 
 CH. in] The several editions 79 
 
 words were re-written, and many new words inserted 
 in the body of the work. And though he was then 
 in his 8 yth year, his handwriting was as clear as 
 in his younger days, and he took the same care with 
 the accentuation. 
 
 Throughout this long period of fifty-four years 
 the labour of improving the Lexicon was never 
 intermitted. Author after author was read through, 
 and careful references were made to every note- 
 worthy use of word or phrase ; the help of Indexes 
 thus gradually giving way to the actual perusal of 
 the whole text of the writers themselves. Even 
 Passow's laborious treatment of Homer was found 
 to be quite unsatisfactory. 
 
 'I regret/ wrote Liddell in 1853, 'to find how 
 much better the Lexicon might be ! I have been 
 going over the Homeric part, and find, alas ! many, 
 many errors both of sense and taste. I wish we 
 had at once seen that the best way was only to use 
 Passow as a convenience, and that all real work should 
 have been done by ourselves. It would have been 
 less labour in the end.' 
 
 And not only the Greek authors themselves, but 
 all the chief modern works dealing with the Greek 
 language had to be carefully examined. The new 
 
 in 1883, and electrotype plates were then taken. From these plates 
 additional copies were struck off in 1885, 1886, and 1890. 
 
 The eighth edition was ordered in 1895 and appeared in 1897. 
 The corrections are such only as could be introduced into the existing 
 electrotype plates. 
 
 Sir Henry Acland calculates that there are more than 20 million 
 letters, stops, and accents in the volume ; and this is confirmed by the 
 Controller of the Press.
 
 So The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 Paris edition of Stephani Thesaurus was, as it came 
 out, in constant use. Much help was afforded by 
 Rost and Palm's Greek-German Lexicon, and Dr. 
 Veitch's Greek Verbs, Irregular and Defective. The 
 etymological portion of the work was entirely re- 
 cast, with the help particularly of the writings of 
 Georg Curtius ; and in the later editions, as the 
 book was now widely circulated in America, Pro- 
 fessors Drislerof New York, Goodwin of Cambridge, 
 Massachusetts, and Gildersleeve of Baltimore, con- 
 tributed very valuable assistance throughout the 
 volume : Professor Drisler's name appearing on the 
 title-page of the American edition '. 
 
 So the life's work, or bye-work, went on ; an 
 engrossing occupation for spare moments in the 
 busy career at Westminster and Oxford, and a re- 
 creation in the retirement of Ascot. 
 
 ' I remember one day,' writes the Dean of Dur- 
 ham, ' having to call on Liddell on College business, 
 and was told that he was in the Library. Thither 
 I went to seek him, and found him seated in one of 
 the small rooms to the south. As I came in, he 
 looked up, with that kind look of his, and said, 
 " You have found me at the very end of a life's 
 
 1 ' Some of the old objectionable etymologies,' writes Professor Max 
 Miiller, ' have now been removed and replaced by others which are 
 supported by Curtius in his Grundziige der Griechischen Etymologic. 
 But such has been the progress of Comparative Philology since the 
 days of Curtius, such, more particularly, the improvement in the more 
 delicate handling of phonetic rules, that a careful revision by a young 
 scholar such as I was in the fifties and sixties would be very useful 
 even now, and would be highly appreciated by classical scholars, who 
 rightly recognize in every true etymology the pre-historic development 
 of Greek words and Greek ideas.' (Fortnightly Review, Jan. 1899.)
 
 CH. in] Liddell and Mr. Ruskin 81 
 
 task ; for I am writing the last sheet of the last 
 edition of the Lexicon which I shall undertake. 
 I shall henceforth leave it to others to correct, or 
 future editions may come out as I have left this one." 
 I said, he would miss it very much, such an old 
 friend ; and after my bit of business, I left him. 
 In the following October Term, I had again to 
 trouble him ; and hearing again that he was in the 
 Library, I found him busy on one of the sheets of 
 the lately issued edition, preparing already for the 
 next. I reminded him of what he had said, and 
 with a laugh he confessed that he could not keep 
 his hands off it ; that so many people had sent him 
 corrections and suggestions for the new edition, that 
 he felt he could not lay down the task. And so he 
 continued working steadily at it, I believe, down to 
 the very end.' 
 
 Sometimes Liddell's older friends, who had known 
 the range of his artistic tastes, and remembered the 
 rare promise of his younger days, were inclined to 
 regret that he had devoted so much of his life to the 
 drudgery of Lexicography. This regret is implied 
 in Mr. Ruskin's words already quoted, when he 
 speaks of ' the prosaic and practical element in him 
 having prevailed over the sensitive one/ and describes 
 him as 'a man sorrowfully under the dominion of the 
 Greek dvdyKri! When Liddell read those words, in 
 1886, he wrote to Mr. Ruskin as follows : 
 
 ' Your Christ Church Choir I have read with 
 much interest. It calls back old times and revives 
 the memory of many things. . . . As for myself, I have 
 to thank you for your kindly expressions. Kindly 
 
 M
 
 82 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 I call them, though I am sensible that, under the 
 kindliness, lies severe censure. But I think this 
 censure is based upon an over-estimate of my 
 umquhile capacities. To alter your phrase, I conceive 
 you to say that by bowing my neck under some kind 
 of dvdyKrj, I have become a Philistine instead of 
 becoming, as was possible, a true Israelite. Well, 
 I hope I am not an absolute Philistine. But I am 
 sure that I never could, with any success, have 
 attempted a way 
 
 qua me quoque possim 
 Tollere humo, victorque virura volitare per ora. 
 
 This, I suppose, is what you mean. 
 
 I None of us, in looking back, but must say with 
 old Samuel Johnson, " I have lived a life of which 
 I do not like the review." But this is different 
 from imagining that one might have done great 
 things instead of little. Enough of myself.' 
 
 To this Mr. Ruskin replied : 
 
 ' I am very grateful for your letter. What 
 was held back in my reference to you was chiefly 
 my own mortified vanity, at your praising other 
 people's lectures, and never mine ! and sorrow that 
 you kept dictionary making, instead of drawing trees 
 at Madeira in colour. 
 
 I 1 hope what further words may come, in after 
 times, as I go on, will not pain you ; though I was 
 very furious about the iron railing through Christ 
 Church meadow. 
 
 ' Ever your affectionate pupil, 
 
 'JOHN RUSKIN.' 
 
 The publication of the Lexicon gave a respite 
 from incessant occupation ; and in the Long Vacation
 
 CH. in] First Visit to Switzerland 83 
 
 of 1843 Liddell paid his first visit to Switzerland. 
 His impressions of Swiss scenery are recorded in 
 two letters. To his sister Charlotte he writes from 
 Thun : 
 
 ' Here I am, rather unexpectedly, in the midst 
 of the most beautiful scenery that I ever saw, more 
 beautiful than I ever conceived. To-day it is 
 slightly raining, and the high Alps are wrapt in 
 clouds. But yesterday morning was bright and 
 clear, and the chain of the Bernese Alps stood sharp 
 against the sky the Jungfrau, Wetterhorn, and 
 all the rest dazzling one with their everlasting 
 snow. We went up the lake in a steamer to Inter- 
 laken and got up to a height which commands the 
 lake of Brienz, where we were some twelve English 
 miles nearer to the high mountains. But it is not 
 near so beautiful a scene as from my bedroom 
 window at this place : and verily I bless God for 
 having made so fair a scene. ... I long to see an 
 Alpine pass and glacier. But the days are gone 
 when I should have eagerly climbed every height, 
 and thought each day wasted in which I had not 
 walked twenty or thirty miles. I feel that one 
 ought to come to Switzerland at a much earlier 
 time of life than I have done, at a time when one 
 is more alive to the wondrous scenes of Nature, the 
 rock, the mountain, and the flood, when one's health 
 and body are more fresh and vigorous, and one is less 
 alive to petty annoyances. However, I will not 
 complain, and I am glad to find that, though my 
 hair is falling off and going grey, I yet feel much 
 of youthful ardour and freshness return when I 
 breathe this fresh and sparkling air, and look on 
 
 M 2
 
 84 The Lexicon [CH. m 
 
 these scenes which are all Nature's own, and bid 
 defiance to man's art to alter them.' 
 
 To Scott he wrote later : 
 
 ' Tell Mrs. Scott that I cannot less well appreciate 
 the scenery of Cumberland and Westmoreland from 
 having been in Switzerland. Indeed I am pleased 
 to find that really beautiful scenery interests one 
 the more, the more one sees. It is not the actual 
 scale, but the relative proportions and colour, and 
 a thousand nameless things, that make beautiful 
 scenery. If she challenges me to say that Cumber- 
 land is as sublime as Switzerland there I must 
 demur. To be in the heart of the Bernese Alps 
 (much finer they, me judice, than Mont Blanc), to 
 see and hear avalanches " momently falling," to 
 look on real peaks, thousands of feet above you, 
 when you are yourself at twice the elevation of any 
 Cumberland hill, shining in the smoothest, brightest, 
 purest covering of eternal snow in relief against 
 a dark-blue sky, or at sunset passing through a 
 hundred hues, from pure white through the grada- 
 tions of yellow, orange, roseate red (a quite 
 indescribable colour so delicate, so rich), and then 
 again fading into silver white, heightened by the 
 moonbeams : this, with all their beauties of form 
 which the pencil cannot give, far less words, renders 
 the Bernese Alps from the Faulhorn the sublimest 
 scene I ever hope to see.' 
 
 It is strange that, possessing so keen a sense for 
 the beauties of Nature, and so deep a love for 
 History and Art, Liddell very rarely travelled
 
 CH. m] Swiss Scenery 85 
 
 abroad. After his marriage, he seldom left England, 
 except under Doctor's orders. He visited Athens 
 only once, when he was cruising in the Mediter- 
 ranean for his health ; and, more strange still, he 
 never visited Rome, though his Roman History 
 seems to show close familiarity with its topography.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 HEADMASTERSHIP OF WESTMINSTER, 1846-55 
 
 IN entering upon his work at Westminster in 
 September 1846, Liddell began a very important 
 period of his life, comprising many successes indeed, 
 but many grave cares and anxieties. 
 
 He brought his bride to their new home in 
 the ancient low-roomed house on the east side of 
 Dean's Yard, adjoining the archway which leads into 
 Little Dean's Yard. This house had originally 
 formed part of the Prior's lodgings, but had for 
 long been assigned to the Headmaster, and its walls 
 were hung with the portraits of former occupants, 
 including the famous antiquary Camden, who had 
 been Headmaster in Elizabeth's reign, 1593-99. 
 Since that distant time, no one had been chosen for 
 the Headmastership who had not been educated at 
 the school ; and the selection of a non- Westminster 
 was an innovation which, though admitted to be 
 necessary, was a severe shock to the venerable 
 traditions of the place. All the chief school build- 
 ings, as well as the Headmaster's house, were part
 
 School Buildings 87 
 
 of the ancient Abbey, lying close against it on its 
 southern side. The schoolroom was formed out of 
 a portion of the Monks' dormitory; the Abbot's 
 refectory was the dining-hall of the forty Queen's 
 Scholars. They had in olden times been lodged in 
 the Abbey granary, but had been transferred in 
 1732 to a new dormitory, begun while Atterbury 
 was Dean, from a design furnished by the Earl of 
 Burlington based upon an earlier design of Wren's, 
 which stretched along the western side of the 
 Infirmary garden. The cloister garth was the boys' 
 fighting green ; the Abbey was their chapel. The 
 school was without property of its own, and was 
 entirely dependent on the Dean and Chapter, who 
 were not accustomed to be over-generous, or to 
 spend much anxious thought upon the special 
 requirements of the boys. The neighbourhood was 
 bad ; and, to reach the chief playground in Vincent 
 Square an open space of about ten acres many 
 low streets had to be traversed. The river indeed 
 provided a place for recreation not yet rendered 
 perilous by crowded steamboat traffic ; but the 
 Thames then received the whole drainage of London, 
 and its tidal waters were by no means without their 
 drawbacks. 
 
 Liddell was encouraged by a cordial welcome from 
 all persons connected with the school, and his own 
 reputation augured well for the success of his rule. 
 Buckland, but lately made Dean, was, as we have 
 seen, most ready to back him to the utmost in all 
 that he attempted, and was himself profoundly
 
 88 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 dissatisfied with the existing state of the school. 
 Arthur Stanley describes a conversation with 
 Buckland in the previous January, as they were 
 travelling down to Oxford together: 
 
 ' He talked a great deal and very sensibly about 
 the reform of Westminster School, the abuses of 
 which he described at great length, particularly in 
 the physical department counterpanes in the dormi- 
 tory not washed for eleven years, school not cleaned 
 since Queen Elizabeth died, tyranny and cruelty 
 among the boys, three of whom he had been instru- 
 mental in expelling. All this he meant thoroughly 
 to look into, and thought of writing a pamphlet on 
 the subject, and made me give him a detailed 
 account of great parts of the system at Rugby.' 
 
 In Mrs. Gordon's Life of Buckland, the College is 
 thus described : 
 
 1 Buckland found that Dean Atterbury's dormitory, 
 after over a hundred years' use as bedroom, sitting- 
 room, and playroom, was in a most dismal condition, 
 with the walls blackened by smoke, and here and 
 there hung with moth-eaten green baize curtains ; 
 the tables and lockers seamed and scarred in all 
 directions ; and the floor . Taking his children to 
 see the place, their father asked, "Well, children, 
 what 's this floor like ? " The answer was prompt, 
 " The fossil ripple-marks in our hall at home." 
 [A fossil slab of ripple-marks now in the Oxford 
 Museum.] The floor was only cleaned once a year, 
 so that its rough surface was not to be wondered at, 
 as the boys did a great deal of cooking there amongst 
 their other diversions.'
 
 CH. iv] Changes on the Staff 89 
 
 Many of the Chapter too, if not all, shared the 
 Dean's sympathy with reforms, and Liddell speaks 
 particularly of the sub-Dean, Lord John Thynne : 
 
 ' Who is a real gentleman (as they say in Ireland), 
 a most agreeable, kind, good man, who will do all 
 that lies in his power to promote the good of the 
 school and my wishes.' 
 
 The great body of Old Westminsters also desired 
 to encourage the new Headmaster; and the entries 
 of new boys were eminently satisfactory. But the 
 task before him was not an easy one. 
 
 ' I shall have to begin,' he writes, ' with some 
 very unpleasant business. I shall have to turn off 
 people who consider themselves excellent servants 
 of the College. I shall have to make myself many 
 enemies. But nothing can be done without this. 
 I shall have the concurrence and support of all 
 Westminsters whose opinions are worth having. 
 I shall be warmly seconded by Buckland and Weare, 
 and by all the electors, so I shall, in reliance on all 
 this favour, boldly throw down the gauntlet, and 
 make a clean sweep.' 
 
 The existing ushers gave place to new men of 
 Liddell's own choice, all of whom were admirably 
 fitted for their posts ; the Rev. Stephen J. Rigaud, 
 a double First Class man and Fellow of Exeter 
 College, the Rev. James Marshall, of Christ Church, 
 and the Rev. B. F. James, of Exeter College. 
 Rigaud five years later became Headmaster of 
 Ipswich School, and afterwards Bishop of Antigua. 
 Mr. James spent the whole "of his working life at 
 
 N
 
 90 Headmaster ship of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 the school, and died soon after his retirement. 
 Mr. Marshall remained at his post for nearly thirty 
 years, and still possesses, in the dutiful affection of 
 many generations of Westminster men, their grateful 
 appreciation of a very noble ideal of faithful service 
 and pure and lofty aims. With such assistants 
 many changes, which would otherwise have been 
 difficult, were made comparatively easy. Stricter 
 discipline and more industry were enforced ; the 
 work of the Forms was re-cast ; proper provision was 
 made for the teaching of French and Mathematics, 
 and Wordsworth's Greek Grammar and Edward VI's 
 Latin Grammar took the place of the antiquated 
 Westminster manuals. 
 
 The Under-master, the Rev. Thomas W. Weare, 
 cordially welcomed all improvements. He had been, 
 as has been said, a fellow-student of Liddell's at 
 Christ Church, and his lengthened experience of 
 Westminster, as boy and master, gave a special 
 value to his advice and assistance. To him belonged 
 by custom the entire management of the College ; 
 and it was his wish to co-operate with his new chief in 
 introducing such changes as would adapt the College 
 life to modern requirements without impairing its 
 ancient autonomy. Two great blows had recently 
 been aimed at its traditions by Samuel Wilberforce, 
 during his short reign as Dean, and both had been 
 parried. He had proposed that a master should reside 
 actually in the College building, so as to live among 
 the Queen's Scholars, and to exercise a constant 
 check upon their independence. Such an intruder
 
 CH. iv] Improvements to Dormitory 91 
 
 would have found himself stirring a hornets' nest. 
 Wilberforce had also made a determined effort to 
 abolish the Latin Play; but this had been met by 
 a unanimous protest from the whole body of Old 
 Westminsters, addressed to Dean Buckland soon 
 after his appointment. Reforms such as these, 
 dictated by a spirit unfamiliar with the ^0o? of 
 a Public School, would have no place in the plans 
 of the new Headmaster and his colleague the Under- 
 master. But they heartily supported the Dean and 
 Chapter in their proposal, already made in June 
 1846, to carry out certain structural alterations in 
 the College building. Below the great Dormitory, 
 the only home of the Queen's Scholars by day and 
 night, there was a spacious cloister, inaccessible to 
 the boys, but open to the College garden, and used 
 by members of the Chapter and their families as 
 a sheltered walk, or a serviceable tea-room at garden 
 parties. This area it was now proposed to enclose, 
 and to form within it large rooms which would afford 
 proper accommodation as day quarters for the 
 Queen's Scholars. The Dean and Chapter were 
 not willing to advance the necessary funds for this 
 improvement, but they issued an appeal to Old 
 Westminsters and others ; and within a short time 
 the new rooms were constructed, and a Sanatorium 
 was also built at the south end of the College, con- 
 taining adequate provision for sickness, and a home 
 for a resident Matron, who was to look after the boys' 
 linen, and tend them when on the sick list. This was 
 a vast improvement. Hideous indeed was the Sana- 
 
 N 2
 
 92 Headmasters/tip of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 torium, and hideous and gloomy beyond words were 
 the new apartments of the College. Buckland had 
 no aesthetic sensibilities, and was fond of corrugated 
 iron ; and it was thought fair that if the boys in- 
 habited the cloister, they should at least be deprived 
 of the privilege of a sight of the green grass and 
 stately plane-trees of the garden. The windows 
 of the new rooms were accordingly placed high up, 
 and were glazed with an opaque substance which 
 excluded even the sky. They were prison cham- 
 bers ; but the boys became accustomed to them, 
 and they led at once to the disuse of the Dormitory 
 as a day room. Liddell's own sense of what was 
 beautiful or decorous must have caused him many 
 a sigh over such ugly and mean quarters. In the 
 College Hall, too, the ancient open fire in the centre 
 of the floor, its smoke escaping through the louvre 
 in the roof, gave place to a square iron erection of 
 a singularly inartistic character, which however had 
 one decided merit, in that it provided two clear 
 and bright fires admirably adapted for the making 
 of toast. Many were the laments of the boys over 
 the abolition of the old fire-place : but when about 
 forty years later this iron structure was in its turn 
 replaced by a more worthy successor, it had so far 
 established itself in the affections of the boys that 
 its loss was the theme of plaintive epigrams at the 
 Election dinner. ' Ah,' said Liddell to his neigh- 
 bour as he sat there as Elector, ' they lament its 
 loss now: but you should have heard how they 
 abused me when it was first put up ! '
 
 CH. iv] Life in the College 93 
 
 The great schoolroom, also, many years after 
 worthily restored, was now stripped of its ancient 
 benches, picturesque in their decay, and hewn and 
 hacked by the knives of many generations, and in 
 their place was fitted spick and span modern oak 
 furniture with iron supports, supplied at small cost 
 from the neighbouring depot of the National Society. 
 It was very ugly, but much more convenient for 
 Form-work. 
 
 The life of the boys within the walls of College 
 had been from time immemorial very independent. 
 Authority was in the hands of the ten ' Seniors,' 
 the Captain and three monitors at their head. 
 There were curious customs of all sorts, many of 
 them unsatisfactory survivals, and the life was 
 rough ; and for the ten junior boys, who were 
 Fags, not only rough but hard. Most of the 
 menial offices of the College were performed by 
 them, and little time was left for their school work. 
 The allowance for the food of the Queen's Scholars 
 was so inadequate that they paid a considerable 
 sum each Term for breakfasting at the boarding- 
 houses, and a great deal of evening cooking went 
 on at the three fires in the long Dormitory. These 
 evil economies were now to a great extent abolished ; 
 proper meals were provided in the Hall, and ad- 
 ditional service, the latter indeed at the expense of 
 the boys, or rather of their parents. An annual 
 charge was also made in the bills for the improve- 
 ments to the College buildings, till the whole expense 
 was paid off. This tax outlasted Liddell's time.
 
 94 Headmaster ship of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 It will be well to insert here an account of the 
 new Headmaster's work at Westminster, from 
 the pen of the Rev. James Marshall, who writes 
 with an authority and knowledge possessed by 
 him alone. It gives a very interesting picture 
 of Liddell's position, and an appreciative estimate 
 of his character : 
 
 'When Mr. Liddell came to Westminster, the 
 school, as is well known, was at a very low ebb. 
 There were even vacancies in College for want 
 of a sufficient number of boys qualified by con- 
 tinuance in the school to make up the statutable 
 complement of forty. Mr. Liddell had from the 
 first caused it to be fully understood that he would 
 only accept the Headmastership on the express 
 condition that he should bring his own assistant- 
 masters. Irritation was naturally to be expected 
 on the part of the gentlemen who retired, and 
 of their many and warm friends. Some disquiet 
 from this cause was also more widely spread. The 
 Old Westminsters were a manly, warm-hearted, 
 outspoken body of gentlemen and scholars, devoted 
 to their school, and jealous of its traditions ; a little 
 exclusive, perhaps, from a genuine doubt whether 
 anything outside Westminster could equal what 
 was within it. 
 
 ' I am glad of the opportunity of acknowledging 
 one very kindly and characteristic tradition. At 
 the annual dinner of the Old Westminsters it was 
 the custom to invite the Masters as guests. It 
 was also the custom, on that occasion, for those 
 Masters who were clergymen, to wear cassock and 
 bands, and the pudding-sleeved gown. We edified
 
 CH. iv] Mr. Marshall's Letter 95 
 
 the passers-by in St. James' Street by stepping 
 across the pavement in this guise, and passing into 
 the Thatched House, where we dined in the room 
 of the Kitcat Club. 
 
 ' This important constituency welcomed a Head- 
 master of such high academical distinction, of such 
 weight of personal character, and, I think I must 
 add, of such a presence ; but were at the same time 
 somewhat dismayed at seeing that four out of the 
 five Masters were non- Westminster men. The Old 
 Westminsters were not free from the inconsistencies 
 that are usually found in large and irresponsible 
 bodies. They were anxious for improvement, and 
 at the same time nervously alarmed lest any actual 
 step taken in that direction should impair the 
 characteristic spirit of the school. Their attitude 
 therefore, or at least the attitude of many of their 
 number, was one of watchfulness rather than of 
 unreserved confidence. 
 
 ' Meantime, the criticisms on the Dean and 
 Chapter were free and frequent, and sometimes 
 bitter. This criticism the Abbey authorities 
 naturally resented. They were willing to do all 
 that they thought could fairly be required of them. 
 Dean Buckland in particular entered con amore into 
 the plan of structural alterations designed for the 
 better accommodation of the Queen's Scholars. But 
 they were plainly determined to resist indefinite 
 encroachments on the part of the school : and with 
 some reason, for a school, be it where it may, has 
 a capacious maw which is not easily satisfied. 
 
 ' The new Headmaster felt his position very 
 keenly ; the more so, perhaps, because his personal 
 influence at Oxford had been unquestioned and
 
 g6 Headmaster ship of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 extraordinarily great. He was fully alive to his 
 responsibilities, and grieved that, in discharge of 
 them, he was sometimes forced to run counter to 
 the feelings and opinions of men whose regard he 
 valued and whose position he respected. He was 
 by no means one who wore his heart upon his 
 sleeve ; but once, in course of conversation, with 
 a very resolute, but at the same time a sadly 
 pained expression, he took upon his lips the words 
 " I have set my face like a flint." 
 
 ' This prejudice was gradually but not slowly 
 dissipated. The restoration of the Play had a very 
 reassuring effect. It had been intermitted in 1846, 
 and a question had been raised about its continuance 
 in future. This was set at rest by Dean Buckland's 
 answer to a memorial presented by the Marquis 
 of Lansdowne, and signed by nearly all the Old 
 Westminsters then living. Accordingly in December 
 1847, Hervey Vaughan Williams, the Captain, in his 
 dress as Queen's Scholar, with the usual courtly 
 addition of knee-breeches and silk stockings, stepped 
 forward on the Dormitory stage to tender the new 
 Headmaster a greeting in the old well-recognized 
 form. And when, in the Prologue, he thus struck 
 the dominant note 
 
 Gaudere multos, qui nuric audiunt, puto, 
 Quod prodit in scenam iterum nostra fabula ; 
 Gaudemus et nos ; anno namque proximo 
 Omissa multos terruit, baud iniuria : 
 
 the burst of applause which followed ; the pleasurable 
 excitement or rather enthusiasm shown by so many 
 refined and intelligent faces ; and, in the older men, 
 the look of kindly encouragement for boyhood, made 
 up a scene not soon to be forgotten by those who 
 witnessed it.
 
 CH. iv] Increase of Numbers 97 
 
 ' Prince Albert, to whom Mr. Liddell was domestic 
 Chaplain, was present at a fourth special representa- 
 tion of this Play, and afterwards at that of 1851. 
 
 ' The school increased in numbers and was in 
 a fair way of recovering its old connexion. Many, 
 some of high rank, several of great distinction, again 
 sent sons to their old school. It was seen that 
 Mr. Liddell, though not an Old Westminster, was 
 in the best sense of the term a Public School man ; 
 and that, while he would prune unsparingly erratic 
 and mischievous growths, he would leave untouched 
 the free, manly, and honourable stock of the Public 
 School spirit. He was too wise a man to sacrifice 
 a use because of an abuse. 
 
 ' The tide continued for some time steadily to 
 rise ; but counteracting forces came gradually into 
 play. It is worthy of the great position formerly 
 occupied by the school that the checks to its 
 prosperity should be closely connected with the 
 great movements of national thought. 
 
 ' One of these, which is still in full force, had 
 already made itself felt in Reform, Catholic Emanci- 
 pation, and Free Trade. 'The "Spirit of the Age," 
 which with the "March of Intellect" was a phrase 
 much in vogue at that time, was emphatically one 
 of inquiry. That a thing had been was no pre- 
 sumption that it should be. In that respect the age 
 might be represented by Dr. Arnold, of whom it 
 was said that he always awoke in the morning with 
 the idea that everything was an open question. 
 This was actually the case at Westminster School 
 from the time of Mr. Liddell's appointment. Every- 
 thing connected with it was a subject of discussion 
 with a view to possible alteration or abolition. The 
 
 o
 
 98 Head master ship of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 subjects and mode of instruction, the discipline, the 
 constitution of the College, the relation of the school 
 to the Chapter, to the Universities, and to the Public, 
 were all in their turn brought under the microscope, 
 and had to await the result of the scrutiny ; and, 
 to crown all, it was extremely doubtful whether 
 Westminster School was to remain at Westminster, 
 or to migrate to another site. All these uncertain- 
 ties were perfectly well known in London, and 
 consequently among the boys. This knowledge 
 made discipline none the more easy, and would 
 have had a very prejudicial effect, but for the 
 cordial union among the Masters, a union which 
 was naturally based on the warm regard and high 
 admiration which was felt by all for their chief. 
 All wise policy for a School, as for a State, must be 
 far-sighted. It was impossible to plan for the future, 
 when all the elements which entered into the com- 
 bination might be swept away at six months' notice. 
 ' There is no doubt that Mr. Liddell chafed against 
 these limitations, which in every direction hampered 
 his designs. He was a strong man with his hands 
 tied. But no sign of impatience appeared. There 
 was no cooling of his interest in the boys, no 
 diminution of the care with which he superintended 
 the work of the school or discharged his own 
 special office of the teaching of the Sixth Form. 
 Of the manner of that teaching I naturally had no 
 experience ; I can only speak of results. Boys used 
 to pass from my Form into the Sixth. Occasionally 
 their answers to examination questions would pass 
 through my hands ; and I have noticed how boys' 
 minds have been enriched by even a short period 
 of intercourse with the Headmaster.
 
 CH. iv] Impediments to Progress 99 
 
 ' For the school in general a system of periodical 
 examinations was devised and gradually developed 
 under Mr. Liddell and his successor, till it became 
 theoretically almost perfect. Practically fewer papers 
 and questions, and greater strictness in exacting 
 answers, would perhaps have been better for the 
 lower Forms. The arrangement was such that 
 favouritism was impossible ; and, after the minute 
 and unsparing criticism of the Public School Com- 
 mission of 1864, there was no question of the justice 
 with which the boys had been classified or elected 
 into College or to the Universities ; nor, it may be 
 added, a hint that a single shilling of the funds 
 administered by the school authorities had been 
 misapplied. Meantime every idea of material im- 
 provement was met by a non possumus. The 
 restoration of the ample and nobly proportioned 
 schoolroom, the provision of class-rooms, and an 
 almost unique school Library and adjuncts, works 
 which have since been so successfully carried out, 
 could not even be attempted while the tenure of 
 the school was uncertain, and while there was no 
 arbitrament possible between the claims of the 
 school and Chapter on one another. It was some- 
 times forgotten that the Dean and Chapter were 
 Trustees for their own body as well as for the 
 school. Unfair judgments were passed upon them. 
 When the school was empowered to manage its 
 own affairs, it was found that the service of the 
 Queen's Scholars in Hall could not be conducted 
 on the same lavish scale as before. 
 
 ' The second great movement which impeded 
 the prosperity of the school was the attention 
 which began to be paid to matters affecting the 
 
 o 2
 
 ioo Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 health of individuals and the public. The Duke 
 of Buccleuch's Sanitary Commission, which was 
 favoured by Prince Albert and Sir Robert Peel, 
 reported in 1844, two years before Mr. Liddell came 
 to Westminster. There was a growing feeling in 
 favour of the country in preference to town for the 
 residence of boys. The feeling was increased by 
 an unhappy event which soon followed. 
 
 ' Dean Buckland had lost no time in devising 
 a scheme for pipe-draining the precincts, which was 
 to be carried out by the sanitary authorities. In 
 the preliminary soundings, notwithstanding all pre- 
 cautions, a source of malaria was tapped, with its 
 most disastrous consequences. Typhoid fever at- 
 tacked the Dean and two of his family, and was 
 fatal to two young and promising boys who had 
 lately been elected into College. Two Canons' 
 daughters also died. The terrible disease entered 
 the Headmaster's house, and Mrs. Liddell was for ten 
 days in imminent danger. Her alarming illness 
 naturally excited general interest and sympathy. 
 Consequently the accidental and temporary un- 
 healthiness of Westminster became known far and 
 wide; and the impression made was so deep that 
 it did not disappear when the cause of the disease 
 had been removed. It was useless to point out 
 that the school had been before, and afterwards 
 continued to be, remarkably free from serious illness. 
 
 ' Still the belt of building towards the South 
 and West kept spreading, and the river, before 
 the main drainage of London was taken in hand, 
 became year by year less attractive. Mr. Liddell, 
 who had been profoundly moved by the visitation 
 of fever, seems gradually to have become convinced
 
 CH. iv] Fever at the school 101 
 
 of the impossibility of maintaining a great residential 
 school at Westminster. I have heard him express 
 that opinion in very strong terms ; and I think 
 that he welcomed preferment to the Deanery of 
 Christ Church not only for its own sake, but also 
 because it relieved him from a position of great 
 perplexity. 
 
 ' The strain upon his powers must have been 
 very great, and was not sufficiently estimated at the 
 time. Besides the administration of a Public School 
 under special embarrassments, and the teaching 
 of the Sixth Form, he before long imposed upon 
 himself the difficult and responsible task of preaching 
 at intervals to the boys. This was full work for 
 one man. But he was also on the Oxford Uni- 
 versity Commission, which was very industrious 
 in its sittings. The revision of his Lexicon was 
 a constant drain upon his time, and with it he was 
 engaged in the severe labour of combining in an 
 orderly narrative his researches into Roman History. 
 And London society would not forgo its claim 
 on one so fitted to adorn it, who was living in its 
 very midst. Yet with all this variety of care and 
 exertion, there was rarely any appearance of hurry, 
 still less of irritation ; but uniformly the same 
 dignified composure of demeanour. It is no wonder 
 that, after nine such years, his health should have 
 broken down, and that he should have had medical 
 orders to recruit himself during two winters in 
 Madeira, soon after entering upon the duties of 
 the Deanery.' 
 
 After mentioning the Lexicon and the Roman 
 History, Mr. Marshall refers to Liddell's literary 
 style :
 
 IO2 Headmasters kip of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 ' It has this quality of excellence, that it never 
 draws attention to itself. This purity of diction is 
 characteristic. He would have boys and men say 
 what they mean, and mean what they say, and was 
 ruthless in stripping off the purpurei panni. An 
 undergraduate in his paper work at an Oxford 
 examination had introduced, a propos of nothing, a 
 fine expression derived from Hooker, and ultimately, 
 I imagine, from the Schoolmen, " The angels fell 
 by reflex thought." Mr. Liddell used to describe, 
 with some gusto, the state of imbecility to which the 
 unfortunate man was reduced, when he was asked 
 in viva voce to explain the meaning of his words. 
 
 ' The same nervous simplicity extended to his 
 Latin style. The prologues which he wrote to be 
 spoken before the Westminster Play exemplify his 
 power of compelling a somewhat intractable language 
 to express exactly what he felt. One specimen is 
 appended; a description of the famous Exhibition 
 of 1851 : 
 
 Ergo anno iam peracto bis millesimo 
 
 Mire aedificatum vidimus Palatium, 
 
 Cui non rigebat mole saxea latus 
 
 Firmique solido roboris fulcimine, 
 
 Sed vitrea sic micabat pulchritudine, 
 
 Et paene incredibili artificis sollertia, 
 
 Tanquam si nebula mane consurgens novo 
 
 Gelata medio constitisset aethere. 
 
 Sed inerat aedi si quid usquam splendidi 
 
 Si quid magnified, si quid ignoti prius 
 
 Ars hominum efficere posset atque industria; 
 
 Denique natura si quid olim cautius 
 
 Terrae in latebris condidisset abditis, 
 
 Si quid sub alto condidisset aequore, 
 
 Sive in inaccessis montibus, id inerat quoque 1 . 
 
 1 Another instance may be quoted in the elegiac lines which told of 
 the 'Adelphi,' a play originally acted at the funeral games of Aemilius
 
 CH. iv] Latin Prologues 103 
 
 ' Mr. Liddell's speech had, of course, all the refine- 
 ment of breeding and culture, but it breathed of the 
 North in the greater richness of the vowel sounds, 
 and the more distinct articulation of consonants. 
 The aspirate made itself felt in such words as "who," 
 " when," and " where." I have often thought that 
 the greater play thus habitually given to the lips 
 made them more expressive than their owner quite 
 realized. He certainly had the power of saying 
 much without words. For instance, one of his 
 pupils at Christ Church, a man of mark, was observed 
 to be preparing his work for lecture with a care that 
 was by no means usual in his case. Being rallied 
 by his friends, he said, " Well, you know, I can't 
 stand Liddell's look when I am breaking down." 
 This silent punishment, be it observed, was for those 
 who did not use their gifts, not for those who had 
 no gifts to use. 
 
 ' His sermons to the boys were strong, clear, and 
 sometimes severely simple. One in particular deeply 
 affected them, when he spoke of their schoolfellows, 
 some lying beneath the " bleak Crimean shore," 
 others upon it with their brave comrades in arms 
 enduring privation and toil, and living in hourly 
 familiarity with death. In the year 1851 he preached 
 before the Queen a sermon on faith, hope, and charity, 
 
 Paullus, and at Westminster in the December following the death of 
 General Wolfe (1759) and the death of the Duke of Wellington (1852). 
 The ' swing ' of the verses still lingers in the memory after an interval 
 of forty-six years. 
 
 Fabula quae prodit nata est dum maxima Roma 
 
 Prosequitur Paulli funera moesta sui ; 
 Dein nostram redit in scenam, volventibus annis, 
 
 Ut Wolfi exsequias Anglia tristis obit ; 
 Tertia sors restat vocat illam tertius Heros 
 Te, Wolfi, maior, maior et Aemilio.
 
 IO4 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 which was afterwards published by command. That 
 perhaps gives the best idea of his spiritual insight 
 and reach of intellect, and suggests the thoughts on 
 which he most loved to dwell. 
 
 ' In his preaching there was the same withdrawal 
 of self as in his writing. This was not mere literary 
 method, or good taste ; it was the result of genuine 
 Christian humility, which shrunk from display, but 
 was deeply rooted, and was part of the staple of his 
 inner life. I venture to assert, against all possible 
 contradiction, that no estimate of the late Dean's 
 character can be just and full, which does not take 
 this gracious quality into account. 
 
 'It is unnecessary for me to speak of Dean 
 Liddell's reputation for learning. But, great scholar 
 as he was, his noblest lessons were taught less by 
 what he knew than by what he was. Those who were 
 brought into close relations with him, especially 
 minds that had the plasticity of youth, learned by 
 the mere association to loathe what was mean and 
 cowardly, to covet earnestly the best gifts, and to 
 be true in thought and word by the strength of Him 
 who is the Truth.' 
 
 This admirable testimony to the Headmaster's 
 work and character may be briefly supplemented by 
 some reminiscences of those who were boys under 
 him. 
 
 i. One vivid impression, which length of time 
 has not wholly effaced, was that of awe. The new 
 comer, called up to stand before him and the Under- 
 master, both dressed in full canonicals, with bands, 
 cassock, and Geneva gown, and to answer questions 
 with the object of having his place in the school
 
 en. iv] LiddelVs demeanour 105 
 
 determined, experienced the unpleasant sensation of 
 sinking into his shoes, before a presence so majestic, 
 a voice so deep, a manner so reserved. And this 
 first impression was not transitory. It was renewed 
 every Saturday morning, when the Headmaster went 
 round the school, visiting Form after Form, and 
 reading out the week's order of merit, the ' principes' 
 as the list was called from the winners of the top 
 places. This review of the week's work was a severe 
 and alarming scrutiny, and idlers met with stern 
 rebuke. Yet even while they dreaded his advent, the 
 boys learnt to attach immense importance to his brief 
 words of comment, and to be greatly encouraged by 
 his praise. There was indeed much gentleness 
 underlying his austere demeanour. On one occasion 
 when he had to rebuke a boy of good ability who, 
 week after week, had fallen below his proper place in 
 Form, his voice faltered, and his eyes moistened, as 
 he spoke in fatherly condemnation of the folly and 
 wrong of this continued idleness. He never spoke 
 in anger : he never lost perfect self-control. He 
 had learnt the value of self-command. In a letter 
 from Westminster to an intimate friend who had 
 been appointed to the Headship of a College at 
 Oxford, he wrote with the frankness of old acquaint- 
 ance on the importance of calmness in dealing with 
 young people : 
 
 ' Perhaps you will not take it ill if I take the 
 liberty of an old friend to add a piece of advice. 
 
 Several persons who formerly knew you at , in 
 
 talking over with me the chances of the election, 
 
 p
 
 io6 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 doubted the propriety of electing you, because (they 
 said) you did not exercise sufficient control over 
 your temper in dealing with undergraduates. I am 
 afraid I cannot boast of a very good temper myself. 
 But I am fully aware and try to exercise what 
 I feel of the great and primary importance of per- 
 fect coolness and deliberation in speaking to and 
 dealing with young persons. I know not whether, 
 and how far, what I have heard is true. If it is not 
 true, then what I say is naught. If it is, you are 
 (I am sure) candid enough to set what I say down 
 to the right and only motive.' 
 
