Morning thoughts: Conjectures and expectations. A specimen of Oxford manners, being another new lesson

Left by myself on the morrow, and revolving in my mind the events of the preceding day, I had occasional doubts, which had I suffered them to prevail, would have been exceedingly mortifying. The young lady was certainly a beautiful lady: was modest too, and well bred. I had seen nothing to impeach her virtue: on the contrary, it had been the principal topic of our discourse. 'Tis true I had, as became me, been too respectful to put her chastity to any proof. I was not so discourteous a knight.

But then, that she should have been so intimate as she appeared to be with those gentlemen sharpers, that she should be going the same road, that she should lose her purse in so odd a manner, and that she should accept my ten guineas, were circumstances that dwelt irksomely upon my mind. Yet it was totally improbable that so sweet a young creature should be trammeled in vice. What! be the companion of such men, relate a string of falsehoods, give a forged draft on a banker, and even shed tears at distress which, if it were not real, was a most base and odious artifice? That she could act so cunning and so vile a part, and I not detect her, was wholly incredible. I was very unwilling to imagine I could be so imposed upon, so duped. A raw traveller? If so, raw indeed! Of all suppositions, that was the most humiliating. I endeavoured but in vain to banish suspicion. In fine, whatever might be the cause, which I could not very well develope, I found the soliloquies of the morning by no means so fascinating as the visions of the preceding evening.

Wearied of this subject, I turned my thoughts into a new channel, and endeavoured to conjecture what Oxford was, and what kind of people were its inhabitants. I had heard it described, and remembered the leading features; its expansive streets, aspiring turrets, noble buildings, and delightful walks. The picture rose to magnificence; but the wisdom learning and virtue of its sages, and their pupils, were still more sublime. High minded and noble youths, thirsting after knowledge, assembled under the auspices of philosophers whose science was profound, and whose morals were pure. The whole fabric rising in beautiful order: under-graduates, bachelors, masters, doctors, professors, presidents, heads of colleges, high stewards, and chancellors, each excelling the other in worth as in dignity! Their manners engaging, their actions unblemished, and their lives spent in the delightful regions of learning and truth. It must be the city of angels, and I was hastening to reside among the blest! A band of seers, living in fraternity, governed by one universal spirit of benevolence, harmonized by one vibrating system of goodness celestial! Among such beings evil and foolish men could find no admittance, for they could find no society.

Theology too would here be seen in all her splendour; active energetic and consolatory; not disturbed by doubt, not disgraced by acrimony, not slumbering in sloth, not bloated with pride, not dogmatical, not intolerant, not rancorous, not persecuting, not inquisitorial; but diffusing her mild yet clear and penetrating beams through the soul, where all could not but be light and life and love!—Oh Oxford, said I, thou art the seat of the muses, thou art the nurse of wisdom, thou art the mother of virtue!—I own my expectations were high.

My reveries concerning my old companion, Hector, were in the same tone. I had heard that he had often been down at Mowbray Hall, during vacation time; but the mutual interdiction of our families had prevented our meeting. He cannot but be greatly altered, said I. It is impossible he should have remained so long in this noble seminary, and continue the same selfish, sensual, and half-brutal Hector Mowbray, whom formerly I knew. I regretted our quarrel: he might now have become an agreeable companion, perhaps a friend. Olivia, too?—She had a sister's partiality for him before; she might now love him infinitely, and justly.

While I sat ruminating, the coach continued rolling onward over hill and dale, passing house, hedge row and heath, till the towers and turrets of Oxford came in view. My heart bounded at the sight, and active fancy industriously continued her fictions. We entered the city and drove clattering along to one of the principal inns.

The moment the coachman pulled up, I stepped out of the carriage and into the street. It was the eve of a new term; the gownsmen were swarming, carriages and horsemen post haste were arriving, the bells were ringing, waiters and footmen were hurrying to and fro, and all was dazzle, all was life. Eager to mingle in the scene, I walked up and down the high street, saw college after college, hall after hall, and church after church. The arches the pillars the quadrangles rose in incessant and astonishing succession. My eyes turned from building to building, gazing with avidity, adding wonder to wonder, and filling the mind with rapture. 'It is all that I had imagined,' said I, 'and much much more! Happy city, happy people, and happy I, that am come to be one among you! Now and now only I begin to live.'

