realities of the religious crisis. The Cambridge martyrs, one and all, died with a fortitude worthy of their cause; and many as have been the passages notable for their touching pathos which men of lofty nature have penned in the anticipation of death, the farewell to which Ridley gave expression, as his university and his ancient college of Pembroke, with its orchard walk, came back to his memory, is unsurpassed in its kind. In January 1557 another visitation of the university took place, the details of which have been preserved to us in a quaint and interesting account by John Mere, the registrary, and one of the esquire bedells of the university. They are chiefly noticeable as illustrations of the ceremonial and procedure observed by the visitors in carrying out their main object. One act, however, conspicuous from its wanton indecency and barbarity, cannot be altogether passed by. The remains of Bucer and Fagius were exhumed, chained like the bodies of living heretics to the stake, and publicly burnt on Market Hill.

The chief result of the visitation was a new body of statutes, generally known as those of Cardinal Pole. They were, however, designed to be only temporary, and proved in their actual result almost inoperative.

Dr. Caius refounds Gonville Hall, 1558.

From these and similar reactionary or vindictive measures, it is a relief to turn to the one act which, during the reign of Mary, conferred a real and permanent benefit on the university. This was the refounding of Gonville Hall by Dr. Caius, an eminent scholar and physician, who, by the practice of his profession, had acquired a considerable fortune. Although a Catholic, his

religious prejudices were tempered by long residence abroad, by a wide erudition, and by much observation of men and affairs. He had studied anatomy under Vesalius at Padua, and had himself taught Greek at that famous university. With many of the most eminent scholars of France and Germany he was personally well acquainted. Dr. Caius had received his Cambridge education at Gonville Hall, and by his munificence the college was now reconstituted so as to consist of a master, thirteen fellows, and twenty-nine scholars. Of the fellowships, three represented the original foundation of Edmund Gonville and Bishop Bateman, three the new foundation of Dr. Caius, while the remaining seven derived their endowment from the joint bequests of the other minor benefactors. Himself a native of Norwich, it was his design chiefly to assist Norfolk and Suffolk men; but in other respects the statutes which he gave to the college in 1572 were equally distinguished by liberality and good sense, although, indeed, many of the regulations with respect to general discipline and pastimes must appear, like those of St. John's and Trinity, singularly irksome to a later generation. The three gateways, of Humility, Virtue, and Honour, which adorned the new buildings, were designed by Dr. Caius himself, the last, in all probability, being in imitation of the ornamental designs of the silversmiths of Italy, with whose work he had become familiar during his residence in that country.

The royal favour, during the reign of Mary, was bestowed chiefly on Oxford; Trinity College, however, received a benefaction, and the building of its chapel

was commenced. The queen's death, succeeded within a few hours by that of Cardinal Pole, ushered in a new state of things, and with the acceptance of the chancellorship by Sir William Cecil, it was felt that a new era had begun, and that the period of mere reaction was at an end.

CHAPTER VII.

THE UNIVERSITY DURING THE ELIZABETHAN ERA.

Cambridge

able to the Reformation than Oxford.

THAT the larger share of patronage bestowed on Oxford during Mary's reign was the result of the greater degree of favour with which Cathomore favour- lic doctrines were there regarded admits of no question. The special reputations of the two universities had greatly changed since the time when Lydgate boasted that of heresie Cambridge bare never blame.' The fame of Oxford, as a great centre of theological science and speculation, had long ago departed; while Cambridge, as a home of Reformation doctrine, might rival Wittenberg or Marburg. John Burcher, writing to Bullinger a few months after Bucer's death, and recommending Musculus as his successor, intimates that 'the Cambridge men will not be found so perversely learned as Master Peter found those at Oxford.' By 'not so perversely learned,' he explains, it is his design to indicate that tendency to so-called 'heretical' doctrine evinced by the rising scholarship of the university, which it had been Gardiner's first aim to repress and trample out. It might well appear only natural that Elizabeth should have been inclined to regard with marked

C. H.

H

favour that university where the doctrines which she and her adherents supported found their earliest recognition and their ablest exposition in England. But the preference which she showed for Cambridge is really to be attributed to the good offices of William Cecil, an influence not less productive of abiding benefit to the university than had been that of Bishop Fisher with the Lady Margaret. It is to Cecil's wise counsel and judicious co-operation from without, combined with Matthew Parker's untiring and unselfish labours within, that we must, in a great measure, attribute the steady, although not altogether numbers in the uninterrupted, advance which the statistics of the university exhibit down to the close of the century,-an advance which may be broadly illustrated by a comparison of the number of those proceeding to the degree of B.A. in the academic year 1558-9 with that of the years 1570 and 1583. In the first-named year the number was only 28; in the latter years it was 114 and 277 respectively.

Increase of

university.

The return of the Marian exiles could hardly fail to be attended by circumstances of some difficulty. Return of the Their terms of expatriation had been passed Marian exiles. amid privations and sufferings which gave peculiar intensity to their sense of wrong; and their conduct, when reinstated in office in their own country, was too often such as to suggest that a desire for retaliation, to use no stronger term,-was their prevailing sentiment. They had also formed associations which affected not a little their theological sympathies. At Frankfort and at Strassburg, at Basel and at Zürich, they had received hospitality and aid which