Winchester College

“ In the High Street stands the graceful Perpendicular city cross. The county hall embodies remains of the Norman castle, and in it is preserved the so-called King Arthur's round table. This is supposed to date actually from the time of King Stephen, but the painted designs upon it are of the Tudor period.
Winchester is famous as an educational centre, and in addition to Winchester College there are several modern preparatory schools here. The College of St Mary, lying to the south of the cathedral close, is one of the greatest of English public schools. ”

“ Eton, like Winchester, has seventy scholars—"King's scholars," or "collagers," as they are called—who are chosen by competitive examination, and are supported by the funds of the foundation. Every year four or five of these are awarded scholarships at King's College, Cambridge, just as the best boys from Winchester go to New College, Oxford. The rest of the boys, as at Winchester, live under the care of masters in houses of about thirty-five boys each, scattered through the town, and are called "oppidans." ”

“ MANSFIELD, School-Life at Winchester College, p. 30. The eight senior præfects were said to have “full power,” and had some slight privileges not enjoyed by the remaining ten, who were generally called BLUCHERS.
1864. Blackwood, p. 86. The remaining eight college præfects (called in Winchester tongue, BLUCHERS) have a more limited authority, confined to Chambers and the Quadrangle.
1867. Collins, The Public Schools, p. 55. The remaining eight college prefects (called in Winchester tongue BLUCHERS) have a more limited authority, confined to chambers and the quadrangle ”

“ Winchester College is the first example of a boarding school, pure and simple. Collegiate churches had previously provided for the gratuitous instruction of scholars, but the real object of the establishment of a collegiate church was that divine worship should be rendered in an effective and dignified manner. Endowments had previously been provided for the feeding and lodging of scholars, but this was to be effected in connection with an existing charitable institution. ”

“ On his return to Christ Church he was appointed to a public tutorship by Gaisford (dean in 1831) , and was ordained deacon by Bishop Bagot of Oxford (21 Dec. 1834) . He did not proceed to the priesthood until six years later (13 Dec. 1840) .
Meanwhile, at midsummer 1835, he was elected second master of Winchester College. The mastership had never been held except by a Wykehamist. The office brought him an opportunity for the exercise of his special faculty of teaching and a valuable experience of management, involving the inner control of the ancient college and its seventy scholars. ”

“ The details of daily life at Winchester are not easy to understand. The "college," as, in fact, each of the "houses," is divided into chambers or "shops," as the boys call them. In each of these lives a community of say a dozen boys, over which three Prefects preside. The sleeping-rooms are locked up, except at night. In the study-room each boy has a desk, which he calls his "horse-box." The Prefects have tables, placed in commanding positions. ”

“ The interesting event of a vacancy having occurred at New College, whether by death, marriage, or the acceptance of a living, was announced by the arrival of “speedyman” at Winchester College. “Speedyman,” in conformity with immemorial usage, used to bring the news on foot from Oxford to Winchester. How well I remember the look of the man, as he used to arrive with all the appearance of having made a breathless journey, a spare, active-looking fellow, in brown cloth breeches and gaiters covered with dust. ”

“ The government of the school is very like that at Winchester. The Captain of the College has much the same duties as the Prefect of Hall, and is aided by the other best scholars. The oppidans have also a Captain, but he is under the Captain of the College. Besides this, the houses have each a Captain, as the Winchester houses, have Prefects. Of course it does not always happen that the man who leads his house in scholarship is man enough to rule the rest; but if he is not, the leading athletes step in and take matters into their own hands. ”

“ I am certain, however, that there is no school where, at the present day, the authorities take a more personal and careful interest in the moral and physical wellbeing of the boys; and this is rendered more practicable at Winchester than at most other public schools, owing to the number being limited to about two hundred, instead of being allowed to expand till it becomes rather a cluster of small schools than one solid establishment. ”

“ It was a real and serious examination, whereas that of candidates for admission to Winchester College was a mere form; and it was certainly a searching examination into the thoroughness with which schoolboys had done their schoolboy work. But the supposition that any New College man ever imagined his examination in election chamber to be of equal difficulty with the subsequent work at the university, or with that in the schools for honours, is an absolute proof that the person so{204} supposing never knew anything about them, or had come much into contact with them. ”

“ One small estate at Otterbourne was given by him to help to endow Winchester College, to which it still belongs.
Good men had come to think that founding colleges was the very best thing they could do for the benefit of the Church, and William of Waynflete, who was made Bishop of Winchester in 1447, founded another college at Oxford in honour of St. Mary Magdalen. To this College he gave large estates for its maintenance, and in especial a very large portion of our long, narrow parish of Otterbourne. ”

“ At both Winchester and New College the scholars are proud to call themselves Wykehamists; and when a fellow has been through both he is apt to tell you that he is a Wykehamist of the Wykehamists—which means more than you can ever understand until you hear and see a man say it. The first result of preparing boys to enter the university was to make them too far advanced for the teaching they found when they got there. To carry on their education Wykeham had to have a special body of tutors at New College. ”

“ The fine bold chalk hill which dominates the river valley to the South of Winchester, has memories of early Celtic days, of Cnut, and of the ancien régime at Winchester College. Round its summit is the ‘ring’ of the great refuge camp of præ-Roman days which it is estimated required some 3000 people to defend it. Cnut made a grant of ‘Hille’ and other lands to the old minster. On the summit there was once a pilgrimage chapel dedicated to St. Catherine. ”

“ Felstedian, Nov., p. 75, “A Day’s Fagging at Winchester.” The CANDLE-KEEPERS are the next in chambers to the præfects; generally fellows who have not much brains, but from having been a long time in the school, having a certain number of “juniors,” and are excused fagging and have certain minor privileges approaching those of a præfect.
Candlestick, subs. (Winchester) .—A humorous corruption of the word “candidate.”
c. 1840. Mansfield, School-Life at Winchester College, p. 175. ”

