PAGE
[CHAPTER I.]
Gone to Oxford1
[CHAPTER II.]
An Oxford Sunday23
[CHAPTER III.]
The Freshman’s Term39
[CHAPTER IV.]
The Eights51
[CHAPTER V.]
The Long Vacation68
[CHAPTER VI.]
“The Flying Terms”77
[CHAPTER VII.]
A Reading Party88
[CHAPTER VIII.]
In the Thick of it120
[CHAPTER IX.]
The Close139
[CHAPTER X.]
Gown at Last149

OXFORD DAYS;
OR,
HOW ROSS GOT HIS DEGREE.

CHAPTER I.
GONE TO OXFORD.

There was a long discussion between the Vicar of Porchester and Mr. Ross, the lawyer, as they walked together after evening service to the vicarage. Frank Ross was just eighteen, the eldest of six brothers. He was still at school, but it was time for him to go to the University. Oxford had been chosen—not from any notion of superiority to Cambridge, but simply because of school and home associations. The difficulty was the choice of a college. The vicar—a well-to-do bachelor—an old Eton and Christ-Church man, advised his own college. But Mr. Ross was frightened. “Christ-Church” to him had ever been a terror, and meant waste of time and money, in the shape of cards, drink, and horse-flesh; and all the vicar’s eloquence could not shake his unfounded prejudice. The result of the discussion was that Mr. Ross decided to write to a friend at Oxford, settled there as a “coach;” and also to Mr. Rickards, a country doctor, with a family larger even than his own. The doctor’s answer was as follows:—

“Dear Ross,—My boy is going to Brasenose: at least, he goes up in May to try for a close scholarship. I can give you no advice, as I know nothing about the place. I sent him to the Hereford Cathedral School by a fluke some years ago; and as there are scholarships and exhibitions from the school to Brasenose, I am saved the difficulty of choosing a college.

“Yours truly,

“W. Rickards.”

The vicar explained that a “close” scholarship was, like other scholarships, a sum of money paid annually for four or five years as a prize, but differed from them in being confined to competition among boys from certain schools; and that the value of them varied from 45l. to 80l. per annum, part being paid in money, and part made up in allowances in the way of diminished fees. The letter from the “coach” was more valuable:—