I
FROM THE
OXFORD MAGAZINE
Xi
ECHOES
FROM THE
OXFORD MAGAZINE
Ojforfc
HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY
ECHOES
FROM THE
OXFORD MAGAZINE
BEING
REPRINTS OF SEVEN YEARS
SECOND EDITION
: 116
LONDON : HENRY FROWDE, AMEN CORNER, E.G.
1890
STACK
ANNEX
THE Poems and Parodies which make up this
volume have been selected from a large number of
fugitive pieces which have appeared in the columns
of the OXFORD MAGAZINE since its first issue in
January i88j. The following signatures may be
interpreted :
R.L.B.. R. L. BINYON, Trinity College.
C. G. F. . C. G. FAG AN, Queen's College. '
A. G. . . A. D. GODLEY, Magdalen College.
S.T. . . H. W. GREENE, Magdalen College.
C. E. M. . C. E. MONTAGUE, Balliol College.
Q. . . . A. T. QUILLER.COUCH, Trinity College.
R. . . . R. W. RAPER, Trinity College.
Si, ... A. SIDGWICK, Corpus Christi College.
W.J. R. . JR. J. WALKER, Balliol College.
F. P. W. . F. P. WALTON, Lincoln College.
CONTENTS.
A WARNING ....
O'lri irep (f>v\\wv . . .
WlLLALOO ....
TWILIGHT .....
CARMEN GUALT. MAP
RETROSPECTION ....
HEPHAESTUS IN OXFORD .
IN A COLLEGE GARDEN
A FRAGMENT ....
ANECDOTE FOR FATHERS .
D. T. FABULA .
CALIBAN UPON RUDIMENTS
CHAUCER IN OXENFORDE .
A SONG OF DEGREES
MISERERE SUFFRAGATORIS
SOLVITUR ACRIS HIEMPS .
DOCTRINAE SEDES
T< Bd.KX6. 7, 1883
63
Orf. 26, 1887 .
K. . .
V O
65
Vlll
CONTENTS:
i
AGE
- ON POLITICAL JESTING
Jan. 23, 1889 .
A.G. .
68
DULCE EST DESIPERE
no
v THE GREAT HOME RULE MEETIN'
Jan. 1 8, 1888 .
K. . .
/ **
72
FIRE
June i, 1887 .
Q. . .
7 6
* AN OXFORD MARTYR
May i, 1889
A.G. .
80
* UNITY PUT QUARTERLY .
March 2, 1887 .
Q. . .
8 4
" To X
April 25, 1883
F. P. W.
86
THE GARDEN OF CRITICISM
Nov. 21, 1888 .
R. L. B. .
88
TITANIA
Feb. 16, 1887 .
Q. . .
9i
v CLEANSING FIRES ...
Feb. 20, 1889
Q4
Sic PEDO CONTURBAT . .
Feb. 15, 1888
:rr
Q 6
DAS KOCHMANNSLIED
Dec. 4, 1889 .
S. T. . .
y w
98
June 20 & Oct. 17,
O.
1 02
1888
5&*
- A REPLY
Oct. 24, 1888 .
X. Y. Z.
107
OUR OWN NEWDIGATE
June 20, 1888 .
K. . .
112
v DISILLUSION ....
Oct. 17, 1888 .
A.G. .
116
* THE EDITOR'S FAREWELL
March 13, 1889
K. . .
118
1 AN ARISTOTELIAN FRAGMENT .
Feb. 13, 1889 .
A.G. .
123
THUCYDIDES AT THE TRIALS
Jan. 19, 1887 .
C. E. M.
126
A BACON MS
Nov. 1 8, 1885 .
C. E. M.
131
ANOTHER BACON MS.
June 2, 1886
C.E.M.
134
"* FRAGMENTUM ....
Dec. 5, 1888 . .
A.G. .
138
THE DESTRUCTION OF DIDCOT
March 17, 1886
Q. . .
141
THE NEW DON QUIXOTE .
June 6, 1888
C. E. M.
I4.c
5* AGYMNASTICUS
Juneg&c 16, 1886
C. T. . .
*T3
151
FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE
Dec. 8, 1886 . .
K. . .
163
YE ROYALL VlSITE .
May g, 1883
MENDAX.
170
NON-PLACET SOCIETY'S DINNER
Dec. 7, 1887
n^
L'ENVOY ....
March 13, 1888
* /o
178
A WARNING.
Addressed to the Editor of the Magazine at a time when social and
educational topics were dealt with on a scale of some magnitude,
and in a style of uniform sobriety.
MR. EDITOR, surely some lightness of touch
Would be not unbecoming your famed Magazine :
Of lectures and sermons you give us too much ;
Toynbee Hall gets to pall, and I loathe Bethnal
Green.
When I get my testamur, if ever I do,
And when I 'm a B.A., if ever I am,
I intend, Sir, to edit a rival review,
Full of learning put lightly, like powder in jam.
My contributors almost o'erwhelm me, I own;
The Vice-Chancellor smiles on my gallant
attempt ;
The Proctors send stories of "men they have
known,"
And the Psychicists legends of things they have
dreamt.
r
2 A WARNING.
A gay sermonette full of banter and scoff
Comes from Chichester's Dean 1 , very racy and
tart;
Mr. Page sends a leaflet on " Pulls from the off" ;
Miss Broughton a novel, "A Head and his
Heart."
I have stories of Sandford and memories of
Merton :
I've a new comic song title, "Got him on toast";
I 've a cryptogram, making it morally certain
That what we call Gaius was written by Poste.
Mr. Raper has promised a curious note
On the lost compositions of writers unknown ;
And the Boden Professor a tale he once wrote,
"How I shot the stuffed buffalo sitting, alone!"
There are fine Jingo projects, and Socialist dreams ;
There are Whig economics supplied me in
shoals,
And the Russell Club send me some excellent
schemes
For allotments laid out in the Quad of All Souls.
1 Dean Burgon.
ff'Tut
A WARNING. 3
Then the Canning and Palmerston furnish reports
Of the speeches their members are hoping to
make :
Norham Gardens, familiar with fashion and courts,
Sends society gossip that's certain to take.
Such a concourse of talent makes rivalry vain :
Though my warning is friendly, I mean what
I 've said.
Ere we meet, Sir, as foes, let me once more
remain
Your respectful, admiring, but firm
X. Y. Z.
B 2
OIH HEP 4>TAAHN.
OCTOBER'S leaves are sere and wan ;
And Freshmen each succeeding year
Are, like the leaves, less verdant than
They were.
Time was, they paced the Broad or High
In cap and gown, with sober mien,
Their only wish to gratify
The Dean :
But now they seek the social glass,
The bonfire and the midnight feast:
And e'en describe their Tutor as
A Beast.
Once, when that Tutor strove to show
How (though it's sometimes hard to see)
There t's a difference 'twixt ov
And w
OIH REP 4>TAAliN.
They gazed with simple wonder at
The treasures of his hoarded lore,
Nor hinted that they'd "heard all that
Before."
They wore a cap hind part before,
A gown of quaint domestic cut :
They served the general public for
A butt.
On them the casual jester tried
(Nor failed) his old ancestral jokes :
They nightly placed their boots outside
Their oaks.
No youths but recently from school
Could hope to ape the senior man :
But now I state a general rule
They can :
And it's comparatively rare
For Fourth-year men, though old and gray,
To have as much of savoir faire
As they.
OIH HEP TAAIiN.
For still among the myriad throng
Who yearly tread Oxonia's stones
Monotony extends her sway,
And Smith grows liker every day
To Jones.
A. G.
WILLALOO.
BY E. A. P.
IN the sad and sodden street,
To and fro,
Flit the fever-stricken feet
Of the freshers as they meet,
Come and go,
Ever buying, buying, buying
Where the shopmen stand supplying,
Vying, vying
All they know,
While the Autumn lies a-dying,
Sad and low
As the price of summer suitings, when the winter
breezes blow,
Of the summer, summer suitings that are standing
in a row
On the way to Jericho.
See the freshers as they row
To and fro,
Up and down the Lower River for an afternoon
or so
8 WILL A LOO.
(For the deft manipulation
Of the never- resting oar,
Though it lead to approbation,
Will induce excoriation)
They are infinitely sore,
Keeping time, time, time
In a sort of Runic rhyme
Up and down the way to Iffley in an afternoon
or so :
(Which is slow).
Do they blow?
'Tis the wind and nothing more,
'Tis the wind that in Vacation has a tendency to go :
But the coach's objurgation and his tendency to
" score "
Will be sated nevermore.
See the freshers in the street,
The ilite!
Their apparel how unquestionably neat !
How delighted at a distance,
Inexpensively attired,
1 have wondered with persistence
At their butterfly existence !
How admired !
WILL A LOO.
How I envy the vermilion of the vest !
And the violet imbedded in the breast!
As it tells,
"This is best
To be sweetly overdressed,
To be swells,
To be swells, swells, swells, swells,
Swells, swells, swells,
To be simply and indisputably swells."
See the freshers one or two,
Just a few,
Now on view,
Who are sensibly and innocently new;
How they cluster, cluster, cluster
Round the rugged walls of Worcester !
Book in hand,
How they stand
In the garden ground of John's !
How they doat upon their Dons !
See in every man a Blue !
It is true
They are limited and lamentably few.
io WILLALOO.
But I spied
Yesternight upon the staircase just a pair of
boots outside
On the floor,
Just a little pair of boots upon the stairs where
I reside,
Lying there and nothing more ;
And I swore
While these dainty twins continued sentry by
the chamber door
That the hope their presence planted should be
with me evermore,
Should desert me nevermore.
Q.
TWILIGHT.
BY W-LL-M C-WP-R..
'Tis evening. See with its resorting throng
Rude Carfax teems, and waistcoats, visited
With too-familiar elbow, swell the curse
Vertiginous. The boating man returns,
His rawness growing with experience
Strange union ! and directs the optic glass
Not unresponsive to Jemima's charms
Who wheels obdurate, in his mimic chaise
Perambulant, the child. The gouty cit,
Asthmatical, with elevated cane
Pursues the unregarding tram, as one
Who, having heard a hurdy-gurdy, girds
His loins and hunts the hurdy-gurdy- man
Blaspheming. Now the clangorous bell proclaims
The Times or Chronicle, and Rauca screams
The latest horrid murder in the ear
Of nervous dons expectant of the urn
And mild domestic muffin.
12 TWILIGHT.
To the Parks
Drags the slow crocodile, consuming time
In passing given points. Here glows the lamp,
And tea-spoons clatter to the cosy hum
Of scientific circles. Here resounds
The football-field with its discordant train,
The crowd that cheers but not discriminates,
As ever into touch the ball returns
And shrieks the whistle, while the game proceeds
With fine irregularity well worth
The paltry shilling.
Draw the curtains close
While I resume the night-cap dear to all
Familiar with my illustrated works.
a
CARMEN GUALTERI MAP EX AUL.
NOV. HOSP.
OTIOSUS homo sum : cano laudes oti :
Qui laborem cupiunt procul sint remoti :
Ipse sum adversus huic ration! toti:
Pariter insaniunt ac si essent poti.
Diligens Arundinis lucidique solis,
Aciem quod ingeni acuis et polis,
Salve dium Otium, inimicum scholis
Atque rebus omnibus quae sunt magnae molis!
Nota discunt alii remigandi iura,
Qua premendus arte sit venter inter crura :
Haec est vitae ratio longe nimis dura:
Nulla nobis cutis est deterendae cura.
Habitu levissimo magna pars induto
Pellunt pilas pedibus, concidunt in luto :
Hos, si potest fieri, stultiores puto
Atque tantum similes animali bruto.
i 4 CARMEN GUALTERI MAP.
Alius contrariis usus disciplinis
Procul rivo vivit et Torpidorum vinis :
Nullus unquam ponitur huic legendi finis :
Vescitur radicibus Graecis et Latinis:
Mihi cum ut subeam Moderationes
Tutor suadet anxius " Frustra " inquam " mones :
Per me licet ignibus universas dones
Aeschyli palmarias emendationes ! "
Ego insanissimos reor insanorum
Mane tempus esse qui dictitent laborum:
Otium est optimum omnium bonorum :
Ante diem medium non relinquo torum.
Ergo iam donabimus hoc praeceptum gratis
Vobis membris omnibus Universitatis,
Dominis Doctoribus, Undergraduatis
PROFESSORES CVRA SIT OMNES VT FIATIS.
A. G.
RETROSPECTION.
AFTER C. S. C.
WHEN the hunter-star Orion,
(Or, it may be, Charles his Wain),
Tempts the tiny elves to try on
All their little tricks again ;
When the earth is calmly breathing
Draughts of slumber undefiled,
And the sire, unused to teething,
Seeks for errant pins his child;
When the moon is on the ocean,
And our little sons and heirs
From a natural emotion
Wish the luminary theirs;
Then a feeling hard to stifle,
Even harder to define,
Makes me feel I 'd give a trifle
For the days of Auld Lang Syne,
16 RETROSPECTION.
James for we have been as brothers,
(Are, to speak correctly, twins),
Went about in one another's
Clothing, bore each other's sins,
Rose together, ere the pearly
Tint of morn had left the heaven,
And retired (absurdly early)
Simultaneously at seven
James, the days of yore were pleasant,
Sweet to climb for alien pears
Till the irritated- peasant
Came upon us unawares ;
Sweet to devastate his chickens,
As the well-aimed catapult
Scattered, and the very dickens
Was the natural result ;
Sweet to snare the thoughtless rabbit;
Break the next-door neighbour's pane ;
Cultivate the smoker's habit
On the not-innocuous cane;
Leave the exercise unwritten ;
Systematically cut
Morning school, to plunge the kitten
In his tomb, the water-butt.
RETROSPECTION. 17
Age, my James, that from the cheek of
Beauty steals its rosy hue,
Has not left us much to speak of:
But 'tis not for this I rue.
Beauty with its thousand graces,
Hair and tints that will not fade,
You may get from many places
Practically ready-made.
No ; it is the evanescence
Of those lovelier tints of Hope
Bubbles, such as adolescence
Joys to win from melted soap
Emphasizing the conclusion
That the dreams of Youth remain
Castles that are An delusion
(Castles, that's to say, in Spain).
Age thinks "fit," and I say "fiat."
Here I stand for Fortune's butt,
As for Sunday swains to shy at
Stands the stoic coco-nut.
If you wish it put succinctly,
Gone are all our little games ;
But I thought I 'd say distinctly
What I feel about it ; James.
Q.
HEPHAESTUS IN OXFORD.
'Ei> 8' eriflei TTOTCI/AOIO fiirjv K\VTOS dp;(piyv?]ety
fvda 8vo> vrjas Kovpoi epi8a Trpocpepoyres
o)Ka irporipe(roi, pivoi 8* {mfvcpOev
Xaoi 8' 0)9 ore KUjua iro\vres KTrjcnv /ueyaA' t]\i9a 7roX\rjv
jxcix//-, ardp ou Kara Kocr/ixoy' eiretra 8e r' ev6opov avroi.
TOVS 8' apa i/io-o-op-evous aTr' a^vfjiovos op-^rjO^olo
n-pw/crcop beyp.fvos ^OTO, TreAa>p d^e/xtoria eZSwy,
oAU
HEPHAESTUS IN OXFORD. 19
trap 68(3 ev crKOTnfj, o6t irep zncro-ecrflcu
[OVK olos' ap.a rw ye /ewes TroSas apyoi
^i? 6 /xev ecrKOTTta^', ot 8' *]\v6ov a(f)pabir](nv'
877 roY eimr 1 eTro'poucre, yeros 8' epeeiz>ez> e
8' avr' fTreOrix' ot 8' OVK e^e'Aovres
8' aAAocr' e^euyoi' ai>a rp?j)(etcti'
A. G.
C 2
IN A COLLEGE GARDEN.
