My gate wide open, and my heart sincere;
Within these walls, for him I spend my store.
But thieves, away! on you I close my door."
Anon.
Honorary Degrees (Vol. viii., pp. 8. 86.).—The short note of C. does not elucidate—if, indeed, it touches upon—the matter propounded. It was stated, whether correctly I know not, that honorary doctors created by diploma (reference being made to the Duke of Cambridge, and one or two other royal personages) would have the distinctive privilege of voting in Convocation. It then occurred to me that Johnson—whose Oxford dignity was conferred in 1776, by special requisition of the Chancellor, Lord North (his M.A. degree had been, I judge, likewise by diploma)—is not mentioned by Boswell or Croker, as having on any occasion exercised the right referred to. Did he possess that right? and, if so, was it ever exercised? The frequency of his visits to Oxford, and the alleged rigid adherence to academical costume, make the question one of some interest: besides, in regard to a person so entirely sui generis, and upon whose character and career so much minuteness of biographical detail has been bestowed, it is not a little remarkable how many points are almost barren of illustration.
M. A.
"Never ending, still beginning" (Vol. viii., p. 103.).—See Dryden's Alexander's Feast, l. 101.
F. B—w.