[202] Neither the benefaction of Henry VII. nor his annual commemoration has any connection with the custom of singing a Latin hymn on the Tower at sunrise on May-day. Two accounts of the origin of this custom, which allege such a connection, have often been repeated and sometimes confused: (1) That Mass was formerly said at an early hour on May 1st upon the top of the Tower for Henry VII., and that the hymn is a survival from this service. (2) That the sum paid by the Rectory of Slymbridge to the College was intended for the maintenance of the custom of singing on the Tower. Of the first of these accounts it may be said that there is no evidence of any celebration of Mass on the Tower (a thing à priori highly improbable) at any time; and that the hymn, which now forms part of the College “Grace,” is probably a composition of the seventeenth century, and is certainly not part of the Requiem Mass according to the rite of Sarum, or any other rite. Of the second account it may be said that the deeds relating to Slymbridge show clearly that the payment was not intended for this purpose, to which it was never applied. The present custom of singing the hymn from the “Grace” originated, it is believed, in the last century on an occasion when the former custom of performing secular music on the Tower was interrupted by bad weather. The hymn was probably chosen as a substitute because the choir were perfectly familiar with its words and music. The details of the ceremony as it is at present performed were arranged about fifty years from the present time.
[203] The Tower was begun in 1492, and finished in 1507. The theory which ascribes to Wolsey the credit of being its designer rests on no secure foundation. At the time when it was begun he was not more than twenty-one years of age. The legend that he left Oxford in consequence of some misapplication of the College funds in connection with this work, is perhaps still less trustworthy. He was twice bursar during the progress of the building, being third bursar in 1498 and senior bursar in 1499-1500. In the former year he also held the post of Master of the College School, and was for some time absent from Oxford, acting as tutor to the sons of the Marquis of Dorset. The accounts for this year are preserved, and show no sign of any transaction of the kind alleged. The accounts of 1499-1500 are now lost; but it may be remarked that in 1500 Wolsey was appointed to the office of Dean of Divinity, which would hardly have been the case if the College had had reason to complain of his conduct as bursar.
[204] Some members of the College, including apparently several of those who had withdrawn at the accession of Mary, were ejected by Bp. Gardiner at a Visitation in 1553.
[205] There is an interesting brass in the College chapel bearing the effigy of President Cole, now concealed by the steps at the lectern.
[206] The elms now in the grove were planted soon after the Restoration, in 1661 or 1662. The walks round the meadow were laid out in their present shape rather later.
[207] Frewen was one of the few bishops who outlived the Commonwealth period. He was afterwards Archbishop of York. Warner, Bishop of Rochester, another of the bishops who returned from exile, was also a member of Magdalen College, and a considerable benefactor to its library.
[208] This organ is now, or was till quite lately, in the Abbey Church at Tewkesbury. Cromwell has left a curious memorial of his presence in a note written on the fly-leaf of a copy of Bp. Hall’s Treatises, still in the College Library.
[209] Spectator, No. 494.
[210] The names of those who returned are engraved on a cup known as the “Restoration Cup,” which is used as a “Grace-cup” in the Hall on the 29th of May. The same cup is used on the 25th of October to commemorate the Restoration of the President and Fellows, who were ejected in 1687, and restored just before the Revolution, on Oct. 25th, 1688. The same “toast” is employed on both occasions—Jus suum cuique.
[211] It has been related with some picturesque detail, but with substantial accuracy, by Macaulay: and it is more completely treated in the sixth volume of the publications of the Oxford Historical Society.