176 THE CHATEAU OF INDEPENDENCE. counter-signature of the Sergeant-Major in command, called technically 'BroadSergeant Major.' The numbers of course denote the total force of the insurgent army. It is indeed surprising that a body of over two hundred thousand strong should have been so totally defeated as to have left no enduring mark on the history of the University: we do not even know the means by which the plot was detected or overthrown, the only subsequent record of the event was a Grand Commemoration Ball, of which we read in an Oxford paper of the month of June, 1874. This Ball was a huge cannon-ball, probably modelled on those fired by the War Office Circular, built in commemoration of the suppression of the insurrection, and placed for view in one of the large buildings of the University where for many years later ladies and gentlemen of noble families used to meet on a certain day and dance around this Ball in memory of the escape of the rulers from the most imminent danger of wholesale massacre. THE CHATEAU OF INDEPENDENCE. Had gloomy-minded mortals heeded nought But in dull sloth their time to wear away, Had they, alone, the lap of Honours sought, Pleased on that pillow their thick heads to lay, Baotian brains had been our brains to- No humor e'er its palaces had raised, None e'er had sarcasm plied, nor censured been, nor praised. Gold Gamble's song had never stirred With tricks of metre round prosaic deeds; The wits of Château- Vert had puffed. Or amber mouth-pieces restrained their tongue : Our Robin's frolics choked in marshy meads, Our Friar strolled and laughed back wits among, Ne had our Little John his well tipped Dumb too had been our Much and Bland, Greenleaf, Scarlet, all of Sher- Those starry lights of humor that have blessed The grim old cloistered quads with playful flame, Had all been lost with such as have no name. Who then had marred men's comfort for their good? Who then had toiled Stupidity to shame ? Who in the public breach defiant stood, And for his Oxford's cause drawn many a dotard's blood? THE SHOTOVER PAPERS, Or, Echoes from Oxford. "Take thy correction mildly, kiss the rod."-SHAKESPEARE, Richard II., A. 5, Sc. 1. VOL. I. January 23rd, 1875. NO. XII. A NEW YEAR'S GREETING. A THUNDERSTORM is but a rainbow looked at from a different point of view: we have thundered, and our beloved Oxford has softened under our gentle showers, and with benignant brilliancy we have solemnly resolved to give our sign that the floods shall be no more. But weep not, friends, at the thought that our brief life must end with our next number our promise is indeed of double edge. We have greater things than these yet in store. In these fine times when every mole-hill splutters forth into a volcano, be sure that the classic heights of Shotover shall yet stand high among historic hills. Our bows are strengthened with use; our arrows are of nobler flight. Soon upon a wider world shall our merry troupe send forth its caustic wit. Friends in Oxford, you will know us yet again, and will laugh with us; for, though in other guise, we shall not, nor would we, pass unknown among those who for one year have been the companions of our mirth, the butts of our jest, the chroniclers of our renown. Once again we are among you with a greeting, but this time it is the prelude to a parting. In our next we bid you our farewell: the Shotover brand is still marked upon our weapons, and he who waits will recognize after a short period of rest the Shotover brand on our new missiles. Dons, we salute you again: you have stood fire kindly. The large world has others such as you may they bear as wisely the slings and arrows of outrageous merriment; we are mixing a cup which may inebriate, even if it does not cheer. Undergraduates, you are a sorry lot: you have served our purposes. Doubtless we have served yours, or you would not have encouraged us. Your like we shall never meet again, and we do not quite regret it but if ever you come across our like again, perhaps your regret may be great; for others who see you in your property-dresses of folly and arrogance may handle you with a rougher touch than ours. : But to those who are best among you, АА HALT! Right-about-face! March! I would have you move off, not from any wish to be quit of your society, but because it is interesting to study your massive swagger. You are of a sort which would atone for the world's lack of appreciation by an extra supply of self-esteem. You are believed to have a Maker: indeed to judge by your language your are on very affable terms with him. You speak of him with an air of friendly insolence which contrasts finely with your blustering buffoonery to your companions under the festive board. I wonder why you are proud of your space-enfolding legs. The steady rotundity of their purpose marks you afar off, it is true but it also marks you as a step in the order of development, half-way between the gorilla and the beer-barrel. You shew to best advantage with an oar in your hand; if you would always stay in a boat when you have once got there, I doubt not your reputation would vastly improve at the expense of your robust health. On the river circumstances limit your tongue to a stereotyped routine of language in which no novelty can shock the hearer. warning to future generations of Undergraduates. But we are anticipating our farewell. Time enough for that. For the present, our purpose is to offer you the New Year's Greeting from the Château Vert. LITTLE JOHN. STUDY. On land you are ridiculous or offensive: you are sometimes seen to beam affably round one of the London theatres from a box and a suit of dress-clothes: you are then ridiculous: just so a kangaroo on a pair of skates is ridiculous. : Or you walk about arm-in-arm with one of your gang; I will not follow you to your destination; it leaves a bad enough taste merely to imagine those indulgences which require such severe training as yours before they can be renewed with safety. But in the street you are as fatal to a sensitive