Fearful of bewildering myself in this fairy land, I turned back to the inn, but continued gazing with new amazement at every step. Just as I came to the gate, I heard the galloping of horses behind me, looked round, and there most unexpectedly saw Hector Mowbray, pulling up his horse, with two livery servants, three grey-hounds, and a brace of pointers at his heels! He had new boots, buckskin breeches, a buff waist-coat, a scarlet coat with a green collar, and a gold button and loop, tassel, and hat-band. I was within a yard of him when he alighted. 'Bless me,' said I, 'Mr. Mowbray?'—'G—— d—— my blood! Trevor! Is it you?'

The apostrophe startled me.

Hector gave three loud cracks with his whip, whistled his dogs, and with a Stentor voice called after one of his servants—'Why holloa! You blind blood of a w——! Why Sam! G—— shiver your soul, what are you about? Uncouple Jerry Sneak and Jowler, and give limping Jenny's ear a 'nointing—D—— my body, Trevor, I'm glad to see you! When did you arrive? How did you come? In stile; a chaise and four; smoking the road; raising a mist?'—I was ashamed of my stage-coach vehicle and was silent.—'What, my buck, are you to be one of us?'—'I am'—'D—— my b—— that's right—Jack Singleton! Jack! G—— blunder your body! Why don't you answer, you shamble shanked beggar's baby? Go to the Bursar, and tell him to send supper for six and claret for sixteen; served up to a minute. Do you hear?—D—— my body, I'm glad to see you! We'll make a night ont! What, are you come to enter at our college?'—'Yes'—'D—— my soul, I'm glad ont! D——n me, our college will be the go! D——n me, we are a rare string already! D——n me, we shall beat them all hollow, D——n me, now you're come, d——n me: we shall, d——n me!—Holloa! Sam! Run, you blood of a w——! yonder's Lord Sad-dog turning the corner in his phÆton, four in hand: scamper away and tell him, d——n me, he must sup with me to night. Tell him by G—— he must; he and the jolly dog his tutor. Tell him we have a new comer, a friend, a freshman, piping hot, d——n me, from our village; and that we must make him free of Oxford to night, d——n me. Do you hear?'

Astound, breathless, thunder-struck, at this intolerable profaneness, I stood like an idiot, unable to speak or think. Hector took hold of my arm and dragged me along. I obeyed, for I was insensible, soul-less; and even when the return of thought came, it was all confusion. Was this Oxford? Were these its manners? Were such its inhabitants? Oaths twenty in a breath, unmeaning vulgar oaths; ribaldry, such as till that hour I had never heard!

What could I do? I was a stranger. Were they all equally depraved, and equally contemptible?—That, said I to myself, is what I wish to know, and I suffered him to lead me wherever he pleased.

He took me to inns coffee-houses and halls, to call on one companion and beat up for another. I saw the buildings; the architecture doubtless was the same, but the scene was changed! The beauties of Oxford were vanished! I was awakened from the most delightful of dreams to a disgusting reality, and would have given kingdoms to have once more renewed my trance. The friends of Hector, though not all of them his equals in turbulence profaneness and folly, were of the same school. Their language, though less coarse, was equally insipid. Their manners, when not so obtrusive, were more bald. They all cursed blustered and behaved with insolence in proportion to the money they spent, or the time they had been at the university. The chief difference was that those who were less rich and less hardened than he had less spirit: that is, had less noise, nonsense and swagger. But, though the scene was not what I expected, it was new, and in a certain sense enlivening, and my flowing spirits were soon at their accustomed height.

The president had been written to and I was expected at college, where, when we came and my arrival was announced, I found an apartment prepared for my reception. Passing through the common room, I saw a face which I thought I recollected. 'Is not that Turl?' said I to Hector—'Pshaw, d——n me, take no notice of such a raff,' replied he, and stalked away. I was too ignorant of college cant, at that time, to know that raff was the term of contempt for poverty.

As we passed through the quadrangle, the president, entering the gate, saw Hector in his scarlet green and gold, and without his gown and cap, and beckoned to him. Hector, to evade as I afterward learned what he expected, introduced me. The president eyed me for a moment, received me graciously, and desired me to call on him in the morning. He then asked Mowbray why he left his chamber in that dress, and without his gown? Hector answered he had only arrived the day before, had been to take a ride, and had mislaid his cap, which was not to be found; but he had a new one coming home in the morning. The president, after saying—'Well, Sir, I request I may not meet you in this manner again,' passed on. The story of the cap mislaid was a direct falsehood: the old and new cap were both in his chamber, for he had been trying them on and asking me which looked the best. Hector winked his eye, lolled his tongue, and said to me—'That's the way, d——n me, to hum the old ones.'