Senex. Saye, cushat, callynge from the brake,
What ayles thee soe to pyne?
Thy carefulle heart shall cease to ake
Ere spring incarnadyne
The buddynge eglantyne :
Saye, cushat, what thy griefe to myne ?
Turtur. Naye, gossip, loyterynge soe late,
What ayles thee thus to chyde?
My love is fled by garden-gate ;
Since Lammas-tyde
I wayte my bryde.
Saye, gossyp, whom dost thou abyde?
Senex. Loe ! I am he, the " Lonelie Manne,"
Of Time forgotten quite,
That no remembered face may scanne
Sadde eremyte,
I wayte tonyghte
Pale Death, nor any other wyghte.
IN A COLLEGE GARDEN. 21
O cushat, cushat, callynge lowe,
Goe waken Time from sleepe :
Goe whysper in his ear, that soe
His besom sweepe
Me to that heape
Where all my recollections keepe.
Hath he forgott ? Or did I viewe
A ghostlie companye
This even, by the dismalle yewe,
Of faces three
That beckoned mee
To land where no repynynges bee?
O Harrye, Harrye, Tom and Dicke,
Each lost companion !
Why loyter I among the quicke,
When ye are gonne?
Shalle I alone
Delayinge crye "Anon, Anon"?
Naye, let the spyder have my gowne,
To brayde therein her veste.
My cappe shal serve, now I "goe downe,"
For mouse's neste.
Loe ! this is best.
I care not, soe I gayne my reste.
?&"
A FRAGMENT.
With apologies to AESCHYLUS and Miss EDGEWORTH.
'ATra^er' ovv es KT/TJW, &)S
pa^rfs, fj.rih.ivov
^r 8' e7n?A.0ev apKTos, f
V\lsa(r' es r6 Kovpelov /3oa'
T^ ytJp ; Kovias ap' e^et o-' ayyvla ;
6 8' ovv aTrwXe^'* ^ 8' aTrpocrKOTros Ka/cou
8' es fcrriatnv ol r?7 Aew?,
aAAoi Trap' aAAcoi' v TTOTOV,
piyGxn OaXiros, KavfJ-arav iiapa-tyvyri,
ri 6ivov(ri.v eoriWts evreArjy
^ Too-ov(r8' al&vas avOpu>TTTov
r?js aKpas
rua-', ei^' fAKOfiefos ctr' ap' ow
TGi BAKXOi. 45
ofros avtirveva-' , kv TrcTpai
TTjy crrjv avrj\l/a, Opiynbv Tjboi'fjs, Tivpav.
WKT&V, etr'
Se'Arot? a.vr\v\)TQicnv ', as Kplvtiv p. 8et,
piXrov 6' ve\KLV y
KaTia^iovvra (rrj^aTcav 11X1)60$ ve
fir oivv (TO(j)ol(TL rots TrdXai ^apvvop.ai.,
QovKvbioov TiXoKCucrt,, So^o/cAeous T\VTJ,
&vois Xoyoicri. rols EvpLiribov,
ITAaTcoviKaTo-i, Hivbdpov 8oA),
\af3Aea), Tiobas f\(av irpbs eortdy,
Kat Tray /3poreioy e^aTraAAd^a) KaKo'v.
2.
/ LAYE A-DREAMYNGE.
AFTER T. I.
As I laye a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge,
O softlye moaned y 6 dove to her mate within y 6 tree,
And meseemed unto my syghte
Came rydynge many a knyghte
All cased in armoure bryghte
Cap-a-pie,
As I laye a-dreamynge, a goodlye companye !
As I laye a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge,
O sadlye mourned y 6 dove, callynge long and call-
ynge lowe,
And meseemed of alle that hoste
Notte a face but was y 6 ghoste
Of a friend that I hadde loste
Long agoe.
As I laye a-dreamynge, oh, bysson teare to flowe !
As I laye a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge,
O sadlye sobbed y e dove as she seemed to dyspayre,
48 AS I LAYE A-DREAMYNGE.
And laste upon y 6 tracke
Came one I hayled as "Jacke!"
But he turned mee his backe
With a stare :
As I laye a-dreamynge, he lefte mee callynge there.
Stille I laye a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge, a-dream-
ynge,
And gentler sobbed y 6 dove as it eased her of her
payne,
And meseemed a voyce y* cry'd
" They shall ryde, and they shall ryde
'Tyll y e truce of tyme and tyde
Come agayne !
Alle for Eldorado, yette never maye attayne ! "
Stille I laye a-dreamynge, a-dreamynge, a-dream-
ynge,
And scarcelye moaned y 6 dove, as her agonye was
spente :
"Shalle to-morrowe see them nygher
To a golden walle or spyre ?
You have better in y r fyre,
Bee contente."
As I laye a dreamynge, it seem'd smalle punyshment.
AS I LAYE A-DREAMYNGE. 49
But I laye a-wakynge, and loe ! y e dawne was break-
ynge
And rarelye pyped a larke for y e promyse of y e daye :
" Uppe and sette y r lance in reste !
Uppe and followe on y e queste !
Leave y 6 issue to bee guessed
At y e endynge of y 6 waye "
As I laye a-wakynge, 'twas soe she seemed to say
" Whatte and if it alle bee feynynge ?
There be better thynges than gaynynge,
Better pryzes than attaynynge."
And 'twas truthe she seemed to saye.
Whyles the dawne was breakynge, I rode upon my
waye.
Q.
ODE TO THE TEMPORARY BRIDGE
AT OSNEY.
Osney Bridge fell into the river and was left there by the caution of the
civic authorities for about three years : its place being taken by an
elegant but insecure wooden structure. This is a standing refutation
of those who allege that Oxford is too prone " stare super antiquas
vias."
PROUD monument of British enterprise !
Stately highway of Commerce ! thou art old :
Since with enraptured gaze we saw thee rise
Three winters o'er thy perilous planks have
rolled,
Each with its load of carriages and carts :
Freshmen, who saw thy birth, are Bachelors of
Arts.
Majestic arch, that spans the Isis' flow,
Fraught with the memory of our lives imperilled,
We could not hope to keep thee thou must go.
Yet shall no bard in Chronicle or Herald,
No civic Muse, deplore thee ? none of all
Who paid augmented rates to rear thee, mourn
thy fall?
OSNE Y TEMPORAL Y BRIDGE. 5 1
Thou art of schemes municipal the symbol,
As crazy, and as tortuous. Fare thee well!
Not long o'er thee shall Undergraduate nimble
Evade the Proctor and his bulldogs fell :
Business and Pleasure to their old forgotten
Path will return again, and leave thy timbers
rotten.
Perchance some Alderman, or Member of
The Local Board, his shallop softly mooring,
Beside thy site contemplative will rove
And weep awhile thy glories unenduring:
And unimpeded by thy barring wood
Dead cats and dogs shall float adown the central
flood.
A. G.
E 2
KENMARE RIVER.
'Tis pretty to be in Ballinderry,
'Tis pretty to be in Ballindoon,
But 'tis prettier far in County Kerry
Coortin' under the bran' new moon.
Aroon, Aroon!
'Twas there by the bosom of blue Killarney
They came by the hundther' a-coortin' me;
Sure I was the one to give back their blarney,
And ivery man in the I. R. B.
But niver a stip in the lot was lighter
An' diwle a boulder among the bhoys,
Than Phelim O'Shea, me dynamither,
Me illigant arthist in clock-work toys.
'Twas all for love he would bring his figgers
Of iminent statesmen, in toy machines,
An' hould me hand as he pulled the thriggers
An' blew the thraytors to smithereens.
KENMARE RIVER. 53
An' to see the Queen in her Crystial Pallus
Fly up to the roof, an' the windeys broke!
And all with diwle a thrace of malus,
But he was the bhoy that enjoyed his joke !
Then oh ! but his cheek would flush, an'
"Bridget"
(He 'd say) "will yez love me ? " But I 'd be coy,
And answer him, " Arrah, now dear, don't fidget ! "
Though at heart I loved him, me arthist bhoy !
One night we stood by the Kenmare river,
An' "Bridget, creina, now whist," said he,
"I'll be goin' to-night an' maybe for iver,
Open your arms at the last to me."
An' there by the banks of the Kenmare river,
He tuk in his hands me white, white face,
An' we kissed our first an' our last for iver
For Phelim O'Shea is disparsed in space.
'Twas pretty to be by blue Killarney,
'Twas pretty to hear the linnet's call,
But whist ! for I cannot attind their blarney
Nor whistle in answer at all, at all.
54 KENMARE RIVER.
For the voice that he swore 'ud out-call the linnet's
Is cracked intoirely, an' out of chune,
Since the clock-work missed it by thirteen minutes
An' scatthered me Phelim around the moon.
Aroon, Aroon !
Q.
TO MY PAPERKNIFE,
THOU art old, my Paperknife, old and dented !
Yet hast served me well, since in Eighteen-sev'nty
I first saw thee, left in the railway-carriage,
Left by a maiden,
Who, beside her mother demurely seated,
Glanced in turn at Telegraph, Times and Standard,
Or, above the Telegraph, Times or Standard,
Let a look wander
Shyly forth 'neath eyelashes long and raven.
She, the unknown, alighted, but thee she left there,
Paperknife ! Since then thou hast cut the leaves of
Homer and Virgil,
Lycophron, Sidonius Apollinaris,
Rhodian Apollonius, Egyptian Hermes,
Hegel and the twain Metamorphosistae,
Darwin and Ovid.
W. J. R.
THE INNINGS.
DEDICATED TO WALT WHITMAN.
I.
To take your stand at the wicket in a posture of
haughty defiance :
To confront a superior bowler as he confronts
you:
To feel the glow of ambition, your own and that
of your side :
To be aware of shapes hovering, bending, watching
around white-flannelled shapes all eager, un-
able to catch you.
2.
The unusually fine weather,
The splendid silent sun flooding all, bathing all in
joyous evaporation.
Far off a gray-brown thrush warbling in hedge or
in marsh ;
Down there in the blossoming bushes, my brother
what is it that you are saying?
THE INNINGS. 57
3-
To play more steadily than a pendulum ; neither
hurrying nor delaying, but marking the right
moment to strike.
To slog :
5-
The utter oblivion of all but the individual energy :
The rapid co-operation of hand and eye projected
into the ball ;
The ball triumphantly flying through air, you too
flying.
The perfect feel of a fourer !
The hurrying to and fro between the wickets :
the marvellous quickness of all the fields :
The cut, leg hit, forward drive, all admirable in
their way ;
The pull transcending all pulls, over the boundary
ropes, sweeping, orotund, astral:
The superciliousness of standing still in your ground,
content, and masterful, conscious of an unques-
tioned six ;
The continuous pavilion-thunder bellowing after
each true lightning stroke;
58 THE INNINGS.
(And yet a mournful note, the low dental murmur
of one who blesses not, I fancied I heard
through the roar
In a lull of the deafening plaudits ;
Could it have been the bowler? or one of the
fields ?)
6.
Sing on, gray-brown bird, sing on ! now I under-
stand you !
Pour forth your rapturous chants from flowering
hedge in the marsh,
I follow, I keep time, though rather out of breath.
7-
The high perpendicular puzzling hit : the consequent
collision and miss : the faint praise of " well
tried."
The hidden delight of some and the loud dis-
appointment of others.
8.
But, O bird of the bursting throat, my dusky demon
and brother,
Why have you paused in your carol so fierce from
the flowering thorn ?
THE INNINGS. 59
Has your music fulfilled the she-bird ? (it cannot
have lulled her to sleep :)
Or see you a cloud on the face of the day unusually
fine?
9-
To have a secret misgiving:
To feel the sharp sudden rattle of the stumps from
behind, electric, incredible :
To hear the short convulsive clap, announcing all
is over.
10.
The return to the pavilion, sad, and slow at first :
gently breaking into a run amid a tumult of
applause ;
The doffing of the cap (without servility) in be-
coming acknowledgment ;
The joy of what has been and the sorrow for what
might have been mingling madly for the moment
in cider-cup.
The ultimate alteration of the telegraph.
ii.
The game is over ; yet for me never over :
For me it remains a memory and meaning wondrous
mystical.
60 THE INNINGS.
Bat-stroke and bird-voice (tally of my soul) " slog,
slog, slog."
The jubilant cry from the flowering thorn to the
flowerless willow, "smite, smite, smite."
(Flowerless willow no more but every run a late-
shed perfect bloom.)
The fierce chant of my demon brother issuing forth
against the demon bowler, "hit him, hit him,
hit him."
The thousand melodious cracks, delicious cracks,
the responsive echoes of my comrades and
the hundred thence-resulting runs, passionately
yearned for, never, never again to be for-
gotten.
Overhead meanwhile the splendid silent sun,
blending all, fusing all, bathing all in floods of
soft ecstatic perspiration.
R.
"BEHOLD! I AM NOT ONE THAT GOES
TO LECTURES."
BY W. W.
BEHOLD ! I am not one that goes to Lectures or the
pow-wow of Professors.
The elementary laws never apologise : neither do
I apologise.
I find letters from the Dean dropt on my table
and every one is signed by the Dean's
name
And I leave them where they are ; for I know
that as long as I stay up
Others will punctually come for ever and ever.
I am one who goes to the river,
I sit in the boat and think of "life" and of
"time."
How life is much, but time is more; and the
beginning is everything,
But the end is something.
I loll in the Parks, I go to the wicket, I swipe.
I see twenty-two young men from Foster's watching
me, and the trousers of the twenty-two
young men.
I see the Balliol men en masse watching me. The
Hottentot that loves his mother, the untu-
62 LECTURES.
tored Bedowee, the Cave-man that wears
only his certificate of baptism, and the Pata-
gonian that hangs his testamur with his
scalps.
I see the Don who ploughed me in Rudiments
watching me : and the wife of the Don
who ploughed me in Rudiments watching
me.
I see the rapport of the wicket-keeper and umpire.
I cannot see that I am out.
Oh ! you Umpires !
I am not one who greatly cares for experience,
soap, bull-dogs, cautions, majorities or a
graduated Income-tax,
The certainty of space, punctuation, sexes, institu-
tions, copiousness, degrees, committees,
delicatesse, or the fetters of rhyme
For none of these do I care : but least for the
fetters of rhyme.
Myself only I sing. Me Imperturbe! Me
Prononce" !
Me progressive and the depth of me pro-
gressive,
And the pdQos, Anglice bathos
Of me chanting to the Public the song of Simple
Enumeration. Q
BALLADE OF ANDREW LANG.
Answer, inform of Ballade, to a Freshman. of Merton College.
You ask me, Fresher, who it is
Who rhymes, researches, and reviews,
Who sometimes writes like Genesis,
And sometimes for the Daily News :
Who jests in words that angels use,
And is most solemn with most slang:
Who's who who's which and which is whose?
Who can it be but Andrew Lang?
Quips, Quirks are his, and Quiddities,
The epic and the teacup Muse,
Bookbindings, Aborigines,
Ballades that banish all the Blues,
Young Married Life among Yahoos,
An Iliad, an Orang-outang,
Triolets, Totems, and Tattoos
Who can it be but Andrew Lang?
