To these Stoke joins
himself, and they waltz joyously into the church, and in and out of
the gateways of the different halls, singing, -
"Mihi est propositum in taberna mori,
Vinum sit appositum morientis ori,
Ut dicant, quum venerint, angelorum chori
Deus sit propitius huic potatori."
The students of the Northern nations mock, of course, at these
revellers, thumbs are bitten, threats exchanged, and we shall see
what comes of the quarrel. But the hall bells chime half-past noon;
it is dinner-time in Oxford, and Stoke, as he throws off his mask
(larva) and vine-leaves, mutters to himself the equivalent for "there
WILL be a row about this." There will, indeed, for the penalty is
not "crossing at the buttery," nor "gating," but--excommunication!
(Munim. Academ., i. 18.) Dinner is not a very quiet affair, for the
Catte's men have had to fight for their beer in the public streets
with some Canterbury College fellows who were set on by their Warden,
of all people, to commit this violence (ut vi et violentia raperent
cerevisiam aliorum scholarum in vico): however, Catte's has had the
best of it, and there is beer in plenty. It is possible, however,
that fish is scarce, for certain "forestallers" (regratarii) have
been buying up salmon and soles, and refusing to sell them at less
than double the proper price. On the whole, however, there a rude
abundance of meat and bread; indeed, Stoke may have fared better in
Catte's than the modern undergraduate does in the hall of the college
protected by St.
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