 But gradually, to the feeling of awe was added 
 that of affection, as the boys rose in the school and 
 came under his personal instruction in the Sixth 
 Form. For he was an admirable teacher : thorough, 
 clear, suggestive, stimulating; exacting in the care 
 which he demanded in the preparation of book-work, 
 but singularly interesting in the instructiveness of 
 his comments and the wide range of his illustrations. 
 He was not a mere textual scholar, but an historian 
 and statesman. His Juvenal lesson still lingers in 
 the memory, as a model of what a lesson should 
 be; the boys were not only well drilled in the text 
 and allusions, but were referred to the best modern 
 satires, and indirectly led to an appreciation of much 
 of the noblest English literature. He was fond of 
 poetry, and taught the elder boys to recite it well. 
 During a portion of the year, there were ' speeches ' 
 in the great schoolroom on Friday mornings, at the 
 end of the lesson, in the presence of all the boys, 
 when the members of the Sixth Form stood up
 
 CH. iv] Tke Challenges 107 
 
 by the Headmaster's table, and repeated passages of 
 English poetry which had been previously selected. 
 On one occasion, when the present Vicar of St. Peter's, 
 Bournemouth, had recited the whole of Gray's 'Elegy' 
 with faultless taste and without a single mistake, an 
 emphatic 'Thank you, Fisher' gave an apt expression 
 to the feeling of all the listeners, and a more than 
 ample reward to the reciter. 
 
 In those ancient days, a rudimentary knowledge 
 of Hebrew was most wisely required of the elder 
 boys who were candidates for the Universities. 
 Liddell taught this subject in a very interesting 
 manner, although it was generally believed that he 
 had acquired all his knowledge in the short interval 
 between his appointment as Headmaster and his 
 entering on his office. 
 
 2. The challenges, or examination for admission 
 into the College, were a severe tax upon the Head- 
 master's powers of endurance. According to modern 
 custom, the candidates would be tested by an 
 examination lasting a few days or a few hours : 
 but in those more leisurely times the competition 
 extended over two months, occupying almost daily 
 the interval between morning school and dinner; 
 the minor candidates, as they were called, were 
 pitted one against another in pairs, engaging in a 
 curious conflict partaking somewhat of the nature 
 of the old academical disputations. Short passages 
 of Greek or Latin, previously selected by the Head- 
 master from the Greek Epigrams or Ovid's Meta- 
 morphoses, were construed, and then the lower boy, 
 
 p 2
 
 io8 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 called the challenger, asked his opponent certain 
 questions founded upon the words or sentences in 
 the passages. If the upper boy, the challengee, 
 could not answer them, and the challenger himself 
 answered them correctly, the former lost his place, 
 and became in turn the challenger. So the contest 
 went on, till the stock of questions was exhausted. 
 In some challenges, the number of questions was 
 limited, in others it was not; and two boys who 
 had been carefully drilled in the Greek and Latin 
 grammars would keep up the contest throughout a 
 whole day, from early morning till nine at night. It 
 was a mode of examination which demanded rigid 
 grammatical accuracy, and the Headmaster, who 
 presided, had to be continually on the alert to note 
 every question and answer, and to give a prompt 
 decision on all doubtful points. Around him stood 
 the ' Helps,' elder boys who had prepared the 
 combatants for the fray, and acted as advocates 
 for their several clients. When a question arose 
 as to the exact meaning or derivation of a word, 
 the large dictionaries were referred to ; and Liddell 
 and Scott was of course the authority for Greek. 
 Sometimes discussions would arise even as to the 
 correctness of this august volume, and ' Helps ' 
 would boldly venture to quote Scapula or Schreve- 
 lius against the new Lexicon. But Liddell was 
 always good-tempered and always reasonable, and 
 enjoyed the keen advocacy of the boys. It used 
 indeed to be told but this was an amusing libel 
 which no one really believed that when an admitted
 
 CH. iv] School Epigrams 109 
 
 error was pointed out, Liddell would say, ' Ah, yes, 
 Mr. Scott wrote that paragraph/ This tradition, 
 however, gives a point to the following anecdote, 
 which is narrated on the authority of the actual 
 writer of the bold effusion. Once a year, on the 
 Friday before the election to the Universities, it 
 was customary for the Headmaster to come into 
 school, carrying a bowl containing Maundy money, 
 the little silver coins which were supplied from the 
 Royal Mint. He would then call upon the boys to 
 gather round him, and to read epigrams upon Theses 
 announced a few hours before. These epigrams 
 supposed to be the boys' own composition were 
 rewarded by gifts of the silver pence ; the very best 
 gained four coins : a four-penny, three-penny, two- 
 penny, and penny piece ; the others were rewarded 
 by a less complete set. Upon one occasion, when 
 the challenges had revealed some mistake in the 
 Lexicon, the thesis for school epigrams happened 
 to be ' Scribimus indocti doctique! A boy delivered 
 the following epigram : 
 
 Two men wrote a Lexicon, Liddell and Scott ; 
 
 Some parts were clever, but some parts were not. 
 
 Hear, all ye learned, and read me this riddle, 
 
 How the wrong part wrote Scott, and the right part wrote Liddell. 
 
 The audacious poet survived the venture, and 
 gained not only a hearty laugh, but a full comple- 
 ment of pence, from the Headmaster. 
 
 On another occasion, soon after the schoolroom 
 had received its new and mean furniture, the thesis 
 mutandus locus est was given out, and produced the
 
 no Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 following epigram from the pen of one of the senior 
 boys, now a dignified Registrar in Chancery : 
 
 'Mutandus locus est, 1 and those who rule 
 
 Act up to this ; improvements come in swarms. 
 They change the ancient customs of the school, 
 
 And will not even leave to us our forms. 
 Instead of those old desks with many a name 
 
 Carved over, they would bring us to propriety 
 By filling school unutterable shame 
 
 With benches from the National Society ! 
 
 Another delightful epigram on the same thesis 
 was read by a very small boy : 
 
 I was placed in the 'fourth' when I came here, 
 By Mr. Liddell and Mr. Weare; 
 But I've done pretty well, so I think I've some claims 
 To be placed in the 'fifth' under Mr. James. 
 
 It is evident that liberty of speech was not then 
 curtailed at Westminster. 
 
 3. The moral tone of the school was undoubtedly 
 raised under Liddell's rule, and the manners grew 
 less rough, as the conditions of life were made more 
 comfortable. It was of great benefit to the boys to 
 be guided by masters who were thorough gentlemen, 
 and entirely imbued with the Public School spirit. 
 They all trusted the boys, were ready to accept their 
 word, and would take no unfair advantage of them. 
 There are no memories of Liddell which are not 
 associated with a chivalrous sense of honour ; and 
 boys instinctively grew to be honourable and 
 truthful themselves. 
 
 One who can speak from the most intimate know- 
 ledge of him writes :
 
 CH. iv] Special School Services in 
 
 ' What I should like brought out is his great 
 aversion to exaggerations about anything, and his 
 love of exact truth. I think of late years at West- 
 minster he scarcely ever punished except for a lie, 
 and then he had no mercy. There was nothing 
 that disturbed him so much as to feel that any one 
 was not speaking the exact truth to him ; he never 
 trusted them again. I have heard that boys used to 
 say they could not tell Liddell a lie and look him 
 in the face ; and I have heard him say, " I can call 
 no man a gentleman who can act a lie, even if he 
 does not tell it." He was truth itself, and even 
 what is called " humbug " he could not endure.' 
 
 The Under-master taught the Queen's Scholars the 
 same lesson. The latter was indeed, perhaps, over- 
 sensitive on one point. Upon entering College from 
 his house, he would always give a prolonged warning 
 by putting the key noisily into the lock, and turning 
 it in a very leisurely fashion ; or if he passed through 
 College in the day-time, he would cough, or rattle 
 his bunch of keys, to enable the boys to know 
 that he was near. Perhaps they sometimes took 
 advantage of this courtesy ; but on the whole, it 
 was respectfully appreciated. 
 
 The institution of special school services in the 
 Abbey had much influence on the religious life of 
 the boys, and brought the Headmaster into a new 
 relation to them. Before Liddell's time, they had 
 attended the Abbey simply at the usual morning 
 and evening services on Sunday, and never in full 
 numbers. Leave out was always granted to boys 
 who had friends in London, from noon on Saturday
 
 H2 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 till Sunday evening. Many, therefore, were always 
 away from the Abbey services, and the remnant sat 
 in their accustomed places in the choir. The sermons 
 were preached by the Canon in residence, and had 
 no special reference to the needs and difficulties of 
 boys. Liddell resolved to have an occasional service 
 for the school alone, at which he might himself 
 preach. He accordingly got leave from the Dean 
 and Chapter to use the Abbey on the first Sunday 
 of each month, at eight o'clock in the morning. The 
 whole school then attended, and no leave of absence 
 was granted. There was no music, but the prayers 
 were read by the Under-master, and Liddell preached 
 from his stall. They were, as Mr. Marshall has 
 already stated, very remarkable sermons : simple, 
 direct, stately, dealing with the incidents of school 
 life, and the current events of the history of the day. 
 They made a deep impression on the boys. One 
 on the death of the Duke of Wellington, and of 
 Liddell's favourite pupil, Hervey Vaughan Williams- 
 he printed for private circulation, with the line from 
 Tennyson as its motto, ' The path of duty is the 
 way to glory.' At other times, though he would not 
 print his sermon, he would, at their earnest request, 
 put it into the hands of the elder boys, and they 
 would copy it for themselves : a good test of the 
 value they attached to it. The services were greatly 
 liked, and did much good ; but the hour was un- 
 comfortably early, and the stopping of ' leave out ' 
 was a tiresome incident of them. In the winter, 
 moreover, the Abbey, then untouched by any system
 
 CH. iv] The Latin Play 113 
 
 of heating, was piercingly cold, even dangerous to 
 delicate boys without great coats and before the 
 breakfast hour : and it was but dimly lighted with 
 a few wax candles. One can still recall the chill 
 and the darkness, and the prayers unrelieved by 
 music or singing, and then the magnificent English 
 and sonorous tones of the preacher. Perhaps the 
 sermons gained in impressiveness from the fact that 
 ' Early Abbey,' as it was called, came only once a 
 month. 
 
 4. The Latin Play, performed before the Christ- 
 mas holidays, was, from the point of view of the 
 Queen's Scholars, the greatest event of the year. 
 The erection indeed of the theatre in the actual 
 Dormitory threw all domestic arrangements into con- 
 fusion for some weeks beforehand, and the constant 
 rehearsals were perhaps to some extent a hindrance 
 to school work. But larger considerations happily 
 prevented any change in the time-honoured custom 
 dating from Queen Elizabeth's reign; and the 
 crowded and enthusiastic audience assembled in the 
 narrow and uncomfortable theatre showed the very 
 wide interest taken in the performance by the tlite 
 of London society. The Prologues were, as a 
 rule, written by the Headmaster, and specimens of 
 Liddell's felicitous Latinity have been already given. 
 The Epilogues were humorous satires on the foibles 
 of the day, and were usually the work of some 
 Old Westminster of scholarly tastes. Many possess 
 sterling merit as specimens of Latin adapted as a 
 vehicle for the expression of. modern ideas, and for 
 
 Q
 
 H4 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 their refined and delightful humour. The Chartists, 
 the Peace Congress, and the ' Bloomer ' dress fur- 
 nished the themes of three of the best Epilogues 
 during Liddell's time. In the last of these, Thais, 
 Pythias, and Dorias come upon the stage dressed 
 in half-masculine costume, to the horror of their 
 former lovers. Thais invites Thraso to cross the 
 Atlantic with her to America, and is met with the 
 reply : 
 
 Ah ! me mare terret ; 
 Ipsaque tu terres, horrida imago mart's ! 
 
 Mrs. Dexter, Mrs. Bloomer's representative in 
 England, threatened an action at law for the 
 ridicule thrown upon the cause she advocated ; 
 being especially annoyed at the lines (probably 
 
 the only ones at all intelligible to her) : 
 
 
 
 Bloomer tu, Dexter an audis, 
 Nil opus hie inquam est dexteritate tua. 
 
 By a strict etiquette, the Play was always omitted 
 on the death of a Royal personage. The Queen 
 Dowager died on December 2, 1849, when all the 
 preparations for the year were well advanced, the 
 theatre erected, and the tickets issued. What was 
 to be done ? The Queen's Scholars audaciously took 
 the matter into their own hands, and wrote a letter 
 to the Prime Minister, Lord John Russell, who was 
 an Old Westminster, entreating him to represent to 
 Her Majesty the disappointment and inconvenience 
 which would result if the Play were abandoned. 
 They also wrote to Colonel Phipps, the Queen's 
 private secretary. Through these two persons, both
 
 CH. iv] ea o e ueen owager 115 
 
 of whom took it for granted that the application was 
 made with the full sanction of the school authorities, 
 Her Majesty was approached, and most graciously 
 and considerately allowed the performance of the 
 Play, provided it did not take place on the day of 
 the funeral. The matter then came, for the first 
 time, to the Headmaster's ears, and the triumph of 
 the boys was short-lived. He interposed without 
 a moment's delay, and wrote as follows to Colonel 
 Phipps : 
 
 ' I regret extremely to find that the Queen's Scholars 
 of St. Peter's, Westminster have thought fit to 
 apply to Her Majesty to sanction the performance 
 of the usual Latin Play, while the remains of Her 
 late Gracious Majesty the Queen Dowager are still 
 uninterred. 
 
 * It is probable that the application was understood 
 to be sanctioned by the Dean of Westminster or 
 myself. It was however made without our know- 
 ledge ; and if we had been consulted we should 
 certainly not have allowed it to be made. 
 
 ' It is the feeling of all the authorities of the school, 
 as well as of many old Westminster men, that this 
 would not be a proper occasion on which to break 
 through an old custom of respect paid by the Royal 
 foundation to the Family of the Sovereign. The 
 personal excellence, as well as the exalted station 
 of Her late Majesty, demand this tribute. We 
 therefore, with all gratitude for the consideration 
 shown by Her Majesty, and especially for the 
 extremely kind and gracious way in which Her 
 pleasure was conveyed, beg leave to decline the 
 permission which She has accorded.' 
 
 Q 2
 
 n6 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 The Play was accordingly most properly omitted ; 
 and in the Prologue of the following year a fitting 
 reference was made to the death of the Queen 
 Dowager. 
 
 5. The Headmaster had already, in the previous 
 year, run counter to the wishes of the boys in another 
 matter of great importance in their estimation the 
 Eton and Westminster boat-race. This contest 
 had begun in 1829 ; and, in spite of the disparity in 
 the numbers of the two schools, Westminster had 
 been victorious in four out of the eight races which 
 had already taken place ; and in 1 846, on the course 
 from Putney to Mortlake, had gained so decisive 
 a victory that it was arrogantly asserted by the 
 boys that if Eton were beaten again she would 
 probably refrain from challenging her adversary in 
 future years. So in 1847 there was a general 
 enthusiasm in favour of the race ; a new boat was 
 built by Noulton and Wyld ; it was named after 
 Mrs. Liddell, and launched by her; and on July 29 
 the race was rowed on the ebb tide from Barker's 
 rails to Putney. But the fates were adverse, and 
 Eton gained an easy victory. 
 
 Liddell, however, felt grave misgivings as to the 
 expediency of such a contest. To row so long a 
 course was a severe tax upon the physical power 
 of the boys ; too much time was spent in preparation, 
 and too much interest was devoted to the event : 
 and the necessary publicity of a contest on London 
 waters was in itself an evil. Dr. Williamson had 
 felt similar scruples, and had prevented the race
 
 CH. iv] Eton and Westminster Race 117 
 
 from taking place in 1838, though he had allowed 
 it in subsequent years. And now it was definitely 
 abandoned ; not without many regrets on the part 
 of the boys and the old members of the school, but 
 with the full concurrence of the authorities. In 
 1860, under Dr. Scott, an Etonian Headmaster, an 
 attempt was made to revive the contest on a shorter 
 course ; but after four years' experience it was finally 
 given up. The London river had by this time 
 become too crowded and dangerous for practice ; and 
 Eton was overwhelmingly superior in numbers. 
 
 So the work went on, busily and hopefully. The 
 school grew in numbers and in reputation ; there 
 seemed every prospect of its steady advance. Then 
 came the first great blow and crushing anxiety. 
 The fever which desolated the precincts did not 
 spare the school ; two of the Queen's Scholars died, 
 as has been already mentioned, and Mrs. Liddell lay 
 for ten days unconscious, at the point, as it seemed, 
 of death. Through the skill of Dr. Watson, and 
 the assiduous care of Dr. Acland, who was hastily 
 summoned from Oxford to watch by her bedside, 
 her life was happily saved. 
 
 But the effect of this outbreak upon the fortunes 
 of the school was immediate. The entries in 1846-7 
 had been 47. Three years afterwards they were 
 37, and in the succeeding years, 30, 32, 34, 37, 
 and 23 respectively. The rumour of unhealthiness, 
 founded upon this one outbreak which could be 
 traced to a definite source of infection, spread abroad 
 among the public : boys were withdrawn and the
 
 n8 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 numbers would not rise. Cholera, too, came to 
 London in the summer of 1849, and the Head- 
 master was obliged hastily, and on his own responsi- 
 bility, to postpone the meeting of the school in 
 September. This act brought him into collision 
 with the Dean of Westminster, who thought he had 
 exceeded his powers, and usurped the Decanal 
 authority ; and a correspondence ensued, containing 
 among others this severe letter from Buckland : 
 
 ' The tone of your last letter, which I received at 
 Woburn Abbey, where I had not access to our 
 statutes, and in which you " express what you think 
 should be the proper rule for your conduct in such 
 matters," makes it imperative that we should come 
 to a distinct understanding as to the duties of our 
 respective offices in this College. . . . You say 
 "you believe the Headmaster always has regulated 
 the length of the holidays without reference to the 
 Dean." I have inquired of the Chapter Clerk, 
 whose recollections are most exact, whether in his 
 father's time any extension of the customary weeks 
 of vacation was ever made by the Headmaster 
 without permission first obtained of the Dean. His 
 reply was, Never, except when the Sovereign com- 
 manded it. I therefore think that your recent 
 extension of the holidays, on account of the cholera, 
 without consulting the Dean (whom a letter might 
 have reached in twenty-four hours in any part of 
 the kingdom if sent to the Deanery) was a virtual, 
 if not a direct violation of our statute, Cap. 14, de 
 vitanda aeris contagione. . . . As you refer to the 
 practice of other collegiate schools, I must inform 
 you that in my own case, as a scholar of Winton
 
 CH. iv] JJean tfucKlanas Letter 119 
 
 College, Dr. Huntingford, of his sole authority as 
 Warden, gave me leave of absence for six weeks of 
 ordinary school time ; and that on my waiting on the 
 Headmaster, Dr. Goddard, of whom I had asked 
 no permission, on the eve of my departure for these 
 six weeks, he said to me that had he been Warden, 
 or possessed power to prevent it, I should not have 
 had this indulgence. In the case of Rugby, which 
 you refer to, and where you say Dr. Arnold stipulated 
 for absolute power as the condition of his accepting 
 office, I consider such a foundation by a private 
 individual (and governed by lay Trustees, not one 
 of whom is necessarily resident, nor accustomed to 
 collegiate or academic habits) to form no parallel 
 to the collegiate establishments of Winchester, Eton, 
 and Westminster ; and if Dr. Arnold (my friend and 
 relative), whose transcendental love of liberty induced 
 him to admit of no law within that school but his 
 own will, and tolerate no superior to himself, and 
 to stipulate, as a condition of his accepting office, 
 that there should be in Rugby School no control 
 superior to his own : if he had been nominated under 
 similar conditions by the Dean of Christ Church or 
 Master of Trinity, and proposed to the Dean of 
 Westminster as the successor of Dr. Williamson, 
 I must have exercised my veto, and would not and 
 could not have assented to such a stipulation without 
 violating my oath to keep the Statutes of our 
 College. The effect of your proposal " that the 
 boys ought to look to the Headmaster as supreme" 
 would amount to a reversal of the past and present 
 order of authorities recognized by the tradition of 
 all Old Westminsters, viz. that within this College 
 we know but three authorities, the Sovereign, the
 
 I2O Headmasters/lip of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 Dean, and the Headmaster ; and to substitute a new 
 order of precedence, consisting of the Sovereign, the 
 Headmaster, and the Dean. I should consider my 
 assent to such an abdication of my proper place to 
 be a betrayal of that office which has been entrusted 
 to me by the Sovereign, and nothing but the mandate 
 of our Royal Visitor, reversing our statutes, will 
 induce me to abandon a tittle of my rights, in 
 a manner that would degrade myself and all my 
 successors.' 
 
 To this stormy epistle the Headmaster returned 
 a gentle answer, pointing out that he had regarded 
 the question as one of expediency and not of right, 
 and that it had been practically impossible to con- 
 sult the Dean before deciding on the matter, which 
 it was imperatively necessary to settle without any 
 delay. 
 
 Gradually the conviction grew that the only real 
 remedy for the school, if it was to retain its ancient 
 character of a Boarding school, was to be found 
 in its removal to the country. Schemes were then 
 discussed by which such a fundamental change 
 might be carried out. Prince Albert gave the 
 assistance of his warm sympathy and co-operation, 
 and various sites, including Cooper's Hill and Caver- 
 sham, were visited. At one time it was contemplated 
 that the school should be removed at the public 
 expense, so as to make room for a magnificent 
 avenue which, beginning at Buckingham Palace, 
 should end at the Victoria Tower, the Abbey 
 standing out on its north side. But there were
 
 CH. iv] History of Rome 121 
 
 insuperable difficulties in the way of every scheme ; 
 and the Public Schools Act has finally settled the 
 question of the retention of Westminster, on its 
 existing site, as a great London school. 
 
 The Headmaster's hands were always full of 
 work. In addition to the ordinary burdens and 
 anxieties of his post, he had the unending task of 
 correcting and enlarging the Lexicon. Moreover he 
 undertook to write, for Mr. Murray, a History of 
 Ancient Rome. This work was first published in 
 1855, in two volumes. It was soon afterwards 
 abridged into a School History, and in this form 
 has ever since retained its place on Mr. Murray's 
 list as ' The Student's History of Rome, to the 
 Establishment of the Empire.' That it so main- 
 tains its position, though it has never been revised 
 or brought up to date by the introduction of the 
 results of modern research and discoveries, is a strong 
 testimony to its sterling merits. It is a thoroughly 
 useful book 1 , well illustrated, well arranged, and 
 admirably written. Mr. Marshall thus speaks of 
 its opportune publication : 
 
 'The History of Rome had its own seasonable- 
 ness. Niebuhr had revolutionized the scheme of 
 Roman History. But his influence had nearly 
 spent itself. Scholars began to weary of disquisi- 
 tions which, however learned, acute, and brilliant, 
 resulted after all for the most part in conjecture. 
 They craved to realize the full-blooded life of the 
 
 1 An Italian translation of the larger History reached its sixth edition 
 as long ago as 1886. 
 
 R
 
 122 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 Roman State without being worried by perpetual 
 suggestions of doubt and discussions of hypotheses. 
 Mr. Liddell's history came opportunely to satisfy 
 this want. He did what could only be done by 
 a writer of historical instinct and sound judgment, 
 who was saturated with knowledge of his subject. 
 He gave a masterly summary of what was ascer- 
 tained respecting the original races which coalesced 
 in the Roman people, and the evolution of their 
 not less complicated political system. I recollect 
 the pride and interest which I felt when I was 
 allowed to read the MS. of the chapter which 
 describes the Senate, and there for the first time 
 found a clear, concise, yet adequate account of 
 the constitution and functions of that memorable 
 assembly.' 
 
 This book was the only historical work that came 
 from Liddell's pen. But he was always deeply 
 interested in the study of history ; and his friends 
 at Oxford had been anxious, several years before, 
 to encourage him to devote himself seriously to the 
 subject. In 1849 he was strongly urged to apply 
 for the Regius Professorship of Modern History, 
 vacant by the death of Dr. Cramer. From his 
 intimate friend J. M. Wilson, who had succeeded 
 him as Professor of Moral Philosophy, he received 
 the following letter : 
 
 ' MY DEAR LlDDELL, 
 
 ' I passed through London a week ago, and 
 was sorry to hear that you were absent. I wished 
 to see you, having a strong desire that you should
 
 CH. iv] H. Halford J^angkan 123 
 
 come to Oxford as Professor of Modern History. 
 Is there any probability of this ? I cannot tell you 
 how much we want you here. I am certain your 
 being here (or coming among us as Arnold did) 
 would be of the greatest service to us. I should 
 take twice the interest in my own lectures if I had 
 any one to speak to respecting them, but I have no 
 one. Depend upon it you can have no better sphere 
 of work than Oxford is at present, and your coming 
 would be life to not a few. I wish I could induce 
 you to make application for the Professorship. I 
 cannot help thinking that you might easily procure 
 it ; and the railroad would make coming and going 
 easy. 
 
 ' Very truly yours, 
 
 'J.M. WILSON.' 
 
 He felt himself, however, quite unable to act on 
 the suggestion, and the Professorship was accepted 
 by his friend H. Halford Vaughan, whose brilliant 
 lectures deservedly attracted very large audiences. 
 They are now so completely forgotten that it may 
 be interesting to read what Liddell wrote about 
 them to Vaughan himself: 
 
 ' I hear on all hands the highest encomiums on 
 your lectures. Conybeare of Christ Church, for 
 instance, writes me word that, though he was himself 
 prevented from hearing them, " he has talked of 
 them with many clever men of various political 
 views and has only heard one opinion of them." 
 " All," he adds, " seem struck with the great beauty 
 of the language, with the imagination and wide 
 illustration, as well as the philosophical power of 
 
 R 2
 
 124 Headmasters hip of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 mind shown in them." "Suggestive" is a term 
 popularly applied to them. There is also a general 
 wish as well as (I may as well tell you) a general 
 expectation to see at least your first two lectures 
 in print. People say they want to have an oppor- 
 tunity of reading what gave them so much pleasure 
 in the hearing; and some did not go to hear, .in 
 the hope that they should be able to read. Unless 
 you have some reason against printing, I think you 
 would gratify many persons by so doing. I hear 
 also from Conybeare the following, which agrees 
 with what you wrote me word of, viz. " the large 
 attendance perhaps frightened some of the Heb- 
 domadal Board. From whatever cause, there is 
 an agitation carrying on by Greswell and others 
 against the Modern History School : they argue 
 that it will beat Natural Science out of the field. 
 Daubeny and Acland refuse to join this illiberal 
 crusade ".' 
 
 In a short sketch of Vaughan's life written many 
 years later Liddell describes the lectures as well 
 deserving the success which they at first attained : 
 
 ' He read me portions of them at Hampstead, 
 and I well remember a most graphic picture of 
 the household of William the Conqueror and his 
 rollicking sons. But before long he got tired of 
 the work, showed great caprice and irritability in 
 his intercourse with his friends at Oxford, and 
 finally resigned the Professorship into the hands 
 of Goldwin Smith in 1858. 
 
 ' Vaughan's personal appearance was striking. 
 His features were large, well-defined, and mobile, 
 especially his eyes. They revealed at one time
 
 CH. iv] First University Commission 125 
 
 bright enjoyment of some humorous thought or 
 word, or admiration of some strong and vigorous 
 sentiment ; at another time they were fixed on you 
 with an intensity of expression that seemed to pierce 
 to your very soul. He had an immense " fell " of 
 rough hair, of which his father the judge once said, 
 "To my certain knowledge the masons refused to 
 buy Halford's hair to mix with their mortar ; it was, 
 they said, too coarse." This gave a sort of wild 
 Olympian character to his head.' 
 
 It will not be necessary to say much about 
 Liddell's labours on the first Oxford University 
 Commission. The Commission was issued under 
 the great seal in August 1850, and held its first 
 meeting on October 19 in that year. The Com- 
 missioners were S. Hinds (Bishop of Norwich), 
 A. C. Tait (Dean of Carlisle), F. Jeune (Master of 
 Pembroke), H. G. Liddell, J. L. Dampier (Vice- 
 Warden of the Stannaries), Baden Powell (Savilian 
 Professor of Geometry), and G. H. S. Johnson 
 (Fellow of Queen's). The Secretary was Arthur 
 Stanley, and the Assistant Secretary Goldwin Smith. 
 No fewer than eighty-seven meetings were held, and 
 from only one of these was Liddell absent. It was 
 through their work together on this Commission that 
 Liddell's friendship with Stanley ripened into that 
 close and affectionate intimacy which only closed 
 with Stanley's death. 
 
 The strain of this work, coming as an addition 
 to his duties as Headmaster, was lightened by 
 the great interest which he took in the question
 
 126 Headmaster ship of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 of University Reform. He had for many years 
 been convinced of the necessity of remodelling the 
 constitution of the University by getting rid of the 
 supremacy of the Heads of Houses, and giving 
 real power to the great body of residents engaged 
 in education. Early in life he had written a 
 pamphlet on the subject; and his long collegiate 
 and academical experience had convinced him that 
 the unenlightened and even reactionary rule of the 
 Hebdomadal Board made all improvement at their 
 hands impossible. He had observed the action of 
 the Heads of Houses in the various theological con- 
 troversies of his time, and had had ample evidence of 
 its unwisdom. The chief reforms recommended by 
 the Commission were the revival of the Ancient 
 House of Congregation, upon a reformed basis, 
 as an effective Legislative body ; a reconstruction 
 of the Professorial system, so as to give it a leading 
 place in the educational machinery of the University; 
 the relaxation of the obligation to take Holy Orders 
 as a condition of the tenure of Fellowships ; the 
 removal of local and other restrictions on the 
 tenure of scholarships and Fellowships ; the abolition 
 of the distinction between Nobleman, Gentleman 
 Commoner, and Commoner; and the introduction 
 of a new class of students not belonging to any 
 College or Hall. 
 
 These recommendations were the result of pro- 
 longed deliberations ; and they expressed a unanimity 
 only arrived at after much discussion. In a letter 
 to Vaughan, Liddell writes :
 
 CH. iv] Changes recommended 127 
 
 ' You know very well that all the more important 
 of these recommendations were compromises, and 
 that perhaps not one certainly not myself of the 
 Commissioners would wish to see them adopted 
 exactly as they stand. But the spirit and tendency 
 of them was (I think) approved by all.' 
 
 Mr. Vaughan, owing to his position as Professor, 
 and his long intimacy with Liddell, carried great 
 weight with the Commissioners. 
 
 ' Your answers formed the text of our debates, 
 and I carried propositions in general terms founded 
 on your proposal for remodelling Congregation and 
 the Hebdomadal Board. Your arguments in favour 
 of Lodging Houses told.' 
 
 The subsequent changes in the constitution of 
 the University as embodied in the Act of 1854, 
 and the Ordinances of the several Colleges, were 
 based upon, but were by no means identical with, 
 the recommendations of the Commissioners. 
 
 It was obvious that the contemplated alterations 
 in the tenure of Fellowships and scholarships would 
 affect materially the relations existing between West- 
 minster School and Christ Church. Ever since 
 Queen Elizabeth's time, boys had been elected annu- 
 ally from the College at Westminster to studentships 
 at Christ Church ; and these studentships stood 
 on the footing of Fellowships, in being tenable for 
 life subject to certain conditions. The Commis- 
 sioners recommended that the studentships should 
 for the future be divided into two classes, corre- 
 sponding to Fellowships and scholarships at other
 
 128 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 Colleges ; and that a certain number of the junior 
 studentships (or scholarships) should be set apart 
 for Westminster candidates, and should be tenable 
 no longer for life, but for a period of seven years. 
 This change would alter the whole status of the 
 Westminster students. It was not likely that so 
 radical a proposal would be welcomed at the school 
 or at Christ Church. Indeed, among all the Oxford 
 potentates, Dean Gaisford had stood alone, if not 
 in irreconcilable hostility to the Commissioners, cer- 
 tainly in contemptuous disregard of them. ' From 
 the Dean of Christ Church/ says the report, ' alone 
 of all the Heads of Colleges, no answer was received 
 to any of the communications of the Commission.' 
 
 When Liddell was appointed Commissioner he 
 deemed it an act of courtesy to write to Gaisford 
 and acquaint him of the fact. The reply was 
 somewhat chilling : 
 
 ' MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 ' Though you desire me to refrain from 
 acknowledging your letter, I must write shortly to 
 say that I can express no opinion as to the propriety 
 of your accepting the office of Commissioner in 
 the projected visitation of the University ; but as 
 to the Commission itself I feel, in common with 
 almost every one both at Oxford and Cambridge, 
 that it is a measure which can be productive of no 
 good, and may eventually breed discord and disunion, 
 and destroy the independence of those bodies. 
 ' I am, yours faithfully, 
 
 ' T. GAISFORD.'
 
 CH. iv] Illness at Westminster 129 
 
 The changes in the constitution of Christ Church, 
 including the alteration in the tenure of the West- 
 minster studentships, did not take effect till 1858. 
 Indeed, owing to unexpected delay in the sealing of 
 the Ordinance, the boys chosen from Westminster in 
 that year were, to their surprise and delight, elected 
 on the ancient footing, and were the very last to be 
 inscribed on the venerable roll of ' Students of Christ 
 Church,' as it had existed from the time of King 
 Henry VIII. 
 
 The domestic life of the Headmaster, which had 
 begun so brightly, was not without its sorrows and 
 anxieties. The terrible fever of 1848 has been 
 already mentioned. In 1853 came scarlet fever: 
 two of his children suffered from it, and with his 
 second son, a child nearly three years old, it proved 
 fatal. He died on November 27. The trouble was 
 the greater, because Mrs. Liddell was not allowed to 
 share in the nursing of her child, or indeed to be near 
 him. The doctors had insisted on her absence. So 
 the burden of the trial fell on Liddell himself, and he 
 shared by day and night the labours of the nurse. 
 
 ' Nothing can be done,' he writes to his mother, 
 ' but to support nature and trust in God. He has 
 so far taken his food very well, and if he continues 
 to do so we may continue to hope.' 
 
 Of his wife he says : 
 
 1 She must not come near our dear angelic little 
 child. I can call him by no other name so good 
 and patient and gentle he is. I am sitting by him 
 
 s
 
 130 Headmastership of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 now, while the nurse goes out to get a little air, and 
 every quick-drawn breath goes to my heart. One 
 does not know how one loves them, till a time like 
 this comes.' 
 
 To H. H. Vaughan, he wrote later : 
 
 ' My presentiments were too just. On Sunday 
 the 2yth, just a week after you saw me, my dear, 
 dear little boy died. It was a miserable week, each 
 day bringing many alternations of hope and fear. I 
 buried him on Wednesday, and resumed my labours. 
 But I was so worn out by watching and anxiety, 
 added to my usual work, that I fell ill on Saturday ; 
 and, though I am much better to-day, they have 
 said that I must leave town, and remain quiet for a 
 few days at least. My wife is not allowed to return 
 home. One of the other children has had the same 
 direful disease, but (thank God) favourably. The 
 other two are well.' 
 
 To Acland he wrote just afterwards from Tan- 
 hurst, a house on Leith Hill kindly lent by Mr. 
 Justice Vaughan Williams, father of the present 
 Lord Justice : 
 
 ' I cannot even yet believe that we shall never 
 see again on earth his fair face with those gentle 
 bright blue eyes and silken hair. A more healthy 
 strong child never was. A more docile obedient 
 child never was. I hardly can remember when 
 it was necessary to speak a second time. His 
 winning pretty ways are stamped in our memories, 
 I believe, for ever. His thoughtful happy dis- 
 position made him the favourite wherever we went ; 
 and I verily believe the grief of my father and
 
 CH. iv] Appointment to Ch. Ch. Deanery 131 
 
 mother is hardly inferior to our own. You will 
 pardon these babblings of fondness. But I watched 
 him alone through that dreadful illness, and it 
 relieves me to write so to those who can and will, 
 I know, feel with me.' 
 
 Those who were then at the school will remember 
 how the boys shared in their Headmaster's sorrow, 
 and how touchingly he thanked them, when they 
 spontaneously requested that the annual Play, for 
 which all preparations had been made, should not 
 take place. 
 
 The burden of responsibility, and the conviction 
 of the impossibility of raising the school to a high 
 level in numbers and prestige, so long as it remained 
 in London, disposed him, in 1854, to seek some 
 other sphere of work ; and he was near to accepting 
 the Mastership of Sherburn Hospital in the county 
 of Durham. But happily no such retirement was 
 necessary. On June 2, 1855, Dean Gaisford died, 
 and there was scarcely a doubt that Liddell would 
 be his successor. He first received definite news 
 of the appointment in the following letter from his 
 old pupil the present Earl of Wemyss, then Lord 
 Elcho. 
 
 June 6, 1855. 
 
 ' MY DEAR DEAN, 
 
 ' I went to Lord Palmerston this morning, to 
 urge your appointment. He told me that he had 
 heard so much in your favour, that he had taken 
 the Queen's pleasure about it the day before yester- 
 day, but that his time had been so fully occupied 
 
 s 2
 
 132 Headmasters hip of Westminster [CH. iv 
 
 yesterday, that he had not had time to write to you. 
 Upon my asking him if / might announce this to 
 you, he begged of me to do so, as it would save 
 his writing to ask you to call upon him to-morrow 
 morning at 11.30, at which hour he wishes to see 
 you. He added, in his jocose manner, " you may 
 tell him likewise, that I hope he will excuse my 
 having named him to the Queen, without having 
 previously obtained his consent." I can assure you 
 that nothing could have given me greater pleasure 
 than to be thus the means of communicating in- 
 telligence so pleasing to my old tutor and friend. 
 I rejoice most sincerely at your appointment, as I 
 feel confident that in your hands Christ Church* 
 will hold out every possible inducement to us to 
 send our sons there, in the full confidence that you 
 will turn them out gentlemen and useful members of 
 society. 
 
 ' Yours ever, 
 
 ' ELCHO.' 
 
 Then came the hurry of the remaining weeks of 
 the Summer Term, and at last the leave-taking. 
 Those who were then boys at the school will recall 
 the presentation in the big schoolroom of the 
 silver vase which was their parting gift, and the 
 addresses read by the captain of the Queen's Scholars 
 and the head Town Boy addresses which Liddell 
 afterwards carefully docketed, and preserved to the 
 end of his life among his most treasured papers 
 and then the supper at the Headmaster's house. 
 There was genuine sorrow in saying Farewell : for 
 the boys were very proud of their splendid Head-
 
 CH. iv] Farewell to Westminster 133 
 
 master ; and Mrs. Liddell had endeared herself in a 
 thousand ways to the whole school, having taken 
 a kindly interest in all their doings. The actors in 
 the annual Play owed her a special debt of gratitude 
 for the pains and taste which under the guidance of 
 Sir Charles Newton she had expended upon the 
 due arrangement of their classical dresses ; and those 
 of them who had acted female parts, for the lessons 
 she had taught them as to their gait, restraining 
 their stride within feminine limits, and teaching 
 them the management of their arms. To many of 
 those then present it was a parting for life, but 
 6me looked forward, in just confidence and with 
 delightful anticipations, to a renewal of the friend- 
 ship before long within the walls of Christ Church.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 DEANERY OF CHRIST CHURCH, 1855-91 
 
 ' I WISH I could convey to you the cheer which 
 followed the announcement by Lord Palmerston 
 of your appointment in the House. It said more 
 than I can say, and would have gratified you, I am 
 sure.' These words of a member of the House of 
 Commons expressed a feeling very generally shared 
 by all who were interested in the welfare of Oxford, 
 and especially in the welfare of Christ Church. 
 The distinguished career and European reputation 
 of the new Dean, and the important services which 
 he had lately rendered to the cause of University 
 Reform, made his appointment not only obvious 
 and proper, but also very widely acceptable. At 
 Christ Church itself, however, there prevailed an 
 old-fashioned conservatism, which had regarded with 
 dislike and apprehension the changes recommended 
 by the Commission, and which dreaded the ex- 
 perience of the rule of one who had been a prominent 
 member of that body. 
 
 ' The expectation of us all/ writes the Bishop of 
 Gibraltar, ' but I cannot say the hopes, were fixed 
 upon the able and distinguished Headmaster of
 
 The Chapter of Christ Church 135 
 
 Westminster. Many of us at that time were strong 
 conservatives as regards the affairs of Christ Church, 
 and little wished to have one who was a liberal, and 
 had been an influential member of the University 
 Commission, to be our ruler. Moreover, he was 
 personally unknown to all but the seniors.' 
 