“ On a fine summer afternoon, the Doctor might accidentally cast his eye over School, and observing that it had rather a deserted expression, would send out the Bible Clerk and Ostiarius to make a foray in Meads, who would presently return with a flock of truants; it being impossible to flog such a number, [113] it was usual to make them “cut in a book,” [7] to settle which half-a-dozen should be distinguished in this manner.
SCHOOL.
The educational system at Winchester is, I believe, most excellent, and turns out a very superior article in many cases. ”

“ This fine the college paid willingly, complimenting the Prefects for their zeal and common-sense. The spirit which prompted both masters and pupils exists to-day, not only at Winchester, but at all public schools. The result is that not only is order maintained without ill feeling between masters and pupils, but the eighteen Prefects of each year learn to fill posts requiring unusual tact, common-sense, and courage.
The duty of a Prefect which an American would least envy is that of inflicting bodily punishment—"tunding," as it is called in Winchester slang. ”

“ ROLL—Any list of boys’ names. “The Roll” par excellence is the list of the boys who have passed their examination for New College, and of those who are to come in to Winchester. There is also a Roll printed every November, which contains the name of every one connected with the School, from the Warden to the Choristers. The lists from which the Præfects of Hall and Chapel called names ”

“ On 18 July 1770 he became a fellow of New College, and from about that period he seems to have held an assistant-mastership at Winchester College, and to have taken holy orders. Huntingford was for some time curate of Compton, near Winchester, and always retained an affection for the parish. ”

“ In 1832 he became organist of Winchester College, which post he continued to fill, in addition to that at the cathedral, until his death, which took place on 23 May 1849, at the age of 84. His wife Amelia and one child survived him, but the former died 16 March 1850,and is buried with her husband in the cloisters of Winchester College. ”

“ He was ordained deacon in 1857 and priest in 1858, and after a two years' experience in teaching Sixth Book at Winchester he was recalled to Oxford, where he still retained his fellowship, by the offer of a tutorship. Here he took a leading part in the series of reforms which threw New College open to scholars and commoners who had not been educated at Winchester, and he helped to amend the statutes so as to allow tutors and other college officers to retain their fellowships after marriage. ”

“ And it was reported among Wykehamists of an earlier generation than mine{131} that never was husband so severely ruled by a wife as the Bishop was by his sister-in-law. “Peace to his manes,” as old Cramer, the pianist, used to say, always pronouncing it monosyllabically, “mains”! His rule of Winchester College was a long and prosperous one; and as long as it lasted he was able to carry out his favourite maxim, “No innovation!” ”

“ After attending the grammar school at Bridport, he entered Winchester as a commoner in 1777, and before the end of the year was already in sixth book and fifteenth boy in the school. In 1778 he entered college, and next year was senior in the school; he gained medals for Latin verse and Latin essay (1778–9) , and was elected to New College in 1780, being second on the roll. ”

“ Besides this, he provided for a hundred poor men to be supplied daily with dinner. Bishop Toclyve, de Blois's successor in the see, added to the charity the feeding of yet another hundred poor men daily; and it has been said, on somewhat slight evidence, that the poorer scholars of Winchester College dined without fee in the "Hundred Men's Hall". ”

“ A splendid additional cricket-ground has been laid out adjoining the old Meads, which together make, I fancy, the finest playground attached to any school in the world.
The glories of the old Election week have altogether vanished. The election to Winchester is still in the middle of July; and there is a dinner in Hall on Domum Day, but there are very few old Wykehamists in attendance. The parents and tutors of the candidates for election muster strong for the examinations, which last three days ”

“ Mary's College and the cathedral at Winchester, and at New College, Oxford, originally founded as "St. Maries' College of Winchester at Oxenford", marks a very decided epoch in the development of English architecture. His works, in an architectural style found nowhere but in England, are the outcome of a mind free from triviality, and full of common sense. His buildings are admirably suited to their purpose, and at first sight they appear to be so simple in design that it has been suggested that Wykeham cared more for the constructive than the artistic side of building. ”

“ From the scholars of Winchester, when they had reached at least the age of fifteen years, and from them only the seventy scholars of “S. Marie College” were to be chosen by examination. A preference was given to the founder’s kin and the natives of certain dioceses. These young scholars, if they were not disqualified by an income of over five marks or by bodily deformity, entered at once upon the course in Arts, and, after two years of probation and if approved by examination, might be admitted true and perpetual fellows. ”

“ The oldest of all the schools is Winchester. Fellows at Andover sometimes tell you that their fathers and grandfathers went there before them. At Winchester this is a common case; and since the quadrangles of the college were built, there has been time not for one grandfather but for fifteen in a line. The prim and charming buildings look every day as old as they are ”

“ The Warden of Winchester was to be appointed by New College, and New College was also to have extensive powers of visitation.
In Wykeham’s day any separation of the religious element from other aspects of education would have been deemed impossible, and everything was cast in a religious and even semi-monastic mould. Nevertheless the organisations for the school and chantry were kept quite distinct, and while divine service was celebrated practically continuously by the chantry staff, the scholars were required to attend chapel services only on Sundays, saints’ days, or other festivals. ”

“ That he was a day-boy commoner at Winchester is possible, but seems unlikely. He was never claimed in his lifetime by either college as one of its alumni. That he was at Oxford, and probably a scholar at one of the grammar schools there, before passing on to the higher faculties, is shown by a letter of the chancellor addressed to him when provost of Eton (Ep. Acad. Oxf. Hist. Soc. i. 158) which speaks of the university as his “mother who brought him forth into the light of knowledge and nourished him with the alimony of all the sciences.” ”