thing of bigotry, unmannerliness or
censoriousness, which then were in the zenith amongst some of the Heads
and Fellows of Colleges in Oxford." It is to be hoped that such
criticisms would not now be made on the manners of the senior members of
the University, and that in this respect Oxford has been reformed, to
the approval of all concerned.

While Wilkins was experimenting and philosophising in London, events had
been marching rapidly in England and in Oxford. In Wood's 'Life and
Times' is written the history of the city of Oxford, of the University
and of himself, from the day of his birth till his death in 1681. The
three histories are mingled in a quaint and incoherent fashion. Wood is
a chronicler like Aubrey, his friend, with whom he quarrelled, as
antiquarians and historians do. Both were industrious, uncritical,
and--Wood especially--sometimes venomous; both were vivid and
picturesque, keen observers, and had a wonderful power of saying much in
few words.

Antony Wood, the son of Thomas Wood, Bachelor of Arts and of Civil Law,
was born in 1632 at Oxford, where his father lived, in the Collegiate
parish of St John Baptist de Merton. He was educated at New College
School, in Oxford, and later at Thame Grammar School; was admitted into
Merton College at the age of fifteen as a "filius generosi," and became
Bible Clerk in 1650. When ten years old he saw the king, with his army
of foot, his two sons, Charles and James, his nephews, Rupert and
Maurice, enter Oxford after the battle of Edgehill. The incident was
impressed on his memory by the expulsion of his father from the house
in Merton Street, and the removal of the boys of New College School to
the choristers' chamber at the east end of the College hall, "a dark
nasty room, very unfit for such a purpose, which made the scholars often
complaine, but in vaine." From this time onward Wood, a clever and
observant boy, kept both his ears and eyes open, and accumulated from
all quarters materials for his narrative which covers fifty years, the
most interesting and important half century in the history of Oxford.

"Your orthodox historian puts
In foremost rank the soldier thus,
The redcoat bully in his boots
That hides the march of men from us."

The "redcoat bully," as Thackeray somewhat harshly calls him, figures
largely in the early pages of Wood's 'Life and Times,' but does not hide
the march of men. In August 1642, "the members of