64 BALLADE OF ANDREW LANG.
Ah Ballade makers ! tell me this,
When did the hardest rhymes refuse
The guile that filled that book of his
With multiplying Xs and Us?
You see me shuffle in his shoes,
You hear me stammer where he sang,
Who cannot charm you as I choose,
Who cannot be an Andrew Lang.
ENVOY.
Fresher! he dwelt with Torpid Crews,
And once, like you, he knew the pang
Of Mods, of Greats, of Weekly Dues,
And yet he is an Andrew Lang!
BALLAD OF THE UNIVERSITY JUBILEE
ADDRESS, June, 1887.
To commemorate the story
Of fifty years of glory,
Which our nation in happiness had spent
A Deputation splendid,
And not to be transcended,
Was decreed at Convocation to be sent to be sent.
There were Proctors in their ermine
(Which is torn from ribs of vermin),
And the purple pride of Provosts and of Pres.
To advance in order flocking
(Pumps and tights and white silk stocking),
And present congratulation on their knees on their
knees.
So with innocent elation
They got out at Windsor station,
Shyly crowded round their Chancellor like sheep;
Then gayer than a marriage,
Were all packed into a carriage,
On the top of one another in a heap in a heap.
66 BALLAD OF THE UNIVERSITY
They were landed at the Palace,
Like the passengers from Calais,
On the steam-ships of Sir Edward Watkin, Bart. ;
Then set down to recreation
At a sumptuous collation,
Till the Chamberlain said "Now's the time to start
time to start."
Then the Deputation found Her,
And the Life Guards all around Her,
With their brandished swords and uniforms of red ;
And Her Majesty all gracious,
Likewise looking most sagacious,
With her sceptre and the crown upon her head
on her head.
Now the Chamberlain says " Steady ! "
And all settle themselves ready,
With a look of joy and loyalty combined
Save a Head who blushed and sidled,
For his armourer had idled,
So he'd had to leave his toasting-fork behind fork
behind.
And the Orator delivered
His Address, although he shivered,
JUBILEE ADDRESS. 67
(Being bolder at Encaenia than at Court);
But Her Majesty just smiling,
Said at once without beguiling,
"Very sorry I'm obliged to cut it short cut it
short."
Then the Deputation tacking,
To the door continued backing,
Whilst the Chamberlain assisted in the rear;
Till the evanescent glimmer
Of the Presence growing dimmer,
Slowly faded never more to reappear reappear.
K.
F 2
?V Of /~ >n tH-vx^ {>-/>
07V POLITICAL JESTING.
MR. REID : " I have not much to say upon this matter. My learned
friend presents it to your lordships as a piece of academic banter"
O YES, I was there when he said it,
In his own unapproachable style :
And I hope that my statement you'll credit
I do not remember a smile.
The papers I read the day after,
Reporting the words that he spoke,
Had inserted assuredly "Laughter,"
If he 'd meant the remark as a joke.
Was it all "in a spirit of banter,"
Not meant as a serious attack,
When he said that a Parnellite ranter
Was something like Whitechapel "Jack"?
When he hinted that Healy and Dillon,
And similar pestilent folk,
Resembled a commonplace villain,
Was he only intending a joke?
ON POLITICAL JESTING. 69
We thought his rhetorical vigour,
His arguments' fervour and weight,
Recalled the majestical figure
Of Cicero saving the State ;
But the State must find others to save it,
New champions the Cause must invoke;
For the speaker has made affidavit
That he only intended a joke.
Was it thus (we would ask him) that Tully,
By Antonius or Catiline pressed,
Would have deigned his consistence to sully,
Explaining he said it in jest?
Alas ! for our phrases sonorous
Are merely frivolity's cloak
And Demosthenes' self would assure us
That he meant the Philippics in joke !
A. G.
DULCE EST DESIPERE IN LOCO.
ITE, vos Oxonienses,
Et praesertim Mertonenses,
Bellicos stringatis enses !
Gustos, Doctor, Magistratus,
Stat catenis oneratus,
In judicium sublatus.
"Vultu vir spectande tristi,
Ecquid culpae admisisti,
Aut injuriam fecisti ?
" Nonne contra bonos mores
Tot Hibernos senatores
Nuncupasti percussores ?
"An triumvirorum mentes
Sic exasperare tentes
Contra reos innocentes ?
"Nisi culpa te purgabis,
Atque crimen expiabis,
Luculentam poenam dabis."
DULCE EST DESIPERE IN LOCO. 71
Saevis indejectus fatis
Notae vir urbanitatis
Dat responsum delegatis.
"Olim contionabundus,
Totus teres et rotundus,
Fio pueris jucundus.
" Illis operam impendo
Exemplaribus monendo,
Vel jocis alliciendo.
" Tester, judices severi,
Verbis ioca immisceri
Tantum licet confiteri.
" Sed subtilitas jocorum
Nunquam penetrat Scotorum
Cerebrum causidicorum."
Quaesitores colloquuntur
Omnes curae diluuntur,
Risu tabulae solvuntur.
THE GREAT HOME RULE MEETIN'.
Dec. 1888.
O TIM, have ye heard of thim Saxons
And their iligant meetin' last year,
Which they held to demolish the tyrint,
Mr. Sidgwick himsilf in the cheer?
Och ! the desolate counthry of Erin
Shall smoile with a tear in each oy,
Now Professors have mounted the shamrock,
And humbled the brutal Viceroy,
Dear boy,
I am thrimbling with proide and with joy.
'Twas own uncle he was to the tyrint
That bathes in the gore of our hearts,
But the oylids of Oireland shall quiver
With the sunshine of Liberty's darts :
For he opened the beautiful meetin',
And expressed his Gladstonian regret
That our frind Thorold Rogers was absint,
Southwark's Radical champion and pet;
You bet,
Ivry cheek with our cryin' was wet.
THE GREAT HOME RULE MEETING 73
And the great Universithy Masther
(Was it Jowett or Broight that I mane?)
Couldn't follow the soigh of his bosom,
And pronounce for the Plan of Campaign.
For the base Saxon Government blagyards,
Of thrue feelin' they haven't a dthrop,
If he'd come with his badles and pokers,
Bedad, they would shut up the shop,
And lop,
Or intoirely his salary stop.
Misther Freeman, ould Liberty's backbone,
Said that none could call names like the boys,
'Twas the Oirish so nate were at toitles,
And the rale indepindence and noise;
And 'twas he was the man to detarmine,
And, faith, nivir fear but he would,
For each conthradictorin' scoundthrill
He'd thrate as he thrated that rude
Jim Froude;
If he got, he could give back as good.
1 A stanza is here advisedly omitted.
74 THE GREAT HOME RULE MEETIN'.
Thin came Murray, John's College, the darlint!
An Austhralian from over the say.
May the Saints shower blissins upon him,
And help him to get his degray!
May St. Pathrick put tips in his papers
And cajole the Examiners tu !
May he grant him the fame of Mahaffy,
And a leedy with ois of the blue,
His due,
And to doy with the wealth of a Jew !
May the name of that jewel M c Grigor
Bring the blush to the forehead of slaves !
And may Heaven free Oireland for ivir
From Saxons and Scotchmen and thaves !
Till the kings of our counthry returning
Shall the Emerald island increase
With pataties and whiskey and splindor,
Now she's got on her side Misther Rhys;
A pleece
In her heart he shall have without cease.
And the great Docthor Murray desarted
His Scripthum the Land League to cheer,
Whose diction'ry like our own rints was
Six pay-days or more in arrear:
THE GREAT HOME RULE MEETING 75
And the Austrians, Rooshians, and Saxons,
How he thrampled them into the dust,
And the tyrints all over the wide wurrld
Who said if men promised, they must :
Disgust
Filled his soul till he couldn't but bust.
Then the editor well-known of Johnson
(A divil who hated the Whigs),
And shure but I am Misther Parnill
Denounced them himself, the mane pigs!
Och ! the darlint American Fanians,
Across the Atlantical wave,
Will lift up their hands and their voices,
Now that Oxford has larnt to be brave
God save
The thrue boys that know how to behave !
LARRY O'TooLE.
K.
FIRE!
BY SIR W. S.
Written on the occasion of the vt'sit of the United Fire Brigades to
Oxford, May 1887.
I.
ST. GILES'S street is fair and wide,
St. Giles's street is long;
But long or wide, may nought abide
Therein of guile or wrong ;
For through St. Giles's, to and fro,
The mild ecclesiastics go
From prime to evensong.
It were a fearsome task, perdie !
To sin in such good company.
n.
Long had the slanting beam of day
Proclaimed the Thirtieth of May
Ere now, erect, its fiery heat
Illumined all that hallowed street,
And breathing benediction on
Thy serried battlements, St. John,
FIRE! 77
Suffused at once with equal glow
The cluster'd Archipelago,
The Art Professor's studio
And Mr. Greenwood's shop ;
Thy building, Pusey, where below
The stout Salvation soldiers blow
The cornet till they drop ;
Thine, Balliol, where we move, and oh !
Thine, Randolph, where we stop.
in.
But what is this that frights the air,
And wakes the curate from his lair
In Pusey's cool retreat,
To leave the feast, to climb the stair,
And scan the startled street?
As when perambulate the young
And call with unrelenting tongue
On home, mamma and sire ;
Or voters shout with strength of lung
For Hall & Go's Entire ;
Or sabbath-breakers scream and shout
The band of Booth, with drum devout,
Eliza on her Sunday out,
Or Farmer with his choir:
78 FIRE!
IV.
E'en so, with shriek of fife and drum
And horrid clang of brass,
The Fire Brigades of England come
And down St. Giles's pass.
Oh grand, methinks, in such array
To spend a Whitsun Holiday
All soaking to the skin !
(Yet shoes and hose alike are stout ;
The shoes to keep the water out,
The hose to keep it in.)
v.
They came from Henley on the Thames,
From Berwick on the Tweed,
And at the mercy of the flames
They left their children and their dames,
To come and play their little games
On Morrell's dewy mead.
Yet feared they not with fire to play
The pyrotechnics (so they say)
Were very fine indeed.
FIRE ! 79
VI.
(PS. BY L D M Y.)
Then let us bless Our Gracious Queen and eke
the Fire Brigade,
And bless no less the horrid mess they've been and
gone and made;
Remove the dirt they chose to squirt upon our best
attire,
Bless all, but most the lucky chance that no one
shouted "Fire!"
Q
fa-
AN OXFORD MARTYR:
An incident of the Donegal Campaign of April, 1889.
IT was two gallant Balliol men, that went across
the sea;
It also was that statesman bold, O'C-nybeare, M.P. :
With grief and indignation the enormities they saw
Of the base and brutal Balfour, and the myrmidons
of Law.
As they marked the destitution of the tenants of
Gweedore,
Their political philanthropy inflamed them more
and more:
And they felt an inward prompting to provide them
bread and tea,
Did H-rrison, and B-nson, and O'C-nybeare, M.P.
"When tyrants put O'Brien in gaol, we smuggled
meat and beer in,
And vindicated partially the liberties of Erin :
AN OXFORD MARTYR. 81
Although we cannot raise the siege, at least we'll
feed the garrison."
(Thus spake the bold O'C-nybeare to B-nson and
to H-rrison.)
" In England public feeling is for payment of a debt,
But England is behind the times in certain things
as yet :
And the man 's a mere oppressor, as I 've said in
Parliament,
Who would ask an Irish tenant for a portion of
his rent.
" Then we '11 feed these bold insolvents, as we fed
O'Brien before,
And do in fair Falcarragh what we did at Tullamore !
The Secretary's myrmidons no terrors have for me :
For the Game of Law and Order's up," said
C-nybeare, M.P.
They have purchased bread and butter, and also
tea galore
But windows had those tenants none, and dared
not ope the door:
G
82 AN OXFORD MARTYR.
O then, my valiant H-rrison ! none other 'twas
than you
That took the victuals to the roof and passed them
down the flue !
But 'twere better he 'd been studying the history
of Greece
Than evading the detection of a cordon of police :
It is safer reading "Contracts" on Isis' peaceful
shore,
Than assisting their infringement by the tenants
of Gweedore.
For the tyrant sent his minions with instructions
for to catch
That gallant young philanthropist, descending from
the thatch,
And posterity will shudder as it listens to the tale,
How a Balliol undergraduate was lodged in Derry
gaol.
There is woe in Fisher's Buildings, and the Front
Quad's wrapped in gloom,
And the bones of Dervorguilla are uneasy in the
tomb:
.
AN OXFORD MARTYR. 83
While the Pr-sident of Tr-nity can't understand
at all
Why he does not hear the organ and the banjo
in the Hall.
Alas, heroic H-rrison ! ochone and wirrasthrue !
Yet what you did for others, sure some will do
for you :
And whiskey down the chimney of your cell, we '11
hope, they'll pour,
To reward you for your services to freedom and
Gweedore !
A. G.
G 2
UNITY PUT QUARTERLY 1 .
BY A. C. S.
THE Centuries kiss and commingle,
Cling, clasp and are knit in a chain ;
No cycle but scorns to be single,
No two but demur to be twain,
'Till the land of the lute and the love-tale
Be bride of the boreal breast,
And the dawn with the darkness shall dovetail,
The East with the West.
The desire of the grey for the dun nights
Is that of the dun for the grey ;
The tales of the Thousand and One Nights
Touch lips with "The Times" of to-day.
Come, chasten the cheap with the classic;
Choose, Churton, thy chair and thy class,
Mix, melt in the must that is Massic
The beer that is Bass!
1 Suggested by an Article in the Quarterly Review enforcing the
unity of literature ancient and modern, and the necessity of providing
a new School of Literature in Oxford.
UNITY PUT QUARTERLY. 85
Omnipotent age of the Aorist !
Infinity freely exact,
As the fragrance of fiction is fairest
If frayed in the furnace of fact
Though nine be the Muses in number
There is hope if the handbook be one,
Dispelling the planets that cumber
The path of the sun.
Though crimson thy hands and thy hood be
With the blood of a brother betrayed,
O Would-be- Professor of Would-be,
We call thee to bless and to aid.
Transmuted would travel with Er, see
The Land of the Rolling of Logs,
Charmed, chained to thy side, as to Circe
The Ithacan hogs.
O bourne of the black and the godly !
O land where the good niggers go,
With the books that are borrowed of Bodley,
Old moons and our castaway clo' !
There, there, till the roses be ripened
Rebuke us, revile, and review,
Then take thee thine annual stipend
So long over-due.
Q-
TO X.
I WILL not mention, Love, thy name,
Because I do not know it;
Nor could I hand it down to fame,
Not being, Love, a poet.
I yearn, I languish more or less,
Fritter away my life,
And yet I can't so much as guess
Thy name, my future wife.
Sometimes I think I '11 take to verse,
Professional ambition
Impels a lover to rehearse
The woes of his condition ;
But to depict an abstract love
I fear is barely possible,
Since Bishop Berkeley seems to prove
She's by no means cognoscible.
And soon as e'er I ask the Muse
To help me to my aim,
She says her rule is to refuse
Without the Lady's name.
TO X. 87
Publish or not, it's all the same,
What makes her so decide is
The giving of the fair one's name
Is proof of bona fides.
Perhaps, Love, 'tis the same with you;
You wonder oft and sigh
"Ah who is he will come to woo?"
Be happy, Love, 'tis I.
Though Algebra I fairly hate
And problems are vexations,
Let's try, Love, to express our state
And solve it by equations.