 It speaks well for them and for him that he 
 received a generous and courteous welcome from all 
 the residents, and entered upon his new office amid 
 every expression of cordial goodwill. The Sub- 
 Dean, Archdeacon Clerke, kindly offered the use of 
 his house while the Deanery was being prepared 
 for its new occupants. The Chapter of that time 
 comprised many distinguished men, but representing 
 very different opinions, and various types of Church- 
 manship. The Sub-Dean had been chaplain to 
 Bishop Bagot, and was a delightful example of the 
 courteous, old-fashioned, tolerant Churchman, just 
 touched by the Oxford Movement, but cautious in 
 accepting its lead. He was now serving Bishop 
 Wilberforce as faithfully as he had served his pre- 
 decessor, but probably with some bewilderment of 
 mind. Next to the Sub-Dean, though much his 
 senior in years, came Dr. Barnes, then in venerable 
 old age. He had been appointed to a studentship 
 sixty-five years before, had filled the various college 
 offices, had been a Canon since 1810, and during 
 the great war had served, from 1 796 to 1 802, as 
 Major of the University Volunteers. Dr. Pusey, the 
 Regius Professor of Hebrew, had been Canon since 
 1828. He was at the height of his influence,
 
 136 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 and brought the weight of long experience and 
 high academical position, in addition to his unique 
 ecclesiastical authority, as a force to be reckoned with 
 in all matters relating to reform at Christ Church. 
 Dr. Bull, the Treasurer, enjoyed, in addition to 
 his Christ Church preferment, another Canonry at 
 Exeter, a Prebendal Stall at York, and the delightful 
 Vicarage of Staverton, Northants, his usual summer 
 residence 1 . He had been Tutor and Censor in 
 bygone days, was a courtly gentleman, a refined 
 scholar, and a shrewd man of business. Dr. Jelf, 
 who had been Tutor to the King of Hanover, was 
 Principal of King's College, and much occupied in 
 his London duties. He was a kindly, reasonable, 
 and friendly man. Dr. Jacobson was the Regius 
 Professor of Divinity. His opinions were definitely 
 
 1 Dr. Bull's preferments are summed up in a once well-known 
 epigram : 
 
 ' In a coach with Will Whip, ere the use of the Rail, 
 To Town I once travelled ; and inside the Mail 
 Sat a Canon of Exeter ; on the same perch 
 Sat a Canon of Oxford's Episcopal Church. 
 Next came one who held (I own the thing's small) 
 In the Minster of York a Prebendal Stall ; 
 And last came a Vicar all comely and fair, 
 With a Vicarage snug and some hundreds a year. 
 Now good reader you'll think that the coach was quite full 
 No, there was but one traveller, Dr. John Bull \ ' 
 
 An old Christ Church student may perhaps venture to express his 
 dislike of the modern fashion of addressing members of our Chapter 
 as ' Canon ' so and so. A title of very indefinite and often of infini- 
 tesimal value thus takes the place of a specially honourable designation ; 
 for it has been customary for the University to confer the degree of 
 D.D. upon Canons of Christ Church by Decree of Convocation. Dr. 
 Pusey was never called ' Canon ' Pusey.
 
 CH. v] Powers of the Dean and Chapter 137 
 
 liberal, and in favour of University Reform. Dr. 
 Ogilvie, the Regius Professor of Pastoral Theology, 
 had been chaplain to Archbishop Howley, and asso- 
 ciated, in far distant times, as Tutor of Balliol, with 
 the radical changes which created the greatness of 
 that college. He was now quite without enthusiasm 
 for reform, and inclined to resent all novelties. Dr. 
 Heurtley, the junior member of the Chapter, was the 
 Margaret Professor of Divinity, a gentle, holy man, 
 of the old evangelical school, not without strong 
 conservative convictions, but never unmindful of 
 Christian charity. 
 
 It was a heterogeneous body: with none of its 
 members, except Dr. Jacobson, was the new Dean 
 likely to be in warm sympathy. Yet to the Dean 
 and Chapter then belonged the whole government 
 of Christ Church ; the students had absolutely no 
 power or authority. Though the Censors and 
 Tutors were responsible for the discipline and the 
 tuition of the undergraduates, they were without 
 a voice in all questions relating to the property or 
 the general administration of the House. The Dean 
 and Chapter were the sole governors. As an illus- 
 tration of the subordinate position then occupied by 
 the students, it may be mentioned that the High 
 Table on the dais in the Dining Hall, at which 
 the Dean and Canons sat twice a year upon the 
 annual ' Gaudy ' days, was habitually occupied not 
 by the Tutors, but by the undergraduate noblemen, 
 or ' Tufts,' who ranked as Doctors, and thus sat 
 daily above their preceptors at their common meal. 
 
 T
 
 138 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 It was a strange survival from the sixteenth century, 
 and was not likely to endure much longer. In 
 relating the story of Dean Liddell's rule, it will be 
 necessary to note briefly the inevitable changes by 
 which the educational staff obtained their proper 
 position in the government of their College. 
 
 The old pre-eminence of Christ Church in the 
 Honours Schools had not been maintained in recent 
 years, and the new Dean was likely to have an up- 
 hill task in once more establishing it. DeanGaisford 
 had not given much encouragement to competition 
 by members of the House for academical dis- 
 tinctions, though he was a steady and strenuous 
 supporter of all good work done by them within its 
 walls ; and his profound scholarship and untiring 
 industry could not but make a deep impression on 
 all the abler men who came under his influence. He 
 had been in many respects a great ruler, strong in 
 sturdy independence and simple straightforwardness ; 
 his authority was undisputed, and on the whole he 
 had guided the fortunes of Christ Church with 
 dignity and success. But kind as he was at heart, 
 he was not distinguished for urbanity of demean- 
 our : an epigram used to contrast him with his 
 contemporary, the courtly Warden of All Souls : 
 
 Gaisford and Sneyd each other's lectures seek, 
 The one learns manners, and the other Greek. 
 
 The story of his appointment to the Greek Chair 
 illustrates this characteristic, and may be given in 
 Liddell's words : 
 
 'In 1810, Gaisford had published an edition of
 
 CH. v] Gaisford and the Greek Chair 139 
 
 the Grammarian Hephaestion, which established his 
 reputation as one of the chief Greek scholars of the 
 day. In the next year, the Professorship of Greek 
 became vacant by the promotion of William Jackson 
 to the Bishopric of Oxford. The choice of his 
 successor lay between Elmsley and Gaisford. Dean 
 Jackson had retired from his high office to seclusion 
 in the village of Felpham, near Chichester. But he 
 was still consulted by Lord Grenville (the Chancellor) 
 and other great men in London on all Oxford 
 appointments. There could be no doubt as to 
 which of the two distinguished scholars would have 
 his recommendation. The old Dean did not hesitate 
 to put Gaisford forward. He sent for his former 
 pupil to Felpham, told him to get a copy of his 
 Hephaestion bound in the best style, and to send it 
 with a letter, which he dictated himself, to Lord 
 Grenville. He obeyed, and in due course received 
 from his Lordship the gratifying information that the 
 Prince Regent had been pleased to place the Regius 
 Professorship at his disposal. The story went that 
 he replied not this time from the dictation of Cyril 
 Jackson : 
 
 " MY LORD, I have received yours, and accede 
 to the proposal. Yours, 
 
 " T. GAISFORD." 
 
 ' He held the office till his death in 1855, and 
 justified his appointment by the various excellent 
 editions of Greek authorities which he published. 
 He never gave lectures.' 
 
 Dean Liddell adds : 
 
 ' I had been recommended by Lord Palmerston to 
 succeed Gaisford in the Deanery of Christ Church. 
 
 T 2
 
 140 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.V 
 
 Who was to succeed to the Professorship ? I remem- 
 ber that Charles Clifford of All Souls was deputed by 
 the Prime Minister to consult me about it. " Won't 
 you take it yourself," he asked, " and relieve us of 
 all further trouble ? " I declined the offer, partly 
 because I knew there were better Greek scholars 
 than myself in the University, partly because I 
 thought it inexpedient that the Professorship should 
 be attached to the Headship of a College. " Well 
 then," Clifford said, " you must see Lord Palmerston, 
 and tell him who you think ought to be appointed." 
 Consequently I was summoned to an interview with 
 Lord Palmerston, and mentioned several names 
 Scott, Newton, and Jowett. As to Scott, I said 
 there was (in part) the same objection that I felt in 
 my own case ; he was Head of a College. Newton 
 and Jowett were, I thought, both of them inferior to 
 him in Greek Scholarship. But Newton had earned 
 a high reputation in one department of Greek 
 literature in inscriptions a department which had 
 hitherto received scanty encouragement in Oxford, 
 and I thought this gave him a strong claim. " Oh 
 yes," said Lord Palmerston, " I know that man ; ask 
 him whether he will accept." I did so ; but Newton 
 was unable to relinquish his post at the British 
 Museum for a Professorship which was at that time 
 worth only ^40 a year paid by Christ Church. In 
 the end Jowett was appointed. As Professor, he 
 devoted himself chiefly to the task of familiarizing 
 English readers with the master works of Greek 
 philosophy, or providing what Mark Pattison ir- 
 reverently and wrongly called "cribs." His trans- 
 lations of Plato and Thucydides are masterly 
 transfusions of Greek thought and language into
 
 CH. v] Reforms at Christ Church 141 
 
 English. They may be read as if they had been 
 originally written in the vernacular tongue/ 
 
 It is interesting to add that, in 1893, when the 
 Greek Chair was again vacant, some correspondence 
 with reference to Jowett's successor passed between 
 Mr. Gladstone and Dr. Liddell, who was then, like 
 Cyril Jackson in 1811, living in dignified retirement, 
 in a quiet country home. 
 
 The first important question which the new Dean 
 had to face was the reform of the constitution of 
 Christ Church in accordance with the recommenda-" 
 tions of the Royal Commission. The Commission 
 had clearly pointed out the evil arising from the 
 close system of nomination to studentships by the 
 Dean and Canons, from the inadequate emoluments 
 of the students, and from the absence of all participa- 
 tion by them in the government of the House and 
 the management of its property. 
 
 1 At Christ Church,' says the report, ' the students, 
 those from Westminster excepted, are nominated by 
 the Dean and Canons in turn, the Dean having two 
 turns. It is true indeed that many of these dignitaries, 
 especially the Dean, have taken pains to make 
 creditable appointments ; but it is notorious that 
 studentships are often given as a matter of favour, 
 and that the relations or friends of Canons are likely 
 to be preferred. 
 
 ' The Dean and Canons have only to surrender 
 their patronage, and to invite the best scholars in 
 England to compete for their studentships. . . . The 
 studentships should be divided into two classes,
 
 142 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 corresponding to the fellowships and scholarships 
 of Colleges. Means should be found to increase 
 the value of the studentships, especially the senior 
 studentships, in order to enable Christ Church to 
 compete fairly with other Colleges. It is not unreason- 
 able to expect that something should be done by the 
 Chapter, whose own income is very large, if not 
 while the present vested rights subsist, yet on the 
 occurrence of vacancies.' 
 
 The Commissioners proceed to suggest the sup- 
 pression, for this purpose, of the two canonries 
 unconnected with professorships ; the suspension of 
 election to twenty studentships pending the settle- 
 ment of the new Ordinance ; and the reservation 
 of a definite proportion of junior studentships for 
 Westminster School. 
 
 The Ordinance of 1858, which effected the first 
 change in the ancient foundation of King Henry VIII, 
 was framed on these lines. The Dean and Canons 
 were still to be the sole governing body, the sole 
 administrators of the property ; but in place of the 
 large body of students appointed except the West- 
 minster men by a system of private nomination, 
 there were now created twenty-eight senior student- 
 ships and fifty-two junior studentships, twenty-one 
 of the latter to be connected with Westminster 
 School. All the rest, both senior and junior, were 
 thrown open to public competition. The senior 
 students would rank as fellows of Colleges but 
 without the real position and authority of fellows 
 the junior students, as scholars. The Canonries
 
 CH. v] Ordinance 0/1858 143 
 
 were reduced from eight to six. In order to ensure 
 an effective and impartial electoral Board, the election 
 of students, whether senior or junior, was placed in 
 the hands of the Dean, six Canons, and the six senior 
 members of the Educational Staff. Thus, for the 
 first time, the students had equal powers with the 
 Canons in this important matter ; and the system 
 of private nomination was abolished for ever. But 
 the appointment of the College Officers (Censors 
 and Readers) still rested with the Dean and Canons ; 
 and their authority, in all matters connected with the 
 property of the College, was in no respect curtailed. 
 This change effected an important and most salu- 
 tary reform. But it was naturally unpalatable, for 
 various reasons, to many of the Canons. The pro- 
 posals of the Commissioners were often and fully 
 considered at Chapter meetings, but unanimity did 
 not prevail. Towards the close of their discussions, 
 Dr. Pusey saw the uselessness of offering further 
 resistance. 
 
 ' I shall not write to the Commissioners/ he told 
 the Dean, ' a single voice will not be heard by 
 unwilling ears. I have done what I could towards 
 retaining the old Christ Church. Fuit Ilium. The 
 Commissioners, with yourself and Dr. Jacobson, will 
 be responsible for the new. I shall be very glad 
 if the Commissioners' plan should work better than 
 I hope of it. ... The Act has deluded us with 
 a show of power of negativing propositions which 
 we think disadvantageous to the College. I shall 
 not keep up an ineffectual struggle, though I must 
 think that we have been treated ill.'
 
 144 Deanery of Christ Chztrch [CH. v 
 
 The Dean replied : 
 
 ' With regard to the Ordinance, it is matter for 
 difference of opinion. Old Christ Church is, so far 
 as I can see, in a state of decay, and must (if not 
 restored) fall into decrepitude. The measure pro- 
 posed for restoring it may be good or bad. It can 
 hardly reduce it lower than it is. Neither you nor 
 I may see the success which I hope for. But I cheer- 
 fully accept the responsibility.' 
 
 That success, however, was only partial. The 
 changes then effected were not destined to be final. 
 It was not likely that this newly-created body of 
 senior students, comprising the whole educational 
 staff of the College, and recruited yearly by the 
 election of able young men from other Colleges who 
 had no traditional reverence for old Christ Church, 
 would acquiesce in holding an anomalous position, 
 immeasurably inferior to that of fellows elsewhere. 
 It was inevitable that a movement should soon 
 begin to alter the status of the students, and give 
 them a recognized place in the administration of the 
 corporate property. After much controversy, and 
 many negotiations between the Chapter and the 
 students, a body of Referees was appointed in 
 February 1866, who were to decide all matters 
 at issue. Archbishop Longley and Sir John T. 
 Coleridge were named for this purpose by the 
 Canons ; Sir Roundell Palmer by the Dean ; Sir 
 William Page Wood and the Hon. Edward Twisleton 
 by the students. Their recommendations were em- 
 bodied in an Act of Parliament, ' The Christ Church
 
 CH. v] Statutes 0/1882 145 
 
 Oxford Act/ which was passed in 1867. By this 
 Act the government of the Foundation, and the 
 disposal and management of its possessions and 
 revenues, were vested in the Dean, Canons, and 
 Senior Students. Certain powers with respect to 
 the Cathedral Church, its services and ministers, 
 were reserved to the Dean and Chapter, and ample 
 revenues were set apart for a Chapter Fund. The 
 Act made careful provisions for the various com- 
 plications resulting from the composite nature and 
 divergent interests of the new Governing Body. 
 
 ' The Dean,' writes the Bishop of Gibraltar, ' had 
 a difficult part to play, as he was head of both the 
 contending parties. That the revolution, for it was 
 no less, created no discord or ill-feeling was due 
 in a large measure to the impartial and conciliatory 
 attitude which he took throughout/ 
 
 It was also due it should be added to the 
 generous acceptance by the Chapter of their altered 
 position. 
 
 So matters remained till 1877, when Oxford was 
 again thrown into the crucible, and the Parliamentary 
 Commission, of which Lord Selborne was chairman, 
 made drastic changes in the character and tenure 
 of College emoluments. Under statutes which 
 became law in 1882, the names of 'senior' and 
 'junior' student were abolished; the latter became 
 scholars ; the former, under the ancient title of 
 students, were divided into two classes, official and 
 non-official, with different conditions of election and 
 tenure. 
 
 U
 
 146 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 Such, in brief outline, were the successive changes 
 in the constitution of Christ Church which Dean 
 Liddell witnessed, and for which he was largely 
 responsible. He was not indeed on more than 
 one Commission. He refused though pressed 
 to serve on the executive Commission which followed 
 upon the first, for the purpose of framing or ap- 
 proving the new Ordinances. This refusal was 
 chiefly based on the ground that it would be un- 
 desirable for the new Dean, just entering on his 
 office, to be hampered by duties which would have 
 a distinctly party character, and would necessarily 
 involve much unpleasant controversy. 
 
 ' The more I think of it ' (he writes to Vaughan) 
 'the more unwilling I am to begin my reign at 
 Oxford conjointly with an office of Commissioner. 
 Is no one else to be found ? ' 
 
 In 1876 he was again invited to serve on the 
 Commission which Mr. Disraeli's Government pro- 
 posed to issue, and to allow his name to appear 
 in the Bill which was to be introduced at the 
 beginning of the session of 1877. He was then 
 in quite an altered position in the University. He 
 had but lately served for four years as Vice- 
 Chancellor, and had won the respect and confidence 
 of all parties, and his acceptance of office would, 
 as he was assured by Lord Salisbury, 'singularly 
 add to the strength of the Commission and the 
 value of its work.' Lord Salisbury's invitation was 
 privately backed by influential members of his party.
 
 CH. v] Improvements at the Deanery 147 
 
 ' I am sure,' wrote Sir John Mowbray, 'your ac- 
 ceptance of the post will inspire confidence in every 
 quarter, Conservative and Liberal.' But after much 
 consideration the Dean declined the offer; mainly, 
 it is believed, on the ground that his acceptance 
 would deprive the Commission of the services of a 
 distinguished Oxford man who had more leisure than 
 himself for the task, and who would, in the Dean's 
 judgment, be of more use as a Commissioner. No 
 doubt he was also influenced by his unwillingness 
 to embark once more, at the age of 66, on the strife 
 and vexation connected with University reforms, of 
 which he had already had his full share. 
 
 Dean Liddell's name will be for long associated 
 with the buildings of Christ Church. On becoming 
 Dean he was for the first time in his life able to indulge 
 his artistic tastes on an adequate scale, and without the 
 restrictions which had hampered him at Westminster. 
 First, of necessity, came his new home, the Deanery. 
 It needed many alterations. To his refined taste are 
 due the panelling and decorations of drawing-room 
 and hall, the opening out of the long gallery on the 
 first floor as an additional reception-room, and 
 the construction of the stately staircase, called the 
 ' Lexicon ' staircase, because its cost was defrayed 
 from the profits on that book. Much delay took place 
 before the Deanery was fit for occupation ; a fire 
 at Baker's factory in Lambeth destroyed all the new 
 woodwork just as it was on the point of completion. 
 However, early in 1856 the work was almost finished. 
 On February 12, he wrote .to his mother: 
 
 u 2
 
 148 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 ' As I sit in this now very beautiful house, and 
 admire all that has been done, I feel sensible how 
 worthless it all would be, if we had not kind parents 
 and kinsfolk and friends to join us in admiration ; 
 and so it is with birthdays and all that brings joy 
 in this life. . . . Painters and paperers still linger, 
 but we are now very nearly done, and hope to throw 
 open our doors for an evening musical party next 
 week. They are intending to get up the ' Macbeth ' 
 music, with choruses, some glees, and other music, by 
 the help of some of the young men and some ladies, 
 if they are not too prudish to join. The gallery 
 will be a good place for sound, forty-four feet long, 
 opening by a wide archway upon the stairs, so that 
 a great number may be present not to mention 
 the drawing-room. I wish you, like my father, had 
 seen the house before it was done, in order that you 
 might appreciate what has been done. We have 
 spent all my father's magnificent present upon the 
 sideboard, which I hope he will soon come to 
 admire. It is really, I think, or rather will be (for 
 it is not finished), most beautiful. I have not yet 
 got anything with your present for my library, for 
 that room at present remains untouched/ 
 
 About a fortnight later he adds : 
 
 ' The house is all but finished, and now nothing 
 remains but the pleasant task of showing it to our 
 friends and paying the bills. We begin with two 
 musical evenings on Thursday and Saturday next, 
 without any dinner parties. All the College will 
 be asked on the two nights, and all whom we know 
 among Heads of Houses, &c., are asked. We very 
 much wish you could all be here. You could sit 
 and hear it all quietly in your own bed-room, if you
 
 To face page 148. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL IN 1813.
 
 CH. v] Chapel in old days 149 
 
 did not feel equal to venturing into such a crowd ; 
 for what will, I hope, be your bed-room opens into 
 the gallery where the music will be performed. So, 
 about 8 o'clock on Thursday evening, think of 
 Madam making her first curtsey at the head of her 
 own stairs in Oxford. This is a strange place for 
 rumours. It has been reported that Mrs. Liddell is 
 
 getting up private theatricals, and that Dr. C 
 
 permits his daughter to personate one of the witches, 
 while the Dean is expected to represent Macbeth ! ' 
 
 Next came the work on the Cathedral ; a re- 
 arrangement of the interior urgently needed, but 
 not intended to be final. Not till seventeen years 
 later was an adequate restoration of the building 
 attempted. But the over-crowding of the con- 
 gregation, who were confined within the restricted 
 space of the choir itself, led to much irreverence ; 
 and some alterations were imperatively necessary. 
 Old Christ Church men will remember the daily 
 scene in Chapel in those ancient days ; the choir cut 
 off from the body of the Church by the heavy organ- 
 screen ; and within its narrow limits the mob of 
 undergraduates seated on rows of benches which 
 faced westward, and crowded up against the altar 
 rails ; the high barrier of stalls concealing the view 
 of the choir aisles * ; the ' Prick bills ' walking up 
 
 1 Keys, the Dean's Verger, was stationed at the entrance to the 
 choir, and kept a stout dog-whip with which to belabour any dogs 
 which as not unfrequently happened followed their masters into 
 Chapel. Keys lived in the south transept, and his beer store was in 
 a cupboard just below the pew, on the north side of the choir, in which 
 the Deanery ladies sat. Dog-whip and beer were both summarily 
 ejected by Dean Liddell, to the old verger's great annoyance.
 
 150 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 and down, pricking in the men on to their lists as 
 they managed to identify them ; the singing men and 
 boys, on 'Surplice' prayer-days, bracketed out aloft 
 under the shadow of the Norman arches, the men 
 on one side, the boys on the other; the slovenly 
 undevotional service, whether English Prayers on 
 Sundays and Holy Days, or Latin Prayers on other 
 occasions, when the sonorous tones of Dean Gaisford 
 overpowered the responses of all other worshippers. 
 Mr. Ruskin indeed has idealized the scene in his 
 ' Praeterita,' and his description does justice to his 
 fine imagination, and deserves to be quoted : 
 
 ' In this choir, written so closely and consecutively 
 with indisputable British History, met every morning 
 a congregation representing the best of what Britain 
 had become, orderly, as the crew of a man-of-war, 
 in the goodly ship of their temple. Every man in 
 his place, according to his rank, age, and learning; 
 every man of sense or heart there recognizing that 
 he was either fulfilling, or being prepared to fulfil, 
 the gravest duties required of Englishmen. A well- 
 educated foreigner, admitted to that morning service, 
 might have learnt and judged more quickly and 
 justly what the country had been, and still had 
 power to be, than by months of stay in court or 
 city. There, in his stall, sat the greatest divine of 
 England under his commandant niche, her greatest 
 scholar amongst the tutors the present Dean Lid- 
 dell, and a man of curious intellectual power and 
 simple virtue, Osborne Gordon. The group of 
 noblemen gave, in the Marquis of Kildare, Earl 
 of Desart, Lord Emlyn, and Francis Charteris, now
 
 CH. v] Ruskin's 'Christ Church Choir' 151 
 
 Lord Wemyss, the brightest types of high race and 
 active power ; Henry A eland and Charles Newton 
 among the senior undergraduates, and I among the 
 freshmen, showed, if one had known it, elements 
 of curious possibilities in coming days. None of us 
 then conscious of any need or chance of change, 
 least of all the stern Captain, who, with rounded 
 brow and glittering dark eye, led, in his old thunder- 
 ous Latin, the responses of the morning prayer.' 
 
 Nevertheless, it was high time that a change 
 should be made. The arrangement of the interior, 
 as it then was, dated from the reign of Charles I, 
 when Brian Duppa was Dean, and the seventeenth- 
 century woodwork was of interesting design and 
 worthy of preservation. It was as far as possible 
 kept. But the organ-screen was removed, and the 
 organ placed on the floor of the south transept. 
 The stalls of the Dean and Canons were shifted to 
 a position westward of the third bay of the nave, 
 so that almost the whole length of the church, as 
 it then existed, was made use of for service. The 
 seats were all re-arranged, and the lofty barriers at 
 the sides of the choir removed ; the choir itself was 
 assigned to the bulk of the undergraduates, the 
 Censors sitting among them ; the Tutors and other 
 graduates, as well as the noblemen and gentlemen 
 commoners, sat westward of the transepts ; and 
 under the central tower were placed the choristers. 
 The pulpit occupied almost its present position, and 
 the Vice-Chancellor's throne (now relegated to the 
 Latin Chapel) was placed opposite to it. The
 
 152 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 sounding-board of the pulpit added dignity to the 
 episcopal throne, placed below the altar-steps on 
 the south side. It is stated that the whole of this 
 reconstruction was contrived out of the old wood- 
 work, none of it being removed from the church, 
 and no new materials introduced. The effect as 
 a whole was good, and the services were vastly im- 
 proved. More care was taken in selecting chaplains 
 capable of intoning their part, and the choristers 
 were diligently trained by Dr. Corfe, the organist. 
 The church was no longer a by-word. 
 
 Dr. Corfe was at this time sorely plagued by one 
 of the choirmen, whose ' alto ' singing was miserably 
 bad. He came to the Dean. ' Mr. Dean, I really 
 cannot have that man singing any longer : he spoils 
 the whole choir. If only he sang "bass," it would 
 not so much matter ; but such an " alto " is intoler- 
 able.' ' Very well, Dr. Corfe,' said the Dean, ' I 
 will deal with the matter.' So the choirman was 
 sent for. ' Dr. Corfe complains of your singing, and 
 says he cannot have you sing "alto" any longer; 
 but that it would not be so bad if you sang " bass." 
 For the future, therefore, be good enough to sing 
 "bass".' 'But, Mr. Dean,' rejoined the man, 'I 
 cannot sing "bass".' 'Well,' answered Liddell, 
 ' I am no musician ; but sing " bass " you must. 
 Good morning.' And for many a year afterwards, 
 as can be but too well remembered, the man sang 
 'bass,' till he was finally shelved. 
 
 On ordinary week-days, Latin Prayers were 
 always said at the College services. They were
 
 CH. v] Latin Prayers 153 
 
 not abolished till the end of 1861, when the present 
 Bishop of Gibraltar and Dean of Durham were 
 Censors. It was supposed that the substitution of 
 English for Latin would encourage devotion, but 
 it is doubtful how far this has been the case ; and 
 certainly there was a loss in the abandonment of 
 the time-honoured book in its dingy brown binding, 
 with its long S's that led the unwary astray (one 
 Chaplain always read ' sumas ' as ' fumas ' in the 
 Litany), and its quaint rendering of the Psalms, 
 some verses of which must always linger in the 
 memory. Who, that ever heard them, does not 
 remember the Dean and Censors repeating with 
 stentorian voice that mysterious verse : 
 
 ' Similisque factus sum onocrotalo gaudenti solitudine, ac buboni 
 agenti in locis desertis ; ' 
 
 or the in saecula saeculorum, Amen, rolled out in 
 tones which made them sink into Lord Dufferin's 
 memory, to be used, some years afterwards, as the 
 most fitting ending for his famous Latin speech in 
 Iceland J ? 
 
 On Sundays and Holy Days there were Surplice 
 Prayers ; the Holy Communion was celebrated once 
 a month after the Choral Matins : its proper place, 
 no doubt, but involving a service of nearly two hours' 
 length before breakfast. College sermons were not 
 known ; but when the Dean or a Canon preached 
 in his turn before the University, the sermon always 
 took place at Christ Church and not at St. Mary's. 
 This ancient privilege has been surrendered since 
 
 1 See Letters from High Latitudes^ ch. vi. p. 68. 
 X
 
 154 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.V 
 
 1869, as a necessary result of the introduction of ten 
 o'clock service with sermon, for the members of the 
 House and for the general public. It was a privilege 
 for which Dean John Fell contended fiercely in 1673, 
 and it was then ordered, after reference to the King 
 and Council, ' that from henceforth every Canon of 
 Christ Church should (guatenus a member of the 
 University) preach at St. Mary's, and (guatenus 
 Canon) at Christ Church.' 
 
 This rearrangement of the church was carried 
 out under the Dean's close supervision, with the 
 assistance of an architect, Mr. Billing. It was a 
 thoroughly congenial task, and he was constantly 
 engaged in it, superintending every detail. Even 
 in the middle of August he was found in Oxford, 
 having travelled up specially from Bamborough 
 Castle to see that all was going right. 
 
 ' I spent the greater part of yesterday morning ' 
 (he writes on August 17, 1856), 'in the church, 
 going through all small details, so as to prevent, 
 if possible, the necessity of my return. But it is 
 very fortunate that I came. There would have 
 been several enormous blunders. When work is 
 going on, one ought always to be on the spot. The 
 whole really will look very well. But I wish you 
 could have seen it when it was quite clear and open. 
 They have begun fixing the seats now.' 
 
 The work was pressed on, so as to be finished 
 before the re-assembling of the College in October ; 
 but the Dean was not allowed to witness its com- 
 pletion. On September 30 came the beginning of
 
 CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL, 1856-1870. 
 
 To face page 154.
 
 CH. v] Restoration of Cathedral in i8jo 155 
 
 the serious illness which kept him away from Oxford 
 for many months. He had been visiting an estate 
 in Leicestershire, and on that day writes to his 
 wife : 
 
 ' I renewed my cold by my Market Harborough 
 trip, and Acland says I had better stay in bed. It 
 is very tiresome, as I had fully calculated upon 
 being up to welcome you. Nor have I been able 
 to superintend the finishing of the church, as I 
 desired.' 
 
 These improvements in the interior of the Cathe- 
 dral were intended to be of quite a temporary 
 character. They had not been costly, had been 
 hastily completed, and left very much to be done 
 when a favourable opportunity should arise. That 
 opportunity was not found until the new Governing 
 Body had been created under the Ordinance of 1867. 
 It was of happy omen for the future relations be- 
 tween the Chapter and the students, that a cordial 
 acceptance was given to a proposal made by the 
 senior resident student, the Rev. T. Chamberlain, 
 for the appointment of a Committee to confer with 
 the Chapter on the question of the restoration of the 
 Cathedral. This resolution was passed in March 
 1868. There were difficulties to be faced at first; 
 but a year afterwards matters had so far advanced 
 that Mr. G. Gilbert Scott was asked to prepare 
 plans and estimates. An appeal for funds was next 
 made to the general body of Christ Church men. 
 The Governing Body subscribed 1,000 from their 
 corporate funds ; the Chapter, a like sum from 
 
 x 2
 
 156 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 the Chapter Fund; the Dean promised a private 
 subscription of 500 ; and the other residents gave 
 according to their means or inclinations. In the 
 summer of 1870 the first contract with the builders 
 was signed, and two years later the work was prac- 
 tically completed, at a cost of more than ,17,000. 
 
 Those who were privileged to serve on the 
 ' Restoration ' Committee under the presidency of 
 the Dean will gratefully acknowledge the debt 
 due to his untiring attention to every detail of 
 the work, and to his exquisite artistic taste and 
 well-balanced judgment. 
 
 It was not indeed so much a 'Restoration' 
 as an 'adaptation' of the church to its twofold 
 purposes, to serve as the Cathedral Church of the 
 Diocese, and the College Chapel. Before Dean 
 Liddell's time, the first of these two objects had 
 been for long almost unrecognized. There was 
 an episcopal throne indeed, which was occasion- 
 ally occupied, and there were Canons' Prayers 
 on week-days, scantily attended. But the re- 
 quirements of the College had always been first 
 considered. The Cathedral Church was within the 
 College gates, and was therefore only accessible 
 at the pleasure of its Head. The Dean, moreover, 
 claimed to be his own Ordinary, and the Bishops 
 had met with scant courtesy from former Deans. 
 Even in Dean Liddell's earlier years, the Bishop, 
 on his rare visits, would slink into his seat from 
 the side aisle as though he were almost an interloper. 
 But after some years of diligent care in the
 
 CH. v] Changes in Nave and Choir 157 
 
 improvement of the services, the Cathedral, made 
 more convenient for a mixed congregation by the 
 reconstruction of the interior in 1856, had become 
 well attended by the general public, and there 
 were larger demands upon its space at the Sunday 
 services. The work undertaken in 1870 brought 
 the church, in all essential points, into its present 
 condition. The interior of the fabric was thoroughly 
 cleaned, the whitewash brushed off, and the original 
 surface exposed. The quaint seventeenth-century 
 screens, which shut off the chapels north of the 
 choir from the north transept, were removed. 
 They were of unusual design, shaped as inverted 
 arches, so as to form, with the Norman arches 
 above them, complete circles with solid masonry, 
 only partly pierced, below. The plain two-light 
 windows which Brian Duppa had inserted throughout 
 the church, and had filled with Van Ling's glass, 
 were removed, and somewhat commonplace Per- 
 pendicular windows took their place. One only 
 of these curious windows remains. It was spared 
 in compliance with a general request of members 
 of the House, and may be seen at the west end 
 of the north aisle of the nave. It represents 
 Jonah under the gourd, and the city of Nineveh 
 in the distance. The east window, then of 
 Decorated tracery, and filled with gaudy French 
 glass recently given in commemoration of the 
 tercentenary of the foundation of the College, made 
 way for a charming reconstruction of the eastern 
 end in accordance with indications of earlier work
 
 158 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. v 
 
 discovered by the architect. Portions of the French 
 glass may still be seen distributed among the cleres- 
 tory lights of the south transept. This transept, one 
 bay of which had long been desecrated by its use 
 as a Verger's house, was now brought wholly into 
 the church ; and a curious chamber, which extended 
 over the slype, was carefully rebuilt in accordance 
 with traces found in situ. A light screen of open 
 iron-work, wrought by Skidmore of Coventry, was 
 carried round the nave and choir, so as to mark 
 off the central portion of the church for Collegiate 
 use without excluding the general congregation 
 from full enjoyment of the service. At the west 
 end of the nave an additional bay was built, 
 replacing one of the three destroyed by Wolsey ; 
 it was intended that it should be called Dr. Dowdes- 
 well's bay, the cost being defrayed by a sum of 
 money bequeathed some years before by that member 
 of the Chapter. And when, before the restoration 
 was completed, the Canon's house which separated 
 the Cathedral from the Great Quadrangle became 
 vacant, an approach to the church was made from 
 the terrace through a double archway. This was 
 completed in 1872, and now forms the chief 
 entrance. The central tower arcade was also 
 opened to view ; its Norman arches had been long 
 hidden by the floor of the ringing chamber. But 
 the bells were now removed altogether from the 
 church, and a new belfry was constructed for them 
 above the Hall staircase. There they were placed 
 in a plain wooden case, irreverently called the
 
 CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL AFTER RESTORATION. 
 To face page 158.
 
 CH. v] Improved Services 159 
 
 4 Tea-chest,' which was some years afterwards hidden 
 from view by the construction, from the designs of 
 Mr. Bodley, of the stunted tower with four corner 
 turrets, which rises at the south-east corner of 
 the Great Quadrangle. It was Mr. Bodley's wish 
 to surmount this lower tower by a lofty campanile 
 of wood and copper; it is hoped that this design 
 may yet be carried out. 
 
 It remained to furnish the interior in a manner 
 worthy of the building. The stalls and seats in 
 the central portion were made of dark Italian walnut 
 from Mr. Scott's designs. The floor of the choir 
 was laid with rich marbles, surrounding designs in 
 Maltese inlaid work. The Bishop's throne, a 
 Diocesan memorial of Bishop Wilberforce, was also 
 designed by Scott. Gradually other enrichments 
 were added by various donors ; the place grew in 
 beauty year by year. The altar frontal, and the 
 richly-bound Bible of 1674, were the gifts of Dean 
 Liddell's three eldest daughters. 
 
 The Cathedral was indeed an object of his un- 
 ceasing care, and is a worthy monument of his taste. 
 And he desired to throw the building open as widely 
 as possible to the public, and to have the services 
 conducted with care and reverence. Although with 
 no liking for any of the extreme developments in 
 doctrine or ritual which were becoming so common, 
 Dean Liddell was in hearty sympathy with every 
 attempt made to meet the demand for more frequent 
 and more reverent services. A weekly celebration 
 of Holy Communion was introduced in 1865 ; to
 
 160 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.V 
 
 this was subsequently added a celebration on Thurs- 
 day mornings. Diocesan gatherings of various kinds 
 were encouraged during the vacations, when the 
 church was not needed for College purposes. Bach's 
 Passion music was rendered for the first time on 
 March 20, 1873, by the three choirs of Christ 
 Church, Magdalen College, and the Chapel Royal, 
 Windsor. Later in the same year Bach's Christmas 
 music was rendered there, and the Church has again 
 and again been used for such special services. If, 
 a few years before Dean Liddell's time, a writer 
 in the Ecclesiologist could describe the service at 
 Christ Church as ' the most slovenly and irreverent 
 that we have ever witnessed in any English 
 Cathedral,' it may now claim to rank among the 
 most beautiful, even in a University which boasts 
 of New College and Magdalen Chapels. 
 
 Another important architectural work is associated 
 with the earlier years of Dean Liddell's rule. For 
 some time past the Chapter had been accumulating 
 funds for rebuilding an ancient part of the College, 
 and, in a communication to Lord Palmerston in 1854, 
 they expressed a hope that the undertaking would 
 soon be begun. Many Christ Church men will 
 remember the Chaplains' Quadrangle, the scene of 
 innumerable bonfires, formed by the Old Library 
 (the monastic refectory) on the north, Wolsey's 
 kitchen on the west, the cloister and passage to 
 the meadow on the east, and on the south a low 
 range of venerable buildings where the Chaplains 
 and Auditor had rooms. A narrow archway led
 
 7V> face page 160. 
 
 THE GREAT QUADRANGLE, CHRIST CHURCH 
 From a Drawing made in 1856.
 
 CH. v] Meadow Buildings & Gt. Quadrangle 161 
 
 eastward from the cloister to a somewhat mean 
 block of buildings erected after the fire of 1669 
 by Dean John Fell, which fronted the Broad Walk. 
 It was now resolved to pull down Fell's Buildings 
 and the south side of the Chaplains' Quadrangle ; 
 and in their stead was erected the long range of 
 Meadow Buildings, from the designs of Mr. Deane 
 of Dublin, whose firm, then Deane and Woodward, 
 had been the architects of the University Museum. 
 The style is Rhenish Gothic, and the exterior 
 elevation still perhaps invites criticism ; but the 
 interior arrangements are excellent, and rooms have 
 been provided for a large addition to the numbers 
 of the College. The work was completed in 1865, 
 some of the rooms having been occupied in the 
 previous year. 
 