Supper time presently came, and Hector and his companions were assembled. Beside Lord Sad-dog and his tutor, there was a senior fellow, and a master of arts, all of our college and all of them the prime bucks of the place. My late high expectations of learning and virtue were entirely forgotten. There was novelty in every word they uttered; and I listened to their conversation with the most attentive ardour. Nor did I feel astonishment to hear that dogs, horses, gluttony, drunkenness, and debauchery were the grand blessings of life: Hector had prepared me to hear any thing with but little surprise. The Lord and the Squire gloried in braving and breaking the statutes of the college and the university; the tutor, fellow, and master of arts in eluding them. The history they gave of themselves was, that the former could ride, drive, swear, kick scoundrels, bilk prostitutes, commit adultery, and breed riots: the latter could cant, lie, act the hypocrite, hum the proctors, and protect their companions in debauchery: in gluttony drunkenness and libidinous thoughts they were all avowed rivals.

Hector descending to trifling vices, vaunted of having been five times in one week imposed (that is, reprimanded by set tasks) for having neglected lectures and prayers, and worn scarlet, green and gold; while the more heroic Lord Sad-dog told how he had been twice privately rusticated, for an amour with the bar-maid of a coffee-house whom he dared the vice-chancellor himself to banish the city. Fearful of being surpassed, they exaggerated their own wickedness and often imputed crimes to themselves which they had neither the opportunity nor the courage to commit.

That I might appear worthy of the choice group among whom I was admitted, Hector, by relating in a distorted manner things that had happened, but attributing to me such motives as he imagined he should have been actuated by had he been the agent, told various falsehoods of my exploits. I had too great a mixture of sheepishness and vanity to contradict him in such honourable society, and therefore accepted praise at which I ought to have blushed.

During supper, while they were all gormandizing and encouraging me to do the same, his lordship, addressing his tutor, asked—'D——n me, Jack, can you tell me why it was I took you into my pay? What the d—mn—t——n are you good for?'—'Tell you? To be sure I can! You will not pretend that, when you first came under my tuition, you were the man you now are? Who taught you to laugh at doctors, bully proctors, stare the vice chancellor out of countenance, and parade the streets of a Sunday in sermon time but I?'—'You!'—'Yes! I!'—'D——n my body, well said, Jack!' roared Hector. 'D——n me you are a good one! Go it! Keep it up! D——n me go it!' The tutor continued—'

Of whom did you learn to scout the gownsmen, cudgel the townsmen, kiss their wives, frighten their daughters, and debauch their maids but I? You were a mere tyro when I took you in hand; you did not so much as know how to throw in a knock down blow!'—'Why you lying son of a ——'

I must not repeat his lordship's reply, or the continuation of the dialogue; it was too gross to be read or written. I only intend the above as a short specimen of what lords' private tutors at universities sometimes are, and of the learning which their pupils sometimes acquire.

While at supper, I was continually plied to drink; each pledging me in turn; their intention being, as Hector had declared, to make me free: that is, as drunk as possible. I had not the courage to incur their ridicule by refusing my glass. Beside my spirits were raised, and my appetite, which travelling had increased, was good. My constitution too was strong; for it had been confirmed by exercise and a cheerful mind, and never injured by excess. For these reasons I stood their attacks far beyond their expectation, and my manhood received no little applause.

The night advanced, and they grew riotous. The lord and his tutor were for sporting the door of a glum: that is, breaking into the chamber of a gownsman who loves study. Hector vociferously seconded the motion, but the fellow and the master of arts cunningly endeavoured to keep them quiet, first by persuasion, and, when that was ineffectual, by affirming the students they proposed to attack sported oak: in plain English, barred up their doors. Had they been without the walls of the college, there would have been a riot; but, having no other ventilator for their magnanimity, they fell with redoubled fury to drinking, and the jolly tutor proposed a rummer round—'D——n me,' said Hector, 'that's a famous thought! But you are a famous deep one, d——n me!'

The rummers were seized, the wine poured out, and his lordship began with—'D—mn—t——n to the flincher.' Who should that be? I, the freshman? Oh, no! For that night, I was too far gone in good fellowship.

This was the finishing blow to three of us. Hector fell on the floor; his lordship sunk in his chair; and I, after a hurrah and a hiccup, began to cast the cat: an Oxford phrase for what usually happens to a man after taking an emetic. Happily I had not far to go, and the fellow and the master of arts had just sense enough left to help me to my chamber, where at day light next morning I found myself, on the hearth, with my head resting against the fender, the pain of which awakened me.