Let x denote my future wife ;
Years 25 I've run ;
If y be I, then when, my Life,
Will x + y be i ?
A plague on problems for a cheat,
Such tasks were not for me meant,
Let's rather try, Love, when we meet,
The Method of Agreement.
F. P. W.
THE GARDEN OF CRITICISM.
With humble apologies to " The Garden of Proserpine."
BLUNT beyond brute or Briton,
Crowned with calm quills she stands,
Who gathers all things written
With cold unwriting hands.
Her pampered praise is sweeter
Than friends' who fear to greet her,
To poetlings that meet her
From many schools and lands.
She waits for each and other,
She will not heed their prayer
That she was such another
As those before her chair;
Dazed with dim dreams of dollars,
Masters and slaves and scholars,
With dank and dubious collars,
And sad superfluous hair.
THE GARDEN OF CRITICISM. 89
To each she giveth sentence,
To some, perchance, rewards;
Or rules to ripe repentance
With snows of stern regards.
Before her Fame sinks shaken
Pale poets tempest-taken,
Sweet Shakespeare broiled to Bacon,
Red strays of ruined bards.
She is not sure of gleaning
By threat or call or curse
The curious crumbs of meaning
That rugged rhymes may nurse.
Sighing that song should canker,
Her heart begins to hanker
For pages even blanker
Than blank Byronic verse.
From too much love of Browning,
From Tennyson she rose,
And sense in music drowning,
In sound she seeks repose.
Yet joys sometimes to know it,
And is not slow to show it,
That even the heavenliest poet
Sinks somewhere safe to prose.
90 THE GARDEN OF CRITICISM.
Then rhyme shall rule o'er reason,
And Swinburne over Time,
And panting poets seize on
Each continent and clime ;
Aching alliteration,
Infantine indignation,
Eternal iteration
Wrapt in eternal rhyme.
R. L. B.
TITANIA.
BY LORD T N.
So bluff Sir Leolin gave the bride away.
And when they married her, the little church
Had seldom seen a costlier ritual.
The coach and pair alone were two-pound-ten,
And two-pound-ten apiece the wedding-cakes ;
Three wedding-cakes. A Cupid poised a-top
Of each hung shivering to the frosted loves
Of two fond cushats on a field of ice,
As who should say "/see you." Such the joy
When English-hearted Edwin swore his faith
With Mariana of the Moated Grange.
For Edwin, plump head-waiter at The Cock,
Grown sick of custom, spoilt of plenitude,
Lacking the finer wit that saith, " I wait,
They come ; and if I make them wait, they go,"
Fell in a jaundiced humour petulant-green,
Watched the dull clerk slow-rounding to his cheese,
Flicked a full dozen flies that flecked the pane
All crystal-cheated of the fuller air,
92 TITANIA.
Blurted a free "Good-day t'ye," left and right,
And shaped his gathering choler to this end :
" Custom ! And yet what profit of it all ?
The old order changeth giving place to new,
To me small change, and this the Counter-change
Of custom beating on the self-same bar
Change out of chop. Ah me ! the talk, the tip,
The would-be-evening should-be-mourning suit,
The forged solicitude for petty wants
More petty still than they, all these I loathe
Learning they lie who feign that all things come
To him that waiteth. I have waited long,
And now I go, to mate me with a bride
Who is aweary waiting, even as I ! "
But when the amorous moon of honeycomb
Was over, ere the matron-flower of Love
Step-sister of To-morrow's marmalade
Swooned scentless, Mariana found her lord
Did something jar the nicer feminine sense
With usage, being all too fine and large,
Instinct of warmth and colour, with a trick
Of blunting "Mariana's" keener edge
To " Mary Ann " the same but not the same :
Whereat she girded, tore her crisped hair,
TITANIA. 93
Called him "Sir Churl," and ever calling "Churl!"
Drave him to Science, then to Alcohol,
To forge a thousand theories of the rocks,
Then somewhat else for thousands dewy-cool,
Wherewith he sought a more Pacific isle
And there found love, a darker love than her's.
Q.
CLEANSING FIRES.
FEB. I4TH, 1889.
You ask me, then, what caused the fire
Which devastated Mansfield College
What if I let the facts transpire
Which lately came within my knowledge !
It was a piece of High Church guile
To wreck the Nonconformist pile.
From Pusey House at dead of night
I heard the furtive clinking latch :
A bearded form stepped into sight
With lantern dark and silent match ;
Muttering some words about "her cup,"
And something like "her smoke went up."
From Keble's dark monastic cells
I saw two men in surplice come :
One carrying explosive shells
And one some crude petroleum.
" Down with it " so I caught the sound
" Down with it even to the ground ! "
CLEANSING FIRES. 95
And one came from S. Barnabas, *
One from S. Philip and S. James ;
I heard them swearing " By the Mass "
They would devote to vengeful flames
An Institution which was meant
To propagate unmixed Dissent.
And there is evidence which lends
A tone of truth to the report,
That certain of a Bishop's friends
Came slily from the Lambeth Court,
And laughed, and said they'd put to rights
Vex'd questions of "forbidden lights."
But why poor Fairbairn's house was fired
While Hall and Library were spared
I have not hitherto inquired;
Yet some could tell us if they dared.
I think they might have burned at least
The Chapel for not facing East!
S/C PX>O CONTURBAT MATHO DEFICIT.
Circiter hoc tempus, ut perhibent, vetus illud ac splendidissimum
Collegium di. Jo. Bapt. olim praediis, villis, agris ditissimmn,
vel male rent procurando vel effusos adhibendo sumptus, adeo nihil
in loculis habebat ut neque Praesidenti neque Sociis quidquam nu-
merare posset : immo egestatis excusationem palant afferebat ne
quid pro rata parte in usus Academicos pendcre cogeretur.
PRAESIDENS, confectus annis,
Sedet vix opertus pannis
In Collegio Joannis.
Nam nee praedia vendendo
Nee impensas minuendo
Erit amplius solvendo.
Dicit " Agriculturalis
Nunc Depressio fit talis,
Ut conficiamur malis.
Summus inter Praesidentes,
Sociique esurientes,
Egestatem vix ferentes,
Quondam sole sub sereno
Qui gaudebant sinu pleno
Labant acre alieno."
SIC PEDO CONTURBAT MATHO DEFICIT. 97
Quid si jam suffragia dentur
Ne in posterum morentur
Aut fortasse excusentur
Contributiones istae
Universitatis cistae
E coll. divi Jo. Baptistae?
H
DAS KOCHMANNSLIED.
De inclined reader vill rememper dat de Cambridge shentletnan men-
dioned in dis Lied vas write a book on de TIMAEUS ofBlado mit so
moosh errordoms ge-filled dat der Logiksbrofessor Kochmann haf
mit anoder book ge-antworded. Mitvhiles haf he a vork ge-written
deaching how de philosopcdevheelsherumwirbelnde man shall de
hosdile cavallrie bevilderfy, ash in de hereafderfolgende pallad ish sed
oudt, unddere ish abictureofhim und his gomrades in DE ILLUSH-
DRADED LONTON NEWS, to show dat de boet shpeaks de Troot.
ID vas an audumn afdernoons, vay down in eighdy-
.
nine,
De pully poys of Oxford vas geranked in pattle line,
All brebared for vight und ploonder, und 'tvas
peautiful to see
De philosopede gontingent und de footman-cavallrie.
At Abenddammerung a scoud coom hollering droo
de camp,
" Rouse dere, rouse dere, Herr copitain, it 's dime
for us to tramp !
De repels ish at Culham, und ash far ash I
couldt see
Dey's blayin* at lawn-tennis vhile dey trinks nach-
mittag tea."
DAS KOCHMANNSLIED. 99
Ash vhen upon die Mitternacht, shouldt he a progdor
meet,
Schnell scoots de cownless untergrat all down de
hohe shtreet,
So flewed each pold Freiwillige. "Make all de
shpeed you can,
Der Teufel put dese vellers droo ! " so gried der
Kochemann.
Den o'er de Madel's Brucke die Soldaten reiten
gehen
Py de allerverfluchte rifer und de allerverdammte
plain ;
Und immer amit de vhirling vheels rote foremost
in de van
Dot gyrotwistive Knasterbart, der edle Kochemann.
So hoory, hoory, on dey rote, philosopedes und all,
Dough de troompeter (vrom Merton) cot a most
drementous fall,
Und de foot-cavallrie Hauptman saidt (like Sherman)
priefly "D n!"
Vhen he found his callant Kriegspferd reguisitioned
for de dram.
H 2
ioo DAS KOCHMANNSLIED.
Boot vhen de repel Reiterei coomed doondering on
his droop
Mit efery brebaration um de Kochemann zu scoop,
He oop-ended his philosopede, und lyin' on de
cround,
Like Toddie in de 'Merican book, shoost made de
vheels go round.
Oop-ended too de repel's horse, und down de repel
^ frt ift'vtfv&fi/v^Xtf boomped,
Den on him shtraighd der Kochemann wie Doon-
derblitz geshoomped,
Und ashked his brosdrade enemy ash o'er him he
tid shtoop,
" Peliev'st dou in de Demiurge ? If so, I lets you
oop."
"I don't know nix apout soosh dings, no more
dan 'pout Home Rule,
You'd scarcely find a Cladstonite dot's ganz so crate
a fool,
I'm greener ash a freshman, ash a shtatesman moosh
more blind,
More ignorant ash de Cambridge men for dey reads
Archer Hind."
DAS KOCHMANNSLIED. 101
"Shtand oop, yoong man," der Kochmann gried,
und blaced him on his feet,
" By vay of ransom you moost schvear my ladest
vork to readt,
If ve ish daken brisoners, id dakes moosh geld to
free us,
I gtfs to you mein liddle book, dot treats of de
Timaeus"
Wer kommt so lustig vhile de great Urbummellied
he sings?
Dot ish der valiant Kochmann, und he smile like
efery dings.
Who 's dot ge-cooming afder him, mit soosh a gloomy
look?
Dot 's de oonhobby brisoner, who 's cot to readt dot
book!
S. T.
A LETTER.
Addressed during the Summer Term of 1888 by MR. ALGERNON
DEXTER, Scholar of College, Oxford, to his cousin, Miss
KITTY TREMAYNE, at Vicarage, Devonshire.
DEAR KITTY,
At length the Term's ending;
I 'm in for my Schools in a week ;
And the time that at present I 'm spending
On you should be spent upon Greek :
But I 'm fairly well read in my Plato,
I 'm thoroughly red in the eyes,
And I Ve almost forgotten the way to
Be healthy and wealthy and wise.
So " the best of all ways " why repeat you
The verse at 2.30 a.m.,
When I'm stealing an hour to entreat you,
Dear Kitty, to come to Commem. ?
Oh come ! You shall rustle in satin
Through halls where Examiners trod :
Your laughter shall triumph o'er Latin
In lecture-room, garden and quad.
A LETTER. 103
They stand in the silent Sheldonian
Our orators, waiting for you,
Their style guaranteed Ciceronian,
Their subject " the Ladies in Blue " :
The Vice sits arrayed in his scarlet ;
He's pale, but they say, he dissem-
-bles by calling his Beadle a "varlet"
Whenever he thinks of Commem.
There are dances, flirtations at Nuneham,
Flower-shows, the procession of Eights :
There 's a list stretching usque ad Lunani
Of concerts and lunches and fetes :
There's the Newdigate, all about 'Gordon/
So sweet, and they say it will scan.
You shall flirt with a Proctor, a Warden
Shall run for your shawl and your fan.
They are sportive as gods broken loose from
Olympus, and yet very em-
-inent men. There are plenty to choose from,
You '11 find, if you come to Commem.
I know your excuses : Red Sorrel
Has stumbled and broken her knees ;
Aunt Phrebe thinks waltzing immoral;
And " Algy, you are such a tease ;
io 4 A LETTER.
It's nonsense, of course, but she is strict";
And little Dick Hodge has the croup;
And there's no one to visit your "district"
Or make Mother Tettleby's soup.
Let them cease for a se'nnight to plague you ;
Oh leave them to manage pro tern.
With their croups and their soups and their ague,
Dear Kitty, and come to Commem.
Don't tell me Papa has lumbago,
That you haven't a frock fit to wear,
That the curate "has notions, and may go
To lengths if there 's nobody there,"
That the Squire has " said things " to the Vicar,
And the Vicar "had words" with the Squire,
That the Organist's taken to liquor,
And leaves you to manage the choir :
For Papa must be cured, and the curate
Coerced, and your gown is a gem ;
And the moral is Don't be obdurate,
Dear Kitty, but come to Commem.
" My gown ? Though, no doubt, sir, you 're clever
You 'd better leave such things alone.
Do you think that a frock lasts for ever?"
Dear Kitty, I'll grant you have grown ;
A LETTER. 105
But I thought of my " scene " with McVittie
That night when he trod on your train
At the Bachelor's Ball. "'Twas a pity,"
You said, but I knew 'twas Champagne.
And your gown was enough to compel me
To fall down and worship its hem
(Are " hems " wearing ? If not, you shall tell me
What is, when you come to Commem.)
Have you thought, since that night, of the Grotto?
Of the words whispered under the palms,
While the minutes flew by and forgot to
Remind us of Aunt and her qualms ?
Of the strains of the old Journalisten ?
Of the rose that I begged from your hair ?
When you turned, and I saw something glisten
Dear Kitty, don't frown ; it was there !
But that idiot Delane in the middle
Bounced in with "Our dance, I ahem!"
And the rose you may find in my Liddell
And Scott when you come to Commem.
Then Kitty, let "yes" be the answer.
We'll dance at the 'Varsity Ball,
And the morning shall find you a dancer
In Christ Church or Trinity hall.
io6 A LETTER.
And perhaps, when the elders are yawning,
And rafters grow pale overhead
With the day, there shall come with its dawning
Some thought of that sentence unsaid.
Be it this, be it that" I forget/' or
" Was joking " whatever the fem-
-inine fib, you'll have made me your debtor
And come, you will come? to Commem.
Q.
A REPLY
From Miss KITTY TRESIAYNE to MR. ALGERNON DEXTER, de-
clining his invitation to the Encaenia of June 1888, on the ground
that she proposes to attend the University Extension Summer
Meeting in the Long Vacation of the same year.
DEAR ALGY,
How could you suppose that
I care for your silly Commem.
Every Home Reading Circle well knows that
Such gaieties are not for them.
I am bent upon probing life's mystery,
And I write seven essays a week,
I read pure mathematics and history,
And high metaphysics and Greek.
I care not for balls and flirtations,
I am dull 'mid frivolity's throng,
But I pine for quadratic equations
In the studious repose of the Long.
I really don't know what you '11 say to
The remarkable progress I 've made :
Like you I can prattle of Plato,
Like you I can pilfer from Praed.
io8 A REPLY.
I have come to believe in the mission
Of woman to civilise man ;
To teach him to know his position,
And to estimate hers if he can.
Perhaps you would rather I 'd greet you
With snatches of music-hall song :
Ah, I fear I'm not likely to meet you
In those serious hours of the Long.
You once said I danced like a fairy,
Yet are dances but circles and squares,
And "quadrata rotundis mutare"
(It is Horace, dear Algy) who cares ?
Oh, if squaring the circle were possible !
How I 'd work to that end night and day.
Still, the Infinite may be cognoscible,
And 'tis rapture to think that it may.
These, these are the thoughts that come o'er one ;
These high aspirations belong
Not to luncheons and concerts that bore one,
But to serious life in the Long.