 The Great Quadrangle in its turn required to 
 be dealt with. No material alteration in its archi- 
 tecture had been made since the time of its com- 
 pletion under Dean John Fell, when the whole of the 
 north side was built. At the same time Wolsey's 
 work had been curiously transformed by the addition 
 of an Italian balustrade running round the whole 
 range of buildings, including even the Hall ; and the 
 earth excavated from the centre of the Quadrangle 
 had been piled up to raise the broad terrace, so that 
 the bases of the shafts which were to support the 
 vaulting of Wolsey's projected cloister were hidden 
 below the level of the terrace walk. There had 
 apparently been no uniformity of surface in the 
 area of the Quadrangle before Fell's time; the 
 
 Y
 
 1 62 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.V 
 
 whole place was till then unfinished ; and a staple 
 with ring for fastening horses was to be seen near the 
 Deanery door as late as 1870, thus indicating that 
 it could be reached on horseback in olden days. 
 In 1842 the terrace had been very handsomely faced 
 with grey Cornish granite. Now under Dean 
 Liddell the crumbling surface of the soft Oolite 
 stone of which the Quadrangle was built, long 
 disintegrated by rain and frost, was renewed with 
 a harder stone from the Taynton quarries wherever 
 necessary. The shafts designed to carry the vaulting 
 of the cloister received with perhaps an almost over- 
 conscientious reproduction of Wolsey's unfinished 
 project the slightly curved stones to show the 
 intended springing of the vaulting ; the arches, 
 which had been smoothed to the wall face, were 
 renewed round the Quadrangle, and even introduced 
 on the north side, where they had never existed 
 before, and the terrace was lowered about fifteen 
 inches to disclose the bases of the shafts. This 
 change in the level of the terrace revealed the 
 foundation of the external buttresses of the cloister. 
 It was decided, but not without much hesitation, 
 to leave them exposed. The balustrade, some parts 
 of which had lately fallen in a storm, was removed, 
 and battlements took its place. Beneath them was 
 carved a line of shields, illustrative of the long 
 history of the House. The Hall received its pin- 
 nacles, and its splendid proportions were disclosed 
 by the removal of the masking wall which connected 
 it at its eastern end with the corner tower. Over
 
 CH. v] Cloisters and Chapter House 163 
 
 Kill-Canon a small tower, originally intended by Fell 
 for astronomical purposes, but never carried up beyond 
 the line of the balustrade, was now completed. 
 
 There remained the Chapter House, and the 
 mutilated cloister, of which Wolsey had ruthlessly 
 destroyed the western side, to be restored as far 
 as possible to their original beauty. The cloister 
 garth was cleared of a mass of earth which had 
 accumulated there during three hundred years. The 
 removal of the soil not only enabled the proportions 
 of the. cloister itself to be appreciated, but also 
 exposed to view some puzzling foundations of con- 
 ventual buildings, possibly of the lavatory. The 
 northern side of the cloister had long been used 
 as a muniment room, for which purpose it was quite 
 unfit, as Anthony a Wood complained two centuries 
 before. All documents were now removed; the 
 tracery of the windows was renewed throughout 
 the cloisters to its original Perpendicular character ; 
 the lierne vaulting of the roofs was restored ; and 
 over the doorway of the Chapter House a most 
 interesting remnant of an earlier building the bold 
 experiment of a loftier vaulting in oak was suc- 
 cessfully accomplished. The Chapter House an 
 exquisite specimen of early English architecture 
 had been strangely disfigured in the seven- 
 teenth century. A party wall had been built across 
 it, dividing it into two nearly equal portions, and 
 the flooring of the inner part, which was used for 
 Chapter business and hospitable dinners, had been 
 raised within a few feet of the bases of the shafts 
 
 Y 2
 
 164 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.V 
 
 of the tracery which clothed the walls and the 
 graceful eastern window with its five pointed lights. 
 Beneath this floor a cellar had been formed, where 
 the Chapter wine was stored. All these monstrous 
 obstructions were now swept away, and the noble 
 proportions of the room were once more shown. 
 
 Such were the principal architectural works as- 
 sociated with Dean Liddell's epoch. It is a matter 
 of regret that the Meadow Buildings were not called 
 by his name : but his statue the gift of Sir John 
 Mowbray and Mr. Vere Bayne stands above the 
 Kill-Canon archway, on its northern side. On the 
 south side of the same archway is a modern statue 
 of his great predecessor, John Fell. It was the 
 gift of Liddell, as his initials indicate 1 ; and it takes 
 the place of the earlier statue of the same famous 
 Dean, familiar to many generations of Christ Church 
 men, and often subject to indignities at their hands, 
 which now rests in quiet seclusion in the garden 
 of Nuneham Park, bearing the following inscription 
 from Liddell's pen, recounting its chequered history : 
 
 ' Effigies quam aspicis viri optimi qui cur homun- 
 cionibus quibusdam displiceret ipsi nesciebant in 
 Aede Christi minio semel atque iterum illita hoc 
 in recessu requiem obtinuit A. D. 1887.' 
 
 Certainly to no other Dean than Fell did Christ 
 Church owe so large a debt, in the reconstruction 
 1 The inscription is : 
 
 JOHANNI FELL 
 
 H. G. L. 
 
 DECANO DECANUS 
 MDCCCLXXVII.
 
 IT* 1-.,
 
 CH.V] New Walk in Meadow 165 
 
 and dutiful preservation of its buildings, as it has 
 owed to Liddell. And as Fell planted the Broad 
 Walk with its double line of seventy-two elm trees, 
 so to Liddell is due the new avenue which leads 
 from the gate of the Meadow Buildings to the 
 river, superseding the narrow, damp, and unsavoury 
 path which skirted the west side of the meadow 
 by the Trill Mill stream J . 
 
 1 This walk was formally opened in 1872 by Princess Louise. The 
 crews of the Eights assembled in the Deanery Garden, and walked in 
 procession from the Meadow gate to the Barges, carrying the flags of 
 their respective colleges.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 DEANERY OF CHRIST CHURCH (continued) 
 
 MUCH more is needed for a successful ruler of an 
 ancient, learned, and numerous society than artistic 
 taste and high intellectual gifts. The Dean of Christ 
 Church has to maintain the efficiency of a Cathedral 
 establishment and of a great collegiate foundation. 
 He has to gather round him, and guide with con- 
 stitutional, but not arbitrary authority, a body of 
 students comprising brilliant representatives of 
 every department of academical study; and over 
 a very large number of undergraduates he has to 
 preside as the upholder of discipline, the encourager 
 of industry, and the rewarder of merit. Firmness, 
 tact, discernment, consideration, courtesy, are all 
 necessary elements of success in so prominent 
 a position; they largely create that authority 
 without which chaos is likely to prevail, and that 
 confidence which alone makes authority welcome. 
 But confidence is proverbially a plant of slow 
 growth; and a Headmastership has rarely, in 
 Oxford experience, been found a good training 
 for the Headship of a College. It was only by
 
 Matters of Discipline 167 
 
 degrees that Dean Liddell, who never lacked 
 authority, gained the full confidence of every 
 member of his House ; it was only by degrees that 
 respect changed into regard, and regard ripened 
 into affection. 
 
 There were difficulties at first. The unfortunate 
 selection by the new Dean of a Tutor who did not 
 understand how to deal with undergraduates made 
 discipline for a time an arduous task. His own 
 enforced absence for two consecutive winters in the 
 island of Madeira was a serious interruption to his 
 work, and kept him almost a stranger to many 
 whom he desired to know. Fortunately his place, 
 during the winters of 1856-7 and 1857-8, was well 
 filled by the Sub-Dean, Archdeacon Clerke, who 
 was deservedly popular, and held the reins of 
 government with steady hands, ably supported 
 by the Censors. A letter written by him to the 
 Dean in February 1858 will remind old Christ 
 Church men of an incident of not unfrequent 
 occurrence in former days, and will bring to their 
 memory one whose name has been happily associated 
 with the fortunes of thel-Iouse since 1842, and who 
 still, as senior Student of the Foundation, occupies 
 a warm place in the affections of present and former 
 members of Christ Church. 
 
 ' Our winter is now passing away. We are having 
 a most mild one altogether; but have had enough 
 snow to set the boys here at work one night at 
 the old amusement of blocking up Kill-Canon. 
 They are inclined to be more noisy than they were
 
 j 68 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 last Term, but I have not much to complain of. 
 Our new noblemen seem to be a well-conducted 
 set, and I hope we may improve, not spoil them. 
 I am bound to speak well of Prout as Censor l . 
 He shows firmness, and knows how to manage men, 
 and they seem to respect him.' 
 
 From time to time as happens in every College 
 troubles and anxieties with regard to discipline 
 would arise ; the most serious in Liddell's time was 
 as far back as 1870; but the absolute calmness 
 and impartiality of the Dean made such disorder 
 comparatively easy to deal with. The Bishop of 
 Gibraltar, who was Censor from 1861 to the end 
 of 1869, describes his experience of such incidents : 
 
 'After I had become Censor, and for the eight 
 following years, I was brought into constant and 
 intimate relations with the Dean. The discipline 
 of the House rests with him and the Censors. The 
 two Censors divided the Term between them, the 
 Senior Censor being responsible for the first, the 
 Junior for the second half. It was the custom for 
 
 1 Mr. Prout was Junior Censor, having been unexpectedly called 
 upon to take the office on Mr. Lloyd's retirement. The Senior Censor 
 at this time was the brilliant scholar and quaint humorist Osborne 
 Gordon, a man of singular power and wide popularity. He had been 
 in office for several years under Gaisford, and was not perhaps quite 
 in sympathy with Liddell's views, though he always loyally supported 
 his chief. He left Christ Church in 1861, having accepted the College 
 living of Easthampstead. 
 
 It may be interesting to add a complete list of the Censors during 
 Liddell's time as Dean. O. Gordon, till 1861 ; G. Marshall, till 1858 ; 
 C. Lloyd, 1858 ; T. J. Prout, 1858-61 ; C. W. Sandford, 1861-9 ; 
 G. W. Kitchin, 1861-3 ; T. V. Bayne, 1863-77 ; H. L. Thompson, 1870- 
 77; H. Salwey, 1877-82; E. F. Sampson, 1877-94; H. S. Holland, 
 1882-4; R. E. Baynes, 1884-7 5 W. Warner, 1887-92.
 
 CH. vi] Liddell at ' Collections ' 169 
 
 the Censor in office to call upon the Dean every 
 morning before ten o'clock, when lectures began, 
 and to confer with him on any matter affecting 
 the discipline, studies, or other interests of the 
 undergraduates. On looking back on those inter- 
 views, I see the Dean standing at his desk, busily 
 engaged with his great Lexicon. What struck me 
 most in him on these occasions was his perfect 
 self-control, and his inflexible justice. Once or 
 twice I had to report serious breaches of discipline. 
 Trying, disappointing, and disheartening as those 
 outbreaks of lawlessness were, the Dean was always 
 calm, never made an error of judgment, was never 
 provoked into a harsh act, or even into a harsh 
 word.' 
 
 Harsh, perhaps, never ; but stern words often, 
 at least in his earlier days. Many men who were 
 undergraduates during his long reign would, if 
 asked their impression, recall this special character- 
 istic, that he was stern. It was not that he was 
 naturally severe ; we know that he was gentle and 
 tender-hearted ; but he was shy and reserved ; there 
 were traditions of the Decanal office not associated 
 with suavity of demeanour ; he was the official 
 mouthpiece when fault had to be found ; and he 
 was always sparing of praise. The result was that 
 the more industrious members of the College some- 
 times felt that they scarcely received their due meed 
 of commendation and encouragement, while the less 
 deserving experienced justice at his hands, un- 
 tempered by leniency. ' Collections ' at the end 
 of Term brought an ordeal not pleasant to be 
 
 z
 
 170 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.VI 
 
 faced by the indolent or the unruly. The green 
 baize covered table ; the row of Tutors who knew 
 each victim's failings, and had often told him of 
 them; the Dean seated at the north end of the 
 table, with the terminal report before him; and 
 then the examination badly done; the fatal record 
 of lectures unattended, or other and graver mis- 
 deeds ; at last the plain unvarnished words of 
 rebuke which fell from the Dean's lips : this was 
 no agreeable experience, and left no happy memory 
 behind. And with many an undergraduate, this 
 was almost all he knew of the Dean, this terrible 
 review in Collections three times a year. Men did 
 not understand that beneath that cold and impertur- 
 bable presence there lay hid sympathy and tender- 
 ness which would have gladly found expression 
 under different circumstances. Sometimes the 
 Censors had the painful duty of bringing young 
 men before the Dean at his own house for severe 
 punishment or serious warning. The same impres- 
 sion was left on the culprits after their alarming 
 interview. On one occasion an awkward mistake 
 occurred. There were two brothers of the name of 
 
 L , one of whom was a model of propriety, the 
 
 other somewhat of a scapegrace. The latter was 
 one morning to be brought before the Dean by the 
 Censors. They had instructed the Dean as to 
 the nature of the offence, and the character of the 
 rebuke to be administered. The door opened, and 
 an undergraduate appeared, to whom the Dean 
 spoke at once, not mincing his words. But, on
 
 CH. vi] Mistaken Censiire 171 
 
 looking round, the Censor to his dismay perceived 
 
 that the wrong Mr. L had by some mischance 
 
 answered the summons to attend : the good and 
 not the bad brother was in the room. As soon 
 as possible he intervened : ' I think, Mr. Dean, 
 a mistake has been made; this is not the gentle- 
 man we wished to bring before you, but his brother.' 
 ' Oh,' said the Dean, as he put up his eyeglass, and 
 spoke in his coldest tones, ' the Censors have always 
 spoken well of you. Be good enough to pass on to 
 your brother what I have said to you. You may 
 go.' And out the man went, but not in an amiable 
 mood. On another occasion a junior student who 
 had gained high University distinctions, and was 
 of absolutely blameless character, called upon the 
 Dean to enter his name as a candidate for the 
 crowning reward of a successful career a senior 
 studentship. As he entered the study the Dean, 
 without at first completely turning from his desk, 
 addressed the astonished undergraduate with marked 
 severity : ' We're not going to have this sort of 
 thing . . . and a student too ; it makes it worse ! ' 
 Then he looked round, and seeing who his visitor 
 was, he bluntly added, ' Oh ! they've sent the 
 wrong man. Pray be seated, Mr. Paget.' For the 
 person so assailed was no other than the future 
 Dean, who thus learnt a lesson which has perhaps 
 been of use to him in later years. 
 
 A less strong, less dignified, less majestic figure 
 would have suffered from this sternness of de- 
 meanour; but Liddell's straightforward simplicity 
 
 z 2
 
 172 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.VI 
 
 and aristocratic bearing atoned for much, and, 
 especially in his later years, he was universally 
 venerated, while his manner became gentler, and 
 his whole attitude towards undergraduates grew to 
 be more fatherly, sympathetic, and genial. And 
 when some young man who had gone through 
 the experience of undergraduate days at Christ 
 Church was exalted to the position of Tutor, he 
 came to appreciate much that he had not known 
 before, and to regard the Dean with profound and 
 affectionate respect. He discovered that his chief 
 always made the most generous allowance for errors 
 of judgment and immaturity of knowledge in the 
 young Tutor; that he gave to him the utmost 
 encouragement and the wisest guidance ; and that 
 he always supported the authority, even if privately 
 he could not always commend the discretion, of every 
 member of the educational staff. And so as the years 
 passed, and Censors and Tutors came and went, 
 there was one judgment which never faltered, one 
 experience which extended over many generations ; 
 a pillar of strength on which all came to rely with 
 implicit confidence and grateful unanimity. 
 
 In 1868 an occurrence of an unusual kind led to 
 some perplexity. A Roman ecclesiastic, who after- 
 wards obtained an undesirable notoriety, spent some 
 time in Oxford, and was in the habit of frequenting 
 undergraduates' rooms at Christ Church, and trying 
 to unsettle their minds. Dr. Pusey was much con- 
 cerned at this, and wrote more than once to the 
 Dean on the subject. His letters, even at this
 
 CH. vi] Pusey and Roman Controversialist 173 
 
 distance of time, have an interest of their own. In 
 June 1868 he wrote: 
 
 ' I understand that a very clever Roman con- 
 troversialist, Father of Pau, who has taken 
 
 Mr. Comberbatch's duty at the Roman Catholic 
 church for a time, is visiting a good deal with our 
 undergraduates and talking controversy with them ; 
 not particularly with such as think and believe as I 
 do, for we might counteract his influence, but with 
 others who understand less the ground upon which 
 they stand. I fear that the effect of these visits 
 will (as I have said with regard to Dr. Newman) be 
 to produce unsettlement among our undergraduates, 
 who are no match for a clever controversialist. 
 Possibly you have heard this before. But if any 
 persons leave the Church of England for Rome, my 
 friends and I are the persons blamed ; whereas 
 I suppose the intercourse with a controversialist 
 who unsettles minds which have probably thought 
 very little seriously on any subject, is probably the 
 result of his friendship with the Roman Catholic 
 undergraduates. 
 
 ' Of course, I do not look for any answer. I hope 
 that, the Long Vacation being so near, what I fear may 
 
 not be. But Father has been very successful 
 
 among the English residents at Pau, and has, I 
 understand, drawn away a good many. I under- 
 stand that he has all the tact of a man of the world, 
 and can adapt himself admirably to different minds. 
 He seems to be especially addressing himself to this 
 House, where the young men invite him to their 
 rooms. You alone know whether anything can be 
 done, except in the way of helping any who get 
 perplexed and come to one.'
 
 174 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.VI 
 
 The Dean answered this letter, and heard again 
 from Dr. Pusey : 
 
 ' I had heard that Father was introduced not 
 
 by the Roman Catholics but by an undergraduate 
 who as yet calls himself a Presbyterian, and is, I 
 suppose, a Roman Catholic in all but the declaration, 
 which he promised not to make till of age. I did 
 not mean to throw any blame ; only, if you did not 
 happen to have heard it, to mention it, because 
 I knew that the blame would come on me and my 
 friends, and, if possible, that it might be prevented. 
 I have had too sad experience in those cases for 
 twenty-three years not to know what occasions them. 
 I do not think that I have ever taught anything 
 about the necessity of belonging to the Church, 
 having been always happy about good Dissenters, 
 who were acting according to their consciences, as 
 belonging to the soul, though not to the body, of the 
 Church.' 
 
 In a later letter he adds, more generally : 
 
 4 1 trust that it is not so grave a matter as was 
 stated at first, but something passing. 
 
 ' Evil, in this imperfect world, lies close to all good. 
 I do not decry genuine free inquiry, because some 
 abuse it to scepticism ; or progress, because some 
 understand by it casting aside truth ; so neither is 
 reverence for authority an evil, because some follow 
 authority which God never gave them. Nor can I 
 be responsible for those whom people please to call 
 by my name, whereas they themselves say, that we, 
 the old Tractarians, were well enough for our day, 
 but they have got beyond us. I learned what I 
 learned from my mother ; the Catechism, the Holy
 
 CH. vi] Abolition of Distinctions 175 
 
 Scriptures, our Divines, the Fathers, to whom we 
 were directed. If people, like some of the young 
 clergy, take Rome for their model, I am not sur- 
 prised when they go there.' 
 
 The Dean adopted the simple expedient of in- 
 structing the porters not to allow Father to 
 
 enter Christ Church ; and his stay in Oxford soon 
 afterwards came to an end. 
 
 Throughout the Dean's long reign, the number 
 of undergraduates was well kept up. In 1855 
 there were about 200 of them on the books ; in 
 1891, about 280. The rooms were almost always 
 full ; and though some old Christ Church families 
 transferred their allegiance to other Colleges, the 
 bulk of them remained faithful. One great change, 
 which the first University Commission had strongly 
 recommended, the Dean witnessed and approved : 
 the abolition of the distinction between Noblemen, 
 Gentlemen Commoners, and Commoners. What- 
 ever might have been the justification, in older 
 days, for the formal recognition of differences of 
 rank among undergraduates, it was by now 
 an anachronism, and did harm ; especially when 
 young men were admitted to the enjoyment of 
 peculiar privileges, whose intellectual equipment 
 was below the ordinary level, and who were not 
 even nominally employed in reading for a degree. 
 When Gentlemen Commoners appeared at Collec- 
 tions, and were examined in Creasy's Fifteen De- 
 cisive Battles of the World as the staple of their 
 Term's work, it was time that their order should
 
 176 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 cease to exist within the walls of Christ Church. 
 They had degenerated into an idle clique of wealthy 
 men, enjoying certain immunities, but bringing no 
 corresponding advantage to the College 1 . It was 
 far best that all such distinctions should vanish. 
 This reform was effected under the Ordinance of 
 1867, in which it was enacted that : 
 
 'There shall be no distinctions in respect to 
 academical dress, designation, College charges, or 
 College payments, among Undergraduate members 
 of the House, not being Junior Students nor 
 Exhibitioners within the House.' 
 
 The regard graciously shown to Mr. Liddell by 
 Her Majesty and Prince Albert during the whole 
 of his life at Westminster was continued after his 
 preferment to the Deanery, and in Michaelmas 
 Term 1859 H.R.H. the Prince of Wales became 
 a member of Christ Church. He resided at Oxford 
 for two years, living at Frewin Hall, but regularly 
 attending Chapel and lectures, and occasionally 
 dining in hall. In 1863 the Crown Prince of 
 Denmark came into residence, the present Dean 
 of Durham acting as his Preceptor; but his career 
 at Oxford was interrupted by the breaking out 
 of the war between Denmark and Prussia on the 
 
 1 Some years before, Osborne Gordon had sent a Gentleman 
 Commoner, who was devoid of classical tastes, to a course of lectures 
 on ' The Atmosphere,' with a promise to examine him in Collections, 
 
 and find out what he had learnt 'Well, Mr. ,' said Gordon, 
 
 'what is the atmosphere composed of?' After much hesitation the 
 man replied, ' Zinc.' ' Thank you,' said Gordon, ' that will do. Good 
 morning.'
 
 CH. vi] Matriculation of Prince of Wales 177 
 
 Schleswig-Holstein question. In 1872 H.R.H. Prince 
 Leopold was entered on the books. He lived for 
 three years at Wykeham House, and afterwards 
 had rooms assigned to him in Canterbury Quad- 
 rangle, which he occupied during occasional visits 
 to Oxford. 
 
 The matriculation of the Heir Apparent was 
 naturally attended by exceptional ceremonial. The 
 Dean has described it in a letter to his father, 
 dated October 18, 1859: 
 
 ' I had not time to write last night, after our 
 grand doings with the Prince of Wales. He came 
 down in a royal carriage (not by special train) at 
 about four o'clock. I received him on the platform, 
 and followed him to his house. The Vice-Chan- 
 cellor and Proctors then called to pay their respects ; 
 then the Mayor and two Aldermen with an address ; 
 I standing by and introducing them. Then I went 
 down to Christ Church, where we had the gates 
 shut, and all the men drawn up in the Quadrangle. 
 At five he came, and the bells struck up as he 
 entered. He walked to my house between two lines 
 of men, who capped him. I went out to meet him, 
 and as we entered the house there was a spontaneous 
 cheer. All through the streets, which were very 
 full, the people cheered him well. Then I took him 
 up to the drawing-room, and entered his name on 
 the buttery book. He then retired with his Tutor, 
 Mr. Fisher, and put on a nobleman's cap and gown 
 in the gallery, and returned to receive greetings as 
 the first Prince of Wales who had matriculated since 
 Henry V. He was also introduced to the Sub- 
 Dean and Censors. I then walked him across the 
 
 A a
 
 178 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 Quadrangle, and across the streets to Pembroke 
 College, where we found the Vice-Chancellor waiting 
 at the door. He took him upstairs, and there 
 matriculated him in due form. This morning at 
 eight he came down on foot from his house to 
 chapel. His Governor is Colonel Bruce, brother 
 of Lord Elgin, a very nice person indeed ; and his 
 Equerry Major Teesdale, one of the heroes of Kars, 
 a very pleasing young man. Now you will ask, how 
 it all went off. Very well, very well. Colonel 
 Bruce came down to see me this morning, and said 
 everything was done a merveille, and that the whole 
 ceremony was a kind of model of how to do this 
 sort of thing, and that the Queen and Prince Consort 
 would be highly gratified by the account which he 
 should send. The Prince himself is the nicest little 
 fellow possible, so simple, naif, ingenuous and 
 modest, and moreover with extremely good wits ; 
 possessing also the royal faculty of never forgetting 
 a face.' 
 
 One may venture to assert that those two years 
 passed at Oxford by the Prince were very happy 
 years. He did not read for a Degree, but he 
 attended courses of lectures in history and kindred 
 subjects. It may be permitted to describe one of 
 these; a scene still imprinted on the memory. It 
 was a private course given to the Prince by the 
 Regius Professor of Modern History, Mr. Goldwin 
 Smith, who was then residing at New Inn Hall; 
 and the lectures took place in the dining-room 
 there. Nearly opposite to the Hall was an ancient 
 gateway, belonging originally to St Mary's College,
 
 CH. vi] Mr. Goldwin SmitJis Lectures 179 
 
 and at this time forming the carriage entrance to the 
 Prince's residence. Through this gateway he would 
 pass at the hour of lecture, and quickly cross over 
 the street. He always wore a nobleman's cap and 
 gown, and was attended by his Tutor, Mr. Herbert 
 Fisher, and by an Equerry or, sometimes, his 
 Governor, Colonel Bruce. He took a seat at one 
 end of the room, with his Tutor and Equerry on 
 either hand ; and at the other end, nearest the fire, 
 sat the Professor. On the side by the windows was 
 gathered a small and specially selected group of 
 four or five Christ Church undergraduates, who 
 had been invited to make an audience, and afford 
 the Prince a sense of companionship. All took 
 notes, as the lectures went on ; and they were well 
 deserving of the compliment. The text-book was 
 the Annals of England, and the Professor began 
 with the earliest sections ; and he would sit with 
 one leg folded over the other, and talk delightfully, 
 in his brilliant epigrammatic style, about the various 
 subjects which were suggested as page after page 
 was turned. 
 
 The record of the distinctions gained by members 
 of Christ Church in the Honours Schools was no 
 doubt for many years far from being a brilliant 
 one. This was a great disappointment to the Dean. 
 He had entertained sanguine hopes that the opening 
 of the studentships to public competition would ensure 
 not only a constant supply of able Tutors, but also 
 a body of junior students who would benefit largely 
 by their instruction and take high degrees ; and that 
 
 A a 2
 
 180 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.VI 
 
 thus the intellectual tone of the whole College would 
 be sensibly raised. To a certain extent this was 
 effected, but only to a certain extent. The junior 
 students were not sufficiently numerous to make 
 any deep impression upon the whole society ; nor 
 was it likely that in the undignified scramble for 
 clever lads in which all Colleges were then as 
 now engaged the chief prizes would fall to Christ 
 Church, which had not the reputation of being a 
 reading College. Westminster indeed always sent 
 up its best men ; but its numbers were small, and 
 these were often but of moderate ability. Many 
 exceedingly good men were elected as senior 
 students and became Tutors, though the unduly 
 large proportion of clerical studentships con- 
 siderably narrowed the field of choice. It was a 
 grave disaster that one of the first two elected 
 for this purpose, Mr. G. R. Luke of Balliol College, 
 whose rare intellectual gifts and chivalrous devotion 
 to his work made from the outset of his career 
 at Christ Church a profound impression upon col- 
 leagues and pupils alike, perished by drowning in 
 March 1862, in the third year after his election. 
 The loss was irreparable, and was keenly felt by 
 the Dean. 
 
 ' He was far more hurt and pained ' writes Dean 
 Kitchin 'than I ever saw him touched by any- 
 thing, when the news reached him of the sad 
 accident which deprived Christ Church of the 
 splendid scholarship and enthusiasm of Mr. Luke. 
 " How full of misfortunes Christ Church has been,"
 
 CH. vi] Mr. G. R. Lukes death 181 
 
 he cried, " ol Be yeipoves /teVovcrt, the best are taken 
 from us." He was quite overcome with grief; for 
 he not only had a high regard for Mr. Luke, but had 
 hoped that through this infusion of new blood the 
 old heart of Christ Church was waking up into fresh 
 action, and that the former classical distinction of the 
 House was coming back under Mr. Luke's enthusi- 
 astic teaching and influence.' 
 
 It should also be borne in mind that Christ 
 Church has always been frequented by under- 
 graduates who belong to the richer landed gentry 
 of England. Such men have their future secured ; 
 for many there are large estates to which they will in 
 due course succeed ; they have not the same motive 
 for exertion which rouses poorer men. Many are 
 always content with a Pass degree ; to others, the 
 various avenues to the Honours degree through 
 the non-classical schools offer an attractive course ; 
 and a large number of industrious students may 
 make good use of their time, and yet not be found 
 in the highest classes. There was plenty of 
 thorough, sound, and conscientious work done within 
 the walls of Christ Church, which produced no high 
 distinctions ; and a harsh verdict was sometimes 
 quite unjustly passed upon the College, and upon 
 its stately chief. One such attack was made in 
 the newspapers as early as December 1859, when 
 the Dean had but recently recovered from the 
 serious illness which kept him away from Oxford 
 for two consecutive winters, and before the new 
 Ordinance, from which so much was hoped, had had
 
 1 82 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.VI 
 
 time to bear any fruit. Not only were strictures 
 uttered against the College, but personal reflections 
 were cast upon the Dean himself, who was accused 
 of following ' the trail of preferment,' a ludicrously 
 inappropriate charge. Liddell was naturally pained, 
 as his private letters show ; but he declined to make 
 any reply to the anonymous foe. Two generous 
 answers were, however, written : the one by the 
 Master of Pembroke, his late colleague on the Com- 
 mission, and the other by his close personal friend, 
 Arthur Stanley. 
 
 It had been a great joy to Liddell, that on the 
 death of Robert Hussey, the first occupant of the 
 Chair of the lately founded Regius Professorship 
 of Ecclesiastical History, Stanley had been ap- 
 pointed as his successor. Though the appointment 
 was made in December 1856, it did not involve the 
 immediate residence in Oxford of the new Professor, 
 who was then Canon of Canterbury, for the Canonry 
 of Christ Church which had been annexed by Act 
 of Parliament to the Professorship had not yet 
 fallen vacant. But on Dr. Bull's death in February 
 1858, the vacancy occurred, and Stanley came into 
 residence at Christ Church in the Summer Term of 
 that year. From that time till his appointment 
 to the Deanery of Westminster in the autumn of 
 1863 he was Liddell's close neighbour, his loyal 
 colleague in the Chapter, and his chivalrous ally in 
 academical disputes. His house was that which 
 had been built by Dean Fell for the Canon of the 
 third stall. It stands between Kill- Canon and
 
 CH. vi] Stanley as Canon of Christ Church 183 
 
 Peckwater, and now forms part of the lodgings of 
 the present holder of the Chair (Dr. Bright) ; having 
 been enlarged by the annexation of portions of the 
 residence of Dr. Barnes, upon his death in 1859. 
 
 No other friend exercised so much influence as 
 did Stanley over Liddell's opinions, or had so great 
 a share of his confidence and affection, except 
 perhaps the shrewd and caustic Scotchman who 
 succeeded Liddell as Professor of Moral Philosophy, 
 and afterwards became President of Corpus, the 
 Rev. J. M. Wilson. 
 
 It was a happy chance that Stanley came back 
 to Oxford just at the time when Liddell was 
 beginning to feel keenly his isolation, and to long 
 for the support and sympathy of a friend. We have 
 seen that to his colleagues in the Chapter his 
 attitude as to reforms at Christ Church was by no 
 means acceptable. Dr. Jacobson alone could be 
 counted as his supporter on that body. And in the 
 University the leaders of opinion were still of 
 a strongly conservative type ; liberalism in aca- 
 demical politics, and liberalism in theology, were 
 alike distasteful. The earlier elections to the new 
 Hebdomadal Council had not been of good augury 
 for the cause of progress. The co-operation of an 
 old friend, and particularly of a friend who had 
 shared all the labours of the University Commission, 
 was a source of great delight and encouragement 
 to the Dean. He had warmly advocated the ap- 
 pointment. ' Of all offices,' he wrote, ' this is the 
 office for him ; and of all anen he is the man for
 
 184 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 the office.' But people at Oxford did not think 
 so. At the outset of his new career Stanley was 
 destined to find himself on the unpopular side. 
 Those who had the good fortune to be at Oxford 
 then, and to share his friendship, will remember 
 how triumphantly he overcame the initial difficulties 
 of his position ; how singular a power he exercised 
 in the University pulpit and in his Professorial 
 chair ; how rich a centre of universal hospitality 
 his house was made. They will recall the fascinating 
 talk, the playful wit, the radiant sympathy and 
 charity, which brought together in delightful inter- 
 course the cultivated London guest, the formal 
 Oxford Don, and the shy undergraduate, in the 
 pretty seventeenth century drawing-room, with the 
 large water-colour drawing of Mount Sinai over the 
 fireplace, and just above the mantelpiece the line of 
 figures representing the opening procession of the 
 States-General, with Mirabeau (as the host de- 
 lighted to point out) walking at the head of the 
 'tiers e*tat/ 
 
 Stanley stood manfully by the side of the Dean 
 in the Chapter, which body, as he told his mother, 
 contained 'very explosive elements.' The mutter- 
 ings of the storm over the Jowett stipend were 
 beginning to be heard, and in the selection of senior 
 students by the new body of electors, already men- 
 tioned, serious differences of opinion prevailed. And 
 in academical matters the same comradeship was 
 found. There were many battles on behalf of liberty 
 to be fought in the Hebdomadal Council; and
 
 CH. vi] The Jowett Question 185 
 
 important elections, such as that for the Boden 
 Professorship of Sanskrit, where great principles were 
 involved, brought the need of skilful handlingof forces. 
 The Jowett question came before the University in 
 its various phases. Among these was the proposal 
 to endow the Chair from University funds ; this 
 was thrown out. Then came the futile prosecution 
 of the Greek Professor for heresy, in the Vice- 
 Chancellor's Court, by Dr. Pusey, Dr. Ogilvie, and 
 Dr. Heurtley. This was doomed to failure from the 
 outset. Stanley preached a famous sermon before 
 the University just at this time, on Sexagesima 
 Sunday, 1863, in which, without directly referring 
 to the event which was present to the minds of all 
 his audience, he spoke of the evils of theological 
 controversy, and laid down certain rules for abating 
 it. The first rule was the obvious but most 
 necessary maxim, ' Never condemn a book unless 
 you have read it.' He announced and enforced 
 this with marked emphasis. On that same evening 
 the present writer was in Stanley's drawing-room, 
 and happened to take up a volume on Church 
 history which had just been published. He ven- 
 tured to ask his host what sort of a book it 
 was. 'Oh, it is not worth much, it is not worth 
 much.' And then, with a smile of inimitable arch- 
 ness, he added, 'but indeed I haven't read it 1 !' 
 
 1 The details of the long controversy relating to the endowment of 
 the Regius Professorship of Greek have been intentionally omitted. 
 They may be read in the memoirs of Dr. Pusey and of Mr. Jowett. For 
 the final offer of Christ Church to raise the payment to the Chair from 
 ^40 to $oo a y ear ^e Dean was largely responsible. 
 
 B b
 
 1 86 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 With the support of the Dean, in the Summer 
 Term of the same year, Stanley had proposed 
 Charles Kingsley for the honorary degree of 
 D.C.L. This proposal was resisted by Dr. Pusey, 
 who charged Mr. Kingsley with the heresy of uni- 
 versalism, and also with having written Hypatia, 
 a book not fit 'for our wives and sisters to read/ 
 In the midst of the distressing controversy which 
 this strange accusation involved, came the sad death 
 of the Dean's infant son, Stanley's godson, only eight 
 weeks old. 
 
 Stanley wrote at once : 
 
 1 Most truly and deeply do I feel for you for you 
 both. The recollection of that former loss was what 
 made us all so fervently rejoice in this new gift 
 so graciously sent, as it seemed ; so graciously, let 
 us hope, taken away. What can I do for you 
 I or my sister ? Anything that you wish, to ease 
 you or Mrs. Liddell of any part of the coming 
 burden, as it now will seem, of what before seemed 
 such a bright prospect. I sent you a note this 
 morning about the wretched affair of Monday. How 
 different, oh, how different is the vexation, grief, 
 and anxiety of things in which one's own failings 
 and the failings of others are involved, and the pure 
 peaceful sorrow, however keen, that hangs round the 
 death-bed of a little child ! May God be with you ! 
 May you long be spared to us ! You must have 
 seen how much more closely the events and trials 
 of the last year have drawn us together ; how great 
 and constant a support you have been to me.' 
 
 From Dr. Pusey, the other party to the Kingsley
 
 CH. vi] Letter from Dr. Pusey 187 
 
 controversy, there came at the same time a letter 
 to Mrs. Liddell : 
 
 ' MY DEAR MRS. LIDDELL, 
 
 ' Human sympathy avails but little. Yet you 
 will let me express mine at your quick bereave- 
 ment of the little one whom God lent you for so 
 short a time. It is a sore trial ; only our good 
 Father knows how to make all work together for 
 good. I can to this day see the little one whom 
 I lost above thirty years ago, just as she sat smiling 
 then. I know then your sorrow. One comfort 
 alone there is, that God, in His eternal love, created 
 them just to appear in this redeemed world, and 
 made them members of Christ and His own children, 
 and then removed them spotless for that mansion 
 which He ever in His love intended for them, 
 where they behold Him and are blessed in sight of 
 Him. It must be a beautiful band of souls which, 
 born into this world of sin, were so taken away 
 before they could know sin. He loved your child, 
 whom He created out of love, better than you could 
 love him ; and has provided for him, as He knew 
 to be best. God comfort you ! 
 
 ' Yours very faithfully, 
 
 ' E. B. PUSEY.' 
 
 The Oxford atmosphere was indeed charged at 
 this time with controversy, and Stanley's chivalrous 
 temper would not allow him to keep silence when 
 the reputation of a friend or the credit of an un- 
 popular cause was at stake. The Dean always 
 shrank from such conflicts. Liddell had preached 
 the sermon at Stanley's -ordination many years 
 
 B b 2
 
 1 88 Deanery of Christ Church [CH.VI 
 
 before : and often in conversation with friends 
 would Stanley quote the words which in 1870 he 
 printed in the preface to his Collected Essays. He 
 there wrote : 
 
 'Nor can I forbear to call to mind a solemn 
 warning which, at one of those moments in life 
 when even slight things are remembered, fell from 
 a distinguished preacher, afterwards a dear and 
 honoured friend, who, addressing a band of youth- 
 ful candidates for ordination in the Cathedral at 
 Oxford, after enumerating the great realities of 
 theological study and of practical life which ought 
 to occupy the thoughts of an English clergyman, 
 added impressive words to this effect : "Avoid con- 
 troversy, if possible. Few have ever entered into 
 controversy without repenting of it. I might enforce 
 this by many arguments. But I will content myself 
 with repeating what I have already said : few have 
 entered into controversy without repenting of it ".' 
 
 Liddell, on reading these words, wrote as follows: 
 
 ' Let me thank you for your Collected Essays, 
 which I shall read again with instruction and 
 delight. Especially let me thank you for the kind 
 and generous notice which you have taken of words 
 uttered by me ah ! how many years ago words 
 which I little expected to see revivified at the end 
 of so long a period. When I wrote and spoke them, 
 I had not in my mind such controversies as you have 
 been engaged in. I was thinking of the ordinary 
 run of young clerics in country parishes, where solid 
 work and study of a positive and healthy kind are 
 more likely to produce charity and largeness of mind
 
 CH. vi] Stanley and Westminster 189 
 
 than devotion to controversy with nonconformists 
 more narrow-minded perhaps than the young clerics 
 themselves. Of course, controversial writing is 
 necessary, and (properly conducted) most beneficial.' 
 
 Stanley's friendship was very precious to the 
 Dean; and when the time came, in 1863, for the 
 inevitable change to Westminster, he wrote an urgent 
 letter of entreaty that he would even then consider 
 the possibility of remaining at Oxford. Unfor- 
 tunately, through Stanley's absence from England, 
 the letter did not reach him before his final choice 
 was irrevocably made. 
 
