[240] Wood’s Annals, sub anno 1568.
[241] The Visitors.
[242] From a table in Burrows’ Register of the Visitors (Camden Society), pp. 494-6, it may be calculated that the proportion of those who were expelled to those who remained was probably about four to one.
[243] My attention was directed to the rare book, which contains this account, by Mr. C. H. Firth of Balliol College. It is entitled The Private Memoirs of John Potenger, Esq., edited by C. W. Bingham, and was published by Hamilton, Adams & Co. in 1841.
[244] And yet, at the date of his admission, he was more than 16 years old. Even in the early part of the present century, there were many admissions of scholars younger than Potenger. John Keble, when admitted, was only 14 years 7 months old; his brother, Thomas Keble, 14 years 5 months; Thomas Arnold, 15 years 8 months; and R. G. Macmullen, who was admitted in 1828, was actually under 14, his age being 13 years 11 months. During the first thirty or forty years of this century, 15 and 16 were not uncommon ages for the admission of scholars at Corpus; and, in addition to the cases cited above, there were occasional instances of admission at 14. Even then, however, the age was most frequently 17 or 18.
[245] Memoirs of R. L. Edgeworth, Esq., in two vols., 1820. My attention was kindly directed to this book by the Rev. R. G. Livingstone of Pembroke College.
[246] That, in 1665, Monmouth resided in Corpus is distinctly stated by Wood [MS. D. 19 (3)]: “Sept. 25, 1665, the king and duke of Monmouth came from Salisbury to Oxon. … The king lodged himself in Xt Ch. … and the duke of Monmouth and his dutchess at C. C. Coll.” They probably continued in Corpus till Jan. 27 following, when “the king with his retinue went from Oxon to Hampton.” I am indebted to the Rev. A. Clark for this reference to Wood’s MS.
[247] Life of Archdeacon Phelps, Hatchards, 1871.
[248] The story of St. Frideswide and of the convent built in her honour is very fully and quaintly told by Anthony à Wood. See Wood’s City of Oxford (edit. Clark), vol. ii. p. 122.
[249] See Boase, Oxford, p. 3.