From lecture to lecture instructive
I shall hurry with note-book and pen,
Mr. Harrison, preacher seductive,
Will discourse upon eminent men;
A REPLY. 109
Dr. Murray will tell how his Dictionary
May inform generations to come ;
And a Bishop will talk about Fiction, ere I
Return to my parish and home.
Yes, learning would cease to be labour,
Though I studied the tongue of Hong Kong,
With a Dean or a Tutor for neighbour
In my still College rooms in the Long.
I can gaze at the stars from your towers,
Till the summer nights pale into dawns;
I can wander with Readers in bowers,
I can walk with Professors on lawns.
And oh, if from skies unpropitious
Gentle rain in soft drizzle should fall,
There are chances of converse delicious,
Tete-a-tete in the Cloister or Hall.
There's a feeling one has towards one's teacher
Dear Algy, don't say that it's wrong
This communion of souls is a feature
Of our shy student life in the Long.
You won't come. You '11 be thinking of cricket,
Or perhaps of lawn-tennis or sport,
You '11 be studying the state of a wicket
Or measuring the length of a court.
no A REPLY.
You'll be watching the stream and the weather,
With your heart in your flies and your hooks;
You will tramp after grouse o'er the heather,
While at Oxford I toil o'er my books.
So adieu: I've an essay just set me,
And 'tis dinner time there goes the gong;
And dear Algy, you won't quite forget me,
When I'm reading so hard in the Long?
X. Y. Z.
MR. ALGERNON DEXTER appears to have been so much annoyed by the
receipt of this letter as to forget alike his scholarship and his Praed,
and to respond in the fresh and nervous vernacular of the Under-
graduate of the period.
DEAR KITTY,
You used to be jolly,
And I 'd stand a good deal for your sake,
But, Great Scott ! of all possible folly
This last folly of yours takes the cake.
Why, you'd come up a mere carpet-bagger,
And though Bishops and Dons boss the show,
And you think that it 's awfully swagger,
You would find that it 's awfully slow.
Your friends say you J re trying to rile 'em,
And your enemies snigger and grin;
If they run you for Earlswood Asylum,
By Jingo ! you 'd simply romp in.
You were always a bit of a dreamer,
But you're coming it rather too strong,
And I '11 write you a regular screamer
If you dare to come up in the Long.
X. Y. Z.
OUR OWN NEWDIGATE:
BELISARIUS.
GREAT Belisarius, thy glorious name
Is half a synonym itself for Fame.
In the dark clouds she rears her lofty crest,
Eftsoons in solemn splendour sinks to rest:
So sinks the day-star in the Ocean bed
And yet anon repairs his drooping head
With the best colours that the sea affords,
And shines in splendour awful, O ye Gods!
My hero was a Thracian by his birth,
A race as tough as any upon earth :
Born where the North wind, sweeping o'er the
snows,
Straight from the chamber of the Ice King blows,
Rushes in whirlwinds up the mountain steeps,
Now howls in fierceness, now in sorrow weeps,
Then with a mighty gust essays to launch
Down the abyss the thundering avalanche,
Hurls the lithe wild goat screaming from the height,
Then drops his goat-herd spinning out of sight,
Drives the lush eagle from his fragrant lair,
Chills the wan seal or amorous polar bear :
OUR OWN NEWDIGATE. 113
Rude and relentless in its thrilling power,
Yet waits alike the inevitable hour,
For North- wind, hero, polar bear, or slave,
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
Then Belisarius left his Thracian home
To seek his fortune 'neath the star of Rome,
In the imperial guards he found a place,
Then sought and won, sweet boon, the imperial grace.
(This Emperor was Justinian of the Institutes,
Which part of our Oxford Law School up here
constitutes.)
Like Paris handsome and like Hector brave,
His person stalwart and his manner naive,
He was all round admittedly a hero
Whose rivals in comparison were zero.
Where Afric's sunny fountains roll their sand,
He came to war with his heroic band.
Skilled in the field his enemies to handle,
He made short work of the proverbial Vandal ;
Cook'd for that horde their savage goose, and free
Sail'd homewards o'er the waters of the sea.
His next exploits were in severe campaigns
Against the Goths upon the Italian plains.
Now all the Goths he fought were Arians
As well as most unnatural barbarians ;
H4 OUR OWN NEWDIGATE.
And so for Heaven he fought as well as for Justinian
In the extension of that great Emperor's dominion.
Ah ! how shall scenes of war the care engage
Of peaceful poet in a peaceful age !
See at the walls of Rome the advancing host,
Rapine for watchword, Murder for their boast !
The red-mouthed Cannon and the Battering-ram,
The Arblast and the deadly Oriflamme,
All in the onset thunder their acclaim,
While charging savages advance amain.
Here the shields clash before the glittering lance,
There brigands with their bayonets advance :
Here Heroes calm, there Cowards lying low,
While cracks the rifle, twangs the unerring bow.
Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' arms,
Effected more than savage war's alarms :
Like as the cloud the shepherd from afar sees
On the horizon rose the eunuch Narses,
Sad fruit of the imperial distrust,
As well as seed of mutual disgust ;
Thus things were brought into a state precarious,
As well as most annoying to a proud man like
Belisarius.
As the rough ore by the refining art
Is purified to show the metal's heart,
OUR OWN NEWDIGATE. 115
With Belisarius the part of the refiner
Was played, we grieve to say, by Antonina.
No lustre's shed 'upon the hero's life
By his association with his wife.
Cheese has its maggots, and the rose its thorn,
Into this subject we need not be borne.
Man is the sport of a superior Fate,
And princes' favour ends or soon or late.
He to whom no one else could hold a candle,
Conqueror of the Visigoth and Vandal,
In his old age, cast off, neglected, scorned,
By those whom his achievements had adorned,
Slunk through the streets, condemned, so it is said,
To look for eleemosynary aid,
Through rain or sunshine, hail or London fog
Attended only by his faithful dog.
Upon his breast he moves the thankless town
By " Blind but honest " on a placard shown.
Thus borne along through circumstances various
We end the history of Belisarius;
He left a name at which the world grew pale
To point a moral or adorn a tale.
K.
I 2
DISILLUSION.
THEY told me of the August calm
Of Oxford in the Long Vacation,
How rarely plies th' infrequent tram
'Twixt Cowley and the Railway Station ;
How Undergraduates are gone
Or peaks to climb or moors to shoot on,
And none remains but here a Don
And there a speculative Teuton :
How in the Parks you seldom see
The terminal perambulator ;
How tradesmen close at half-past three,
And silence broods o'er Alma Mater.
Ah me ! 'twas all a baseless dream ;
One thing they quite forgot to mention
The recently developed scheme
Of University Extension.
They told me Oxford in the Long
A place of solitude and peace is :
They told me so they told me wrong ;
For every train imports a throng
Of sisters, cousins, aunts, and nieces,
DISILLUSION. 117
Who crowd the streets, who storm the Schools,
With love of lectures still unsated ;
They're subject to no kind of rules,
And can't be proctorised or gated.
'Neath auspices majestical,
Their guide some Principal or. Warden,
From morn to eve they throng the Hall,
And all day long they "do" the Garden.
Upon one's own peculiar haunts
They rudely pry O times, O manners !
They strum the Pirates of Penzance
On Undergraduates' pianners.
The Bursar entertains about
A score of feminine relations,
Whilst I invoke my absent scout,
And hope in vain my humble rations.
If this be Oxford in the Vac.,
When all her sons afar are scattered,
If this be peace, then give me back
The Torpid wine, the tea-tray battered !
A. G.
THE EDITOR'S FAREWELL.
FAREWELL to the labours of copy and proof,
And the strain of redacting reviews,
And welcome a season of standing aloof
From supplying a gap in the news !
Farewell to the toil of inventing remarks,
Whether soothing, offensive or freej
So rest in the shade of thy vineyards, O Parks,
No more to be troubled by me!
Hebdomadal Council, doomed never to rest,
In withstanding the course of the Sun !
No more shall I scan your preambles with zest
For my race of existence is run.
Farewell, propagandists of Specialist Schools,
Who scorn to provide for the mass ;
Professors, farewell, who think Tutors are fools,
And who moan (but don't wish) for a class !
THE EDITOR'S FAREWELL. 119
Farewell, O Museum, too apt to prepare
For success in supplying your wants,
By grasping a more than legitimate share
And demanding inordinate grants!
Farewell to the poets, whose metrical skill
Is hampered by weakness of rhyme !
Continue your sonnets and odes to distil,
Fame is only a question of time.
Farewell, you deep thinkers, whose words should
ensure
A result of importance immense,
But remember in future, expressions obscure
Are apt to throw doubt on the sense !
Farewell to each rival political scheme,
Whether Patriot, Tory or Rad,
As well as to each philanthropical dream,
Spook, Buddhist or Socialist fad !
Farewell to Athletics, whose writers forget,
(Being chafed by grammatical curb,)
Their critical strictures in concords to set,
Or the subject provide with its verb !
120 THE EDITOR'S FAREWELL.
Farewell, O ye beautiful groves of the Press,
Sweet haunt of the bulbul and dove,
Where the spirit of Learning was present to bless
And the Muse ever hovered above !
Farewell to my critics, farewell to my foes,
Farewell to each lover and friend !
The curtain has dropt on an editor's woes,
For the editor's come to an end.
t
. S .
PROSE PIECES
TRANSLATION OF AN ARISTOTELIAN
FRAGMENT IN THE BODLEIAN.
CONCERNING Golf, and how many parts of it there
are, and how we ought to play it, and as many things
as belong to the same method, let us speak, beginning
from the Tee according to the nature of the treatise.
For there are some who begin not only after teeing
the ball, but also immediately after breakfasting A# *
themselves: but this is not Golf, but incontinence or^,^, >
even licentiousness. ***7 '?Jf t*^0U^j,
Now it is possible to play in several ways: for
perhaps they strike indeed, yet not as is necessary,
nor where, nor when ; as the man who played in the
Parks and wounded the infant : for this was good for
him, yet not absolutely, nor for the infant. Where-
fore here as in other things we should aim at the
mean between excess and defect. For the player in
excess hits the ball too often, as they do at cricket :
-_ * \sf ^
and the deficient man cannot hit it at all, except by
accident (KO.TO. tn^/Se^Kos) : as it is related of the man
who kicked his caddie, as they do at football. For
the beginning is to hit it : and the virtue of a good
124 AN ARISTOTELIAN FRAGMENT.
golfer is to hit well and according to reason and as
the professional would hit. And to speak briefly, to
play Golf is either the part of a man of genius or a
madman, as has been said in the Poetics.
And because it is better to hit few times than many
for the good is finite, but the man who goes round
in three hundred strokes stretches out in the direction
of the infinite some have said that here too we
ought to remember the saying of Hesiod, "The half
is better than the whole," thinking not rightly, ac-
cording at least to my opinion : for in relation to
your adversary it is much better to win the Hole
*~ than the Half. And Homer is a good master both
in other respects and also here : for he alone has
taught us how to lie as is necessary, both as to the
hole (xatfoAou), and otherwise.
Again, every art and every method, and likewise
every action and intention aims at the good. Some,
therefore, making a syllogism, aim at a Professor :
for Professors, they say, are good (because dry
things are good for men, as has been said in the
Ethics), and this is a Professor: but perhaps they
make a wrong use of the major premise. At any
rate, having hit him, it is better to act in some such
way as this, not as tragedians seek a recognition
AN ARISTOTELIAN FRAGMENT. 125
; for this is most unpleasant (fuapov), and
perhaps leads to a catastrophe. It is doubted,
whether the man who killed his tutor with a golf-ball
acted voluntarily or involuntarily; for on the one
hand he did not do it deliberately, since no one
deliberates about the results of chance, as, for in-
stance, whether one will hit the ball this time at any
rate or not : yet he wished to kill him, and was glad
having done it : and probably on the whole it was a
mixed action.
Are we, then, to call no man happy till he has
finished his round, and, according to Solon, to look
to the end? for it is possible to be fortunate for a
long time and yet at last to fall into a ditch : and to
the man in the ditch there seems to be no good any
more, nor evil. But this is perhaps of another con-
sideration: and, at any rate, it has been discussed
sufficiently among the topics of swearing. But it is
a question whether a caddie can be called happy, and
most probably he cannot ; those who seem to be so
are congratulated on account of their hope (Sm r^v
A. G.
HOW THUCYDIDES WENT TO THE
TRIALS.
I. Now, in the end of this year, when Bellamaeus
had three years of his archonship to run at Oxford,
and in the middle of winter, when the collections-
harvest was just in its prime, with which I have both
been myself afflicted and have seen others suffering,
there happened to be the great festival of Heracles
Phileretmos.
II. Now, to the place where they row it may
be travelled by the sacred wagons of Hephaestus, if
the wind always blow steadily behind their sterns, in
about half a day, and by a scratch octoreme or by a
man of decent waist, marching on foot, in something
less, so that as well on this account fewer men use
the sacred wagons, and also because not only among
the priests but especially the menials of Hephaestus,
the custom is established rather to receive than
to give, and it is more shameful in their eyes not to
give, having been asked, than, having asked, not to
obtain, notwithstanding which it seemed good to
Thucydides, who wrote this history, an oof-ship from
the Thraceward parts having lately come in, both
otherwise to blow the expense and above all, having
THUCYDIDES AT THE TRIALS. 127
previously hired a crawler, not to spare the necessary
sacrifice to the God, by whose conveyance when
he had gone, himself the fourth, about the time
of the full moon, to Moulsford, they marched at
most seven stades into the inner country and piled
arms at the temple of Dionysus used by the indi-
genous tribes of that coast.
III. And at this point they found those from the
city in a state of sedition and gathered into knots, and
evidently terrified by the mightiness of the stream ;
for the river Isis, flowing down from the mountains
of Cotswold, through the land of the Godstovians
and Eynshamites and the plain of Wytham, and
having made an inundation, it both flooded part
of the country, so that what was towpath is now
peasoup, and suggested as a just conclusion that it
would destroy any who did not anticipate it by
scooting to the higher ground. So straightway they
fell into the factions of the Parali, the Diacrii, and
the Pedieis, whereof the Diacrii retired to the top of
a hill that happened to be about, if in any way they
might see the race, while the Parali tore along the
towpath, running the risk with their bodies, but
the Pedieis, being for the most part funks and . . .
(Hiatus in MS. valde deflendus.)
128 THUCYDIDES AT THE TRIALS.
Of these factions, then, Thucydides joined the Parali,
at once wishing to make a display of valour to ob-
literate the fiasco at Amphipolis, and considering his
life and his exhibition alike ephemeral he thought
it would be not idiotic, reaping his enjoyments
speedily, to abandon the one, painlessly at the zenith
of an anaesthetic excitement, rather than, surviving,
to lose the other, shamefully, something having hap-
pened at Mods. And when the antagonistic oc-
toremes appeared, it seemed to those looking on to
be more like a solemn procession of some god, or
a burying of those fallen in war, than a race : but
straightway there was a clamour : but to Thucydides
it seemed most according to custom to yell "Well
rowed, Four ! " since he also was a citizen of my
own city : which I did, adding to it with an oath,
reasonably, the mud simultaneously getting into my
eyes and ascending my nose.