 ' I apprehend from your language that if the 
 Deanery of Westminster falls vacant, you know it 
 will be offered you. Well, I heartily regret it, partly 
 for selfish reasons, no doubt : but partly because I 
 really think you would be both more useful and 
 happier in your Chair at Oxford. Life in London, 
 no doubt, has its bright side ; but to live perforce for 
 eight months in WESTMINSTER is (experto crede) not 
 an enviable lot. Preaching in the Abbey will give 
 you a wide scope of influence ; but I know not how 
 far your physical powers will be adequate to fill 
 that vast space; and I much question whether any 
 influence you may there exert will, in reality, be 
 nearly so great as that which you have at Oxford. 
 There, at best, you will infuse a flavour or a ferment- 
 ing action into the mass ; at Oxford you create the 
 flavour and the fermenting leaven itself. You will 
 have a seat in Convocation. But that is a barren 
 honour ; and I think you will soon come to the con- 
 clusion that the time spent in that body of debate,
 
 igo Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 not action, is wasted time. Nor will you be more 
 at Her Majesty's service at Westminster than at 
 Oxford ; nay, not so much. For being bound to eight 
 months' residence, and desiring (as you will desire) 
 some time for travel, the time at your command will 
 become more limited than at present it is V 
 
 When the matter was publicly announced, to- 
 gether with Stanley's approaching marriage with 
 Lady Augusta Bruce, another letter from Liddell 
 expressed exactly his feelings : 
 
 4 On your intended marriage I do most heartily 
 and exultingly congratulate you. Since you lost 
 her whose complete union with you was to me one 
 of the most touching and lovely traits I have met 
 with even in you I felt there was something 
 wanted " to free the hollow heart from paining " ; and 
 I felt that, under the circumstances, even in your 
 case that something must be a wife. May Lady 
 Augusta be all that you wish, and you all that she 
 hopes ! 
 
 ' But here, alas ! my congratulations end. Neither 
 for you, nor for us, nor for any one, can I look with 
 pleasure on your leaving your living work here for 
 the dead mass that will meet you at Westminster. 
 
 thinks it an excellent appointment, because it 
 
 will remove you from Oxford. So, no doubt, think 
 the s and s, and " hoc genus omne." 
 
 Hoc Ithacus velit et magno mercentur Atridae. 
 
 Pardon my unavailing regrets. You receive no 
 more honourable testimony than the universal sorrow 
 
 1 This and the two following letters have been already published in 
 Mr. Prothero's memoir of Dean Stanley.
 
 CH. vi] Stanleys Farewell Sermon 191 
 
 of your friends and the joy of your non-friends at 
 your promotion though " promotion " I cannot 
 call it.' 
 
 One more letter must be quoted ; a letter written 
 immediately after Stanley's farewell sermon at Christ 
 Church on November 29, 1863 : 
 
 ' My best and dearest friend, How have you torn 
 open afresh all the wounds which the news of your 
 departure caused ! I can scarcely see to write for 
 tears. 
 
 1 And how nobly have you avenged the friends 
 who would fain have continued you in the office of 
 teaching good and giving true glory to God in this 
 place. I wish for no other punishment upon those 
 who have closed our pulpits against you (for the 
 present not for long, I am confident), than that they 
 should have heard you to-day.' 
 
 Never again, however, till the first Sunday in Lent 
 1871 did Stanley preach before the University. 
 Dean Liddell entered on his office as Vice-Chancellor 
 in October 1870, and resolved to redress this injustice 
 without delay. He nominated Stanley to preach 
 the annual sermon on the Jewish Interpretation of 
 Prophecy in the ensuing Lent Term, having appointed 
 Dr. Liddon to preach on the previous Sunday 
 morning. He writes to his father : 
 
 ' Both sermons have been a great success. 
 Liddon's was what is called the " Humility" sermon, 
 always preached on the Sunday morning before Ash 
 Wednesday. He delivered a very fine discourse to 
 a very crowded church, though the Dean of St. Paul's,
 
 1 92 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 who was present, pronounced it not one of his best. 
 Stanley's sermon yesterday afternoon was a noble 
 sermon. The church was again crowded. He began 
 by saying that he should not enlarge on the Prin- 
 ciples of such interpretation, because he had spoken 
 on that subject the last time that he had addressed 
 a University audience, nine years ago! These last 
 were not his own words. Since that time, except 
 two sermons in Christ Church Cathedral, he has 
 been silenced, so far as the University is concerned. 
 The Archbishop of York, who was present, said 
 it was a perfect scandal to the University that 
 it should be so.' 
 
 In Michaelmas Term 1872 Stanley was nominated 
 by the Board appointed for the purpose as one of 
 the Select Preachers for the ensuing year. Dean 
 Liddell was still Vice-Chancellor, and in virtue of 
 his office was chairman of this Board ; and each 
 name, after receiving his approval, had to obtain 
 the sanction of Convocation. It must be acknow- 
 ledged that at this time Stanley had deliberately 
 brought himself into even more than usual an- 
 tagonism with Churchmen, by his proceedings in 
 connexion with what was called the ' Westminster 
 Communion/ and by his fierce denunciations in 
 the Lower House of the ' damnatory clauses ' of 
 the Athanasian Creed, and his contemptuous criti- 
 cism of those who by explanatory notes would 
 attempt ' to draw out the teeth of this old lion, who 
 sits there in his majesty, and defies any explanation 
 to take out his fierce and savage fangs.' But the 
 more sagacious leaders of the Church party, though
 
 CH.VI] Oppositim to Stanley as Select Preacher 193 
 
 offended and distressed, saw the unwisdom of con- 
 testing his appointment. It was left to Mr. Burgon, 
 and four other members of Convocation, to lead 
 the opposition and summon the non-residents 
 to vote. Some characteristic letters afterwards 
 published were written by Burgon to Liddell as 
 Vice-Chancellor, and received from him short but 
 courteous repli'es, simply pointing out that the 
 opposition to Stanley was in effect a vote of censure 
 on the Board of nomination, and on himself in 
 particular. The effort to prevent the appointment 
 ended in failure ; it was carried by 349 to 287 votes. 
 As a final protest against ' the unfaithfulness to the 
 truth of God which the University manifested by its 
 vote,' the Dean of Norwich (Dr. Goulburn) resigned 
 his post as Select Preacher. 
 
 On receiving the news of the result Stanley wrote 
 to Liddell : 
 
 4 You will have known, without my saying it, that 
 I was more anxious for you than for myself, and 
 more anxious for the University and the Church 
 than for either of us. And now it seems like a 
 sudden return into an unlooked-for haven of peace. 
 
 ' For me, I can truly say that even if there had 
 been any personal annoyance which there was 
 not it would have been a hundred-fold repaid by 
 the kindness of my friends. Even the single vote of 
 Dr. Lushington will be to me "a joy for ever 1 ." I 
 wish that I could find some means of expressing my 
 gratitude. I fear there is none, except to do the 
 
 1 Dr. Lushington, at the age of ninety-one, travelled from London 
 to record his vote for Stanley. 
 
 C C
 
 1 94 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 best I can to justify the appointment. This, as well 
 as so much else, I owe to you. May God bless you 
 for it, and preserve you long among us. By accident, 
 according to a long engagement, I had to give a 
 lecture last night to a very homely audience in 
 Southwark, and took the Bishop of Manchester with 
 me. After the lecture, as you will see briefly 
 reported in the Times, in a capital speech he took 
 up the event of the day. It was the first allusion 
 to it, but the audience quite understood, and the 
 cheers were a good echo of those in the Oxford 
 Theatre.' 
 
 It has been shown that in the Chapter at Christ 
 Church there were men of very various types of 
 character, among whom there were likely to be many 
 serious differences of opinion. And so it was with the 
 new Governing Body established in 1867. A skilful 
 guidance was needed if collisions were to be averted 
 and business profitably transacted. Dean Liddell 
 was pre-eminently good as a chairman. His personal 
 dignity was itself a sufficient assertion of authority. 
 He was fair to every one. He never spoke much, 
 but never allowed debate to wander. He focussed 
 opinion, and at the right moment elicited a decision, 
 often drafting a resolution which happily embodied 
 the gist of the conclusion at which the discussion 
 pointed. He was very patient of tedious speakers, 
 and would solace himself by taking out his gold 
 pen, and after wiping it carefully on the sleeve 
 of his gown (his invariable practice) would draw 
 wondrous landscapes on the pink blotting paper 
 which lay before him, while the stream of talk
 
 CH. vi] Blotting-paper Sketches 195 
 
 flowed on. Churches, castles, bridges, ruined keeps 
 and ivy-clad walls, woodland and river scenes, in 
 endless variety, were the outcome of dreary sessions 
 of the innumerable committees which Oxford crowds 
 into the afternoons of its all too brief Terms. Many 
 hundred sketches from his pen are still treasured 
 up by his friends ; he would leave them on the 
 table at the end of a meeting, and some admirer 
 would carry them off, and well worth preservation 
 they were. 
 
 The services of so excellent a chairman and 
 so practical a man of business were constantly in 
 demand for University and civic matters, and in- 
 volved many engagements in addition to the duties 
 within the walls of Christ Church. The citizens 
 claimed his assistance to guide them in the difficult 
 work of the drainage of Oxford ; and he took a very 
 deep interest in the questions which arose from time 
 to time in relation to the prevention of floods in the 
 Thames valley. His counsel was always sought 
 for : so great and universal was the respect paid 
 to his methodical and business-like habits, and to 
 his sound and unbiassed judgment. 
 
 Work such as this was entirely congenial to the 
 Dean. He liked to have to deal with practical 
 matters ; they were a recreation, by their very con- 
 trast to his other duties. In the midst of his letters 
 to Scott about minute corrections in the Lexicon, 
 one comes upon questions, equally minute, con- 
 cerning the drainage of a town near which his 
 correspondent happened to be spending his vacation. 
 
 c c 2
 
 196 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 He requires to be informed as to whether the town 
 has been lately drained, and by whom ; what is the 
 population of the area dealt with ; what is the 
 length and size (sectional) of the main outfall sewer, 
 and what the size of the secondary sewers ; what has 
 been the expense per head of the works ; and whether 
 the engineer employed has given satisfaction in 
 point of attention and economy. And when the 
 unhappy lexicographer had replied as well as 
 he could to such unexpected and bewildering in- 
 quiries, he received another long letter, containing 
 an elaborate contrast between two classes of engineers 
 those who deal with water-works, and those con- 
 versant with drainage schemes. On one occasion 
 Sir Henry Acland brought to Christ Church a 
 learned German professor who was very anxious 
 to have a sight of the famous writer of the Lexicon. 
 On inquiring for him at the Deanery, they were told 
 that he was in Christ Church Meadow. They went 
 thither, but he was nowhere to be found. On asking 
 a workman whether he had been seen there, ' Oh, 
 yes,' said the man, ' he has just gone down the drain.' 
 An adjacent man-hole was then approached, and 
 in answer to a call, a loud voice was heard from 
 below, and soon the majestic head emerged from 
 the lower depths. The German professed himself 
 more than satisfied, and declared that he had never 
 before seen a famous scholar amid such peculiar 
 surroundings. 
 
 In the drainage of the Thames valley Liddell 
 had taken a deep interest from the time of his
 
 CH. vi] Thames Valley Drainage 197 
 
 return to Oxford in 1855. Many evils attended 
 the frequent recurrence of winter floods, but it was 
 difficult to find a remedy. At last, after committees 
 had spent many years in discussing various schemes, 
 Sir John Hawkshaw was instructed to prepare a 
 report; and the plan which he recommended in 1882 
 involved very considerable undertakings. A new 
 and more direct channel was to be cut for the 
 Cherwell at its junction with the Thames ; and 
 Iffley Lock was to be removed. This last proposal 
 would render necessary the dredging of the river 
 above Iffley, and many subsidiary works. 
 
 It was natural that the proposed abolition of Iffley 
 Lock should provoke fierce opposition, not only from 
 all lovers of the river, but also from the City 
 authorities, who owned the water-works and dreaded 
 the consequences of the lowering of the water-level. 
 But the favourable reception which the scheme as 
 a whole met with at first, and the generous promise 
 of subscriptions from residents in Oxford and 
 riparian owners, emboldened the Dean, in company 
 with the Master of Balliol, Mr. Jowett, then Vice- 
 Chancellor, to enter into a formal agreement with 
 the Thames Valley Drainage Commissioners, by 
 which this body undertook to carry out Sir John 
 Hawkshaw's scheme in its entirety for a sum of 
 ; 1 4,000, payable by instalments spread over three 
 years. For this sum the Vice-Chancellor and the 
 Dean made themselves personally responsible. The 
 scheme, however, was only partially executed. The 
 new mouth to the Cherwell, now called the Vice-
 
 io8 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 Chancellor's Cut, was opened; but in the face of 
 the strong opposition aroused, it was found im- 
 possible to complete the work of the removal of 
 Iffley Lock. The Dean and Mr. Jowett had paid 
 ^"3,600 to the Commissioners, and had no legal 
 claim to be re-imbursed ; but the subscribers con- 
 sented to the repayment to them of this sum, and 
 the balance of the money subscribed was returned. 
 The result of the work has been to carry off the 
 flood-water from the Cherwell valley with greater 
 rapidity than before ; and although Iffley Lock still 
 remains, the Thames valley has experienced con- 
 siderable benefit from the widening of the weirs, 
 which enables the flood-water to pass away more 
 quickly. 
 
 Among the recommendations of the first Oxford 
 University Commission had been the establishment 
 of a class of students unattached to any college 
 or hall, but in all other respects members of the 
 University, and subject to proper supervision in 
 regard to studies and discipline. Of this scheme 
 Liddell had always been an advocate, and it was 
 largely due to his personal efforts that it was carried 
 into effect in 1868 and successfully developed. The 
 Dean of Durham, who was the first Censor of the 
 Scholares non ascripti, writes gratefully of the help 
 which he gave : 
 
 ' Liddell was the true founder and friend of that 
 body. All the success of the movement, first re- 
 commended by him, was due to his clear-headed 
 advice and guidance. For he always stood by these
 
 CH. vi] Scholar es non ascripti 199 
 
 poor lads, and did much to create a friendly feeling 
 for them in the Hebdomadal Council and among 
 the leading members of the University. This it 
 was that carried the feeble society through the 
 difficult years of its childhood, and indeed assured 
 to it its present permanent state.' 
 
 With his warm approval the ancient Congregation 
 House adjoining St. Mary's Church was fitted up 
 as a place for the common worship of the non- 
 collegiate students ; and when in later years it was 
 found practicable to build proper accommodation for 
 them, he cordially supported the Master of Balliol 
 in promoting the erection of the present convenient 
 block of buildings, adjoining the Examination Schools, 
 where a handsome library and lecture-rooms, as well 
 as offices for the Censor and his staff, have been 
 provided at considerable cost. 
 
 To describe with any completeness the public 
 services of Dean Liddell in matters affecting the 
 interests of the University would almost entail 
 the writing of a history of Oxford for a period of 
 more than thirty-five years. During the whole of 
 his tenure of the Deanery, with one short interval, 
 he was a member of the Hebdomadal Council, for 
 he was first elected in 1855 to fill a chance vacancy, 
 and from 1858 to 1891 he served upon it without 
 interruption. With that Council rests the initiative 
 of all academical legislation. For all the changes 
 many of them of a very important and even funda- 
 mental kind which were effected during that long 
 period he was largely responsible, for he exercised
 
 2OO Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 a remarkable influence over the deliberations of the 
 Council, and gradually emerged from the position 
 of a party representative and came to be regarded 
 by the whole University with a singular respect. 
 He combined the knowledge, experience, good 
 sense, courtesy, and impartiality which are invaluable 
 on all important deliberative and executive bodies. 
 He became a Curator of the Bodleian Library in 
 1860, just at the time when his close personal friend 
 H. O. Coxe was appointed Bodley's Librarian. To 
 both Coxe and his successor, the present Librarian, 
 he gave loyal and constant support. In the records 
 of the Library indeed no great reforms are associated 
 with his name ; but he seems to have been always 
 on the side of progress, and to have supported the 
 late Master of Balliol in developing the resources 
 of the Library and rendering its vast stores more 
 accessible to scholars. He was also instrumental 
 in transferring some of its artistic treasures to the 
 University Galleries. 
 
 It should be added that from 1857 onwards he 
 was a Delegate of the University Museum ; a 
 Curator of the University Galleries from 1858; 
 a Delegate of the Press from 1861. For many 
 years he was a Commissioner under the Local 
 Government Board Act, and a Curator of the 
 University Chest. In all these offices his services 
 were of the utmost value ; but it would be weari- 
 some to describe his work in detail. It will suffice, 
 as an illustration of its character and importance, 
 to quote two letters written by men who are well
 
 CH. vi] Delegate of the Press 201 
 
 qualified to estimate his merits, shown in two very 
 different spheres of labour, both congenial to him. 
 Mr. Lyttelton Gell, for many years Secretary to the 
 Delegates of the Press, thus describes his services 
 on that body : 
 
 ' The Dean first attended the Board on June 14, 
 1 86 1, and the last meeting at which he was present 
 was on December 18, 1891. It was only during 
 the last quarter of this period from the autumn 
 of 1884 that I had personal experience of his in- 
 valuable influence upon the Board ; before that 
 time my impressions are gathered from frequent 
 reference to the Press records. 
 
 ' To the undergraduates of my own generation 
 the Dean had been the Vice-Chancellor an Olympian 
 figure, far removed ; and it was not until after some 
 experience of Boards and business in London that 
 I had the opportunity of realizing week by week 
 across a narrow table his remarkable sagacity both 
 in literary and in business problems. 
 
 ' In his earlier years the Press had owed much 
 to his initiative ; but to me, meeting him first in 
 Press business when he was already past seventy, 
 the Dean appeared not so much then as an initiator, 
 but rather as the pivet about which affairs revolved, 
 as the Nestor who was steeped in accumulated 
 experience, and whose judgment as to the wisest 
 way of handling the staff, of transacting business, 
 and of dealing with administrative questions, was 
 invariably accepted. He understood the value of 
 method, and of reference to fixed and pre-determined 
 principles in the conduct of large affairs. Con- 
 sequently one learnt to lean upon him as a rock 
 
 D d
 
 2O2 Deanery of Christ Chiirch [CH. vi 
 
 of consistency, as the man who would stem the 
 hasty stampede from a settled policy, and arrest 
 the snap-decisions which are the weakness of a 
 Board so constituted. He represented a certain 
 tradition which embodied the experience of a remark- 
 able knot of Delegates by whom the Press, as we 
 know it, had been built up and prepared for its im- 
 mense and profitable expansion dating from Jowett's 
 Vice-Chancellorship. Henry Smith, Mark Pattison, 
 and the present Dean of Westminster had not long 
 disappeared from the Board when my experience 
 began ; and (omitting all reference to existing Dele- 
 gates) the Bishops of Salisbury and Hereford, Arch- 
 deacon Palmer and Alfred Robinson, were then still 
 amongst their number. The Dean was very tenacious 
 of certain forms and methods which then governed 
 the conduct of the Delegacy ; and though to one 
 fresh from business in London they seemed at first 
 rather restrictive, yet I soon valued his wise in- 
 sistence upon " the customs of the Board." The 
 periodic arrivals of a new Chairman or new Delegates, 
 necessarily inexperienced in the business referred 
 to them, and sometimes inspired with all the self- 
 confidence and precipitation which ignorance of 
 wider considerations begets, fully justified the Dean's 
 attitude ; and fortunately his authority was such, 
 and his impartiality so absolute, that he had but 
 to state that such a course or such a precedent 
 should be followed, for every one to acquiesce. 
 
 ' His judgment was as sound in the literary as 
 in the administrative sphere. He not only dis- 
 cerned what was good from what was bad, but also 
 he had consistent views as to what (apart from the 
 question of intrinsic merit) it was wise for the Dele-
 
 CH. vi] Delegate of the Press 203 
 
 gates to publish, and what not. Further, he knew 
 the book which was worth improving, and many 
 a proof-sheet profited by his taste and accuracy. 
 To him, as Chairman of the School-books Committee, 
 assisted by its Secretary, the present Dean Kitchin, 
 the excellent little " Clarendon Press Series " owed 
 much of its value. Himself a consummate critic, 
 he helped to plan the volumes and to annotate them, 
 and often revised the proof-sheets with his own 
 hand. He was especially interested in the school 
 editions of the great English writers which marked 
 an epoch in educational views. English Literature 
 indeed, like English Philology, always evoked his 
 keen sympathy. He was assiduous in his care for 
 the progress of the New English Dictionary, though 
 perhaps his practical views made him uneasy at the 
 expansion of its scale ; and he always regretted that 
 the University had become pledged to so huge an 
 expenditure without more precise information as 
 to the state of the materials at the outset of the 
 negotiations with the Philological Society in 1877. 
 Looking back upon my recollections of his attitude 
 towards the various projects which came before the 
 Board, it seems to me that he attached a greater 
 value to work in Teutonic Philology than to Latin 
 and Greek scholarship. The labours of Skeat, 
 Earle, Sweet, Brachet, and Vigfusson were certain 
 of his special sympathy, and to Vigfusson in particular 
 he was a never-failing friend. 
 
 1 Towards one of the greatest of the Board's 
 undertakings, the Revised Version, he always seemed 
 to maintain a considerable reserve. The financial 
 arrangements with the Revisers were made while 
 he presided as Vice-Chancellor, so that there is 
 
 D d 2
 
 2O4 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 every reason to assume that he concurred in the 
 enterprise, though I entertain the impression that 
 he was dissatisfied with the result, at any rate as 
 regards the New Testament. 
 
 ' I had heard from the Dean, when he began to 
 consider his retirement, that the Press would be the 
 last of his University responsibilities which he would 
 lay down ; and in fact the last University Board 
 which he attended was that of the Press Delegacy, 
 upon which he had through more than thirty years 
 rendered such invaluable service. I met him in 
 the Bodleian Quadrangle as he arrived, and he 
 told me that when the meeting rose his final labour 
 for the University would have been accomplished. 
 
 ' Oxford memories are so short, that most people 
 nowadays take the Press for granted, and imagine 
 that its reputation has always stood where it does, 
 that it has always turned out plenty of important 
 and well-printed books, and always contributed from 
 ^5000 to ,10,000 a year to the University Chest. 
 As a matter of fact, these thirty years represented 
 a revolution. At the outset of the Dean's experi- 
 ence the Press was comparatively a small concern. 
 Its publications were few and far between, and 
 the possibility of deriving a regular annual income 
 from the Press for University purposes was not 
 established until Jowett's Vice-Chancellorship, 
 1882-6. Similarly there was a certain disposition 
 to take the Dean for granted, and to assume his 
 qualities and his influence as part of the order of 
 things. Doubtless his own modesty and his re- 
 luctance to assert the authority which he possessed 
 tended to this result. His influence was often 
 almost intangible, the mere outcome of his presence.
 
 CH. vi] Gudbrand J^igfiisson 205 
 
 For he was one of those men who affected every- 
 thing for the better, morally and practically, out of 
 sheer high principle, without any vanity, antagonism, 
 or self-seeking. Other people might claim the 
 actual credit for what the Dean had in reality 
 rendered possible. It is absolutely not conceivable 
 to imagine him claiming for himself the credit of 
 anything, a characteristic which makes it all the 
 greater pleasure to indicate the remarkable value 
 of his services. He remained Olympian too high- 
 minded to be touched with combativeness, or jealousy, 
 or self-assertion, too shy and reserved to be eager 
 to urge his own opinion, or even to express it unless 
 it was essential, yet too wise and public-spirited to 
 stand aloof, if his judgment, saturated with long 
 experience, told him that the right decision was 
 trembling in the balance.' 
 
 The name of Vigfusson recalls a pathetic history, 
 which is best told in the Dean's own language. 
 
 'About the year 1864 I received a letter from 
 Mr. (now Sir George) Dasent, desiring to interest 
 me in the publication by the Clarendon Press of 
 an Icelandic Dictionary. Mr. Cleasby, brother of 
 Mr. Justice Cleasby, had lived many years in 
 Scandinavian lands, and had made large collections 
 for the purpose of a Dictionary of the most ancient 
 and most classical tongue of the Norse nations. 
 Mr. Dasent was well known as a Norse scholar ; 
 and he proposed to himself to arrange Mr. Cleasby's 
 materials and see the book through the press. To do 
 the rough work and assist in the arrangement he had 
 engaged a young Icelandic scholar, who had studied 
 philology at Copenhagen and taken his Doctor's
 
 206 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 degree at that University, by name Gudbrand 
 Vigfusson. The work was proposed by me to 
 the Delegates of the Press, and accepted by them. 
 It entailed much vexation and no little labour on 
 us, which fell chiefly on me. Vigfusson came to 
 Oxford, and was practically left to deal with 
 Cleasby's work single-handed. He found it in 
 great part a chaos, and he often told me that he 
 could have done his task better and with less 
 labour had he started de novo. He was a thorough 
 scholar, worked like a horse, and was altogether 
 a capital fellow. But his English was very defective, 
 though he did not like to acknowledge this, and 
 was apt to be more diffuse than necessary. For 
 many weeks he used to come to me every morning 
 at ten, with some pages which he had prepared, 
 and I worked at them with him for an hour. This 
 regularity of work was interrupted sometimes by 
 official duties, and vacations came when it was 
 necessary to revise his work by post. But I con- 
 tinued to toil through every page, often twice ; and 
 after much trouble the book was eventually published 
 in 1874. The short preface which I wrote is 
 dated 1869. 
 
 'After the completion of the Dictionary I saw 
 little of Vigfusson. He became acquainted with 
 York Powell, the present Professor of Modern 
 History at Oxford, and assisted by him published 
 the " Sturlunga Saga " at the Clarendon Press. 
 
 ' Poor fellow ! he died of a liver complaint in 
 1889. I visited him while he was being nursed 
 at the Sarah Acland Home in Wellington Square. 
 He fully appreciated the attention and comfort of 
 the Home. He left me by his will the gold ring
 
 CH. vi] Vigfusson's Gratitude 207 
 
 which was the symbol of his Doctor's degree at 
 Upsala. I wore it constantly, and intended that 
 on my death it should be given to York Powell. 
 But I have unfortunately lost it. It flew from my 
 finger when I was stripping rhododendron bushes 
 of their seed-vessels in the garden at Ascot, and 
 I failed to find it.' 
 
 It should be added that shortly before his death, 
 Vigfusson presented, with other books, an Icelandic 
 Bible (Bishop Gudbrand's, 1584) to the Library of 
 Christ Church, accompanied by a memorandum 
 written by Mr. York Powell, but signed by himself. 
 He says : 
 
 ' These books I wish in my lifetime to give to 
 the Library of Christ Church, there to be preserved 
 and remain as a remembrance of my grateful feeling 
 towards Christ Church and those of her members 
 herein named in especial. First to the Dean, for 
 his well-timed protection in 1867, without which 
 the Icelandic Dictionary would undoubtedly have 
 broken down, and also for the constant, untiring, 
 and experienced supervision which he gave to the 
 Dictionary from first to last ; which I wish to record, 
 though he himself would be unwilling to have it 
 known ; for no one knows, and no one can ever 
 know, how much the Dictionary, as it stands, owes 
 to the Dean of Christ Church.' 
 
 Then, after mention of the kindness and assistance 
 given him by Dr. Kitchin and Mr. York Powell, 
 he says : 
 
 ' By a strange coincidence, all three are Christ 
 Church men.' And he concludes, ' I wish this
 
 208 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 memorandum to be affixed to Bishop Gudbrand's 
 Bible, and therein to remain, as a record of my 
 deep-felt gratitude. G. V.' 
 
 To the value of the Dean's services at the 
 University Galleries, no one is better qualified to 
 bear testimony than one of his younger colleagues 
 on that Board, the Rev. Dr. Woods, late President 
 of Trinity College, who writes as follows : 
 
 ' Among the many services for which the Univer- 
 sity has reason to be grateful to Dean Liddell, not 
 the least important is the work which he did as 
 Curator of the University Galleries work which 
 I have heard him say was one of the pleasures of 
 his life. For more than thirty years he was an 
 active member of the Board, and to his initiative 
 and administration were largely due the improve- 
 ments effected during that period. He was appointed 
 Curator shortly after his return to Oxford, on the 
 death in 1858 of Mr. Sneyd, Warden of All Souls 
 College. The University Galleries were at that 
 time a recent institution. The building, one of 
 Cockerell's finest and most original works, had been 
 opened in 1845, and its interior must have presented 
 at first a somewhat bare appearance, though the 
 original models for the principal works of Sir F. 
 Chantrey, presented by his widow in 1842, served 
 to furnish part of the lower floor, and portraits from 
 the Bodleian Library, many of which have since 
 been returned, were hung in the Picture Gallery 
 above. The deficiencies of the new institution 
 were, however, soon supplemented. During the ten 
 years which immediately succeeded its opening, 
 more than eighty oil-paintings (including good
 
 CH. vi] Curator of University Galleries 209 
 
 examples of Sir Joshua Reynolds and of the Dutch 
 and early Italian Schools) were acquired by donation 
 or bequest. The growth of the collection of prints 
 and drawings was even more rapid. In 1845 t^ 6 
 priceless series of drawings by Michael Angelo and 
 Raffaello was purchased by a public subscription 
 (towards which the second Earl of Eldon contributed 
 ^4000), and placed in the Galleries. This gift was 
 supplemented by a loan from the Bodleian Library 
 of the fine collection of German and other prints 
 and drawings which had been bequeathed to it in 
 1834 by Mr. F. Douce ; while in 1855 Mr. Chambers 
 Hall, in addition to a previous gift of pictures, 
 presented a large number of prints and drawings, 
 including a valuable series of Rembrandt etchings. 
 
 'On his appointment then as Curator in 1858 
 Dean Liddell found the University Galleries in 
 possession of a fair collection of pictures, and of 
 a large mass of prints and drawings, many of them 
 very recently acquired, and merely put away in 
 cupboards to await arrangement. It is obvious 
 that the rapid growth of the collections must have 
 far outstripped the possibility of properly dealing 
 with them at the time. The first duty of a Curator 
 under these circumstances is to make himself 
 acquainted with the contents of his collections, and 
 there can be no doubt that the Dean spent much 
 time over his work. Notes in his handwriting on 
 the wrappers of the Douce prints and Rembrandt 
 etchings show that he worked through them more 
 than once, and quite towards the end of his time 
 at Oxford I remember how clear and accurate was 
 his knowledge of many of the prints and drawings. 
 Without his knowledge and taste and trained eye 
 
 E e
 
 2io Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 it would have been doubly difficult to make any 
 progress with the arranging, cataloguing, and mount- 
 ing which were so urgently needed. At that time 
 there were only three Curators besides Bodley's 
 Librarian, who was constituted an official Curator 
 so long as the Galleries contained any work of art 
 belonging to the Library, and who naturally concerned 
 himself mainly with the safe custody of these objects. 
 Dean Liddell's colleagues in 185.8 were Dr. Cardwell, 
 Principal of St. Alban Hall, and Dr. Wellesley, 
 Principal of New Inn Hall. Dr. Cardwell was then 
 old, and Dr. Wellesley, though a man of fine taste, 
 as is evident from the important collection of prints 
 and drawings which he made, does not seem to have 
 spent much time or trouble on the Galleries, so that 
 the chief burden of the work must have fallen on 
 the Dean. Considerable progress, however, was 
 made in the direction of sorting, cataloguing, and 
 mounting many of the prints, though the Curators 
 were hampered by the small means at their disposal. 
 A short catalogue of the pictures was also prepared 
 by Mr. Joseph Fisher, the first keeper of the 
 Galleries, who held his office for forty-five years. 
 On the death of Dr. Wellesley in 1866 (Dr. Cardwell 
 had died in 1861) the Dean became the senior 
 Curator, and the Board was strengthened by the 
 appointment of Dr. (now Sir Henry) Acland, and 
 Professor Rawlinson. For the next eighteen years 
 the Board continued unchanged. Sir H. Acland's 
 life-long friendship with the Dean, and their common 
 interests and tastes, enabled them to work together 
 with exceptional cordiality ; while Professor Rawlin- 
 son undertook the responsible office of Treasurer. 
 The effect of the new regime soon became apparent.
 
 CH. vi] Slade Professorship of Fine Art 211 
 
 One matter which Dean Liddell, himself an amateur 
 of considerable force, had much at heart was the 
 dissemination of a knowledge of drawing. In the 
 autumn of 1866 a temporary home was provided 
 at the Galleries for the recently established School 
 of Art. Classes were held by Mr. Macdonald, and 
 were largely attended. On the establishment of 
 the Ruskin School of Drawing in 1871, a portion 
 of the basement of the Galleries was fitted up for 
 the use of the evening classes of the School of Art ; 
 and much encouragement was thus given to the 
 study of drawing by boys and girls of the artisan 
 class. A still more important service to the study 
 of art at Oxford was the appointment of Mr. Ruskin 
 as the first Slade Professor of Fine Art in 1869. 
 By the regulations made under the Declaration of 
 Trust, the lectures of the Professor are to be given 
 at the University Galleries, and the Curators are 
 represented on the Board of Electors to the Chair. 
 Mr. Ruskin's acceptance of the Professorship was 
 due principally, if not entirely, to the influence of 
 his friends Dean Liddell (who was chairman of the 
 Board of Electors) and Sir Henry Acland. It will 
 be remembered how great was the enthusiasm with 
 which Mr. Ruskin's lectures were welcomed. Many 
 members of the University date from that period 
 their first awakening to a sense of the beauty of 
 Italian Art, and it may be doubted whether the 
 interest of the University in painting and sculpture 
 has ever again been so keen or so widely spread 
 as it was then. No one felt more strongly than 
 did the Dean how great was the advantage to 
 Oxford of having Mr. Ruskin among its teachers ; 
 and later on, when his connexion with the Uni- 
 
 E e 2
 
 212 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 versity was severed, to no one did his loss mean 
 more than to the Dean. I have heard him more 
 than once refer with deep feeling to his sense 
 of the personal loss to himself. Another matter 
 with which the Dean and Sir Henry Acland were 
 closely connected was the gift, in 1868, of ^"1200 
 by the present Earl of Eldon to supplement his 
 father's benefaction. This sum was to be applied 
 in the first place to the maintenance and illustration 
 of the series of Michael Angelo and Raffaello 
 drawings, and secondly to the purchase of books, 
 prints, and photographs illustrating Italian Art. One 
 result of this benefaction was the preparation and 
 issue in 1870 of Sir J. C. Robinson's catalogue of 
 the drawings. Other additions made to the collec- 
 tions, and improvements effected at the Galleries, 
 during the years 1866-84 might be mentioned. The 
 two surviving Curators certainly look back with 
 satisfaction to the work done by them during that 
 period under the chairmanship of Dean Liddell. 
 
 * In 1884 a great change took place in the con- 
 stitution of the Galleries Board, by the appointment 
 of six additional Curators. The reason for this 
 change was the increasing importance of the study 
 of Classical Archaeology, and the need felt of having 
 this subject adequately represented on the Board. 
 The Dean continued as chairman of the enlarged 
 body; and was chairman also of a committee 
 appointed in 1885 to consider (i) what works of 
 art in other University buildings would find a more 
 fitting place in the Galleries; and (2) whether the 
 present space was sufficient for the full and proper 
 exhibition of the works of art at present in them. 
 The recommendations of this important committee
 
 CH. vi] Herkomers portrait of Liddell 213 
 
 virtually laid down the lines along which subse- 
 quent changes have moved. The appointment of 
 Mr. Percy Gardner to the Chair of Archaeology 
 in 1887 was followed by the transfer to the Galleries 
 of the Arundel Marbles and the establishment of an 
 Archaeological Library. The difficulties caused by 
 the conflicting claims of the Chantrey Collection and 
 the continually increasing number of casts were 
 partially met by a small extension of the Galleries, 
 two new rooms on the ground floor and one on the 
 basement being added in 1890. With all these 
 changes Dean Liddell had much to do, and appeal 
 was made to his judgment at every turn. Mean- 
 while the other and older work at the Galleries, 
 in which the Dean felt perhaps a more direct 
 interest, was not neglected. The Michael Angelo 
 and Raffaello drawings were admirably repaired and 
 remounted, and have gained a new lease of life. 
 Many pictures which required careful reparation 
 were successfully dealt with, and on the redecoration 
 of the picture-gallery in 1891 the pictures were 
 rearranged, and a provisional catalogue of them 
 was prepared by two of the Curators. In 1886, 
 on the appointment of Mr. Herkomer to the Slade 
 Professorship, a new studio, built after the Pro- 
 fessor's own design, was added to the Galleries. 
 To Professor Herkomer's munificence is due the 
 fine portrait of Dean Liddell which now hangs in 
 the Galleries. It was painted by him shortly before 
 the Dean's departure from Oxford. 
 
 ' The time was now at hand when Dean Liddell 
 was to give up the work which he had so long 
 and so successfully carried on at the Galleries. The 
 last meeting of the Curators which he attended
 
 214 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 was held on November 25, 1891. Reference was 
 made to the fact that he would still continue to 
 be a Curator, and it was ordered that the thanks 
 of the Curators for his services in the chair be 
 entered on the minutes. 
 
 1 It will have become evident that any account of 
 the Dean's work at the Galleries virtually means 
 a history of the Galleries during the twenty-five 
 years of his chairmanship. But the personal aspect 
 of his work must not be altogether passed over. 
 His younger colleagues could not but be conscious 
 that they were associated with a remarkable man. 
 He had a commanding personality, clear convictions, 
 and a sound judgment. His wide experience and 
 knowledge of men and affairs always made them- 
 selves felt in a discussion, though he often delayed 
 giving his opinion until he was asked for it. I had 
 frequently occasion to consult him during the last 
 few years of his time at Oxford, and I shall always 
 gratefully remember his help and kindness. Beneath 
 a certain brusqueness of manner there was great 
 considerateness for other people. I remember, when 
 it became necessary to appoint a deputy-keeper 
 owing to Mr. Fisher's age and infirmities, with what 
 great delicacy the Dean made the communication 
 to him. The Dean was capable of strong attach- 
 ment to those with whom he habitually worked, and 
 I know that he loved the Galleries and everything 
 connected with them. It will probably be long 
 before any one man again does as much for them 
 as was done by Dean Liddell between 1858 
 and 1891.' 
 
 In this interesting account Dr. Woods describes 
 the appointment of Mr. Ruskin to the Slade
 
 CH. vi] 'Modern Painters' 215 
 
 Professorship of Fine Art as having been brought 
 to pass chiefly through the influence of Dean Liddell 
 and Sir H. Acland, and he mentions the Dean's 
 pleasure in welcoming Mr. Ruskin as a teacher of 
 Art at Oxford. Mr. Ruskin's admiration for Liddell 
 in earlier days has already been referred to. Their 
 friendship had begun while Ruskin was an under- 
 graduate J , but had been interrupted by his absence 
 from Oxford and visits to the Continent. With 
 the publication of Modern Painters Liddell had 
 not been concerned ; he had not even heard of it 
 as likely to appear. Many years afterwards (in 1879) 
 he told Mr. Ruskin of his first sight of the volume : 
 
 ' Thirty-six years ago I was at Birmingham, 
 examining the boys in the great school there. In 
 a bookseller's shop window I saw Modern Painters, 
 by a Graduate of Oxford. I knew nothing of the 
 book, or by whom it was written. But I bought 
 it, and read it eagerly. It was like a revelation 
 to me, as it has been to many since. I have it 
 by me, my children have read it ; and I think with 
 
 1 In a letter written in 1837, Liddell thus describes Ruskin : ' I am 
 going to drink tea with Adolphus Liddell to-night, and see the drawings 
 of a very wonderful gentleman commoner here who draws wonderfully. 
 He is a very strange fellow, always dressing in a greatcoat with 
 a brown velvet collar, and a large neck-cloth tied over his mouth, 
 and living quite in his own way among the odd set of hunting and 
 sporting men that gentlemen commoners usually are. One of them, 
 for instance , rode to London and back the other day in five and a half 
 hours, a hundred and eight miles. However, he got rusticated for his 
 pains, so he had better have stayed at home. But Ruskin does not give 
 in to such fancies as these, and tells them that they like their own way 
 of living and he likes his ; and so they go on, and I am glad to say 
 they do not bally him, as I should have been afraid they would.'
 
 216 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 a pleasure, a somewhat melancholy pleasure, on 
 those long past days.' 
 
 The first volume was published in April 1843 ; 
 and Liddell, when he penned the words just quoted, 
 must have quite forgotten that after buying the 
 book and studying it carefully, he ventured, after 
 the appearance of the second edition in 1844, to note 
 down and forward to the author some criticisms and 
 corrections. He seems to have commented un- 
 favourably on the style in which the volume was 
 got up, and to have made various suggestions as 
 to phrases and modes of expression, and some 
 criticisms on the main thesis of the work. His letter 
 is, unfortunately, not to be found ; but the nature 
 of his comments may be gathered from Mr. Ruskin's 
 reply : 
 
 October 12, 1844. 
 
