Oxford [February 1835]

It was in winter, and in the wintry weather in l803, that the author first entered Oxford with a view to its vast means of education, or rather with a view to its vast advantages for study. A ludicrous story is told of a young candidate for clerical orders—that, being asked by the Bishop’s chaplain if he had ever ‘been to Oxford,’ as a colloquial expression for having had an academic education. Those who know Oxford are aware of the peculiar feelings which have gathered about the name and pretensions of Christ Church; feelings of superiority and leadership in the members of that college, and often enough of defiance and jealousy, on the part of other colleges. The reader must understand that, with rare exceptions, all the princes and nobles of Great Britain, who choose to benefit by an academic education, resort either to Christ Church College in Oxford, or to Trinity College in Cambridge: these are the alternatives.