IV. Now there is a sacred ship, the Paralus, in
which the high-priest [having previously taught the
aspirants to practise all the gymnastic virtues in
a small bireme of burden, built like a horse-transport]
himself follows, uttering the needful curses and
general truculence, by means of which he is most
persuasive with the performers, and ragging the
THUCYDIDES AT THE TRIALS. 129
pilots if anywhere he see them meditating the diek-
plus or other manoeuvres which, while in war most
effective, entail an universal obloquy by their use in
a devotional exercise. But, when the race was over,
those on board the Paralus beached their vessel and
seemed likely, making a disembarkation, to invade
the country of the Parali. But they, anticipating
them, and shouting that the Parali were the right
possessors of the Paralus, that they were jiggered
if they'd walk back, and other expressions such as
nautical multitudes love to use, not only came to the
rescue but even boarded the ship, first chucking
their hats and sticks into the space forward of the
boiler, that there might be no repentance. But
Thucydides (deeming it monstrous if Tims should
chop off his hand like that of Aminias the brother of
the poet Aeschylus in the Persian business), holding
fast to his umbrella waved it in a circle, at the same
time exhorting others to go first, and calling the
local deities to witness that Tims was acting unjustly
in invading the land, and testifying that, if any
of the enemy suffer anything incurable from the
gamp, Thucydides is blameless.
V. But at length, a treaty having been made, the
original crew of the Paralus manifestly showed them-
130 THUCYDIDES AT THE TRIALS.
selves to be horse-marines, being unable to push off
from the land, where she was fast grounded. But
at this juncture the Parali seized long poles and,
encouraged by the opinion that two Parali are as
good as about six horse-marines, shoving her off
worked out their passage. And when he had just
put out to sea, I espied the scribe, or second priest,
of the rival cult of Heracles at Cambridge, who was
a prisoner but not bound, nor did I see our own high-
priest attempt anything revolutionary against him, as
one who had contributed not a little to lick us in the
preceding spring.
VI. And at the end of the same season, and on
the same day as the naval show, the Temple of
Dionysus and Aphrodite in the High 1 was partly
burnt, although the worshippers had gone down the
same day ; so that it was probably set alight by some
one of those in power falling asleep on his candlestick.
And the season ended, and the second year of the
four, during which Thucydides read history.
C. E. M.
1 // will be remembered that Queen's College was partly burnt, as
Thucydides states, on the last Saturday of Michaelmas Term, 1886.
Herodotus considers the fire an act of felicitous arson by the God of
Marriage, designed as a nuptial housewarming for the Provost. The
ultra-rationalists at the time traced it (putidius) to a small fire in the
Bursary, used for cooking the accounts.
A BACON MS.
.... CERTAINLY there be some that delight in
nakedness, and count it better to worship in great
boots and a long cloke than in the richest apparel.
I knew a nobleman of the West of England which
made a wager in a waggishness that he would keep
a chapel in a surplice and shoes, or as Livy hath it
of the captives
Ternis tantum vestimentis.
For which humour he was sent down. I hold it
better that the college be answered some small matter
for each garment that is wanting.
For freshers, I mislike not that they be asked to
lunch, but it is a shameful and unblessed thing to
give much hock to them that row. Also let coaches
give many easies. I have known a fresher do two
journeys to Iffley without queeching, when he was
so raw as he would fain be standing up all the rest
of the day. But these be toys.
A Head had need be wary how he admit black
men. I hold it safest that they be ploughed in
K 2
132 A BACON MS.
Matric. For so shall the conceit of their own know-
ledge be beaten down in them, and they shall be less
likely to make war on the Vice-Chancellor. There
was in my time a Persian at Skimmery who conse-
crated his scout to be his priest, whereby the man
was cashiered, and his family miserably destituted.
Tacitus saith of a scout
Vestimenta et offas tanquam indagine capi.
I hold it not well that the scouts lurch all the gains.
To extinguish their peculations utterly is but a
bravery and a dreaming. But for the college to
connive at them, taking privily some part of the
spoils, commonly giveth best way; for so shall it
have them obnoxious and officious towards itself, and
the commoners shall learn that pleasure hath its
cost.
For divers instruments of music, surely it is a hard
thing to keep them all down to strait limits of time.
Let some difference be made. For the banjo, I
would have it free always, seeing it is the same as
the lyre of the ancients. I mislike the bones... . . .
Here the MS. becomes illegible. Certain critics have objected
that Bacon was not a member of the University of Oxford, but of
Cambridge. Surely the merest schoolboy should know that Bacon
was for two years a resident at Teddy Hall, and that he was sent down
A BACON MS. 133
A.D. 1572, as there seemed no chance of his learning enough Greek to
get through Smalls, although hehad most of Abbott and Mansfield's
Accidence copied out on his shirtsleeves. It is certain that he believed
himself innocent in his heart and only wished thereby to benefit man-
kind. His words on the subject are: " I was thejustest man that went
in for Smalls these fifty years, but it was the justest plough done in the
Schools these two hundred years."
C. E. M.
ANOTHER BACON MS.
OF MUSICK.
IT was truly devised of David, himself the greatest
harper
I am become a reproach among all mine enemies, but especially
among my neighbours.
And Cosmus Duke of Florence had a desperate
saying against them that play scales. "You shall
see," saith he, "that we are bidden to forgive our
enemies, but we are nowhere forbidden to make hay
with the pianos of our friends." And certainly the
nature of a musical man hath some composition of a
smug. For them that play the cornet, it is right earth.
The poet hath it better :
Tuba, mirum spargens sonum,
Scalas implet regionum,
O, qua musica tironum.
Macchiavel well noteth that if a man do play out
of tune, he doth in some sort give a passport to faith :
for so shall he bring in a new primum mobile that
ravisheth all the music of the spheres. For smoking
concerts, they are not amiss. Only let the songs be
ANOTHER BACON MS. 135
not hearse-like airs, touching rooks or the rawness of
them that row. And it were well that the hall or
refectory wherein you sing be double-windowed, so
as the followers of Momus, which be many, have no
provand of invective. You shall see that in these days
there hath arisen a sect of zealants which make
psalmody in St. Giles so devoutly as putteth them of
Balliol out of office. Nay, they say that even hath a
negro of that college been so depraved by this over-
heat of zeal as he hath sat in the chair of scorners,
by a great revulsion of spirits, and goeth to roll-call.
Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum.
There be two swords against fiddlers, whereof the
first, which is to break their bones, would be kept in
seasonable use ; the second, to break their fiddles, if
there be no remedy. But let this last be used in
closeness and secrecy, inasmuch as it will scarcely
be brooked that a man do deal so austerely in a kind
of civil judgment on his even clay. I have known a
fiddler, thus destituted of his toy, to fall into so fixed
a melancholy as he presently went off the hooks.
And to make this kind wholly desist, while the breath
is yet in them, is a bravery of the Stoics. So as that
opinion may be sent to Utopia.
136 ANOTHER BACON MS.
But to speak in a mean. That will not be amiss if
a man so frame his actions as he may show that he
liketh not this shindy, as by casting of small stones
at windows whence sound of exercises doth proceed,
or by speech of touch on occasion, as : " You are a
smug/' " When did you leave off beating your grand-
mother?" with many civil bullets in this sort, which
shall do hurt to no man, but rather much good. For
Consalvo rightly noteth that you shall rarely see a
musical man ready and prest for a quarrel, being
themselves more full of jingles and sickly phantasms
of the imagination, which cloud the spirits and check
with a warlike composition.
Ovid saith of a company of flute-players :
Tibiaque effundit socialia carmina vobis
At mihi funerea flebiliora tuba.
And that renowned prince, Sultan Mustapha, is said
to have instituted a law that none should touch a
flute, or as the Turk hath it with some crassness
"spit- whistle," before he hath learned to play the
same.
To speak now of the reformation and reiglement of
music : the way would be briefly thus : let a man
that playeth classical music be gated, or, if he abate
not, sent down. For that is a vein that would be
ANOTHER BACON MS. 137
bridled. Music for dancing is a thing of great state
and pleasure, and herein would polkas be encouraged.
And also it would not be misliked that those in great
place, Vice-Chancellors, butlers, and the like, should
sing nigger songs. For you shall see how prest
they are to admit niggers to the foundations which
they govern.
They say there hath been seen in the Low Countries
a Head of a College which admitted men of war, of a
fierce and turbulent temper, to play the music of their
calling in the quad. This thing would not be imitated.
For how shall the martial brayings of them that earn
their bread
In cruore corporis alieni
sort well to the retired pensiveness of applied studies?
But as Heads are commonly but like the thorn or
briar which do wrong because they can do no other,
so a man were best set up his rest at the last upon
the hope of some posterior . . .
CAETERA DESUNT.
C. E. M.
FRAGMENTUM.
ISDEM ferme diebus orta seditio Wiccamicos
concussit, quanto plures erant, tanto violentius. Ope-
rae pretium fuerit initia et causas eius rei breviter
expedire. erat inter Wiccamicos Julius Undergra-
duatus, procax moribus, non absurdus ingenio : hunc
Titus Cochlearius antiquae sanctitatis apud consules
reum postulaverat, tamquam famoso libello inlustres
feminas laesisset, ira an improbitate dubium. atque
ille in senatu exitiabiles Academiae feminas conques-
tus contumeliam tamen cum nequiret infitiari damna-
tur: de modo poenae multum ac diu agitatum, cum
alii in insulam deportandum alii virgis et more maio-
rum caedendum varie dissererent. vicere qui ex-
silium in praesens censerent: itaque statim urbe
excedere iubetur. additur custos abeunti Higgsius
Jimmius vetus aurigandi, qui usque ad primum lapi-
dem deduceret : et fuere inter plebem qui in via
interficere iussum dictitarent.
Namque vulgus Wiccamicorum iamdudum fremebat
et alienum casum propria ira indignabatur. igitur
FRAGMENTUM. 139
exeuntem curia Undergraduatum circumstare, pren-
,
sare manus, suprema oscula petere : insontem culpae
clamitare, et ne sontem quidem damnandum. mox /-^v*U>^
ad portam flentes et vociferantes prosequuntur ; ' ^
Higgsium cum reda opperientem minis et pugnis
proturbant, donee fessus pavidusque in tabernam
confugeret : inde solutis equis et abactis ipsi colla
iugo supponere, sibi placentes, ceteris ridiculi. nee
deerat ipse, quern trahebant, minitari patribus, Vice-
cancellarium ultorem poenae testari. sic ex urbe
deducitur.
Mox in domos reversis vastum primo silentium.
A*
inclusi et maerentes cibi quoque et religionum usum
aversari: namque epulas solito lautiores patres populo
poni iusserant, levamentum doloris in praesens, in
posterum ultionem. sed illi prae ira famem pati
maluere; horrendas illas epulas: invisa deorum
sacra, ubi priscam libertatem typorum? proinde
aliis quoque id exsilium exspectandum, si Professo-
rem verbo laederet, si Tutorem quamvis vero crimine
lacesseret. deinde in querelas et clamorem erum-
punt, alii Collectiones et atroces notas, alii Aristotelis
Ethica (Graecum librum) propriis nominibus incu-
santes : et adventanti nocte incendium etiam parant,
indignum facinus sed his moribus baud inusitatum.
140 FRAGMENTUM.
neque interventu decani (public! servi id vocabulum)
mitigati ipsum ultro flammis imponebant, nisi missae
a procuratoribus litterae augescentem seditionem
paulatim compescuissent. A. G.
WICCAMICOS] Ret per se satis planae scriptor notae obscuritatis
aliquantum caliginis offudit. Caput autem Collegii cujusdam ita
ntihi ambages percontanti (qua est Latinitate] explicat : " Audori-
tates Novi Collegii hominem demiserunt quiafuisset editor scandalosi
periodicalis." Quo nihil facilius intellectu.
j
.hf.
THE DESTRUCTION OF DIDCOT.
. . . NOT long after these events the Temple of
Hephaestus at Didcot was burnt to the ground for
the first time, being built almost entirely of wood.
Of the origin of this fire I am unable to give any
certain account ; but all may believe as they choose.
For the servants of the temple assert that it caught
fire of its own accord, saying in my opinion the thing
which is not, whereas the directors or high priests
say it was done by some sparks from the neigh-
bouring city of Oxford. These things therefore are
so : but of the temple itself I think it right to give
a fuller account, both because it is notable on many
accounts, and chiefly for this. A sophist from Ox-
ford may always be seen there : I know the man, but
I will not tell his name, and the reasons for which
he comes it is not lawful for me to mention. Also,
the temple has a covered way, in which there is
always the smell of an elephant. For this, although
I have enquired, I am unable to account, inasmuch
as I have never seen an elephant there myself, nor
I 4 2 THE DESTRUCTION OF DIDCOT.
have heard of it from any eye-witness. Indeed, it
appears incredible that an elephant, being so huge a
beast, could have entered a way so narrow : or if one
entered at any time, he must have been much smaller
than the elephants known to us. Let this, then,
remain unknown ; but the servants of the temple
j /Y j\ . (Hthjvurt
L affirm that twice in every day a Dutchman enters
the temple at a great speed in both directions. This
I do not believe, for in addition they say that this
Dutchman flies, whence " the flying Dutchman " has
passed into a proverb among the inhabitants of
Didcot. But how could a Dutchman, being of such
a shape, fly ? Also they make mention of a Zulu :
but these tales I pass over, for the servants do not
seem to speak the truth. And the reason is this.
They wear garments of a green colour, emitting a
~
powerful odour, which, when they have put them on,
so intoxicates the brain that often they stand ringing
a bell and beckoning the pilgrims to the wrong side
of the temple, whereby many annually are slain, and
many more go to places whither it is not meet for
them to go. In this way I myself have come within
sight of Didcot thrice on three successive days.
And even if one should disbelieve, and act upon his
own suggestion, he may yet chance to go wrong :
THE DESTRUCTION OF DIDCOT. 143
for they do not always He. Otherwise prevision
would be easy. Now the carriages that convey
pilgrims are called in their language "trains," and
the road they call a- "line." When the temple was
burnt, they say that a certain man called Gooch
rebuilt it in the following manner. As many trains
as came he diverted on to a side line, having made
one for the purpose, and there kept them until the
temple was finished, after which he again let them
all loose into the " station," as some call the temple.
I examined the skulls of those that died upon this
occasion, being chiefly the skulls of Oxonici, and
found them much smaller than is usual. Now of the
food of the inhabitants of Didcot, I can speak with
assurance, having myself tasted it. It consists chiefly
of cakes, which they prepare as follows .... Having
thus prepared them, they keep them for a space of
three years, during which it is death to eat one, and
even afterwards not without danger. These cakes
they dedicate to the Lady of Banbury, of whom the
following account is given. Having rings upon her
fingers, and some say even bells upon her toes, she
once rode into Oxford and there founded a college,
called Balliol College. The poet Bossades even
narrates that the horse wore a scholar's gown or
144 THE DESTRUCTION OF DIDCOT.
tunic on this occasion. This I do not believe, but I
am certain that she went : for another poet says with
regard to her, " she shall have music wherever she
goes," and there is much music in Balliol College.
Now why there should be so much music I do not
know, nor has any man been able to explain to me.
But of this subject I have already treated in my
published works.
Q.
THE NEW DON QUIXOTE.
Wherein is related the terrific adventure of the galley slaves, otherwise
known as the adventure of the enchanted barque.