 1 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 ' I was on the very point of writing to beg 
 for your opinion and assistance on some matters 
 of art, when your invaluable letter arrived. I cannot 
 tell you how glad and grateful it makes me ; glad for 
 its encouragement, and grateful for its advice. For 
 indeed it is not self-confidence, but only eagerness 
 and strong feeling which have given so overbearing 
 a tone to much of what I have written. I need 
 some support, considering the weight and numbers 
 of those against me ; and you will, I am sure, believe 
 me when I say that I looked to none in the whole 
 circle of the friends whom I most respect, with so 
 much anxiety as to you : though I never ventured 
 to hope for more than pardon from you for one
 
 CH. vi] Mr. Ruskin's Letter 217 
 
 half of the book, even if (which I little anticipated) 
 you should take the trouble of looking over it 
 at all. You may judge, therefore, of the infinite 
 pleasure which your kind letter gave me ; and, 
 from the respect which you know I felt for all 
 your opinions (even when I, in my ignorance, was 
 little capable of understanding them, and felt most 
 inclined to dispute them), you may judge of the 
 deference I would yield to them now, when a little 
 more acquaintance with high art has brought me 
 into nearer sympathy with you. I wish there were 
 something in your letter which I could obey without 
 assenting to, that I might prove to you my govern- 
 ability. But alas ! there is nothing of all the little 
 that you say in stricture which I do not feel and 
 which I have not felt for some time back. In 
 fact, on looking over the book the other day, after 
 keeping my mind off the subject entirely for two 
 or three months, I think I could almost have 
 anticipated your every feeling ; and I determined 
 on the instant to take in future a totally different 
 tone. In fact, the Blackwood part 1 was put in 
 to please some friends (especially one to whom 
 I am much indebted for his trusting me with his 
 drawings) and the booksellers. The title-page is 
 booksellers' work too, and was put in in defiance 
 of my earnest wishes. I let it go, for I considered 
 myself writing for the public, not for men of taste, 
 and I thought the booksellers knew more about 
 the public than I. I was wrong, however, and will 
 allow nothing of the kind in future. 
 
 1 This refers to Mr. Ruskin's reply to the severe criticisms of Turner 
 which had appeared from time to time in Black-wood's Magazine, and 
 to a review of Modern Painters in the number for October, 1843. 
 
 F f "
 
 218 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 ' But it seems to me that the pamphleteer manner 
 is not confined to these passages: it is ingrained 
 throughout. There is a nasty, snappish, impatient, 
 half-familiar, half-claptrap web of young-mannishness 
 everywhere. This was, perhaps, to be expected from 
 the haste in which I wrote. I am going to try 
 for better things ; for a serious, quiet, earnest, and 
 simple manner, like the execution I want in art. 
 Forgive me for talking of myself and my intentions 
 thus, but your advice will be so valuable to me that 
 I know you will be glad to give it ; especially as 
 the matter I have in hand now relates not more 
 to Turner than to that pure old art which I have 
 at last learnt (thanks to you, Acland, and Richmond) 
 to love. 
 
 'As soon as I began to throw my positions 
 respecting the beautiful into form, I found myself 
 necessarily thrown on the human figure for great 
 part of my illustrations ; and at last, after having 
 held off in fear and trembling as long as I could, 
 I saw there was no help for it, and that it must be 
 taken up to purpose. So I am working at home 
 from Fra Angelico, and at the British Museum from 
 the Elgins. I passed through Paris in my return 
 from the Alps, when I at last found myself up to 
 admiration of Titian, and past Rubens (in matter of 
 colour), and now therefore I think I shall do, when 
 I have given a year or two to these pure sources. 
 I don't think, with my heart full of Fra Angelico, 
 and my eyes of Titian, that I shall fall back into 
 the pamphleteer style again. 
 
 ' Don't suppose, however, with all this, that I am 
 going to lose Turner. On the contrary, I am more 
 tpris than ever, and that especially with his latest
 
 CH. vi] Mr. Ruskiris Letter 219 
 
 works, Goldau, &c. Monomania, you think. Pos- 
 sibly ; nevertheless, I should not have spoken so 
 audaciously as I have under the influence of any 
 conviction, however strong, had I not been able to 
 trace, in my education, some grounds for supposing 
 that I might in deed and in truth judge more justly 
 of him than others can. I mean, my having been 
 taken to mountain scenery when a mere child, and 
 allowed, at a time when boys are usually learning 
 their grammar, to ramble on the shores of Como 
 and Lucerne ; and my having since, regardless of all 
 that usually occupies the energies of the traveller, 
 art, antiquities, or people devoted myself to pure, 
 wild, solitary, natural scenery ; with a most unfor- 
 tunate effect, of course, as far as general or human 
 knowledge is concerned, but with most beneficial 
 effect on that peculiar sensibility to the beautiful in 
 all things that God has made, which it is my present 
 aim to render more universal. I think too that just 
 as it is impossible to trace the refinements of natural 
 form, unless with the pencil in the hand the eyj 
 and mind never being keen enough until excited by 
 the effort to imitate so it is nearly impossible to 
 observe the refinement of Turner unless one is in 
 the habit of copying him. I began copying him 
 when I was fourteen, and so was early initiated into 
 much which escapes even the observation of artists, 
 whose heads are commonly too full of their own 
 efforts and productions to give fair attention to those 
 of others. That it was politic to give expres- 
 sion to all my feelings respecting Turner might 
 well be denied, had my object in the beginning been 
 what it is now. But I undertook, not a treatise on 
 art or nature, but, as I thought, a small pamphlet 
 
 F f 2
 
 220 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 defending a noble artist against a strong current of 
 erring public opinion. The thing swelled under my 
 hands, and it was not till I had finished the volume 
 that I had any idea to what I might be led. I saw 
 that I should have to recast the whole, some time 
 or other ; and was too impatient to do something, to 
 do so at once. So I let it go on as it was. The 
 very end and aim of the whole affair was Turner ; 
 and when I let the second edition appear without 
 alteration, it was because I found my views on many 
 points altering and expanding so rapidly that I 
 should never have got the thing together again until 
 the whole of the following portions were completed. 
 So I determined to let it alone, write the rest first, 
 and then recast the whole. I think I shall have it 
 too long by me to run the risk of flippancy of 
 manner again, and the illustrations will render it 
 unnecessary for me to run into caricatured de- 
 scription. I am going to Paris for some time, and 
 then to Florence, before I put it finally together; 
 chiefly to study the early Italian schools, for I want 
 to bring the public, as far as I can, into something 
 like a perception that religion must be, and always 
 has been, the ground and moving spirit of all great 
 art. It puts me into a desperate rage when I hear 
 of Eastlake's buying Guides for the National 
 Gallery. He at least ought to know better not 
 that I should anticipate anything from looking at his 
 art, but from his reputed character and knowledge. 
 
 ' I shall be, as you will easily conceive, no little 
 time in getting my materials together. In fact, I 
 have to learn half of what I am to teach. The en- 
 gravers plague me sadly, and I am obliged at last 
 to take the etching into my own hands, and this
 
 CH.VI] Mr. Ruskins Letter 221 
 
 demands much time. In fact, I ought to have good 
 ten years' work before I produce anything ; but the 
 evil is crying, and I must have at it. I hope in 
 twelve or eighteen months to see my way to a sort 
 of an end ; and however imperfectly (owing to my 
 narrow reading and feeble hand in exhibiting what 
 I feel), I think I shall yet throw the principles of art 
 into a higher system than ordinary writers look for : 
 showing that the principles of beauty are the same 
 in all things, that its characters are typical of the 
 Deity, and of the relations which in a perfect state 
 we are to hold with him ; and that the same great 
 laws have authority in all art, and constitute it great 
 or contemptible in their observance or violation. 
 
 ' And now can you tell me of any works which it 
 is necessary I should read on a subject which has 
 given me great trouble the essence and operation 
 of the imagination as it is concerned with art ? Who 
 is the best metaphysician who has treated the 
 subject generally, and do you recollect any passages 
 in Plato or other of the Greeks particularly bearing 
 upon it ? 
 
 ' Do you know Eastlake at all, or any man con- 
 nected with the National Gallery ? I hope you do 
 all you can to put a stop to this buying of Guidos 
 and Rubenses. Rubens may teach us much of mere 
 art, but there is plenty of him in the country, and 
 for Guido there is not even this excuse. We want 
 Titians, we want Paul Veroneses. Our English 
 school must have colour. Above all, we want the 
 only man who seems to me to have united the most 
 intense feeling with all that is great in the artist as 
 such John Bellini. I don't hope yet for Giotto or 
 Fra Angelico ; but if they would give us John Bellini
 
 222 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 and Titian I shouldn't grumble. I intend some time 
 in my life to have a general conflagration of Murillos, 
 by-the-by ; I suppose more corruption of taste and 
 quenching of knowledge may be traced to him than 
 to any man who ever touched canvas. 
 
 ' Pardon the villanous writing of this letter. I have 
 been much interrupted, and have scarcely had a 
 moment to myself, and I don't like to leave your 
 kind one longer unanswered, or I would write rather 
 more legibly. 
 
 ' Ever, my dear Sir, 
 
 ' Sincerely and respectfully yours, 
 
 ' J. RUSKIN.' 
 
 To this letter Liddell seems to have written a 
 long reply, and at the close to have desired his 
 correspondent to drop for the future the formal style 
 of address, and to call him simply by his surname. 
 
 An answer came from Mr. Ruskin, who was then 
 living at Herne Hill, by return of post : 
 
 October 15, 1844. 
 
 'MY DEAR LIDDELL, 
 
 ' You might think it affectation, were I to tell 
 you the awkwardness with which I obey you, unless 
 you considered the especially child-like position in 
 which my good stars place me ; for while many not 
 older than I are already entrusted with the highest 
 responsibilities that can demand or arouse the 
 energy of manly character, I am yet as much at my 
 ease as I was ten years ago, leading still the quiet 
 life of mere feeling and reverie, 
 
 That hath no need of a remoter charm 
 By thought supplied, or any interest 
 Unborrowed from the eye ;
 
 CH. vi] Second Letter from Mr. Ritskin 223 
 
 and in fact feeling scarcely any difference in myself 
 from the time of impositions and collections, except 
 in so far that I have discovered a great part of my 
 time to have been lost, and made my way to a 
 clearer view of certain ends which have been for- 
 warded in nothing btit vision ; that I feel particularly 
 ashamed of much that I have done, and particularly 
 agonized about much that I have not done ; that I 
 should not now write letters of advice to Henry 
 Acland, nor spend my time at Rome in sketching 
 house-corners. But these changes of feeling render 
 me, if anything, less disposed to unpupil myself than 
 I was before ; and therefore I obey you, though most 
 willingly and gratefully, yet under protest, and only 
 because there are better means of showing respect 
 than mere matters of form. 
 
 ' I could say more on this point, but I don't want 
 to let your letter remain unanswered two days, and 
 as I am going early into town to-morrow I must 
 go on to some things I have to say about the 
 points noticed in your letter. I am glad of your 
 countenance in my opposition of studies, though 
 I am a little afraid that such versatility of admira- 
 tion though it may make a good judge of art 
 makes a bad master of it. Nevertheless for my 
 present ends it is better it should be so. But 
 though I can turn, and am glad to be able to turn, 
 to the most opposed sources of thought and 
 characters of beauty, surely we ought to demand 
 in each kind the perfect and the best examples. 
 The world is so old, that there is no dearth of 
 things first-rate ; and life so short, that there is no 
 excuse for looking at things second-rate. Let us 
 then go to Rubens for blending, and to Titian
 
 224 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 for quality, of colour; to Cagliari for daylight, 
 and Rembrandt for lamplight; to Buonarroti for 
 awfulness, and to Van Huysum for precision. 
 Each of their excellences has its use and order, 
 and reference to certain modes and periods of 
 thought, each its right place and proper dignity, 
 incompatible. Any man is worthy of respect, in 
 his own rank, who has pursued any truth or attain- 
 ment with all his heart and strength. But I dread 
 and despise the artists who are respectable in 
 many things, and have been excelled by some one 
 in everything. They are surely the more dangerous ; 
 for mediocrity in much is more comprehensible and 
 attractive than the superiority in singleness, which 
 has abandoned much to gain one end. Murillo 
 seems to me a peculiar instance of this. His 
 drawing is free and not ungraceful, but most 
 imperfect, and slurred to gain a melting quality 
 of colour. That colour is agreeable because it has 
 no force nor severity; but it is morbid, sunless, 
 and untrue. His expression is sweet, but shallow ; 
 his models amiable, but vulgar and mindless ; his 
 chiaroscuro commonplace, opaque, and conven- 
 tional : and yet all this so agreeably combined, 
 and animated by a species of waxwork life, that 
 it is sure to catch everybody who has not either 
 very high feeling or strong love of truth, and to 
 keep them from obtaining either. He sketched 
 well from a model, and now and then a single 
 figure is very fine. He was not a bad painter, but 
 he exercises a most fatal influence on the English 
 school, and therefore I owe him an especial grudge. 
 I have never entered the Dulwich Gallery for 
 fourteen years without seeing at least three copyists
 
 CH. vi] Turner and the Old Masters 225 
 
 before the Murillos. I never have seen one before 
 the Paul Veronese. 
 
 ' Next, with respect to Turner. I hope we are 
 not opposed so much as you think. You know all 
 my praise relates to his fidelity to, and love of, 
 nature ; it does not affirm in him the highest degree 
 of solemnity, or of purity, in feeling or choice ; and 
 there is one circumstance which it seems to me 
 has great influence on the minds of most men of 
 feeling with respect to the works of the old masters 
 as compared with him. On this subject the 
 creation of pure light and the sacrifice of everything 
 to that end I shall have much to say which (if 
 it has not already occurred to you, as it is most 
 probable it should) will be more pleasantly read 
 in print than in these hieroglyphics. Putting, how- 
 ever, this great source of power out of the question 
 (and how much is involved in it I am not prepared 
 to say), Turner will still appear rather in the light 
 of a man of great power, drawing good indiscrimin- 
 ately, and therefore necessarily in very different 
 kinds and degrees, out of everything, than of one 
 devoting his energies to the full development of 
 any particular moral emotion. He is rather the 
 philosopher who perceives and equally exhibits 
 all, than the ardent lover who raises some peculiar 
 object by all the glories of imagination and with 
 all the powers of his heart. His powers I think 
 you never denied ; at least when I first showed 
 you my "Winchelsea" with the troop of soldiers 
 at Oxford you said, " Yes, just like him, what no 
 
 one else could do, but ." I am not quite sure 
 
 what the particular " but " was ; whatever it was, 
 the powers were admitted. These powers then 
 
 G g
 
 226 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 seem employed with a versatility which gives a 
 result in art very much like what Don Juan is in 
 literature, in everything but its want of moral 
 feeling ; a result containing passages and truths 
 of every character, the most exquisite tenderness, 
 the most gigantic power, the most playful familiarity, 
 the most keen philosophy and overwhelming passion; 
 and yet the whole will not produce on most men's 
 minds the effect of a great poem. It does on mine ; 
 but certainly not to the degree which it might 
 perhaps have done had there been less power and 
 more unity. But it is great in its kind, and there 
 is a system in both the art and the poem which 
 may be reasoned out, and a great whole arrived 
 at by reflection, as out of the chaos of human life 
 and circumstances of its Providence. You must 
 have felt this, I think, in looking over the " Liber 
 Studiorum," in which you pass from the waste 
 of English lonely moorland, with the gallows-tree 
 ghastly against the dying twilight, to the thick 
 leaves and dreamy winds of the Italian woods ; 
 from a study of cocks and hens scratching on 
 a dunghill, to the cold, slow, colossal coil of the 
 Jason serpent; from the sport of children about 
 a willowy pond, to the agony of Rizpah. 
 
 ' Turner, as far as I can ascertain anything of his 
 past life, is a man of inferior birth and no education, 
 arising at a time when there were no masters to 
 guide him to great ends, and by the necessity 
 and closeness of his study of nature withdrawn 
 from strong human interests ; endowed with singular 
 delicacy of perception and singular tenderness of 
 heart, but both associated with quick temper and 
 most determined obstinacy, acting constantly under
 
 CH. vi] Turners temperament & training 227 
 
 momentary impulses, but following out inflexibly 
 whatever he has begun. Considering the little 
 feeling for high art which, till within the last ten 
 years, existed in this country, and the absence of 
 sympathy with him in all but what he felt himself 
 was the mere repetition of things bygone and 
 which could not be bettered, we cannot but expect 
 that there should be something to regret in his 
 career, and something wanting to his attainments ; 
 and we must be content to receive the great and 
 new lessons which he has read to us out of 
 the material world, without quarrelling with the 
 pettinesses and inconsistencies perhaps unavoidable 
 unless where art is the minister to vast national 
 sympathies and the handmaid of religion. 
 
 ' I had much more to say, but my time is gone. 
 I will attend to all you advise respecting the next 
 book. I have not spoken about your kind defence 
 of the present one, but cannot now. I think I shall 
 be pretty sure not to use the language of any 
 particular Church, for I don't know exactly which 
 one I belong to. A Romanist priest, after a long 
 talk under a tree in a shower at St. Martin's, 
 assured me I was quite as good a Catholic as he. 
 However, the religious language I shall use in what 
 references I may have to make will be simply 
 that of the Bible ; and a few allusions to the 
 doctrine of the Trinity and the general attributes 
 of the Deity will be all I shall require. Thank 
 you much for your reference to Vaughan about 
 imagination, &c. Thank you also for your careful 
 notes of the errata in the old book, which I shall 
 take care to alter. 
 
 ' If the only and single result of my labour had 
 
 G g 2
 
 228 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vi 
 
 been that which you mention, some rest to your 
 mind in a period of pain, it would have been enough 
 reward for me, even without the privilege which 
 the close of your letter allows me, of continuing, 
 1 My dear Liddell, 
 
 ' Very truly and gratefully yours, 
 
 'J. RUSKIN.' 
 
 These letters, apart from their high intrinsic 
 interest, show the common ground of artistic sym- 
 pathy which, in distant days, had united Liddell 
 and Mr. Ruskin ; the profound respect with which 
 Mr. Ruskin then regarded his senior (senior by only 
 eight years), and the importance which he attached 
 to his criticisms. It was a happy occurrence, there- 
 fore, that twenty-five years afterwards, when the 
 great teacher was at the zenith of his fame, he was per- 
 suaded by his old friends, who had watched his career 
 from those early times, to undertake the duties of 
 a Chair which would bring him very prominently 
 before the University, and give him an opportunity 
 of instructing a large body of cultivated listeners on 
 the topics nearest to his heart. The post was 
 accepted somewhat diffidently. 
 
 ' I was very grateful for your letter/ he wrote 
 to the Dean in January 1870. ' I was beginning 
 to feel great discomfort in the sense of inability 
 to do not indeed (for that I never hoped) what 
 I would wish to do but what with more deliberation 
 I might be able to do. Your permission to give 
 only seven lectures this spring will give me ease 
 of mind, and, I hope, better power of thinking.
 
 CH. vi] Mr. Ruskin as Slade Professor 229 
 
 I am happy in the general thoughts of what may 
 be possible to me ; clear enough, for all practical 
 purposes, as to what I have to say ; and a little 
 sanguine (yet not so as to be hurt by disappoint- 
 ment) respecting the effect of carefully chosen 
 examples of more or less elementary art, put within 
 the daily reach of all students, with notes enough 
 to enable them to look at once for their main 
 qualities. It is pardonable to be sanguine when 
 I have you and Henry Acland to advise me and 
 help me. I am well assured you know that I will 
 do my best, and that not in any personal vanity.' 
 
 Dr. Woods has not exaggerated the deep im- 
 pression which Mr. Ruskin's lectures, from 1869 
 to 1879, made upon the Oxford world; and his 
 influence as a resident was exercised in many and 
 various ways, some perhaps not a little Quixotic. 
 He had rooms in Corpus, and his friendship with 
 his near neighbours at the Deanery ripened into 
 close intimacy. He would not indeed dine with 
 them. 
 
 ' I never dine out,' he wrote to Mrs. Liddell, ' tired 
 or not. There is really nothing that makes me 
 more nervously uncomfortable than the sound of 
 voices becoming indecipherable round a clatter of 
 knives.' 
 
 But he would often consult the Dean on matters 
 where wide classical knowledge was specially needed ; 
 and there are letters from Liddell, written during the 
 busiest days of his Vice-Chancellorship, discussing 
 at great length, and illustrating by many quotations,
 
 230 Deanery of Christ C/ittrck 
 
 the precise meaning of lov, and its identification 
 with our ' violet,' and whether there was any Greek 
 word answering exactly to our ' moss.' 
 
 Some years afterwards Liddell endeavoured, but 
 without success, to persuade Mr. Ruskin to entrust 
 the publication of his works to the University Press, 
 and to allow them to be sold at reasonable prices. 
 
 ' Many persons/ he wrote, ' wish to possess them, 
 and cannot procure them except at a price which 
 is prohibitive to all but the wealthy ; moreover 
 the profit of the large prices demanded goes not 
 to you (as it ought), but to speculating booksellers 
 or agents.' 'The speculating booksellers,' replied 
 Mr. Ruskin, ' make no profit on my books, except on 
 those which are out of print by my own wish. The 
 others are perfectly accessible, venal to all men ; 
 the best of them for the price of a couple of 
 bottles of good Sillery, and they shall not be sold 
 cheaper. All my purposes in this matter are told 
 at some length in Fors*
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 DEANERY OF CHRIST CHURCH (continued) 
 
 THE Dean became Vice-Chancellor in Michaelmas 
 Term, 1870, in succession to Dr. Leigh ton, Warden 
 of All Souls College. No Dean of Christ Church 
 had held the Vice-Chancellorship since Aldrich in 
 1 692-4. Before that time it had not been uncommon 
 for the two offices to be held together when occasion 
 served. Owen and John Fell were conspicuous 
 figures among the Vice-Chancellors of the seventeenth 
 century. But the custom had fallen into desuetude, 
 and Liddell broke through a venerable tradition in 
 accepting the office. It was no light addition to his 
 labours, and he was now fifty-nine years of age ; but 
 by universal acknowledgment he discharged the 
 onerous duties for four years with unsurpassed dignity 
 and efficiency. The Vice-Chancellor is in a very real 
 sense the Head of the University. He presides 
 over its public assemblies and its Hebdomadal 
 Council ; he is chairman of all committees and 
 delegacies, and has a large share in the appointment 
 of Professors, Examiners, and Preachers ; he is the 
 chief representative of the University on all occasions
 
 232 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 of public ceremony, except during the rare official 
 visits of the Chancellor himself. Much influence 
 and much patronage thus belong to the holder 
 of this important office ; and it is but natural that 
 such power should not unfrequently be used during 
 the short tenure of the office for the furtherance 
 of the interests of the College of which the Vice- 
 Chancellor of the time is Head, or for the advance- 
 ment of political or ecclesiastical causes in which 
 he is interested. Liddell brought to the work 
 lengthened experience, thorough business habits, 
 and familiarity with all academical questions ; but 
 he also brought that entire impartiality and clear 
 sense of justice of which we have so often spoken 
 already, and altogether declined to allow private 
 friendships or personal predilections to influence his 
 conduct. He distinctly raised the whole conception 
 of the office, and laid it down amid universal regret, 
 having won the profound respect of members of 
 every party a difficult achievement anywhere, but 
 exceptionally difficult in the small world of Oxford. 
 
 No very important events occurred during his 
 Vice-Chancellorship. The new Chancellor, the 
 Marquess of Salisbury, had been admitted to his 
 office just before, and had presided at the Com- 
 memoration of 1870. There was a momentary lull 
 in the attempts to reform the institutions of the 
 University; the Duke of Cleveland's Commission 
 of inquiry into its revenues (the prelude to the 
 Parliamentary Commission of 1877) began its in- 
 vestigations in 1872. But reform was then, as always,
 
 CH. vn] Work as Vice- Chancellor 233 
 
 in the air. The University Tests Act of 1871 in- 
 volved many changes in the statutes, to bring them 
 into harmony with the new enactments ; and on 
 various questions connected with the examination 
 statutes there were continual discussions, and some 
 considerable alterations were made. One of the 
 most important of these, affecting the Final Honours 
 School of Literae Humaniores, came into force in 
 1873. There were also many debates and proposals 
 in connexion with the school of Theology, a school 
 only founded in 1870; and a division was made 
 in 1872 between the schools of Law and Modern 
 History, which had formed one school since 1853. 
 
 The Dean discharged his new duties with the 
 utmost conscientiousness. He was very methodical 
 in attendance at meetings and at University sermons ; 
 nothing could exceed his punctual fulfilment of all, 
 even the most tiresome, routine duties. 
 
 ' Nowhere,' writes Professor Max Miiller, in an 
 article already referred to, ' was his silent influence 
 felt so much as when as Vice-Chancellor he acted 
 as chairman of committees. There was a restrain- 
 ing influence in his very presence, people seemed 
 ashamed of lowering themselves before him by 
 selfish, ungenerous, or unacademic behaviour. No 
 gossip was allowed in his presence, no insinuations 
 were tolerated against anybody not present to de- 
 fend himself; no uncommon event at meetings, par- 
 ticularly when, at the same time, to disclose what is 
 said on these occasions is considered dishonourable. 
 If a debate had lasted too long, his question, " Is 
 there anybody who wants to say anything else?" was 
 
 H h
 
 234 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 generally sufficient to stop the flow of not always 
 enlightening eloquence. As to any artifices of 
 which chairmen are not always guiltless, such as 
 proroguing a meeting instead of taking a vote, post- 
 poning a decision in order to secure the presence 
 of a few more favourable voters very harmless 
 contrivances, it may be, in the eyes of so-called 
 practical men, or men of business the Dean would 
 never have condescended to any of them. He 
 knew of no " roguery " that was permissible in order 
 to secure success. Every one who has had the 
 privilege of sitting on committees with the Dean 
 knows what a change his absence made, and how 
 truly and widely his services, nay, his very presence, 
 were appreciated, particularly after he had left 
 Oxford.' 
 
 But he resolved to favour no party in the adminis- 
 tration of his office. In making all appointments 
 he took the utmost pains to find out the best men, 
 and to dismiss all other claims but fitness. The 
 selection of preachers gave him a good deal 
 of trouble : his own knowledge of the foremost 
 preachers in the English Church was naturally im- 
 perfect; he used to consult his friends, and especially 
 Stanley ; and one can remember the many questions 
 asked, and the anxious desire to secure men of real 
 merit, who would be likely to attract large congre- 
 gations : the result being that divines of all parties, 
 and from all parts of England, came up from time 
 to time in answer to his invitation. Some, who 
 travelled to Oxford to preach on a Sunday after- 
 noon in Lent, were grievously disappointed at their
 
 CH. vn] University Sermons 235 
 
 audience at that untoward time : accustomed to 
 address crowded churches, they found themselves 
 in an almost empty building; and the Vice-Chancellor 
 shared their disappointment. But he had the satis- 
 faction of securing Jowett (then scarcely ever heard) 
 to preach a remarkable sermon in 1871, when the 
 church was full to overflowing ; and Liddon and 
 Stanley (as has been already mentioned) preached 
 by his invitation on two consecutive Sundays in the 
 same year. Dr. Pusey succeeded Dr. Stanley as 
 preacher on the Jewish Interpretation of Prophecy. 
 The present Bishop of Lincoln (then Principal of 
 Cuddesdon) was followed by Mr. Stopford Brooke ; 
 and odd juxtapositions such as these showed the 
 generous breadth of the Vice-Chancellor's sym- 
 pathies, or at least his desire to give every party 
 in the Church a hearing in the University pulpit. 
 
 One minor reform connected with St. Mary's was 
 carried out at this period. Attendants at the sermons 
 are familiar with the University Hymnal, in its dark 
 blue cover; and perhaps, during some long sermon, 
 have not been unwilling to peruse its contents and 
 study the interesting notes at the end. But com- 
 paratively few will recollect its first appearance 
 in the Summer Term of 1872, or the poverty-stricken 
 selection of verses from the old metrical versions 
 of the Psalms which the present volume superseded. 
 In 1871 the University authorized the preparation 
 of a new hymnal, and the Delegates of the Clarendon 
 Press appointed a small committee to compile the 
 book. The committee consisted of the Vice- 
 
 H h 2
 
 236 Deanery of Christ Chtirch [CH. vn 
 
 Chancellor, as chairman ; Dr. W. Bright, Dr. Liddon, 
 Mr. John Griffiths, Mr. Henry Smith, Mr. Wickham 
 (now Dean of Lincoln), and the present writer. To 
 these were added, as musical authorities, Dr. Corfe 
 and Dr. Stainer. Each member of the committee 
 sent in a list of the hymns which he considered most 
 suitable for the special purpose of the book ; and when 
 these had been printed a selection was made, and 
 the volume now in use exhibits the survival of what 
 were deemed the fittest. The Dean took a lively 
 interest in the discussions. To his own special 
 choice and advocacy is due the insertion of some 
 stanzas of Milton's hymn on the Nativity. It was 
 objected that there was no tune to suit the metre, 
 but Dr. Stainer replied with a promise that one 
 should be forthcoming ; yet the hymn has never 
 (it is believed) been sung at St. Mary's. It was 
 much wished that some Latin hymns should be 
 introduced. Few, however, were really suitable, and 
 in some which were selected changes had to be 
 made. In the ' Ecce quern vates' Liddell's taste 
 corrected the lines : 
 
 Dexter in Parentis arce 
 Qui cluis virtutibus 
 
 into the sonorous words : 
 
 Dexter assidens Parenti 
 Summa nactus robora. 
 
 And in the ' Dies irae ' he suggested the more 
 rhythmical ' Crucis explicans vexilla ' instead of ex- 
 pandens', the line being an almost necessary substitute 
 for the original ' Teste David cum Sibylla.'
 
 CH. vn] The new Hymnal 237 
 
 One can remember many delightful criticisms on 
 modern hymnody which fell from the Dean's lips : 
 they were the ripe judgment of a master of the 
 English tongue; and the many warnings on the score 
 of orthodoxy which were uttered by the otherwise 
 silent mentor of the committee, Mr. Griffiths. The 
 notes were compiled chiefly by Dr. Bright. Great 
 care was exercised to bring the text, in every case, 
 as near as possible to the original ; but it was not 
 thought advisable to press this principle too far. 
 The committee declined to substitute for the familiar 
 opening of our Christmas hymn the far nobler 
 original : 
 
 Hark, how all the welkin rings, 
 Glory to the King of kings ; 
 
 although in ' Rock of Ages' they retained the strange 
 expression ' When mine eye-strings break in death.' 
 The doxologies and ' Amens ' of modern hymnals 
 were deliberately omitted. The volume is not 
 without its blemishes, but it has for many years 
 fulfilled its purpose well ; and Liddell, who selected 
 the type and binding, was greatly pleased with it. 
 
 It was during this same busy period that the 
 Dean, in 1875, completed his twentieth year of 
 office ; and his portrait, painted by Mr. Watts, was 
 presented to him at the Gaudy in the summer of 
 1876, as a gift from members of Christ Church. 
 It was arranged that Liddell's former pupil, Earl 
 Granville, should make the presentation ; but, to 
 the Dean's great disappointment, he was not well 
 enough to attend. His place, however, was taken
 
 238 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 by Mr. Gladstone, and none who were present 
 on that occasion are likely to forget the eloquent 
 words with which he spoke of the Dean in 
 proposing his health. To Liddell himself the cere- 
 mony was not a little trying : 
 
 ' I had,' he writes, ' to sit under a shower-bath 
 of praise from Mr. Gladstone. He delivered a really 
 magnificent oration ; but I felt very uncomfortable 
 under it, and made a very lame acknowledgment. 
 It was quite miraculous (nothing less) to hear the 
 torrent of eloquence he poured forth for more than 
 half an hour.' 
 
 It is interesting, as illustrating the great orator's 
 extraordinary facility of speech, to add that only a few 
 hours before, one of the Censors (the present writer) 
 had, at Mr. Gladstone's special request, furnished 
 him on a few sheets of note-paper with a list of the 
 chief topics on which it would be proper for him to 
 enlarge : and each in its order came forth, elaborated 
 in the magnificent periods of the speaker. 
 
 This mention of Mr. Gladstone recalls another 
 visit of a very different kind, which he paid to 
 Oxford fifteen years afterwards. He came on this 
 later occasion not to Christ Church but to All Souls : 
 not as an orator, but as a simple student ; and very 
 delightful his visit was to all concerned. Liddell 
 thus describes it in a letter to his son, who was 
 then travelling in India : 
 
 ' I did not in my last letter tell you about Mr. 
 Gladstone's visit to Oxford. It was very surprising.

 
 CH. vn] Mr. Gladstone at Oxford in 1890 239 
 
 He wrote to Sir William Anson, saying that he 
 should like to occupy rooms in All Souls (of which 
 college he is an Honorary Fellow) for ten days or 
 a fortnight, having some work on hand for which 
 he should have to visit the Bodleian. No one 
 would believe it at first. He seldom or never goes 
 anywhere without Mrs. Gladstone ; and how was he 
 to live alone in college rooms, without her solicitous 
 attentions ? However, he came, stayed for about 
 ten days, and seemed supremely happy. Politics 
 were excluded altogether. I asked him to dinner, 
 and invited some known scholars and literati to 
 meet him. One day he dined in the common room, 
 another at our club ; three days in All Souls Hall, 
 and where on the other two or three days I do not 
 remember. He made himself very agreeable, and 
 talked to every conceivable person on every con- 
 ceivable subject. Mr. Goschen says it was the 
 most remarkable episode in a most remarkable 
 life. One night Mr. Gladstone went to the Union. 
 He declined to take part in any debate, but said 
 he would give them a kind of lecture on certain 
 recent discoveries of Assyrian antiquities as bearing 
 on Homer. One of these was that the Assyrian 
 Hades had seven gates, through which the mythical 
 hero Ishtar had to pass. Now, he said, Homer 
 speaks of an 'AtSao TriAa^rq?, which is interpreted 
 gate-keeper ; so that it is clear Homer had the 
 seven Assyrian gates in his mind. Q.E.D. He 
 can persuade himself of anything. He values 
 this discovery so highly that he has sent me 
 a note of it for insertion in the Lexicon. By the 
 way, I am ungrateful, for he paid the very highest 
 compliment to the Lexicon.'
 
 240 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 Liddell's experience as Headmaster of West- 
 minster made his advice especially valuable in 
 relation to all Public School matters ; and though 
 he avoided, as far as possible, engaging himself to 
 the performance of duties which would call him 
 away from Oxford, he could not escape them 
 altogether. He was for many years on the council 
 of Cheltenham College ; and his official connexion 
 with Westminster gave him a permanent place on 
 its new governing body from its creation in 1869. 
 
 At Cheltenham he was one of a distinguished 
 group of men who had been selected to co-operate 
 with the local governors of that college. Lord 
 Redesdale was chairman of the council ; and it 
 was accustomed to meet, not at Cheltenham, but 
 in Lord Redesdale's room at the House of Lords. 
 
 ' There were half a dozen men of mark,' writes the 
 present Dean of Wells, ' among the council, besides 
 the excellent chairman Lord Redesdale, a very 
 hard man to convince of the goodness of a bad 
 case, and a most kind friend to the college and 
 to me. These were Dr. Liddell, Dean of Christ 
 Church, Dr. Thompson, Master of Trinity, Sir 
 Michael Hicks-Beach, Lord James of Hereford, 
 Bartholomew Price, afterwards Master of Pembroke, 
 and my own contemporary, W. L. Newman, whose 
 solid intellect broke down under pressure of over- 
 work in the early seventies. The Dean was 
 excellent at business. His questions at a council 
 meeting were few and piercing, his view clear, his 
 solution practical. He brought to its deliberations 
 exceptional gifts, exceptionally required there.'
 
 CH. vn] 'Election' at Westminster School 241 
 
 The connexion between Westminster and Christ 
 Church was, as we have seen, a very ancient and 
 a very close one; and the Dean, by venerable custom, 
 went every year to the school to elect boys to student- 
 ships, now called scholarships, at Christ Church. 
 He was accompanied by an examiner, usually one 
 of the Censors or Tutors, who also had the status 
 of an elector. At Westminster he was lodged at 
 the Deanery, and there met his brother potentate, 
 the Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, bent 
 upon a like errand, and accompanied also by an 
 examiner. In old days the visit began on the eve 
 of Rogation Sunday, and lasted till the following 
 Wednesday afternoon. Its duration has now been 
 curtailed, and the date altered. Before the railway 
 to Oxford was opened the journey was performed by 
 road, and the Dean of those days could not return 
 to his home at Oxford before Thursday afternoon. 
 It was his duty to preach the University sermon 
 on the Thursday morning, Ascension Day ; but this 
 duty was in his absence always performed by one of 
 the students. With the completion of the railway 
 the return was, of course, easily effected on the 
 Wednesday ; but so anxious was Dean Gaisford to 
 observe the ancient tradition, as to the impossibility 
 of his earlier return, that to the end of his life, 
 though safely back in Christ Church on the previous 
 night, he was careful not to appear in public till 
 Thursday afternoon. 
 
 The few days spent at Westminster were a 
 pleasant episode in each Summer Term. There 
 
 i i
 
 242 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 were dinner parties, and stately processions on the 
 Sunday to the Abbey, where 'High' service was 
 twice performed, and the electors sat in dignity, 
 dressed in full canonicals ; and on the two follow- 
 ing days there were processions through the cloisters 
 to the big school, which was decorated for the 
 occasion with ancient tapestry. The electors sat at 
 a horse-shoe table, also covered with tapestry, the 
 Dean of Westminster presiding. There they had 
 to listen for several hours during two days, while 
 the candidates for election were examined ' viva 
 voce' by the Oxford and Cambridge examiners 
 alternately. On the Monday evening there was 
 a banquet to the electors in the college hall, and 
 epigrams were recited by the Queen's Scholars. On 
 the Wednesday there was again 'High' service in 
 the Abbey, and at the conclusion the boys assembled 
 in the college hall, and the Headmaster entered 
 and read out the choice of the electors, and many 
 a boy's destiny for life was then decided for better 
 or for worse. It was a leisurely and dignified pro- 
 ceeding, and had many good points, but it has been 
 much shortened of recent years, the examination 
 being now largely on paper. Dean Stanley used 
 thoroughly to enjoy his sessions, with the Dean of 
 Christ Church on one side of him, and the Master 
 of Trinity on the other (each had precedence of his 
 brother chief in alternate years) at the table in hall or 
 school, and talked delightfully to them all the time. 
 This annual visit to the school kept up an interest 
 in Westminster on the part of the Christ Church
 
 CH. vn] Question of removal of 'Westminster '243 
 
 authorities, who fully recognized the value to their 
 college of the prosperity and good management of 
 the school. It was very important that its boys 
 should be well taught, and their numbers well main- 
 tained. The question of the removal of the school 
 into the country had been seriously considered, as 
 we have mentioned, during Liddell's Headmaster- 
 ship, and it was again discussed under his successor. 
 In 1860 a large meeting of Old Westminsters was 
 held in the schoolroom, under the presidency of 
 Dean Trench, to consider the matter, and Liddell 
 was asked to attend and speak. He gave his 
 opinion, in no uncertain tones, in favour of removal, 
 declaring that he saw no way by which its ancient 
 prosperity as a boarding school, and its legitimate 
 place among the leading Public Schools of England, 
 could be maintained unless it was moved into the 
 country. ' Even if an angel from heaven were to 
 come down, I do not believe the school's fortunes 
 could be retrieved, so long as it remains in London.' 
 Many Old Westminsters present at the meeting 
 were offended at so outspoken a declaration. They 
 were very reluctant to approve of so radical a 
 change as removal into the country, though indeed 
 few of them sent their sons to the school. It 
 was found impossible, without the support of the 
 main body of Old Westminsters, to carry out such 
 a scheme, and it was definitely abandoned. But 
 there is no doubt that Liddell's forecast was largely 
 justified ; the boarding houses have now for many 
 years past become quite an insignificant part of the 
 
 i i 2
 
 244 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 school : the increase in numbers and that not very 
 large has come from the increased proportion of 
 day-boys. 
 