stomach as a pestilence it is there that you are offensive. It is not your fault that a course of unnatural selection has culminated in a being in which the development of the brute has triumphed over the traces of a human descent, but it is the fault of physical science that you are not relegated to the rhinoceros' pond in the Zoological Gardens. Bump-suppers bring you out well: you then make speeches, and they make you— the laughing stock of your cronies. ARTHUR-A-BLAND. J. W. COLENSO: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 179 J. W. COLENSO: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. "I owe £3746 17s. 3d. for whiskey—” It is perhaps a painful task to watch the Avernus-ward track of some brilliant genius-to watch him wandering further and further from the narrow groove of truth-to watch him to the bitter end, to see him perchance, at the last, curl the lip of scorn at the wisdom of his grandmother. Sad indeed is such a picture-but when the erring genius threatens to drag with him to destruction other presumptuous fools who dare to think themselves capable of criticising their ancestors-then, painful though it be, it is our obvious duty to disply it in all its naked hideousness to a shocked though grateful world. And this duty loses much of its painfulness, when we have to deal with, not a noble though misguided intellect, but a besotted infidel who howls his imprecations at all that is pure and true-who strives to veil in a mythic glamour the nativity of Huz and Buzthat type, throughout all ages, of fraternal love-a man who looks upon the Tower of Babel as a simple castle in the air, and who regards the most touching episode in the life of Lot as a mere pinch of Attic salt. We have surely said enough to show our readers that we refer to none other than the man Colenso. Now in the present paper we are not going to devote our space to a refutation of those of his puerile quibbles which we have studied we are not even going to revile him for those we have not read, but we are about His own words. to lay before our more thoughtful readers a remarkable literary discovery-remark. able for having remained so long unde tected-namely, that there is extantcouched in slightly enigmatical language ―a complete autobiography of our atheist from his earliest days, containing a minute analysis of his mental phases, and rebutting his own assertion that a Zulu chief was instrumental in leading him to his present miserable position. These Confessions appeared originally under the strange title of "Miscellaneous Examples" and were appended to a wild and visionary treatise on numbers, which rashly dived into mysteries far beyond the legitimate powers of the human mind. The Examples" themselves have we believe hitherto passed as a collection of Riddles or Enigmas. What the author implied by the title is doubtful-but certainly these fragments are remarkable "Examples" of the depths to which human depravity can descend. We may remark at the outset that Colenso expresses nearly all his thoughts in an interrogative form-a fact singularly illustrative of the feebleness and vacillation of the mind we have to deal with. We find that the opening paragraph, which must have been written when its author was quite a boy, runs thus:"The circumference of a coach-wheel being 16 ft., how often will it turn round be 180 J. W. COLENSO: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. he mentions, is, and must be, a matter of simple faith—no earnest and humble mind can doubt the existence of such a ratio though its nature is beyond their human ken-and yet this irreverent wretch must taunt the world with his sneering "Find it,-if you can?" Well can we imagine his insatiable thirst for proof demanding at a later date the rudder of Noah's Ark before he is satisfied concerning the existence of the rest. Want of space compels us to touch but lightly upon many passages deserving further study, e.g. "Find the difference between lastly he does not hesitate to grossly exaggerate the distance he travels. Doubtless our future critic of the Pentateuch took care thus to win his bet, and with impish glee removed the linch-pin from," shewing that our snake-like adver the wheel when the journey was completed. A little further on we have plain evidence that Colenso very early in his career had thought of making money by publishing his venom; we find -"The cost price of a book is 3s. 9d.; if the expense of sale be 6 per cent. upon this, and the profit 24 per cent., what would be the retail price?" But we cannot expatiate upon these loathsome details. To see a man calmly debating as to whether he shall sell his own soul and ruin thousands of others for 24 per cent. upon 3s. 9d.' is a sight to make angels weep. And now we hear the cold cruel laugh of the utter sceptic-the man from whose breast hard reason has driven every spark of kindly sentiment-listen: "There is a fraction which, when multiplied by the cube of 1 and divided by the square root of 13, produces; find it." Mark the utter unfairness of the whole sarcasm. Of course the existence of a mysterious fraction such as and sary could be obtuse when it suited him and pretend that he could discern no difference between these diametrically opposed-that is antithetical-But to proceed, observe how he chuckles fiendlike at the demolition of Solomon's Temple-" A plate of gold 3in. sq., and in. thick, is extended by hammering so as to cover a surface of 7 sq. yds.; find its present thickness." How he must have gloated over these last four words, "Find its present thickness,"-forgetting poor fool that he too is mortal. And now we come to a circumstance, which, though it would be inexpressibly painful in the case of another man, it is almost cheering to find related of the atheist we are criticizing, for it shows that once at least his stony heart was melted by remorse. and to drown that remorse he has recourse to the wine-cup-he becomes madly, bestially, drunk-behold the evidence"What will be the expense of glazing a hall Yes, |