Page:The Poems and Prose remains of Arthur Hugh Clough, volume 1 (1869).djvu/421

 A PASSAGE UPON OXFORD STUDIES:

A REVIEW OF THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY COMMISSIONERS' REPORT, 1852.

' to Oxford from the sixth form (the highest class) of a public school. I had at that time read all Thucydides, except the sixth and seventh books; the six first books of Herodotus; the early books of each author I had done at least three times over. I had read five plays, I think, of Sophocles, four of Æschylus—several of these two or three times over; four, perhaps, or five, of Euripides; considerable portions of Aristophanes; nearly all the "Odyssey;" only about a third of the "Iliad," but that several times over; one or two dialogues of Plato the "Phædo," I remember, was one; not quite all Virgil; all Horace; a good deal of Livy and Tacitus; a considerable portion of Aristotle's "Rhetoric," and two or three books of his "Ethics;" besides, of course, other things. I mention these, because they have to do with Oxford. I had been used to do my very best in translating in the class. We were not marked; but expressions of approbation, graduated carefully, and invariably given by the rule so formed, were quite sure to let every boy know how he had done his part. The more diligent used to listen with eagerness for note and comment; the idlest amongst us were considerably afraid of reprimand. We were wont, moreover, to do three long original exercises every week, out of school. These were looked over