THE ingenious Cid Hamet Benengeli relates that
after the adventure above set down, Don Quixote
raised his eyes and saw coming up the river at a
briskish pace a galley manned by eight rowers, all
bound to the work with tight leathern fetters on their
feet, and pounding away at their oars with the vigour
suggested by despair and terror. With them there
also came one man on horseback and three on foot ;
the cavalier, who wore a blood-coloured jerkin, was
of a truculent aspect, and perpetually let fly at the
captives in the boat with maledictions and scurvy
taunts, while the infantry, fine personable varlets of
some 13 stone, kept pace with the aforesaid cavalier
in upbraiding the unhappy galley-slaves with their
sloth, and browbeating them into mending their sorry
progress.
When our knight had considered sufficiently the
thin and miserable raiment of the prisoners and the
L
I 4 6 THE NEW DON QUIXOTE.
arrogant bearing of those that had them in charge,
he turned to Sancho and said, " Doubt not, Sancho,
that in yonder knight you see the gigantic Gilberto-
burno, famous not only as one of the most celebrated
Stinks Dons in Spain, but also as a slashing and
sagacious dialectician, who, merely in two epistles,
overthrew the reactionary historian Fletchero of the
Changed Visnomy, who had presumed to discuss
with him polemically the Posterior Analytics of our
common anatomy, and the discipline most fit to
inflict on backsliding galley-slaves the maximum of
torment and exertion. Unless indeed this be an
enchanted barque of the sage Merlin, or the malig-
nant magician Frisbon be here carrying off for his
seraglio a bevy of captive princesses, transmogrified
by his hellish arts into the seeming of squalid
criminals."
And, having said so much, and commended him-
self to his divine Dulcinea, without further parley he
couched his lance, dug his spurs into Rozinante's
spare ribs, and bore down on the poor "coach," for
such it was, fully set on letting daylight through his
carcase without more ado, and crying loudly : " De-
fend thyself, miserable monster, or instantly restore
to freedom and liberty of thine own accord those
THE NEW DON QUIXOTE. 147
whom thou boldest in durance in yonder enchanted
barge."
The learned Cid here indulges in a sapient specu-
lation on the probable issue of a tourney between
two such champions, for the coach was a man of the
first mettle, and one, as the saying is, not to be
drubbed for a mere song, so that doubtless the passage
of arms would have ended in one of the principals
being cleft like a pomegranate, but, unhappily for the
polite chroniclers of chivalry, he was mounted on
a charger who joined the physique of Rozinante
to the pacific and dilettante-like temper of one who
draws a cab six days out of seven, and no sooner did
he catch a hint of hostilities, than he instantly shook
his ill-hung bones together and scoured across the
plain more nimbly than a gazelle, and with the lungs
of a dromedary.
Don Quixote, exulting in this tergiversation,
commanded the galley to approach, and asked one
of the crew for what offence he was now in such
sorry case, and rated so soundly by yonder recreant
knight.
He answered, " that it was for being heavy with
his hands."
" For that only ! " replied Don Quixote, " why,
L 2
148 THE NEW DON QUIXOTE.
I have heard say your light-fingered gentry are the
more sinners. And you, sir ? "
This criminal, who was stroke, answered, " that he
was abused for hurrying his own swing and so causing
the rest to hang."
"Nay, friend," said Don Quixote, "surely thy
logic is at fault, for in our province they say ' Let
ropes race to hang a knave,' and, besides, the better
speed thou makest to thine own justification by the
grace of hemp, the sooner wilt thou remove thine evil
example from the path of thy fellows. Nor, indeed,
dost thou deserve, for merely exercising the office of
tempter, to row in these craft, inasmuch as the office
is a very ancient and necessary one, and, as the
saying is, the broad road must have keepers to open
its turnpikes as well as another."
He then asked the same question of the third, who
made no reply, so downcast and melancholy was he ;
but the rest answered for him "that he was thus
abused for a slow recovery, and, although their
custodian had sworn his bellyful at him, he was still
as far from being cured as ever."
"What ! " said Don Quixote, "cure the sick with
hard labour, and make them sound the sooner with
scurvy jeers and curses ! "
THE NEW DON QUIXOTE. 149
In this way Don Quixote examined each of the
crew as to his offences, and found in no case any
graver guilt than the apparently venial peccadilloes
of hurrying or being slow, stiffening the hands or
shrugging the shoulders, all of which appeared to
our Manchegan to be, at the worst, merely solecisms
against good breeding, or some trivial neglect of
one's own convenience, or else personal misfortunes
to be pitied rather than censured, and in every case
quite out of measure with the barbarous enormity of
the penalty. On which, turning to the whole string
of them, he said, " From all you have told me, dear
brethren, I make out that your punishments, at any
rate, do not give you much pleasure; and that,
perhaps, this one's want of nimbleness, another's
despair of escaping justice, the feeble health of the
third, and, lastly, the perverted judgment of your
oppressor, may have been the causes of your failure
and present sufferings, and it seems to me a hard
case to make slaves of those whom Nature has made
free. Moreover, sirs of the towpath," added Don
Quixote, turning to the three pedestrians, "these
poor fellows have done nothing to you ; let each
answer for his own sins yonder; Heaven will not
forget to punish the wicked, or reward the good.
ISO THE NEW DON QUIXOTE.
Finally, I desire, and it is my good pleasure, that
laden with those straps which I have taken off your
feet, and each carrying his oar, ye at once set out and
proceed to the city of El Toboso, and there present
yourselves before the lady Dulcinea del Toboso, and
say to her that her knight sends to commend himself
to her, and that ye recount to her in full detail all the
particulars of this notable adventure, up to the
recovery of your longed-for liberty ; and, this done,
ye may go where ye will, and good fortune attend
you."
The precise Cid Hamet is so curious as to recount
that during this passage of arms, and the knight's
discourse, Rozinante was busy with a light intrigue
in a neighbouring pasture, that Dapple and Sancho
surveyed the adventure with great sagacity and
mutual understanding, Sancho reflecting that doubt-
less his master would be in the right to trounce the
burly fellow for rating honest folk that were like to
be Pope as soon as he, and that in the end Don
Quixote remounted, and slowly walked Rozinante in
the direction of the desert sierras of Cumnor, where
he passed the night refreshing his soul with the
lively image of his divine Dulcinea.
C. E. M.
AGYMNASTICUS ; OR, THE ART OF >
BOWLING.
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE.
SOCRATES, who is the narrator.
AGYMNASTICUS, a reading man.
ATHLETES, a sportsman.
And others who are mute characters.
I WENT the other day to witness the great gym-
nastic contest between eleven of our young men and
the famous colonists, which was being celebrated in
a field just outside the city. My only companion
was Agymnasticus, whom I had induced, with great
difficulty, to leave his books, for, as he explained to
me, the time was close at hand when his learning
was to be put to a very severe test, and he had there-
fore very little leisure. We got a good position, just
on the edge of the enclosure, and we were lucky
enough to find my friend Athletes standing near us.
He was looking very excited, and, as I thought,
somewhat sadder than usual. Well, Athletes, I said,
how is the game going?
Very badly, said he, with a sigh ; for, though the
152 AGYMNASTICUS.
colonists did badly, our men are doing much worse ;
four of our best wickets are down already for but
two runs.
And why is this ? I inquired.
That tall thin man there, whom they call the
Daemon, is too much for them ; it is he who has taken
all the wickets. See, there goes another, he cried ;
that stout man who is now walking away is himself
the fifth who has fallen, and the score is not yet ten.
It seems to me only natural, said I, that in such a
contest as this the lean and wiry hound should prevail
over the fat and clumsy. Truly, this Daemon must
be a great batsman.
My dear Socrates, said he sharply, what are you
saying ? You betray an extraordinary ignorance of
the game.
Then I am glad to have you at hand to correct me,
I said ; perhaps I should learn most quickly if you
would answer a few questions which I should like
to put to you about the game. You would admit,
I suppose, that there is an art of bowling?
But he would not answer my question. I know
nothing about art, he said ; but I know exactly what
you are after, Socrates ; and I shall not answer you.
And, disregarding me altogether, he turned to watch
AGYMNASTICUS. 153
the contest. I addressed myself therefore to Agym-
nasticus What do you say, my friend ? I asked ;
is bowling an art or not ?
Undoubtedly it is an art, he replied.
Very well, I said ; let us then consider it with
reference to the other arts. In boxing, for instance,
is not he who is most expert in dealing blows, also
expert in parrying blows ?
Very true, he said.
Again, in medicine, he who can produce a disease
is also best able to prevent one ?
Certainly.
And he is the best guard of a military position who
is best able to take it ?
Quite so.
Speaking generally, then, for I need not examine
all the arts separately, he who is best able to take
anything is also best at guarding, protecting, or
keeping it ?
He is.
But the best bowler is best at taking wickets, is
he not ?
Of course.
He is therefore best able to guard, keep, or protect
them?
iS4 AGYMNASTICUS.
True.
But is not he who is best able to guard or protect
the wickets the best batsman ?
Yes.
It seems, therefore, that the best bowler must also
be the best batsman ?
Yes, Socrates ; you are undoubtedly right.
And something more seems to follow, I said.
What is that ? he asked.
We admitted, I think, that the best bowler, being
the best at taking wickets, was also the best at guard-
ing or keeping them ?
We did.
But he who keeps the wickets is the wicket-keeper,
is he not ?
Yes.
And he who is best at keeping the wickets is the
best wicket-keeper ?
Certainly.
We must conclude, then, that the best bowler is also
the best wicket-keeper.
Indeed we must.
Not only, therefore, was I right in saying that the
Daemon is the best batsman ; but I may now add that
he is also the best wicket-keeper.
AGYMNASTICUS. 155
Yes, you are quite justified.
At this point Athletes, who had evidently been
listening with great impatience to our argument,
suddenly turned round upon me like a wild beast,
and seemed about to tear me in pieces; what nonsense
you are talking, Socrates! he exclaimed with an
oath why, the Daemon never took the wickets in
his life ; and, as for his being a good bat, it is only
very rarely that he makes a run.
Do not be angry with me, said I, as though terri-
fied ; I am only anxious to learn. Let me therefore
take your statements singly. Do you say that the
Daemon never took the wickets in his life?
I do.
And yet just now you declared that in this very
match he is taking all the wickets ! You do not treat
me fairly ; you are making fun of me.
Hereupon my friend only became more angry than
ever ; and made use of some very violent language.
When he had quite recovered his temper, I continued.
But I will forgive you that, I said, if you will treat
me more kindly in future.
Instead of answering me, Athletes pointed to a
young man in a many-coloured cap whose wicket the
Daemon had just captured, and said somewhat scorn-
156 AGYMNASTICUS.
fully : Of course they can do nothing, if they have
two minds about every ball, like that fellow there ?
You hardly speak correctly, I replied ; for surely
nobody has two minds, least of all a gymnast ; but
I quite see what you mean. That unfortunate youth
was indeed much perplexed; for while the spirited
part of his soul was urging him to advance and strike
the ball, the more timid or philosophical element
counselled him to stand still, and play it gently ; and
not knowing which to obey he failed utterly and was
bowled.
Yes, Socrates, he said ; you are right for once.
Speaking generally, I think you will also agree
with me, I said, that it is not advisable for the soul of
the same man to be affected in relation to the same
ball of the Daemon's, at the same time, in contrary
ways, especially when the ball is very near him.
Right again, he said ; a man so affected is bound
to be out, for the Daemon is always on the wicket,
being, I suppose, about the best bowler in the world.
Forgive me, my dear Athletes, I said, if I say
I cannot agree with your last remark. The Daemon
certainly bowls very straight, but I cannot call him
a good bowler. What do you think, Agymnasticus ?
Am I right ?
AGYMNASTICUS. 157
Probably you are, he replied, though I don't quite
see how.
That I can soon show you, I said, if you will allow
me. Let us again consider bowling, which we ad-
mitted to be an art, by the analogy of the other arts.
By all means, he said.
We see at once, I said, that each art as such
considers not its own interest, but rather the interest
of that which is the subject of it.
I do not quite understand, he said.
For instance, the art of medicine as such does not
consider the interest of medicine, but the interest of
the body ?
True, he said.
And the lawyer's art considers the interest not of
the lawyer, but of his client ?
Certainly.
And the scout cares always not for his own interest,
but for his master's ?
Invariably, he said; I think I see your meaning
now.
Very well, I said ; then whose interest should the
bowler consider ? Who is the subject of the bowler's
art?
The bowled at, I suppose, he said.
158 AGYMNASTICUS.
Yes, I said ; or, in other words, the batsman. It
follows, then, that the bowler as such will consider
the interests of the batsman, and will bowl such balls
as will please him ?
It does.
But what sort of balls will please the batsman
most?
I have not the slightest idea, he said.
Well, I said; can you imagine anything more
delightful for a batsman than a half- volley to the off?
No, I cannot, he replied.
Unless it be a full-pitch to leg.
Yes, perhaps we ought to make that exception.
It follows, then, that the bowler as such will bowl
only half-volleys to the off and full-pitches to leg, and
that he is the best bowler who bowls most of such
balls.
That seems to me perfectly reasonable, he said.
Again, will a good bowler ever bowl a straight
ball ? Surely he will not ; for by so doing he may
perhaps strike the batsman's wicket, and so make
the subject of his art worse than he was before
instead of better a thing which no true artist would
ever do.
I quite agree, he said.
AGYMNASTICUS. 159
Verily, Agymnasticus, I said, glorious is the power
of the art of dialectic, which has brought us to such
a conclusion as this. Perhaps the wits will laugh at
us when we tell them that the best bowlers do not
bowl straight ; but we shall speak our minds never-
theless, begging of these gentlemen for once in their
life to be serious. And when one of these cunning
and deceptive bowlers like the Daemon here comes
to our city and wishes to make a public display of his
talents, shall we allow him to do so, or think of ad-
mitting him to our eleven ?
Certainly not, he said.
No, I said, we certainly shall not ; but we shall tell
him that he may be a very good batsman and a very
good wicket-keeper, but that he is certainly not a
good bowler, as we have already proved.
Quite so.
And if he is still unconvinced, we might add another
argument, I think.
What is that ? he asked.
He would admit, I suppose, that that which par-
takes of reality and has .the faculty of knowledge
corresponding to it, is of a superior nature to that
which is unreal and is only the subject of opinion or
ignorance ?
160 AGYMNASTICUS.
Of course he would.
Now the subject-matter of ignorance is not-being,
is it not ?
Yes, he said.
And what kind of not-being are the batsmen and
bowler concerned with ? The no-ball, is it not ?
Certainly.
Of the no-ball, then, the batsman is entirely ig-
norant ?
Yes.
Similarly, he is in a state of opinion with regard to
those balls which seem to roll about midway between
being and not-being, and to play double, as the saying
is, creating but a confused blur of sensation which
the perplexed soul cannot discriminate.
Yes, he said ; and it is in this state of mind that
our young men seem to be to-day with respect to the
Daemon's bowling.
Yes, I said ; and he very rarely bowls the best and
most real kind of ball that, I mean, of which the
batsman can have perfect knowledge.
Very rarely indeed, he said.
We should tell him then, that, as for the most part
he bowls balls as to which the batsman can only be
in a state of opinion, and occasionally even no-balls
AGYMNASTICUS. 161
of which they are bound to be ignorant, but very
rarely the complete and perfect ball the full-pitch
and the like of which there is perfect knowledge, he
is therefore not a good bowler.
If, then, he comes to our city, and wishes to be
admitted to our Eleven, we will fall down and worship
him as a sacred and admirable and charming person ;
but we must also tell him there is no place for him
in our Eleven, for we prefer the simple honest bowler
who considers the interests of the batsman and does
not deceive him. And so having anointed the
Daemon with myrrh, and set a garland upon his
head, and perhaps entertained him at dinner, we
shall send him away to another city. For we mean
to employ only the simple honest bowler who con-
siders the interest of the batsman and does not
deceive him.