 When the school under the provisions of the 
 Public Schools Act acquired its own property, and 
 was made independent of the Chapter, a governing 
 body was created for it, upon which various interests 
 were represented. The Dean of Christ Church 
 was an ex officio member of the new body, and 
 Christ Church also sent one elective member. 
 Liddell was for many years regular in attendance 
 at the meetings, and though he never spoke much 
 his authority was very great. One important 
 question came up from time to time, the ex- 
 pediency of retaining the college with its forty 
 Queen's Scholars in the enjoyment of their ancient 
 autonomy within the college building. It was 
 thought by some that to hamper the chief prizes 
 of the school with the obligation to reside within 
 the walls of college, at a time when the boarding 
 element of the school was dwindling, was seriously 
 to diminish the value of the scholarships, and 
 unduly to restrict the competition for them. It 
 was urged that the Queen's Scholarships the chief 
 prizes of the school should be offered to general 
 competition, without this restriction of residence in 
 the college. To this proposal Liddell ultimately 
 gave his full adhesion ; he had for long been 
 favourable to it, but doubted the wisdom of carrying 
 so great a change without evidence of a strong 
 backing of public sentiment in its favour. The
 
 CH. vn] Liddelts impartiality 245 
 
 question has been settled at least for a time 
 by a compromise. The forty Queen's Scholars still 
 exist within their college fortress ; but there are 
 now twenty more scholars, of whom this obligation 
 of residence is not exacted : so that clever boys who 
 are desirous of living at home and attending the 
 school as day-boys may yet enjoy the dignity of 
 a Queen's Scholarship. 
 
 Both at Cheltenham and at Westminster Dean 
 Liddell had to perform the duty (perhaps the 
 most arduous duty that belongs to governors of a 
 school) of selecting a Headmaster. To this task he 
 brought the same inflexible justice which he showed 
 on every occasion. No consideration of personal 
 friendship, or college claims, would influence him 
 for a moment in preferring one whom he deemed 
 a less worthy to a more worthy candidate. He 
 would be even a little suspicious of such claims, 
 and look with the utmost readiness on the merits 
 of candidates who were strangers to him. It was 
 a grand and a rare impartiality, and gave to his 
 final judgment a unique weight and authority. 
 
 He may be contrasted in this respect with a 
 brother Head, who was always firmly convinced 
 that members of his own college were of pre- 
 eminent merit. ' They have not taken our man 
 
 at ,' said one of his Fellows to him after an 
 
 election to a Headmastership. ' Have they not ? ' 
 said the chief, ' then they have made a very great 
 mistake. He was by far the best of the candidates. 
 By the way,' he added a few minutes afterwards,
 
 246 Deanery of Christ Church [CH. vn 
 
 ' can you tell me who were standing for that Head- 
 mastership ? I have never heard their names.' 
 
 It will perhaps be a matter of surprise to the 
 reader that no reference has been made to Liddell's 
 own sermons throughout his long tenure of the 
 Deanery. It was certainly a matter of regret with 
 those who remembered the excellence of his preach- 
 ing during the years of his residence as Tutor (as 
 has been previously mentioned), that after his return 
 to Oxford as Dean he seldom preached before the 
 University. Sir Henry Acland, one of the few 
 persons now living who heard those earlier sermons, 
 still cherishes the most enthusiastic admiration for 
 Liddell as a theologian, insisting on his richly-stored 
 mind, his well-balanced judgment, his uncontroversial 
 temper, and wide charity. He instances particularly 
 a sermon on John vii. 1 7, in which the phrase ' If any 
 man will do his will ' was discussed with elaborate care 
 and thoroughness. Other men of the older genera- 
 tion fully confirm this estimate. Even in the last 
 year of his life he received an urgent request from 
 Dr. A. S. Farrer, Canon of Durham, that he would 
 publish some of the sermons which he had preached 
 more than half a century before at Whitehall or at 
 St. Mary's. And Mr. Goldwin Smith, in recording 
 his recollections of Liddell in those distant days, 
 dwells on his high reputation as a theologian, and 
 expresses his disappointment that the promise of that 
 time was not fulfilled in later years. 
 
 ' There was, I think,' he writes, ' a certain turn in 
 the course of the Dean's life and interests. In the
 
 CH. vii] Liddelts Sermons as Dean 247 
 
 midst of the theological fray at Oxford between 
 the Oxford school and its opponents, he preached 
 one or two very able sermons of a liberal and 
 philosophic kind, and raised the expectation that he 
 was going to be, as he well might have been, a 
 theological leader in that line. But he seemed 
 afterwards to turn aside and to devote himself 
 entirely to Classical pursuits, and to the production 
 of the Lexicon which has been such a blessing to 
 all scholars. Perhaps it was that his serene mind 
 abhorred controversy, and foresaw that if he gave 
 himself up to theology in those days, controversy 
 must be the result. Still, by some of us the 
 Lexicon, excellent as it is, was not accepted as a 
 full indemnification for the disappointment of the 
 hopes of light and leading with which we had been 
 inspired.' 
 
 Whatever cause may be assigned, it is undoubtedly 
 true that after Liddell's return to Oxford in 1855 ne 
 rarely preached before the University except on 
 Good Friday and Christmas Day, when it was his 
 duty to do so. But his words were always well worth 
 hearing. In Michaelmas Term, 1867, he delivered 
 a very remarkable sermon on the philosophic basis 
 of the doctrine of the Real Presence. It attracted 
 wide attention, and was published ' in deference to 
 opinions which the author is bound to respect/ He 
 preached indeed not unfrequently in the Cathedral, 
 after the introduction of morning sermons in 1869. 
 It was his custom to address the undergraduates 
 on the first Sunday of each Term ; and on these 
 occasions he would deal with current events in the
 
 248 Deanery of Christ Church 
 
 political and religious world, and with incidents 
 connected with the common life which they shared 
 together as members of Christ Church. He was 
 
 o 
 
 occasionally persuaded to print his discourses for 
 private circulation ; and a special interest still attaches 
 to those which narrated the history of the Cathedral 
 church, and described the demolition and partial 
 reconstruction of the shrine of St. Frideswide. But 
 there is no doubt that, as he grew older, he 
 shrank more and more from theological discussions ; 
 and indeed, as some of his later letters indicate, 
 ceased to interest himself in questions which even 
 in a remote degree trenched on theological con- 
 troversy. Moreover, distaste for the attempt to 
 solve matters insoluble was an abiding element of 
 his character. In almost the last letter which he 
 wrote to Sir Henry Acland (Christmas Eve, 1897), 
 he refers to ' my old dislike of speculation in things 
 we cannot know "Die Kerle die speculiren," 
 Goethe says.'
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 HOME LIFE 
 
 THE chief events of the Dean's long reign at 
 Christ Church have now been briefly sketched, and 
 an attempt has been made to give a faithful picture 
 of some of the many phases of his busy public life. 
 But the picture needs to be completed by a short 
 description of his home life during the same period. 
 
 When he came back to Oxford from Westminster, 
 his family consisted of one son and three daughters, 
 the youngest of whom was quite an infant, having 
 been born in January of the previous year. Two 
 daughters and three sons were born at the Deanery, 
 and one of them, Albert Edward Arthur (whose 
 names indicate his two godfathers, the Prince of 
 Wales and Arthur Stanley), died in infancy, as 
 has been already mentioned, in May 1863. For 
 many years therefore the home life involved, for 
 the parents, the care and training of their children, 
 and all the delightful interests which gather round 
 the life of a young family. The reminiscences of 
 this period are full of charm ; and the apparent 
 contrast between the public and private life of the 
 
 K k
 
 250 Home Life [CH. vm 
 
 Dean will perhaps surprise many who dealt with 
 him only in official relations. 
 
 The home life, as recalled by those who knew 
 it best, was a very simple and happy one. He 
 tried to be with his children as much as was possible 
 amid the business of the Term, and of an evening 
 was accustomed to hasten up to the drawing-room 
 as soon as dinner (not so late then as now) was 
 ended, that they might have their hour's reading 
 before bed-time came between 8 and 9. He shared 
 their enjoyment of good tales of adventure, and 
 some favourite books he read over two or three 
 times to different detachments of his children. The 
 first book of his choice was The Children of the 
 New Forest ; and as soon as they were old enough 
 to appreciate Scott he would read some of the 
 Waverley novels, selecting Ivanhoe to begin with, 
 and then his own special favourites, The Antiquary 
 and Old Mortality. He was intensely fond of Scott, 
 both of his novels and of his poetry ; the ' swing ' 
 of the verses had a peculiar charm for him ; and 
 the listeners learnt to share his taste. Then, after 
 the children had gone to bed, he was accustomed 
 to work for an hour or more, correcting the Lexicon ; 
 and when they grew older, and sat up till a later 
 hour, he would delight in listening to their music 
 as he went on uninterruptedly with his work. 
 
 His children cherish with loving remembrance 
 those early days. However pressing the calls upon 
 his time might be, he still found leisure to be with 
 them during some part of every day. Their first
 
 CH. vni] Leisure moments with his children 251 
 
 thought, when family prayers were over in the 
 morning, was to arrange the hour for a ride with 
 him, which generally they took in turns. They con- 
 sulted the Letts's diary which many will remember 
 hanging by his fireplace in the study, and found 
 there a list of his engagements for the day ; and 
 according to these the time for the ride was fixed. 
 On Mondays, when the Hebdomadal Council always 
 met at one o'clock, a morning hour was necessarily 
 chosen, involving the additional pleasure of a respite 
 from lessons. The high ground about Bagley Wood 
 and Foxcombe, or the forest glades of Wytham Park, 
 were their usual resort. And as they rode, their 
 father taught them to know the different forest 
 trees, and to notice the clouds and shadows and 
 all the beauties of nature, or would tell them tales 
 from history, or talk of the books he was reading 
 aloud to them ; and, as they grew older, would 
 discuss various questions of the day. 
 
 In holiday time he was able to be much more 
 with his children, and shared in all their interests. 
 After Christmas Day (on which festival it is 
 the Dean's duty to preach in the Cathedral at 
 Christ Church) the whole family were accustomed, 
 so long as his father was alive, to go down to the 
 grand-parents' home at Charlton Kings ; and then 
 would come all sorts of Christmas amusements, and 
 the Dean would help to prepare charades and com- 
 pose parts for them to act. He was always expected 
 to enter fully into their pastimes, and nothing was 
 complete without his co-operation and approval. 
 
 K k 2
 
 252 Home Life [CH. vm 
 
 In 1 86 1 a small plot of land was bought near 
 Llandudno, in order that a suitable house might 
 be built as a holiday home. It was called Penmorfa, 
 from the spot on which it stood, and was first 
 inhabited in the long vacation of 1865. It was 
 a delightful home for nine consecutive summers, 
 till the growth cK Llandudno, and its invasion by 
 excursionists, robbed it of its privacy and quiet. 
 The spot chosen for the house was a singularly 
 beautiful one, and at that time quite retired. It 
 was close by the shore, at the south-east corner of 
 the Great Orme's Head, facing due south. The 
 view extended over the Conway estuary, first to 
 the lower heights of Penmaenbach, Moel Llys, and 
 Penmaenmawr, with the ridge of Tal-y-fan bounding 
 the amphitheatre between them, and then beyond 
 to the loftier summits of Foel Fras and Carnedd 
 Llewellyn. To the west lay an expanse of shallow 
 sea, with Anglesea behind ; and on a fine evening, 
 when the tide was out and the sun set over the 
 island, there were wondrous colours thrown on the 
 hills, or reflected on the long stretch of wet sands. 
 The place had been selected on account of the 
 surpassing loveliness of the scene ; and at that time, 
 and for many years afterwards, the Great Orme's 
 Head was untouched by a carriage road, and was 
 a wild and little frequented headland, scored by 
 rough paths and sheep-tracks, and still containing 
 some rare plants to reward the search of botanists. 
 Here the long vacations were spent by the children 
 and their parents in unclouded happiness ; there
 
 CH. vin] Home near Llanmiano 253 
 
 were endless walks and scrambles on the Great 
 Orme, picnics, and drives, and lessons in sketching, 
 when their father would suggest views and teach 
 them how to use pencil and brush. And instead 
 of late dinner, there was a common high tea in 
 which the children joined, one of them always sitting 
 next their father unless some tiresome guest usurped 
 the coveted place. Sometimes if the day had been 
 hot, and the moon was near the full, the walk would 
 be postponed till late, and a ramble by moonlight 
 over the Great Orme was a rare and special treat. 
 
 Visitors came and went. Among them was 
 Mr. (now Sir William) Richmond, who spent eight 
 weeks at Penmorfa engaged in painting ' The 
 Sisters,' the exquisite picture of the three eldest 
 daughters. Mr. Gladstone also came; and one 
 day in the midst of a walk round the Great Orme 
 he suddenly stopped, and clung to the Dean, 
 declaring that he could not bear to look down 
 upon the sea from the height which they had 
 reached. They were on a steep and rocky path, 
 and advance or retreat was equally difficult. The 
 path became worse as they clambered down, the 
 Dean leading Mr. Gladstone along, with eyes closed, 
 while the rest of the party formed a sort of buttress 
 to protect him on the seaward side. They were 
 all thankful when the lower ground was safely 
 reached. 
 
 Liddell's own tastes were of a very simple kind. 
 He was abstemious, and scarcely touched wine. 
 He was very regular in his hours, and never worked
 
 254 Home Life [CH. vm 
 
 late at night. During the Oxford Term, he was 
 always at morning chapel. He never smoked, and 
 detested the pollution of the fresh air by the fumes 
 of tobacco. He was in early life, and indeed for 
 some years after he became Dean, a good walker, 
 delighting in long walks : but Oxford engagements 
 so greatly curtailed his leisure hours, that he found 
 riding the best method of getting sufficient exercise 
 in a short space of time. His favourite books were 
 Shakespeare, Horace, Scott, and Bos well's Life of 
 Johnson. They were always on his study table. 
 
 ' I read Boswell's Life of Johnson} he wrote, 
 ' again and again with ever increasing pleasure. 
 I think if I was allowed only one book (besides the 
 Bible) to take with me to a desert island, that would 
 be the book.' 
 
 The position of the Dean made it necessary that 
 the Deanery should be a centre of hospitality, and 
 throughout his long tenure of the office that hospi- 
 tality was lavishly extended, not only to members 
 of Christ Church and the wider circle of the 
 University, but also to the frequent guests who 
 visited Oxford. Mrs. Liddell's social duties made 
 a great demand upon her time and strength, and 
 many generations of Oxford men will recall with 
 gratitude the refined courtesy and generous welcome 
 shown to all their guests by host and hostess. 
 The Dean indeed was not quite at his best if 
 he lacked congenial neighbours at the table. He 
 used to confess that he had no ' small talk,' and 
 was sometimes not a little irresponsive in ordinary
 
 CH. vni] Hospitality at the Deanery 255 
 
 conversation. The undergraduates, who were con- 
 scientiously asked to breakfast at the Deanery, 
 were often painfully nervous in his company, and 
 he seemed to share their feelings. But with friends 
 whom he liked, and with whose tastes he was in 
 sympathy, he was the most delightful of companions ; 
 full of accurate information, and ready to pour it 
 out, on subjects of art, or history, or politics. 
 He was a careful student of passing events, both 
 domestic and foreign ; keenly interested in all the 
 great movements of his time ; profoundly distrust- 
 ful of Mr. Gladstone in his later developments ; 
 cherishing warm admiration for some of the states- 
 men of the older generation, especially Sir Robert 
 Peel. He used sometimes to say that no deaths 
 had inflicted so great loss upon England in his 
 time as the deaths of the Prince Consort and 
 Sir George Cornewall Lewis. He was full of 
 bitter sorrow when the news of Gordon's death 
 arrived. In answer to a birthday letter from his 
 eldest daughter he wrote : 
 
 1 1 ought not to reply to your affectionate words 
 in so sad a strain. But really, just at present, my 
 heart is woe for Gordon, and the feeling touches 
 all my thoughts. It is the saddest, most dismal 
 event that I have lived to see. When your Uncle 
 Charles heard of it he burst into tears, and my 
 feelings were close akin to his. What a true hero ! 
 I was sure he would never be a prisoner. Better 
 that he should die sword in hand than that he 
 should fall into the hands of those savages.'
 
 256 Home Life [CH.VHI 
 
 As the years passed on, there came to the home 
 at the Deanery the inevitable alternations of joy 
 and sorrow which life is sure to bring. There was 
 the proud satisfaction of the parents when their 
 younger son won a scholarship at Eton, and after- 
 wards crowned a brilliant career at Christ Church 
 by gaining a First Class in the Classical School, 
 and a Fellowship at All Souls College. On hearing 
 of his son's success in the Schools in July 1888 
 he wrote : 
 
 1 You can imagine no, indeed, you hardly can 
 imagine the delight which we all felt on receiving 
 Lionel's telegram announcing the news of your 
 success. Never was success better deserved. . . . 
 And now, my dear boy (I must still call you boy), 
 you are fairly launched on the sea of life. You 
 begin with good auspices, and I have no doubt 
 that, so far as your own efforts go, as has been 
 the beginning, so will be the whole course of 
 your life. I cannot expect to see much of your 
 future career. But I have seen enough of it to 
 make me feel ready to depart in peace and in con- 
 fidence. We are, indeed, very happy in our children. 
 So long as my life is spared, your career will be, 
 as it has been, one chief cause of happiness and 
 contentment. Your mother will add her greetings 
 to this imperfect expression of my own feelings/ 
 
 There were three happy marriages, and delightful 
 visits to the new homes of their son and daughters 
 in Hants and Fife, with all the affectionate interest 
 taken in the grandchildren whom they loved to have 
 near them. The Dean's letters to his married
 
 CH. vm] Death of his daughter Edith 257 
 
 daughters are full of simple kindly goodness ; every 
 detail of their lives he wishes to hear of; and, as 
 often as he can, he contrives to be with them. 
 
 But there were heavy very heavy bereave- 
 ments also. His intense affection for both parents 
 made him feel very deeply the loss of his mother 
 in 1871, and of his father in the following year. 
 Then in June 1876 came the crushing blow of his 
 daughter Edith's death at the age of twenty-two, 
 following close upon the joy of her engagement to 
 be married, and coming with a startling suddenness 
 after an illness of three days. The sorrow was so 
 profound, so sacred, that it must not be dwelt on, 
 even at this distance of time. But one may be 
 allowed to quote a letter which Sir James Paget, 
 who had been called in to advise on the case, 
 addressed to Sir Henry Acland immediately after 
 hearing of the death : 
 
 ' This is surely the saddest thing that we have 
 known among all the sadnesses that our calling 
 has brought us to the sight of a very tragedy. 
 Nothing seems wanting for the perfection of sad- 
 ness, and one cannot discern, in any of this world's 
 hopes, a gleam of consolation. May God grant 
 peace and comfort in the sure hope of heaven's 
 joy. It seems very hard to be unable to stand 
 aside for a time, and let life run by, while one 
 might try to learn wisdom from these sorrows. 
 But it cannot be ; the work must be done, and, 
 much worse, the pleasure must be worked out.' 
 
 A window at the east end of the south choir aisle 
 
 L 1
 
 258 Home Life [CH. vm 
 
 at Christ Church, called the St. Catherine's window, 
 enshrines his daughter's memory ; and her grave 
 is just beyond it, in the quiet greensward which 
 fringes the church. The inscription below the 
 window tells the tale : 
 
 *Ji Sacra memoriae EDITH/E 
 Henrici et Lorinaa Liddell filiae, 
 Quae, juveni constantissima fide 
 Vix quinque dies desponsa, 
 Morbo correpta subitaneo 
 
 Animam Deo reddidit 
 Junii die xxvi A.D. MDCCCLXXVI. 
 
 Ave dulcissima, dilectissima Ave. 
 
 The wound was long in healing. A rest in 
 retirement at Holnicote brought back in some 
 measure the needed calm and physical strength ; 
 but the memory of those days was always fresh. 
 From Holnicote the Dean wrote a few lines to his 
 old friend Scott : 
 
 ' Many thanks such as an aching heart can 
 render for your kind letter. We are here for 
 three weeks or thereabouts : Sir T. Acland has 
 most kindly lent us this quiet and beautiful place 
 to rest in ; and we are all better, though what some 
 of us had gone through, both in actual watching 
 and still more in terrible anxiety, cannot soon be 
 overcome.' 
 
 The death of Mrs. Liddell's aunt, Lady Smith, in 
 1877, at the remarkable age of 103 years and 9 
 months, and of her mother, Mrs. Reeve, in 1879, 
 brought more sadness to the house ; but perhaps 
 few deaths affected Dean Liddell more deeply than
 
 CH.VIII] Dean Stanleys death 259 
 
 that of his very dear friend Arthur Stanley, which 
 occurred after a short illness in July 1881, at the 
 comparatively early age of sixty-five. Liddell's 
 affection for the Dean of Westminster, who was 
 less than five years his junior, has already been 
 mentioned ; the two had been drawn together in 
 many ways for many years, and were closely united 
 in sympathies, religious and political. Liddell heard 
 the news of his death when he was staying with his 
 daughter, Mrs. Skene, at Pitlour, and wrote at once 
 to Mrs. Liddell, who was then at Oxford : 
 
 'Alas! alas! and so my worst fears are realized; 
 and our dear, dear friend must be taken to his last 
 rest in that Abbey which he loved so well, and 
 which owes so much to him. Ah me ! Out of my 
 own dear family no death could so rend my heart. 
 Is there any one in England whose loss would be 
 felt by so many, by people of so different conditions, 
 creeds, and opinions ? There was an all-embracing, 
 loving kindliness in his nature which disarmed 
 enmity, and made even those who most differed 
 from him regard him with affection. It is a public 
 loss, of which we can scarcely estimate the effect 
 or the amount. I cannot, I cannot bear to think 
 that I shall never again press his hand, or be 
 greeted by his friendly smile, or listen to the charm 
 of his words. What a fatal year! Not to speak 
 of our own family loss Rolleston, Coxe, and now 
 our dear Stanley gone ! Tkey indeed were delivered 
 from a state of hopeless disease, and they lived long 
 enough in misery to make their nearest and dearest 
 pray for their release. But he how sudden has 
 been his departure, how little expected, how crushing 
 
 L 1 2
 
 260 Home Life [CH.VHI 
 
 to those who loved him ! Yet better so, than that he 
 should have suffered a lingering and hopeless illness, 
 and died after such a struggle as our poor friend at 
 
 is making. Peace be with him, as it assuredly 
 
 is with him. " Let me die the death of the righteous, 
 and let my last end be like his." 
 
 ' I cannot pass, on this paper, from thoughts of 
 our beloved friend to those business matters which 
 must claim attention while we are left on earth to 
 minister one to another. Presently I shall be more 
 collected, and will write a few lines respecting what 
 we can and may do this summer.' 
 
 Next day he wrote again, having received by 
 telegraph an urgent request to preach the funeral 
 sermon on Stanley in Westminster Abbey : 
 
 ' The telegram arrived about 3 p.m. yesterday. 
 I answered: "Most reluctantly I must decline. The 
 distance and the heat I could not well bear." And 
 I have written in detail to-day. I COULD not have 
 got through a sermon in the Abbey I am sure 
 I could not. Alas ! if it were not for you, my 
 dearest, and my beloved children, and one or two 
 others, I feel as if life were at an end for me. All 
 with whom one had sympathy falling one by one. 
 It is a sad privilege to survive.' 
 
 It will be well to add in this place as the matter 
 affected Liddell's private rather than his public 
 life that on Stanley's death he was offered the 
 Deanery of Westminster, and was very urgently 
 pressed to take it. It was difficult to resist a pres- 
 sure which implied an appreciation of his exceptional 
 fitness for the post, and a gracious desire that he
 
 CH. vin] Offer of Deanery of Westminster 261 
 
 should accept it, on the part of those whose wishes 
 were almost equivalent to a command ; but Liddell, 
 while feeling very deeply the honour paid to him, was 
 conscious of his own inability at the age of seventy 
 to undertake the very arduous duties of a new post, 
 including the obligation of preaching sermons to 
 vast congregations, and of guiding the services, and 
 superintending all the varied matters of business 
 connected with the rule of the great Abbey. It 
 was a position rendered far more difficult than it 
 would otherwise have been, from Stanley's splendid 
 work as Dean ; it was one which for Liddell had no 
 attractions : his experience had not fitted him for it ; 
 he had never liked Westminster as a residence in 
 former days, and was convinced that his health 
 would break down if, at his now advanced age, he 
 were once more to live there. His decision was 
 quite clear, and was formed without any misgivings, 
 and there is no doubt that it was a right one. He 
 had yet strength for ten years more work in the 
 familiar world of Oxford ; if he had been trans- 
 planted to Westminster he would, in all probability, 
 soon have sunk under the burden of the novel 
 and uncongenial duties which would have faced 
 him there. 
 
 Liddell's health, however, had been for many years 
 satisfactory. The weakness of the chest, which had 
 assumed so alarming a character in 1856, had 
 yielded to the prescribed remedies. After two 
 winters spent in the island of Madeira ' that 
 island of the Atlantic (as he alluded to it in
 
 262 Home Life [CH. vm 
 
 a sermon more than thirty years afterwards) which 
 by its equable climate and gentle air seems to 
 realize the description given by the great lyric poet 
 of Greece of the islands of the blest,' he returned 
 to work with health fully restored. Except for 
 crippling attacks of sciatica, painful and depressing 
 at the time, he rarely ailed, and all the duties of 
 his post were discharged year after year with 
 unfailing regularity. In 1865, however, he met 
 with a troublesome accident in Switzerland. He 
 had been detained in Oxford that summer later 
 than usual, owing to the contested election for 
 Mr. Gladstone's seat at Oxford, which was then lost 
 to Mr. Gathorne Hardy. 
 
 4 It is very vexatious,' writes Liddell from the 
 Sheldonian Theatre; 'the University is disgraced. 
 To think that Oxford should reject Gladstone, and 
 that such a constituency as Westminster should 
 have returned Mr. John Stuart Mill ! ' 
 
 After this annoying business Liddell started for 
 Switzerland in company with Dr. Acland and one 
 of Acland's sons, and made for Engelberg. There, 
 while descending a steep path, he slipped on a moss- 
 covered stone and turned his left foot. He was 
 with difficulty brought to the hotel, being quite 
 unable to walk, and having to wait on the mountain 
 until dark, when a chaise-a-porteurs reached him. 
 At Engelberg he was a prisoner for a week, and 
 then travelled by easy stages to Paris, where 
 M. Nelaton, the Emperor's surgeon, visited him
 
 CH. vni] Snowed up at Radley 263 
 
 and discovered that the small bone of the leg was 
 broken. It was properly set at once, and in time 
 Penmorfa was reached, and the comforts of home 
 obtained. Happily no permanent bad consequences 
 resulted from the accident. 
 
 In the severe winter of 1880-1 Liddell endured a 
 strange and most unpleasant experience. On January 
 1 8 he was travelling to Oxford from Bournemouth, 
 in company with Mrs. Liddell, his youngest daughter 
 and two sons, when on reaching a cutting near 
 Radley station the train came to a standstill in 
 a deep snow-drift. It could not be extricated, and 
 the passengers were detained for nearly twenty-four 
 hours in the carriage, without food, drink, warmth, 
 or light. He described the event in a letter to 
 Mrs. Skene : 
 
 ' You really have no need to distress yourself 
 about us. Strange to say, we have none of us 
 suffered materially from our Arctic experiences. 
 I do not think I can remember such a day as 
 Tuesday the i8th, with Tuesday night and 
 Wednesday morning. The wind howled, and was 
 so furious that the heavy railway carriages shook 
 and rocked under its force. The snow drove in 
 swirling eddies all round and round. It drove 
 into the carriages through every crevice ; we had 
 no light, for no lamp was in the carriages ; no 
 warmth, for the hot-water tins were cold as ice ; 
 no food to create inner warmth. Twenty-two hours 
 without food at that temperature was indeed a great 
 privation. Your mother and Vio were our great 
 comforters. They retained their spirits, and to
 
 264 Home Life 
 
 some extent their warmth, through all. I being 
 held fast by the gout was a helpless piece of goods, 
 I fear, but I hope I did not add materially to the 
 difficulties. I should not have cared half as much 
 if I could have got about. I think I suffered most 
 in being carried by soldiers for about 200 yards 
 from our . carriage to the station, the snow driving 
 furiously in one's face, and the poor fellows stagger- 
 ing with my weight through the deep snow. 
 I wonder how they got me along at all. You 
 would have been amused to see the motley party 
 assembled about eleven on Wednesday morning in 
 the little third-class waiting-room at Radley station, 
 a stoker handing round tea from a kettle, and 
 afterwards coffee in a bedroom ewer; all drinking 
 in turn from the same tin can.' 
 
 It is a matter of surprise that no lasting bad 
 effects resulted from this rough experience. The 
 Dean soon recovered from the shock and fatigue, 
 and within a few weeks was able to discharge his 
 multifarious duties with his accustomed regularity.
 
 A,,/, y ,',//// //, AW 
 
 /,,////// //y /-y . ''. . M .;/,//,, / , // , . ' . 
 . S/M6&n /></ /// ///' //'/////' 'f /<///> //,//,< >.;//// ( ,/ 
 
 ^air^if-> ,'7aAt4
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 RESIGNATION OF THE DEANERY, AND AFTER-LIFE 
 
 So the time passed on, every year adding authority 
 and dignity to the venerable Dean. Honours 
 came to him from various quarters. At Stanley's 
 death he succeeded to his post of Professor of 
 Ancient History at the Royal Academy. He be- 
 came a Trustee of the British Museum, and received 
 the Hon. Degree of LL.D. at Edinburgh. His 
 duties at Christ Church were still discharged with 
 unimpaired efficiency; nothing was neglected or 
 delegated to others ; and those who shared in the 
 government of the House wondered at the readiness 
 with which he threw himself into the discussion 
 of the many and various proposals for changes and 
 improvements which emanated from the governing 
 body. He had none of the conservative instincts 
 which are so commonly found in elderly men : he 
 welcomed reforms to the last. 
 
 ' Only a few months before his resignation,' writes 
 Mr. Sampson, then Senior Censor, ' Sadler and myself 
 and one or two others raised the question of what 
 Christ Church did for poor men, and the "Extension" 
 question generally (out of which the College at 
 
 M m
 
 266 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 Reading grew). We had a large committee, and 
 held long meetings, and the Dean \vas as wise 
 and generous and far-sighted as ever. There was 
 none of the natural inertia and non possiimus of 
 old age, but he was kindly and hopeful, as though 
 he were planning out a bit of work of which he 
 would be able to see the issue.' 
 
 But the burden of his office grew heavier with 
 advancing years ; an exceptionally severe attack 
 of sciatica in 1887 permanently impaired his walking 
 powers ; and Liddell had often averred, both in 
 public and in private, that he would not consent 
 to retain the Deanery when he was no longer able 
 to perform its duties efficiently. ' I have spoken 
 to my medical adviser,' he once said at the Gaudy, 
 ' and have made him promise to tell me as soon 
 as he thinks that I am becoming in any way unfit 
 for my post : and as soon as that is told me I shall 
 resign.' The audience thought perhaps of the 
 Archbishop and Gil Bias ; but the statement was 
 made in all sincerity, and the promise faithfully 
 observed. In the summer of 1 89 1 the final resolution 
 was come to, and resignation was determined upon. 
 He wrote to Lord Salisbury on August 8 : 
 
 ' DEAR LORD SALISBURY, 
 
 ' I have waited for the prorogation of Parlia- 
 ment, when you will be in some measure freed from 
 the pressure of business, before I communicate to 
 you a purpose which I have deliberately formed. 
 It is, to resign my office of Dean of Christ Church. 
 
 ' You will believe that it is not without many
 
 CH. ix] Letter to Lord Salisbury 267 
 
 searchings of heart that I have come to this 
 conclusion. Christ Church has been my home 
 (barring nine years at Westminster) for more than 
 sixty years. But it is my affection for the place 
 that induces me to take this step. I am now in 
 my eighty-first year, and feel that my work ought 
 to be committed to younger and more vigorous 
 hands. I will not say that I am unable to perform 
 the routine duties of my office. But I am conscious 
 of various infirmities incident to advancing years, 
 and I cannot now take such part in academical 
 and other business as ought to be undertaken by 
 a person in my position. It cannot indeed be long 
 before I must of necessity make the vacancy which 
 I now propose to make voluntarily. But I wish, 
 if I am permitted, to walk out of the Deanery rather 
 than be carried out. This will be best for the 
 college and myself. I have the satisfaction of 
 believing that I leave the college in full efficiency, 
 and that there never was a better or more devoted 
 set of officers in charge. 
 
 ' At Christmas then I propose that my resignation 
 shall take effect. I announce this purpose to your 
 Lordship beforehand, that you may have time to 
 consider whom you will recommend to be my 
 successor. 
 
 ' Meantime, in the interest of the college, it will 
 I think be expedient not to let the matter be 
 generally known. But this I leave to your better 
 judgment. 
 
 ' I have the honour to remain, 
 ' Dear Lord Salisbury, 
 
 ' Yours very faithfully, 
 
 1 HENRY G. LIDDELL.' 
 
 M m 2
 
 268 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 And so at the end of 1891, after a reign extending 
 over thirty-six years and one term, he retired from 
 his high office. He had taken a comfortable house 
 situated among the pine woods of Ascot, with shel- 
 tered lawns and gardens, and a wide range of fine 
 open country around, affording pleasant drives in all 
 directions. Here he spent the remaining six years 
 of his life, with his wife and unmarried daughters, 
 in the enjoyment of well-earned and dignified repose. 
 
 He was never idle, even in these years of leisure. 
 His faculties were happily quite unimpaired. He 
 seldom used spectacles, except when persuaded to 
 wear them for reading of an evening. His hearing 
 remained perfect, and his mind as vigorous as ever. 
 He still worked, as has been recorded, at the 
 Lexicon, making many corrections throughout, and 
 compiling a few pages of addenda and corrigenda 
 for the final edition, which was published in the 
 year before his death. He delighted in reading 
 modern literature, and especially good biographies. 
 He enjoyed the society of his neighbours and 
 welcomed their friendship, and showed a kindly 
 sympathy with all their doings. His advice and 
 assistance were continually sought for in matters 
 of business, and he was always ready to give the 
 help of his wise counsel and ripe experience, and 
 found himself chairman of various small committees 
 to promote local objects. He took as keen and 
 lively an interest in the discussion as to the 
 remodelling of a golf club as he had ever taken 
 in matters of academical importance ; and busied
 
 CH. ix] Proposed Statue at Christ Church 269 
 
 himself eagerly in the establishment of the Nursing 
 Home in South Ascot, of which Mrs. Liddell is 
 now President. He was often consulted as to the 
 appointments to Oxford Chairs ; and he retained 
 to the last one or two ties with the University. 
 He was made an Honorary Student of Christ 
 Church, and was still a Curator of the University 
 Galleries ; and one of the last visits that he paid to 
 Oxford was to take part in the election of a suc- 
 cessor to Professor Wallace in the Chair of Moral 
 Philosophy which he had himself occupied half 
 a century before. One matter disturbed him a little 
 in 1892: the urgent request which came from his 
 old friends, Sir John Mowbrayand Mr. Vere Bayne, 
 that he would allow them to place his statue in 
 the niche on the north side of Kill-Canon. This 
 proposal was genuinely distasteful to him. To 
 Sir John Mowbray's first letter on the subject he 
 replied : 
 
 ' I feel deeply the high honour which you and 
 Mr. Bayne propose to bestow upon me, and I thank 
 you both with all my heart for your kind too kind- 
 appreciation of my services to Christ Church. . . . 
 But I must ask you to forgive me if I demur to 
 accepting this honour. Some time since, my kind 
 friend Dr. Liddon, as I heard, proposed himself 
 to place an effigy of me in the niche you mention. 
 At that time I entreated that nothing of the kind 
 should be done either by him or others. I have 
 not changed my opinion. In the last few weeks 
 I have received gifts and addresses far exceeding 
 my expectation and, I fear, fa.r exceeding my deserts.
 
 270 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 I am more than grateful for the good opinions 
 expressed of me, and I would fain hope that the 
 honour you propose may at least be deferred. After 
 a time people will perhaps take a different view of 
 what is due to me, and may think that enough has 
 been done. You will not, I am sure, think that 
 I undervalue your kind proposal. On the contrary, 
 I value it so highly that I think it goes beyond 
 what I deserve.' 
 
 To this Sir John Mowbray sent a reply, stating 
 fully the grounds of the request, and Mr. Bayne 
 joined with him in asking for a reconsideration 
 of the adverse decision : but Liddell still pleaded 
 that he might not be pressed to-rao-dai XiQwos. So 
 the matter rested for a while ; but the governing 
 body of Christ Church backed up the request by 
 the unanimous expression of a hope that Dr. Liddell 
 would not withhold his consent to the execution 
 of the statue ; and in the end he was persuaded to 
 waive his objections, and the statue (the work of 
 Mr. Dressier) was put into its place in October 1893. 
 
 He was fond of occupying some of his spare 
 moments in writing to old friends ; and several charac- 
 teristic extracts from his letters are worth recording. 
 Sir Thomas Acland, his senior by two years, was 
 engaged in writing a work (published subsequently 
 under the title of Knowledge, Duty, and Faith, and 
 containing a summary of philosophical principles as 
 taught by great thinkers, ancient and modern), and 
 he wrote in February 1894, asking for Liddell's 
 judgment on some points :
 
 CH. ix] Letters from Ascot to old friends 271 
 
 ' I wish I could help you,' he replied, ' but the sum- 
 mary of contents was too brief and general to enable 
 me to form any conception of the substance of the 
 treatise. And with regard to your account of Logic, 
 I despair of saying anything worth sending. I fear I 
 share Mountague Bernard's opinion that, after forty, 
 Metaphysics become distasteful. I have so long dis- 
 continued any study of Speculative Philosophy, and 
 am so ignorant of what has been said or written 
 by moderns, such as Herbert Spencer, Lotze, &c., 
 that I could not give any judgment worth a farthing. 
 I fear the present generation care little for such 
 things, and that any attempt to popularize them 
 would meet with small encouragement. I only 
 wonder at your energy in continuing to pass specu- 
 lative thoughts through the filter of your brain/ 
 
 A few random quotations from his frequent letters 
 from Ascot to Sir Henry Acland may be added : 
 
 ' You say you are " almost broken-hearted " at 
 your want of religious depth in faith and love. 
 This is one of your self-tormenting thoughts, which 
 I have often attempted to combat. Dismiss such 
 dubitations from your mind whenever they arise. 
 As to love, I am sure that there cannot be a more 
 loving nature than yours. To feel yourself "broken- 
 hearted " for want of love is a proof in itself how 
 warm and real is the sentiment in you. As to 
 faith, I suppose you mean that the old provinces 
 of faith are being invaded by conviction of new 
 facts inconsistent with their maintenance. Must this 
 not be so ? It is a question whether, after a certain 
 age, it is worth while, as a matter of duty, to go into 
 such questions. I, for instance, do not feel the least
 
 272 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 inclination to read the Gifford Lectures by (I forget 
 his name), if he attempts to solve transcendental 
 questions by abstract reasonings. The history of 
 religion must be interesting. The philosophy of 
 religion may be barren and provoking. I have 
 been reading Scenes of Clerical Life, by George 
 Eliot. I never read a tale more profound and 
 striking than "Janet's Repentance." How different 
 all our religious squabbles and doubts would be, 
 if such questions were treated as she or Arthur 
 Stanley treated them. But perhaps the tale would 
 excite you too much. I did not know she was so 
 powerful, and so completely fair to all varieties of 
 religious thought and feeling.' 
 
 ' Have you read Max Miiller in the Fortnightly 
 on Christianity and Mohammedanism ? A great 
 deal of it is very striking and very humiliating. . . . 
 His references to the theological points in the 
 Koran are very remarkable. He falls back upon the 
 character of Christ as the point in which there can 
 be no comparison. I have always felt this. If all 
 dogmatic Christianity crumbled away, there is the 
 Rock which never can be moved.' 
 
