Nuts to crack; or Quips, quirks, anecdote and facete of Oxford and Cambridge Scholars

"Soon after the death of my father," says this learned prelate, in his Autobiography, published in 1816, "I was sent to the university, and admitted a sizer of Trinity College,...

Insomuch," continues Fuller, "that for his good disputing, and excellent acting, in the tragedy of _Dido_, she bestowed on him a pension of 20 lib. a year; whilst Cartwright rec...

OTWAY was bred at St. John's College, Cambridge. But though his tragedies are still received with "tears of approbation," he lived in penury, and died in extreme misery, choked,...

was Archbishop Tillotson. In the great dining-room of Lambeth Palace, he says, there are portraits of all the Archbishops, from Laud to the present time, in which may be observe...

A learned living oriental scholar, and a senior fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, who thinks less of journeying to Shiraz, Timbuctoo, or the Holy Land, than a Cockney wou...

"This carol (says Warton,) with many alterations, is yet retained at Queen's College, Oxford," though "other ancient carols occur with Latin burthens or Latin intermixtures." Bu...

Whose very name conjures up the spirits of ten thousand wits, holding both sides, over a copus of Trinity ale and a classical pun, would not only frequently "steal a few hours f...

With ass's ears on his head,--a thing that Tom would 'in perpetuam rei memoriam,' record and never have done with. Wilson, in his _Memorabilia Cantabrigiæ_, says of this said To...

The family of the Spintexts have, it appears, very lately put forth a _scion_, in the person of a learned divine, a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, who, being appointed a...

The first, it is well known, vacated his fellowship, and left himself pennyless, rather than subscribe to the _Thirty-nine Articles_, from which there is no doubt he conscientio...

And they are sure to miscalculate whenever they inter-meddle with such matters, declined entering her two sons at Cambridge in the same year, that, as she said, "They might not...

But although many men of this class are not gifted with that species of perception suited to mathematical studies, however desirable it may be that the mind should be subject to...

When Gray produced his famous Ode for the installation of his patron, the late Duke of Grafton, a production, it is observed, which would have been more admired, had it "not bee...

Are recorded of the famous Cantab and Etonian, the Rev. George Harvest, B.D., who was one day walking in the Temple Gardens, London, with the son of his patron, the great Speake...

Alison Pearson.--Janet Grant and Janet Clark, 1828.--John Cunningham, 1590.--Agnes Sampson, 1591.--John Fien, 1591.--Euphan M'Calzene, 1591.--Patrick Lawrie, 1606.--Margaret Wal...

"She is the consummator of that undefinable species of wit, which we should call (if we did not know the word might be deemed offensive, in which sense we do not mean it) the _s...

But whoever would possess themselves of the true history of the _swapping mallard_ of All-Souls, must read the "_Complete Vindication of the Mallard of All-Souls_," published in...

Though I intend this preface, prelude, or proem shall occupy but a single page, and be a _facile_ specimen of the _multum in parvo_ school, I find I have so little to say, I mig...

Is now fast falling into _forgetfulness_, though there was a time when he was hailed by Granta's choicest spirits, as one who never failed to "set the table in a roar." Poor Jem...