Here Athletes interrupted me, and said with a
laugh (for he had now quite recovered his temper),
I hope, Socrates, I may be allowed to play against
your eleven of honest bowlers when you have made
it up ; it would be great fun. But I rather think, to
use one of your own phrases, that, though the model
of such an eleven may be laid up in heaven, we are
not likely to see a copy of it on earth.
M
1 62 AGYMNASTICUS.
It was now my turn to be angry, so turning to
Agymnasticus I told him it was time to go.
By all means, he said, for I was just thinking,
Socrates, that my state of mind with respect to the
subjects in which I am to be examined is rather
one of opinion than of knowledge, and a little more
study would do me no harm.
Probably not, I said ; and taking him by the arm
I led him away, leaving Athletes convulsed with
laughter, and evidently thinking he had done some-
thing very wonderful.
C. T.
FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE
(With apologies to MR. T. L. PEACOCK)
Between the eminent historians, MR. OMNIUM GATHERUM and
MR. HOBTOASTER, and MR. PITIABLE PEDANT.
Mr. Om. Gath. You will find that modern Oxford
regards these questions from a broader and more
liberal point of view.
Mr. P. P. Be kind enough, my dear Omnium, to
have compassion upon the infirmity of my under-
standing, and employ some other phrase. I have
had the Endowment of Research from the broad
point of view, and the Boards of Study from a
broader point of view, and Female Education from
the very broadest point of view, until, I must frankly
own, amid this kaleidoscopic variety, I sometimes,
perhaps irrationally, sigh for a fixed point of view.
But pray continue with what you were saying.
Mr. Om. Gath. I was saying that we want for
those who study Modern History a more satisfactory
course than is afforded by the Classical Moderations.
For the Final Honour School of Modern History
M 2
164 FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE.
we require a previous course of training in Greek
and Latin authors
Mr. P. P. Dear me, you surprise me !
Mr. Om. Gath. in order that our students
may acquire methodical habits of thought and pre-
cision, and facility of expression. The mass of facts
they have to master is great, the authorities they
must consult are numerous, and therefore they re-
quire previous practice in the selection, the arrange-
ment, and the analysis of materials. The study of
original authorities should be one of the most
valuable parts of the Modern History course, and
therefore the student must not be a novice in the
study and appreciation of the spirit and contents of
works written under different conditions of thought
and civilisation, and in a different language.
Mr. P. P. Most excellently put ! I had scarcely
expected such a line of argument from you. Surely,
Hobtoaster, you must applaud sentiments so just,
expressed in language so refined. It is the very
spirit of classical study.
Mr. Hob. Certainly; but are not these advan-
tages to be obtained under the present Honour
Classical Moderations?
Mr. Om. Gath. We are considering a special class
FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE. 165
of men, too able to bring their proud spirits down to
the level of Pass Moderations, but yet, whether from
deficiency of scholarship or maturity of intellect,
unable to take their place in the treadmill of Classical
Moderations.
Mr. Hob. But if the training be so valuable these
men should surely make an effort. They have not
been sufficiently drilled in scholarship : let them then
learn the drill. They have not proved the armour of
scholarship : then let them march with the smooth
stones from the brook of Bohn.
Mr. P. P. Gentlemen, gentlemen, a little more
sobriety in the use of metaphor. What with tread-
mills, and training, and drill, and brooks, I really
. But pray go on. Let Omnium develop his
scheme. The men you speak of, Omnium, have
souls above Greek and Latin, and are deficient in
scholarship, yet you wish them to obtain all the
advantages of a long classical training within a
limited period, and to receive first-class honours for
their pains. It is a most devout hope, Omnium, but
my sagacity has never yet discovered any way of
getting a tree to grow without first planting it, or of
becoming a man without having first been born into
this miserable world. But pray continue.
166 FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE.
Mr. Om. Gath. I, and those who think with me,
regard this proposed Preliminary Honour Examina-
tion as a substantive portion of the Final Examination ;
we have therefore chosen a list of authors different
to that selected for the Classical Moderations.
Mr. Hob. You have got off Latin prose, but the
number of Classical books is much the same in both
lists. You have limited the amount of Homer,
Cicero and Demosthenes; and Claudian, Ammianus
and Sidonius have taken the place of Virgil, Horace
and the Greek dramatists.
Mr. P. P. O admirable consummation ! the moun-
tain has indeed laboured to some purpose. Not one
mouse only, but three. You have provided admir-
ably for those methodical habits of thought, that
precision and that facility of expression on which you
justly laid such stress. The poets of Augustus yield
to the panegyrist of Stilicho and the last of Rome's
Latin historians, while the glories of the dramatists
of Attica pale before the imperial splendours of Sido-
nius Apollinaris.
Mr. Om. Gath. He is indeed an admirable author.
So also are Claudian and Ammianus Marcellinus.
Strabo too is very tasty in parts.
Mr. P. P. If they had only written in either
FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE. 167
Greek or Latin ! I must own that I prefer the purity
of the Attic dialect even to the rich variety of the
KOIVT], and the diction of the Augustan age to the best
efforts of the " infima Latinitas "
Mr, Hob. Now, Pitiable, I must really protest. I
am bound on this point to make common cause with
Omnium. A truce to this pedantry. In modern
Oxford we look at things from a far broader stand-
point: we read the ancient authors for the sake of
what they convey and not as a mere linguistic study,
or a peg for grammatical disquisitions.
Mr. P. P. And yet linguistic study and gram-
matical analysis are perhaps an aid to those
methodical habits of thought and that precision
on which both you and Omnium justly lay such
stress.
Mr. Hob. I will never admit it. Now take our
present Classical Honour Moderations. Our students
read, -besides their special books, the poems of Homer
and Virgil and the speeches of Demosthenes and
Cicero
Mr. P. P. Do they? It must be the Under-
graduates who do so, because I have met some of
their tutors who have not read all these.
Mr. Hob. And I am in favour of adding to
168 FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE.
this list the Politics, Poetics, and Rhetoric of Aristotle
most valuable treatises you must admit and the
works of Caesar and Herodotus. We must read
these works as literature and not as puzzles in
language. We may not be minute or accurate
grammarians
Mr. P. P. Why, no !
Mr. Hob. (continuing) but we will be scholars
in the sense in which Macaulay defined a scholar, as
"a man who could read Greek and Latin with his
feet on the hob."
Mr. P. P. Bless my soul, Hobtoaster, you don't
really say so "with his feet upon the hob? " And
could Macaulay actually do this? I could too if I
resolved to pass over all the hard passages
Leaving vocabular ghosts undisturbed in their Lexicon limbo,
and
Into the great might-have-been upsoaring sublime and ideal.
You rather remind me of the youth who believes
that all grammarians, from Dionysius Thrax to Dr.
Rutherford, only lived and wrote for the sake of
tormenting boys. Take my word for it, Hobtoaster,
without knowing your verbs or your particles or your
constructions, or attending to grammatical analysis or
FRAGMENT OF A DIALOGUE. 169
the distinction between subject and predicate and
object, you will make sorry work of your Greek and
Latin, even "with your feet upon the hob." What
has become of the methodical habits of thought and
the power of accurate analysis on which you and
Omnium justly laid such stress ? Is this all the choice
that is left me ?
tvOfv ycip 2/n5\\77, (Tfpcadi 8J 5ta Xapv/35ts
a quotation which, I hope, I have made with some
servile approach to grammatical accuracy. On the
one side the Scylla of Macaulay with his feet upon
the hob, and on the other the Charybdis of Omnium
with his Sidonius Apollinaris.
Thanks Hobtoaster and gentle Omnium,
Thanks Omnium and gentle Hobtoaster.
Mr. Om. Gath. The most important, and to my
mind final, argument has not yet been stated for my
view of this matter, and that is, that this preliminary
examination is a first step to the establishment of the
great truth of the Unity of History which
[Exeunt, running at great speed, Mr. Pitiable Pedant
and Mr. Hobtoaster.}
Explicit Dialogus.
K.
A,
KE ROY ALL VISITE.
NOWE I shall tell ye of a greate mattere and let
everie one that redeth these thinges think the higher
of me, for I which write have seen the Kyng's Son.
This same gracious Prince did visite Oxenforde the
whiles I sojourned there, the occasion of which
Honour to the Universitie I shall now set forth.
There dwelt in this Citie certain doctors, learned in
diverse strange Tonges, Sanscrit and Arabian, with
the Dialects of Indoostan and Cathaye. These same
desiring a place wherein they might get their learn-
ing the more privilie and teach it without let from
any man, set to and bilded untoe themselves a lyttel
house in a sweete corner, at the mingling of the
Street of the Holie Well and the way which is called
Broade, nigh untoe the Library of Master Bodlie.
And when the bilding was nowe aboute half done
there cometh the Kyng's Son to laye the Foundation.
For in this Countrie the Kyng's Sons be no idle
Roysterers, but all their joye and course of lyfe is to
laye stones and bild houses : nor may any man bild
YE ROY ALL VISITE. 171
hym an house unlesse the Kyng's Son laye the first
stone. Onlie, if the Kyng's Son be distracted of
much Bissinesse, then may they begin, and anon he
cometh and putteth hym in a stone, and setteth seal
upon the bilding. Which is what was done here.
In this countrie alsoe be there two sortes of Masons,
and the mannere of the twain is this. The one be
laborious and swettie folk and are of none account,
but the others do no work and be held in much
honour : and because they do no work therefore be
they called Free Masons. These saye that theye
kepe certaine greate and dreade secrets the which if
common men should knowe the Devil would be let
loose upon the Earth. Alsoe they say that these
secrets be revealed untoe no man except they first
torture hym privilie, for the better ascertaining of
his Constancie, proddynge hym with heated pokeres
and frying hym over a gryllyng iron. But others
saye they be lyttel more than knaves, having no
secretes. And indeed as concerning the pokere I
myself am not over confident, for the Masons which
I beheld were all stoute men and whole.
Nowe on a certaine daye these fellowes were
gathered together on the toppe of that house with
great ladies and dignities, there being present alsoe
i 7 2 YE ROY ALL V1SITE.
certaine men, Princes, of a swarthie colour wearing
raiment of gold and silver. And none wotted who
these were, but the wiser sorte said they were
Sanscrits. All being readie and my Lords the
Chauncellor and Vyce-Chauncellor being come to
their seats, there ascended the Masons conveying
the Kyng's Son amid much ioyeful booing and
cheering of the meaner sorte which were gathered
together belowe. Alsoe certain yonge Clerkes
leaving their bookes made greate jollitie in the
windows of the houses round about. But these
were lazie lads, and on the morrow were whipped
solemnly by my Lord the Vyce-Chauncellor for their
idlesse. The Prince was a ful grave and semelie
man to look upon and was girt about with a fair
gold apron, and over hys shoulders he wore a red
Doctor's gown, as a sign of hys great learning. He
then being sat down, up iumpes my Lord the Vyce-
Chauncellor and says me certaine lyttel psaumes :
alsoe he prayede somewhat. And after the Singing
Men had sung an hymn, but faintlie, the Kyng's Son
being brought to the place where the stone was, and
having hung thereon a writing in bronze, bade one
praye. Then the priest of the Free Masons prayede
to their gods : nowe the Masons have two gods : the
YE ROYALL VISITE. 173
one is called labez and the other Boaz. When
this praying was ended my Lord the Prince
scattered graine, with good oil and wine upon
the stone and daubed it deftlie with mortere, and
under it he set a Bottel in an hole : and in the
Bottel (so told me one that saide he knewe) were
manie curious charmes: soap made of peares
for easy shaving, and a spelle whiche a certaine
cunning woman brought from Mexico for the better
adorning of olde haires, and a papere which is called
Ye Tymes, and is more soughte after in that countrye
than anye other : of thys papere one told me that it
is alsoe entitled Ye Pynqun. And when my Lord
the Prince had set the stone in hys place there was
given untoe hym the trowel wherewith he layede that
stone, being of silver and curiously carved. For the
Kyng's Son ever taketh with hym the trowel where-
with he layeth, and this is what is called the Kyng's
prerogatyve. Of these trowels he hath in hys Palace
fourtie and nine thousand, five hundrede and seventie-
three : so industrious is he. Then my Lord the Arch-
bishop essayed hys turn at prayer, if perchance he
should prevaile bettere than the reste ; and after that
he was done the Clerkes sang again, this tyme the
National anthem, for soe they call this hymn for the
i 7 4 YE ROY ALL VISITE.
Kyng and Queene. Nowe it being lawe that all do
uncover whiles this hymn is sung, and the wind then
blowing freshly, there was great ducking and dabbing
of heads and blowing about of grey haires, while one
cries "Alack my bald pate, what a rheum will have
me," and a second, "God save my wig for I think it
is cleane gone," and a third cursed bitterlie. All
being finished, the nobler sorte departed to eat with
my Lord the Vyce-Chauncellor. And of this feaste
I saye no more, for I might not entere, though my
bellie pynched me sore ; but one may think what con-
sumption of tortoys soupe was there, and of salmon
fish cookede in a yellow messe, what bibbyng of wines
and brandies. And in the evening, my Lord the
Prince being returned, there went about the streetes
many both of the Clerkes and of the Towne boyes, and
brake one another's heades for ioye of the Kyng's
Son's coming : for this is the way of that people when
they be glad.
MENDAX.
THE NON-PLACET SOCIETY'S ANNUAL
DINNER, 1888.
MENU.
POTAGES.
Consomm6 du conseil hebdomadal.
Puree de nid de jument.
POISSONS.
Poisson d'Avril, sauce reactionnaire et clericale.
Concierge marie (rechauffe) a la Clifton.
ENTRIES.
Hachis de reputations perdues.
Langues modernes sautees.
Cervelle de sp^cialiste.
Rons.
fipaule froide a la nouvelle ecole.
Piece de resistance a Freeman.
LEGUMES.
Choux-fleur du systeme-Parc.
Champignons a la reve utopienne.
Pommes de terre aux sciences naturelles.
i;6 THE NON-PLACET SOCIETY.
VOLAILLE.
Canard a la calamity nationale.
BORE'S HEAD.
ENTREMETS.
Trifle ill-considere'e.
Compote de 1'histoire unifiee.
(Eufs a la Hatch.
Devilled Professors on toast.
Fromage.
Dessert.
Cigares Intimidads.
Cigarettes Flor fina de podsie professoriale.
Tabac Pelham noir.
THE NON-PLACET SOCIETY. 177
The proceedings were private, but the following selection of Music
is understood to have been performed during the evening :
OVERTURE . . La Vie de College.
SONG . " A Bachelor once with his feet on the hob."
GAVOTTE . . Pas des reactionnaires.
SONG . . "Hey, nonny, nonny? non !"
FINALE. . Marche triomphale retrograde.
God save the Vice-Chancellor.
L ENVOY.
IT is but rarely that those who, by no fault of their
own, have from time to time become responsible for
the conduct of this paper, have spoken of themselves.
Editors have changed so much may be admitted
but the qualities of each have been absorbed and
assimilated in the vigorous process of organic growth :
the transparent honesty of the first, the serene im-
peccability of the second, the sombre enthusiasm of
the third, have been but manifestations of a force
and an energy which has been developed, and not
transformed, in the lofty indifferentism of the fourth
or the suave integrity of the fifth. It is not only
nov