 ' How can it be that men engaged in active life 
 should not be " entangled with this world "? What- 
 ever else Jesus Christ was, he certainly was a man : 
 one to whom " nihil humani alienum erat "; one who 
 consorted rather with publicans and sinners than 
 with spiritual teachers ; one who rather approved 
 of our trying to do our duty in that state of life 
 to which we may have been called, than our trying 
 to solve insoluble problems, and shaping our life 
 accordingly. I will look back to my sermon on the
 
 CH. ix] Selections from Letters 273 
 
 Atonement. It is very flattering to have a discourse 
 remembered for forty years ! I fear I do not myself 
 remember its tenor very accurately. Old Gaisford 
 
 said he never remembered a sermon " after Wednes- 
 
 j * 
 day. 
 
 ' I sympathize with the anti-gambling people. 
 If horse-racing could be practised without betting 
 and swindling and all its vile concomitants, well 
 and good. But this I fear is impossible. It is 
 no use for Lord Derby, or the Duke of Portland, 
 or Lord Rosebery, to run their horses " square," 
 without betting. The wretched subordinates, and 
 all who follow in their train, bet and court ruin. 
 Ought I to let my house for the races ? I never 
 doubted it before, but I have some qualms.' 
 
 ' Do you mean to subscribe to the Huxley 
 memorial ? If so, I think you had better join the 
 committee. It is quite true what you say about 
 Christianity. But I think the true Christian spirit 
 is best evinced by recognizing what is good in every 
 man and every system.' 
 
 1 1 have been delighted by reading The Relief of 
 Chitral, by the two brothers Younghusband. I 
 have also been reading Lord Roberts' Forty-one 
 Years in India with the greatest satisfaction. If 
 you have not read it, pray get it without delay. 
 It is a simple, unpretending record of good, hard 
 work, and makes one proud to think that we have 
 such men. Incidentally we learn much of others 
 of even greater note, especially John Nicholson, 
 who was a true hero. . . . These are the sort of 
 books that give me pleasure. Philosophy and, I 
 must add, theology have no delights for me.' 
 
 N n
 
 274 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 ' How fast the leaves are falling ! Old George 
 Richmond and old George Anthony Denison gone 
 in one day. They were both honest, genial, lovable 
 men ; Denison perhaps too positive and too sarcastic 
 to deserve the last epithet. He was very violent, 
 but transparently honest ; and that covers a multitude 
 of shortcomings. To you, of course, the death of 
 George Richmond is far the most heart-touching. 
 And indeed the character and manner of the man 
 must nearly touch all who knew him. The notice 
 in the Times is fair, but not enthusiastic. Well, 
 we are all going the same way, and our time for 
 " crossing the bar " cannot be far removed. . . . 
 I have been reading Mannings Life, a painful book. 
 I think we are better off at home than under 
 a supposed infallible guide, who seems only to irritate 
 and promote disunion.' 
 
 'What a curiously obscure poem is Keble's Sunday 
 after Ascension \ Who could imagine that " down " 
 in line two means " thistle-down " ? And then one 
 is not disposed to be grateful to earth for fostering 
 such down as produces thistles. The rest is more 
 and more involved and obscure. Then one turns 
 to Whitsunday, and lo ! all is clear, simple, and 
 bright as crystal. I remember Hawkins of Oriel 
 saying to a young lady who was ecstatic over the 
 Christian Year with his chin up and his eyes half- 
 closed, more suo, " Do you understand him ?" She 
 might have answered, " Many things I understand 
 and love ; other things are like sayings of St. Paul, 
 hard to be understood." But I must confess 
 that the clear and beautiful passages are far less 
 numerous than the obscure. I have lately found
 
 CH. ix] Criticism on the ' Christian Year' 275 
 
 a copy which was given me by Henry Jeffreys in 
 1834. That was the tenth edition.' 
 
 ' I have no doubt that Ireland is " dear, romantic, 
 and green." But in what respect is it " misunder- 
 stood " ? It has been the prey of parties who did not 
 try to understand it, but merely used it for their own 
 purposes. Since Pitt's time, to the present day 
 almost, this has been going on, and no doubt this 
 game of shuttlecock has complicated the task of its 
 honest rulers fatally. It is very surprising that 
 the elections to small offices should be so entirely 
 one-sided : anti-Catholic in the north, anti- Protestant 
 in the greater part of the island. But why did the 
 Catholics choose Wolfe Tone and Lord E. Fitzgerald 
 (both, I believe, Protestants) for their chiefs at the 
 end of the last century ? And why in one day did they 
 submit to Parnell so implicitly, while now they are 
 divided into three Catholic sections ? I confess it 
 is hard to understand such things ; and if that is 
 what you mean by " misunderstood," I am with you : 
 but I do not think this is what you mean. You 
 mean, do you not, that the English do not under- 
 stand them ? Is not this due to the priests ? In 
 Carlow, where I have stayed, the same repulsion 
 does not exist, at least not to the same extent as 
 you found it in Mr. Trench's country. And if you 
 speak to Livingstone you will find a very different 
 state of things in that part of the west in which 
 he lives. 
 
 ' I think it is a pity that our Irish Church did not 
 avail itself of the opportunity to make some greater 
 alterations in the Liturgy. The high doctrines of 
 the sacraments might well .have been relaxed, and 
 
 N n 2
 
 276 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 with such relaxation much of the sacerdotal stiffness 
 of Pusey, &c., might have been abated.' 
 
 ' I do not think that it can be fairly said that 
 Judaism was the parent of Christianity. It was 
 in distinct opposition to the prevailing Judaism that 
 Christianity asserted itself, resting rather on Gentile 
 tendencies than on Jewish. St. Paul cast aside 
 Judaic principles altogether; and St. Peter was 
 instructed to do the same, though he followed his 
 instructions rather imperfectly/ 
 
 'As to your worry, I will tell you what I used 
 to do about disagreeable matters. I never opened 
 a letter arriving late in the day, for I could not 
 afford to lose my sleep by speculating on how 
 I should reply to a perplexing question. If the 
 letter or question was future or contingent, I thought 
 it over in the day-time, and wrote a draft letter. This 
 I put in my desk, and let it lie there till it was wanted. 
 This enabled me to put the thing aside ; for having 
 written my letter, so far as my information went, 
 I found it useless to speculate, and so did not bother 
 myself at night.' 
 
 On July 23, 1896, the golden wedding was cele- 
 brated at their Ascot home. It was a bright summer 
 day, and many old friends from all quarters gathered 
 together there to give their greetings and to show 
 their affectionate regard for the Dean (as they would 
 still call him) and Mrs. Liddell. 
 
 Among the numerous presents was a picture sent 
 by Mr. Hamilton Aide, accompanied by the following 
 words :
 
 CH. ix] ' Crossing the bar' 277 
 
 ' I hope it is not inappropriate to ask your accept- 
 ance of " A Golden Sunset," or at least the attempt 
 to portray one, in which the grey mists that troubled 
 the city were being absorbed in the tranquil glory 
 of the sky. Such I believe is the evening of your 
 married life, and such may it continue, for your 
 family and friends.' 
 
 Dr. Liddell replied : 
 
 1 Allow me, in my own name and that of my wife, 
 to thank you most sincerely for your beautiful sym- 
 bolical drawing. So long as I live it cannot be 
 long I shall look on it with delight, though I feel 
 that the golden glow will gradually fade into dark- 
 ness. I only hope that the twilight may be short, 
 and that I may " cross the bar" before the glow has 
 quite vanished.' 
 
 That hope was fulfilled. He lived for eighteen 
 months longer, without experiencing more than the 
 gradual failure of power which accompanied advanced 
 years. The end came as he had desired, quite 
 suddenly and painlessly, on the evening of January 
 1 8, 1898, and next day the big bell in Tom Tower 
 announced to all Oxford that their old Dean had 
 gone to his rest. 
 
 His body lies, as he had desired that it might, 
 close by the grave of his daughter Edith, in the 
 peaceful precincts of the cathedral at Christ Church, 
 under the shelter of the southern wall of the 
 sanctuary. A Cornish granite cross marks the 
 spot, and upon the wrought-iron gate leading to 
 it, through the Slype, from .the eastern cloister, are
 
 278 Resignation of the Deanery [CH. ix 
 
 placed his armorial bearings. Within the church, 
 beneath the memorial to his daughter, is fixed 
 a brass with this inscription : 
 
 Dilectissimam juxta filiam sepultus est 
 
 Henricus Georgius Liddell 
 Hujusce JEdis Alumnus MDCCCXXX MDCCCXLVI 
 
 Decanus MDCCCLV MDCCCXCI 
 
 Academiae ornamentum fautor litterarum 
 
 Ecclesiae Cathedralis in pristinum decorem restitutor 
 
 Qui post labores otio tandem perfructus 
 
 Efflavit animam 
 Januarii die xviii MDCCCXCVIII. 
 
 In the long series of rulers of Christ Church 
 Dean Liddell will always hold a distinguished place. 
 Other famous Deans will naturally challenge com- 
 parison with him. Prominent among them is John 
 Fell, who came after the tumult of the Civil War 
 and the desolation inflicted upon Oxford under the 
 Commonwealth. Fell was a man of large views 
 and imperious will ; a divine, a scholar, and a wise 
 patron of learning. To him is due the restoration 
 and completion of the chief buildings of the college. 
 But he was over-masterful and arbitrary; his rule 
 belonged to an age when the sword had been 
 scarcely sheathed, and rough and ready methods 
 of enforcing authority and guiding opinion were 
 adopted and approved. 
 
 Dean Aldrich, who came almost immediately after 
 Fell, was a man of peace and culture ; scholar, 
 architect, musician, philosopher : illustrating his 
 office in all sorts of ways, but happiest among 
 his books and with his incessant pipe ; ' humble
 
 
 THE GATE IN CHRIST CHURCH CLOISTERS LEADING TO 
 
 DEAN LIDDELL'S GrtAVE. 
 To face page 278.
 
 CH. ix] Estimate of Dean Liddell 279 
 
 and modest to a fault,' as Hearne describes him, 
 yet making others happy by his gentle and kindly 
 sway. 
 
 Another great name is that of Atterbury ; but 
 Atterbury was only for a short time Dean ; his 
 fame at Christ Church is principally associated with 
 his life as a student. He was a restless, over- 
 bearing chief; and Smalridge, who succeeded him 
 at Carlisle and Oxford, complained that his first 
 duty at both places was to quench the fires which 
 his predecessor had kindled. 
 
 Cyril Jackson was a grand personage ; perhaps 
 the most remarkable and the most successful in the 
 long line of Deans. He knew how to win and retain 
 the confidence of the great families of England ; 
 Christ Church was never more famous or more 
 popular than in his time ; and he took a lively 
 and helpful interest in the work and careers of his 
 undergraduates, encouraged them to do their best, 
 followed them in their after-life with generous 
 sympathy, and did not forget their merits when 
 occasion came to recommend men for promotion. 
 He evoked the enthusiastic loyalty of members 
 of Christ Church by his splendid loyalty to their 
 House, and his statue in the library is a fitting 
 memorial of their deep affection for him. 
 
 Of Dean Gaisford's sterling merits it will not be 
 necessary to speak : his work, and the character of 
 his rule, have been already described. 
 
 Dean Liddell, as we have seen, if this brief 
 memoir has not failed in its purpose may worthily
 
 280 Resignation of the Deanery 
 
 rank with the greatest of his predecessors, in regard 
 to learning and intellectual power. His devotion to 
 Christ Church was unsurpassed ; his services to it 
 were singularly great and various; and his majestic 
 bearing, high authority, and unswerving rectitude 
 raised him to a very lofty position among the rulers 
 of Oxford. Humble and reverent, not caring for 
 or seeking praise, he lived a long life of singular 
 integrity ; he might have been assigned a higher 
 place than any of his predecessors, if he could have 
 thrown off his shyness and reticence, and allowed him- 
 self to show and express how warmly he shared the 
 interests of those over whom he was set, how keenly 
 he rejoiced in their successes, and how eagerly he 
 desired to encourage their efforts and to repress with 
 a strong hand the idleness and extravagance which 
 in every generation are apt to prevail among the 
 wealthier undergraduates of our Universities. 
 
 Assuredly it may be asserted that as his term of 
 office was unequalled in duration, so it was un- 
 equalled in importance. He witnessed and guided 
 the transition from the old to the new Christ 
 Church ; and has left a lasting memory of a rule 
 marked by august dignity, by strenuous labours, 
 and, above all, by dauntless equity.
 
 INDEX 
 
 ACLAND, Sir Henry W., 28, 30, 45, 
 50, 79 ., 117, 130, 151, 196, 
 
 210, 212, 215, 246, 257, 262. 
 
 Sir Thomas Dyke, 258; his 
 
 work, Knowledge, Ditty, and 
 Faith, 270. 
 
 Aide, Mr. Hamilton, 276. 
 
 Albert, H.R.H. Prince, 97, TOO, 
 120, 176, 255; appoints Dean 
 Liddell Domestic Chaplain, 53. 
 
 Aldrich, Dean, 231, 278. 
 
 Anglesea, 252. 
 
 Anson, Sir William R., 239. 
 
 Arnold, Dr., 35, 97, 119. 
 
 Ascot, 268. 
 
 Athol, Duke of, 23. 
 
 Atterbury, Dean, 87, 279. 
 
 Bagley Wood, 251. 
 Bagot, Bishop, 135. 
 Bamborough Castle, 154. 
 Barnes, Dr., 135, 183. 
 Bayne, Rev. T. V., 164, 168 n., 269. 
 Baynes, R. E., 168 . 
 Bernese Alps, 83, 84. 
 Billing, Mr., 154. 
 Binchester, I. 
 
 Biscoe, Rev. Robert, 14, 24. 
 Bishopton Grove, 2. 
 Blomfield, Bishop, 10, 53. 
 Boldon, 2. 
 
 Boyle, Dean, extract from his 
 Recollections, 56. 
 
 O 
 
 Bradley, Dean, 21. 
 
 Bright, Dr. W., 183, 236, 237. 
 
 Brooke, Rev. Stopford, 235. 
 
 Brown, Rev. W. L., 30. 
 
 Bruce, Colonel, 178, 179. 
 
 Lady Augusta, 190. 
 
 Buccleuch, Duke of, his Sanitary 
 Commission, 100. 
 
 Buckland, Dean, 62, 64, 87, 91, 95, 
 loo; letter on Dean Liddell's 
 postponement of the meeting of 
 school, 118-20. 
 
 Bull, Dr., 59, 136, 182 ; his prefer- 
 ments, 136 n. 
 
 Burgon, Rev. J. W., 193. 
 
 Burton, Dr., 26 ; his death, 32. 
 
 Cambridge, 27. 
 
 Canning, C. J., afterwards Earl 
 Canning, 7, 18, 19, 20, 21, 56. 
 
 Cardwell, Dr., 210. 
 
 Chamberlain, Rev. T., 155. 
 
 Charlton Kings, 251. 
 
 Charterhouse School, 3-10 ; sys- 
 tem of teaching at, 6. 
 
 Cheltenham College, 240. 
 
 Cherwell, the, 197. 
 
 Christ Church, Oxford, 13, 134; 
 Chapter, 135-7 ; students, 137 ; 
 report of the Royal Commis- 
 sion, 141 ; system of private 
 nomination to studentships 
 abolished, 143 ; appointment of 
 O
 
 282 
 
 Index 
 
 a body of Referees, 144; Act 
 of 1867, 145 ; alteration of the 
 Deanery, 147; of the Cathedral, 
 149, 151 ; Latin Prayers, 152; 
 sermons, 153; work of restora- 
 tion, 155-9; the Chaplains' 
 Quadrangle, 160 ; the Great 
 Quadrangle, 161 ; the Chapter 
 House, 163; list of Censors, 
 1 68 n. ; number of under- 
 graduates, 175 ; abolition of 
 differences of rank, 175; class 
 of undergraduates, 181 ; new 
 Governing Body in 1867, 194. 
 
 Clarke, Sir James, 48. 
 
 Cleasby, Mr., 205. 
 
 Clerke, Archdeacon, Sub-Dean of 
 Christ Church, 135, 167. 
 
 Cleveland, Duke of, his Commis- 
 sion of inquiry, 232. 
 
 Clifford, Mr. Charles, 140. 
 
 Cockerell, Professor, 51, 208. 
 
 Coleridge, Sir John T., 144. 
 
 Conway estuary, 252. 
 
 Conybeare, Rev. C. R., 123. 
 
 Corfe, Dr., 152, 236. 
 
 Cosin, Bishop, motto over his 
 Library at Durham, 26. 
 
 Coxe, Rev. H. O., 259; appointed 
 Bodley's Librarian, 200. 
 
 Cramer, Dr., 122. 
 
 Curtius, Georg, 80. 
 
 Dalhousie, James Ramsay, after- 
 wards Marq. of, 17. 
 
 Dampier, J. L., 125. 
 
 Dasent, Sir George, 205. 
 
 Deane, Mr., 161. 
 
 Denison, Ven. George Anthony, 
 19, 274. 
 
 Henry, 17. 
 
 Stephen, 17, 18, 48; his 
 
 estimate of Dean Liddell, 57. 
 
 Denmark, Crown Prince of, at 
 Oxford, 176. 
 
 Desart, Earl of, 150. 
 
 Dindorf, 78. 
 
 Douce, Mr. F., 209. 
 Dowdeswell, Dr., 15, 158. 
 Doyle, Sir Francis H., 17, 21. 
 Dressier, Mr., 270. 
 Drisler, Professor, 80. 
 Dufferin, Lord, 153 ; Letters from 
 
 High Latitudes, 153 n. 
 Dunlop, Andrew, 14. 
 Duppa, Dean Brian, 151, 157. 
 Durham, G. W. Kitchin, Dean of, 
 
 80, 168 ., 176, 180, 198, 203, 207. 
 
 Easington, 20, 22. 
 
 Edinburgh, 22. 
 
 Eldon, Earl of, 209, 212. 
 
 Elgin, Earl of, 19, 178. 
 
 Eliot, George, Scenes of Clerical 
 Life, 272. 
 
 Ellacombe, Rev. H. N., on Dean 
 LiddelFs first University ser- 
 mon, 52 n. 
 
 Emlyn, Lord, 150. 
 
 Engelberg, 262. 
 
 Farrer, Dr. A. S., 246. 
 
 Fell, Dean John, 154, 161, 231, 
 
 278 ; his statue, 164. 
 Fellowes, Mr. Thomas Lyon, 12, 
 
 57- 
 
 Felpham, 139. 
 Fisher, Mr. Herbert W., 177, 179. 
 
 Mr. Joseph, 210, 214. 
 
 Fishlake, Mr., 68 n. 
 
 Fortnightly Review, extract from, 
 
 72 n. 
 
 Foxcombe, 251. 
 Frewin Hall, 176. 
 
 Gaisford, Dean, 13, 16, 18, 24, 51,- 
 59,60,66,241,279; his hostility 
 to the first Oxford University 
 Commission, 128; his death, 
 131 ; appointed Regius Pro- 
 fessor of Greek, 139. 
 
 Gardner, Mr. Percy, 213. 
 
 Cell, Mr. Lyttelton, on Dean
 
 Index 
 
 283 
 
 Liddell's services as Delegate 
 of the Press, 201-5. 
 Gibraltar, Bishop of, 134, 168 ; on 
 the changes in Christ Church, 
 
 145- 
 
 (lildersleeve, Professor, 80. 
 
 Gladstone, Rt. Hon. W. E., 15, 
 141, 255, 262; his speech on 
 presentation of Dean Liddell's 
 portrait, 238 ; visit to Oxford, 
 239 ; at Penmorfa, 253. 
 
 Mrs., 239. . 
 
 Glenlyon, Lady, 23. 
 
 Goodwin, Professor, 80. 
 
 Gordon, General, his death, 255. 
 
 Mrs., extract from her Life 
 
 o/Buckland, 88. 
 
 Rev. Osborne, 150, 168 ., 
 
 176 .; on Dean Liddell's work 
 as Professor, 53. 
 
 Goulburn, Dr., 193. 
 Graham, Sir James, 63. 
 Granville, Earl, 26, 237. 
 Grenville, Lord, 139. 
 Griffiths, Rev. John, 236, 237. 
 
 Hamilton, Walter Kerr, 17. 
 
 Hampden, Dr., his appointment 
 to the Regius Professorship of 
 Divinity, 32 ; opinions, 33 ; ac- 
 tion for damages against, 38. 
 
 Hardy, Mr. Gathorne, 262. 
 
 Harrison, Benjamin, 17. 
 
 Harvey, Rev. H. A., on Dean 
 Liddell, 47. 
 
 Hawkins, Dr., Provost of Oriel, 
 274. 
 
 Hawkshaw, Sir John, his scheme 
 for the drainage of the Thames 
 Valley, 197. 
 
 Heidelberg, 27. 
 
 Herkomer, Mr., his appointment 
 to the Slade Professorship, Ox- 
 ford, 213. 
 
 Hermann, Godfrey, his Review of 
 Gottling's Hesiod, 25. 
 
 Heurtley, Dr., 137, 185. 
 
 O 
 
 Hicks-Beach, Sir M., 240. 
 Hinds, S., Bishop of Norwich, 125. 
 Holland, Rev. H. S., 168 n. 
 Holnicote, 258. 
 Howley, Archbishop, 137. 
 Hussey, Rev. Robert, 182. 
 Hymnal, University, 235-7. 
 
 Icelandic Dictionary, publication 
 
 of, 205. 
 Iffley Lock, proposed abolition 
 
 of, 197. 
 Irvine, Rev. Andrew, 6. 
 
 Jackson, Dean Cyril, 139, 141, 279. 
 
 J., Bishop of Lincoln, 21. 
 
 W., Bishop of Oxford, 139. 
 
 Jacobson, Dr., 136, 143, 183. 
 James of Hereford, Lord, 240. 
 
 Rev. B. F., 89. 
 
 Jeffreys, Rev. Henry Anthony, 17, 
 
 25, 275. 
 
 Jelf, Dr., 21, 136. 
 Jeune, Very Rev. Francis, 125. 
 Johnson, Rev. G. H. S., 125. 
 Jowett, Rev. Benjamin, 74, 140, 
 
 185 ., 197. 
 
 Keble, his Sermon on National 
 Apostasy, 41 ; his Christian 
 Year, 274. 
 
 Keys, the verger, 149 . 
 
 Kildare, Marq. of, 150. 
 
 Kingsley, Rev. Charles, 1 86. 
 
 Kynaston, Rev. Herbert, elected 
 High Master of St. Paul's, 51. 
 
 Lansdowne, Marq. of, 96. 
 
 Leighton, Dr., 231. 
 
 Leopold, H.R.H. Prince, at Ox- 
 ford, 177. 
 
 Lewis, Sir George Cornewall, 255. 
 
 Lexicon, Greek-English, publica- 
 tion of, 57, 65, 76; origin, 66; 
 Preface to the first edition, 
 69-71, 76; arrangement, 72; 
 O 2
 
 284 
 
 Index 
 
 progress, 73; reception, 77; 
 abridgement for schools, 76; 
 number of editions, 78. 
 
 Leyden, Dean Gaisford at, 25. 
 
 Liddell, Albert Edward Arthur, 
 death of, 186, 249. 
 
 Arthur, his death, 129. 
 
 Charlotte, 83. 
 
 Edith, her death, 257. 
 
 Harriett, her death, 48. 
 
 Henry George, his birth, 
 
 I ; parents, I ; at a private 
 school, 2 ; Charterhouse, 3-10 ; 
 religious instruction, 9 ; confir- 
 mation, 10; hatred of school, 
 10; reserved disposition, 12, 
 169; matriculates at Oxford, 
 13 ; life at Christ Church, 14 ; 
 elected to Fell's Exhibition, 14 ; 
 nominated a Student, 15 ; mem- 
 ber of the club 'Ten Tribes,' 
 17; his friends, 1 8, 25, 30; 
 Long Vacation, 19; gains a 
 Double First Class, 21 ; in Scot- 
 land, 22 ; his first stag, 23 ; 
 returns to Oxford, 24 ; studies 
 Divinity, 26 ; pupils, 27, 39, 47 ; 
 duties of a College Tutor, 28 ; 
 artistic tastes, 30, 46, 50; on 
 Dr. Hampden's appointment, 
 32-6; attitude towards Dis- 
 senters, 37 ; on the suit of 
 Hampden v. Macmullen, 38 ; 
 his Ordination, 40, 49 ; memo- 
 ries of Cardinal Newman, 42- 
 44 ; on the preaching of New- 
 man and Dr. Liddon, 44; death 
 of his sister Harriett, 48 ; ap- 
 pointed Greek Reader, 51 ; 
 Select Preacher, 52 ; elected 
 White's Professor of Moral 
 Philosophy, 53; Censor and 
 Whitehall Preacher, 53 ; Do- 
 mestic Chaplain to H.R. H. 
 Prince Albert, 53 ; style of his 
 sermons, 55; congregations, 56; 
 publication of the Lexicon, 57, 
 
 65, 76; engagement, 58; ap- 
 pointed Headmaster of West- 
 minster, 60 ; marriage, 64 ; 
 Preface to the first edition 
 of the Lexicon, 69-71, 76; 
 severe labour, 74, 79 ; mode 
 of life, 75 ; on Ruskin's criti- 
 cism, 8 1 ; his first visit to 
 Switzerland, 83 ; at Westmin- 
 ster School, 86 ; reforms, 89 ; 
 difficulties of his position, 94 ; 
 system of periodical examina- 
 tions, 99 ; strain on his powers, 
 IOI ; literary style, 102 ; ser- 
 mons to the boys, 103, 112: 
 his austere demeanour, 105, 
 169-72; gift of teaching, 106; 
 the challenges or examinations 
 for admission, 107 ; epigrams, 
 109 ; moral tone of the school, 
 no; his love of exact truth, 
 in; special school services, 
 m ; his prevention of the 
 boat-race, 116; effect of the 
 outbreak of fever, 117; letter 
 from Dean Buckland on post- 
 poning the meeting of school, 
 118-20; his History of An- 
 cient Rome, 121 ; on Vaughan's 
 lectures, 123; his labours on 
 the first Oxford Commission, 
 125 ; friendship with Stanley, 
 125, 183, 189 ; death of his 
 son Arthur, 129; appointed 
 Dean of Christ Church, 131 ; 
 on the Professorship of Greek, 
 140; refusal to act as Commis- 
 sioner, 146 ; alterations of the 
 Deanery, 147 ; restoration of 
 the Cathedral, 149, 151, 156-9; 
 supervision of the work, 154; 
 illness, 155; services, 159; 
 other important architectural 
 works, 160-5 ; his statue, 164, 
 269; enforced absence, 167; 
 mode of discipline, 168; on 
 Father , 174; on the Prince
 
 Index 
 
 of Wales' matriculation, 177; 
 his delight in Stanley's appoint- 
 ment at Oxford, 182 ; death of 
 his infant son, 186; sorrow at 
 Stanley's appointment to West- 
 minster, 189, 191 ; on Stanley's 
 marriage, 190; Vice-Chancellor, 
 191,231; his influence as chair- 
 man, 194; interest in the work 
 of drainage, 195 ; the Thames 
 Valley scheme, 196-8; services 
 to Oxford, 199 ; Curator of the 
 Bodleian Library, 200 ; Dele- 
 gate of the Press, 201-5 ; on 
 the publication of an Icelandic 
 Dictionary, 205 ; Curator of the 
 University Galleries, 208-14; n 
 Ruskin's appearance, 215 x . ; 
 criticisms on Modern Painters, 
 216 ; letters from Ruskin, 216- 
 22, 222-8 ; influence as Vice- 
 Chancellor, 233; his interest in 
 the compilation of the University 
 Hymnal, 235-7 ; his portrait, 
 237 ; on Mr. Gladstone's visit 
 to Oxford, 239 ; Council of 
 Cheltenham College, 240; on 
 the removal of Westminster 
 School, 243 ; impartiality in 
 selecting Headmasters, 245 ; 
 his sermons, 246-8 ; his home 
 life, 249 ; simple tastes, 253 ; 
 favourite books, 254 ; hospital- 
 ity, 254 ; death of his parents, 
 257 ; of his daughter Edith, 257 ; 
 of Dean Stanley, 259 ; declines 
 the Deanery of Westminster, 
 260; health, 261; accident to 
 his foot, 262 ; caught in a snow- 
 drift, 263 ; various honours, 
 265 ; letter on his resignation, 
 266 ; retires to Ascot, 268 ; ex- 
 tracts from his letters to Sir 
 Henry Acland, 271-6; cele- 
 bration of his golden wedding, 
 276 ; his death, 277. 
 Liddell, Rev. Henry George, I. 
 
 Liddell, Hon. Henry T., 22, 23. 
 Mrs., 9, 129, 132, 149, 229, 
 
 254, 259, 263, 269, 276; her 
 
 illness, 100, 117; death of her 
 
 infant son, 1 86. 
 
 Robert, 4. 
 
 Sir Thomas, I. 
 
 Thomas, 2. 
 
 Liddon, Dr., 191, 235, 236, 269 ; 
 
 style of preaching, 45. 
 Lincoln, E. King, Bishop of, 235. 
 
 E.C. Wickham, Dean of, 236. 
 
 Lord, 1 8, 19. 
 
 Llandudno, 252. 
 Lloyd, Rev. C., 168 n. 
 Longley, Archbishop, 144. 
 Louise, H. R. H. Princess, 165 n. 
 Luke, Mr. G. R., 180. 
 Lushington, Dr., 193. 
 Lyon, Charlotte, I. 
 Hon. Thomas, I. 
 
 Macdonald, Mr., 211. 
 
 Macmullen, Rev. R. G., his action 
 against Dr. Hampden, 38. 
 
 Madeira, Island of, 167, 261. 
 
 Manchester, Jas. Fraser, Bishop 
 of, 194. 
 
 Duke of, 38. 
 
 Marshall, Rev. Geo.,39, i68. ; his 
 help in the work of the Lexicon, 
 74 ; his abridgement of, 76. 
 
 Rev. James, 89 ; on Dean 
 
 Liddell's work at Westminster, 
 94-101 ; on his literary style, 
 102 ; on his sermons to the 
 boys ; 103 ; on his History of 
 Rome, 121. 
 
 Melbourne, Lord, 32, 33, 35. 
 
 Mildert, Bishop Van, 2, 16. 
 
 Mill, Mr. John Stuart, 262. 
 
 Mowbray, Sir John R., 147, 164, 
 269. 
 
 Miiller, Professor Max, 272 ; on 
 Dean Liddell's Greek Diction- 
 ary, 72 ., 80 . ; on his influence 
 as Vice-Chancellor, 233.
 
 286 
 
 Index 
 
 Ndlaton, M., 262. 
 
 Newcastle, Duke of, 18. 
 
 Newcastle-on-Tyne, 2. 
 
 Newman, Cardinal, 33, 37, 41 ; 
 his pamphlet, Elucidations of 
 Dr. Hampderfs Theological 
 Statements, 34 ; his influence, 
 42 ; sermons, 43 ; style of his 
 preaching, 44. 
 
 W. L., 240. 
 
 Newton, Sir Charles T., 27, 30, 
 133, 140, 151. 
 
 Nicholson, John, 273. 
 
 Nuneham Park, 164. 
 
 Ogilvie, Dr., 137, 185. 
 
 Orme's Head, Great, 252. 
 
 Owen, Dean, 231. 
 
 Oxford. University Commission 
 of 1850, 125; Commissioners, 
 1 25 ; recommendations, 1 26, 127 ; 
 Commission of 1877, 145 ; es- 
 tablishment of non-collegiate 
 students, 198; University Gal- 
 leries, 208 ; collection of pic- 
 tures, 209 ; work of cataloguing, 
 210; classes, 211; lectures of 
 Mr. Ruskin, 211; appointment 
 of six additional Curators, 212; 
 University Hymnal, compila- 
 tion of, 235-7; Tests Act of 
 1871, 233. 
 
 Paget, Sir James, on the death of 
 
 Edith Liddell, 257. 
 
 Mr., afterwards Dean, 171. 
 
 Palmer, Archdeacon, 202. 
 
 Sir Roundell, 144. 
 
 Palmerston, Lord, 131, 134, 139, 
 
 140, 1 60. 
 
 Passow, F., his Lexicon, 67. 
 Pattison, Rev. Mark, 202. 
 Peel, Sir Robert, 35, 56, 63, 100, 
 
 255- 
 
 Penmorfa, 252. 
 Phipps, Colonel, 114, 115. 
 
 Powell, Rev. Baden, 125. 
 
 F. York, 206, 207. 
 
 Price, Rev. Bartholomew, 240. 
 
 Prothero, Mr., his memoir of 
 Dean Stanley, 190 n. 
 
 Prout, Rev. T. J., 168. 
 
 Pusey, Dr., 27, 33, 41, 135, 136 ., 
 185, 1 86, 235 ; on the reform 
 of the constitution of Christ 
 Church, 143 ; on a Roman con- 
 troversialist, 172 ; on the death 
 of Dean Liddell's infant son, 
 187. 
 
 Quarterly Review, extract from, 
 68 n. 
 
 Radley station, 263. 
 
 Randolph, Dr., 51. 
 
 Ravensworth, Baron, I. 
 
 Earl of, 22, 27. 
 
 Rawlinson, Rev. Geo., 210. 
 
 Redesdale, Lord, 240. 
 
 Redmarshall, 2. 
 
 Reeve, Mrs., 258. 
 
 Rich, Rev. J., 62. 
 
 Richmond, George, 274. 
 Sir William B., 253. 
 
 Rigaud, Rev. Stephen J., 89. 
 
 Ripon, 3. 
 
 Roberts, Lord, Forty-one Years 
 in India, 273. 
 
 Robinson, Alfred, 202. 
 
 Sir J. C., 212. 
 
 Rome, 85. 
 
 Rome, History of Ancient, 121. 
 
 Rost and Palm's Greek-German 
 Lexicon, 80. 
 
 Ruskin, Mr., 30 ; his opinion of 
 Dean Liddell, 30, 81 ; on the 
 Cathedral of Christ Church, 
 Oxford, 150; appointed first 
 Slade Professor of Fine Art, 
 21 1 ; his lectures, 211, 229; 
 appearance, 215 . ; letters to 
 Dean Liddell, 216-22, 222-8. 
 Russell, Dr., Headmaster of
 
 Index 
 
 287 
 
 Charterhouse, 4 ; the ' Bell and 
 
 Lancaster' system, 5. 
 Russell, Lord John, 114. 
 Ryle, Bishop, 27. 
 
 Salisbury, Bishop of, 202. 
 
 Marquess of, Chancellor of 
 
 Oxford, 232 ; letter from Dean 
 Liddell on his resignation, 266. 
 
 Sahvey, Rev. Herbert, 168 w. 
 
 Sampson, Rev. E. F., 168 ., 265. 
 
 Sandford, Rev. C. W., 1 68 n. 
 
 Saunders, Rev. Augustus Page, 
 19, 22, 60. 
 
 Schneider, Professor, 67 ; his 
 Greek-German Lexicon, 68. 
 
 Scott, Dr., Headmaster of West- 
 minster, 117. 
 
 Mr. G. Gilbert, 155, 159. 
 
 Rev. Robert, 25, 27, 84, 140, 
 
 258; his share in the work of 
 the Lexicon, 65 ; accepts the 
 college living of Duloe, 71 ; 
 his death, 78. 
 
 Scrope, Deerstalking, 24 n. 
 
 Selborne, Lord, 145. 
 
 Sewell, Rev. William, 66. 
 
 Sherbrooke, Viscount, 22. 
 
 Short, Rev. Thomas Vowler, 13. 
 
 Shotesham Rectory, 12. 
 
 Shuttleworth, Dr., 33, 34. 
 
 Smalridge, Dean, 279. 
 
 Smith, Mr.Goldwin, 124, 125, 178, 
 246 ; his lectures to the Prince 
 of Wales, 179. 
 
 Henry J. S., 202, 236. 
 
 Lady, 258. 
 
 Dean Samuel, 13, 16. 
 
 Sneyd, Rev. L., 138, 208. 
 
 Somerset, Lord Fitzroy, 30. 
 
 Lord Granville, 63. 
 
 Southchurch, 2. 
 
 Stainer, Dr., 236. 
 
 Stanley, Dean, 88, 235, 242 ; Secre- 
 tary of the Oxford University 
 Commission, 125 ; friendship 
 with Liddell, 125, 183, 189; 
 
 appointed Regius Professor of 
 Ecclesiastical History, 182 ; 
 his influence, 184 ; sermon on 
 the evils of controversy, 185 ; 
 letter on the death of Dean 
 Liddell's infant son, 186; pre- 
 face to his Collected Essays, 
 1 88; Dean of Westminster, 189; 
 marriage, 190; nominated Select 
 Preacher, 192 ; death, 259. 
 
 Staverton Vicarage, 136. 
 
 Stockton, 2, 20. 
 
 Strathmore, Earl of, I. 
 
 Studley Royal, 3. 
 
 Sunderland, 2, 20. 
 
 Tait, Archbishop, 125. 
 
 Talbot, Edw. Fitzroy, 31. 
 
 Talboys, Mr., 66. 
 
 Teesdale, Major, 178. 
 
 4 Ten Tribes,' 17 ; list of members, 
 
 17- 
 
 Tennyson, Hallam, Lord, letter 
 from Dean Liddell to, 20. 
 
 Thackeray, W. Makepeace, 8. 
 
 Thames Valley, the work of drain- 
 age, 196-8. 
 
 Thompson, Dr., Master of Trin. 
 Coll., Camb., 204. 
 
 Rev. H. L., 168 n. 
 
 Thynne, Lord John, 89. 
 
 Trench, Dean, 243. 
 
 Trill Mill stream, 165. 
 
 Twisleton, Hon. Edward, 144. 
 
 University Galleries, 208. 
 
 Vaughan, Henry Halford, 17, 20, 
 21, 27, 35 ., 37, 66, 127, 130 ; 
 Professor of Modern History, 
 123; his lectures, 123 ; resigns 
 the Professorship, 124; appear- 
 ance, 124. 
 
 Veitch, Dr., Greek Verbs, Irregu- 
 lar and Defective, 80. 
 
 Veysie, Rev. Daniel, 16. 
 
 Vigfusson, Gudbrand, 205 ; his
 
 288 
 
 Index 
 
 Icelandic Dictionary, 206 ; his 
 death, 206 ; memorandum in 
 Bishop Gudbrand's Bible, 207. 
 
 Wales, H.R. H. the Prince of, 
 placed under Dean Liddell's 
 charge at Oxford, 54, 176; 
 his matriculation, 177 ; attends 
 lectures, 179. 
 
 Wallace, Professor, 269. 
 
 Warner, Rev. W., 168 . 
 
 Watkinson, Mr., 4. 
 
 Watts, Mr., his portrait of Dean 
 Liddell, 237. 
 
 Weare, Rev. T. W., 60, 90. 
 
 Wellesley, Dr., 210. 
 
 Wellington, Duke of, 112. 
 
 Wells, Dean of, 240. 
 
 Wemyss, Earl of, 28, 131, 151; 
 on Dean Liddell, 46. 
 
 Westminster School, 60, 86 ; con- 
 dition of, 61 ; teaching staff, 
 6 1 ; reforms, 89 ; construction of 
 new rooms, 91 ; life of the boys, 
 93 ; food, 93 ; restoration of 
 the Play, 96 ; question of its 
 removal, 98, 120, 243; move- 
 
 ments checking its prosperity, 
 97-101 ; system of periodical 
 examinations, 99 ; effect of the 
 outbreak of fever, 100, 117 ; ex- 
 aminations for admission, 107; 
 moral tone, no; Latin Play, 
 113; the boat-race, 116 ; elec- 
 tions to scholarships, 241-3. 
 
 Whickham, living of, 12. 
 
 Williams, Hervey Vaughan, 96; 
 his death, 112. 
 
 Mr. Justice Vaughan, 130. 
 
 Williamson, Dr., 1 16, 1 19 ; resigns 
 the Headmastership of West- 
 minster, 60. 
 
 Wilson, Rev. J. M., 183 ; letter 
 from, 122. 
 
 Wood, Sir William Page, 144. 
 
 Woods, Dr., on Dean Liddell's 
 services as Curator of the 
 University Galleries, 208-14. 
 
 Wordsworth, Charles, 17, 27. 
 
 Wykeham House, 177. 
 
 Wytham Park, 251. 
 
 York, Archbishop of, 63, 192. 
 Younghusband, The Relief 
 Chitral^ 273. 
 
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