H. P. Grice: "Only the poor learn at Oxford"

Dear Mom,

Despite a formidable outlay of intellect, Oxford is failing to make me really, shall I say, studious. 

The old, time-honoured, witticism, 'only the poor  learn at Oxford,' has long since, some say, ceased to have any meaning. 

But has it?

Even now there seem to be still a few pupils to whom graduation means little more than the satisfaction of having passed the examinations and is not a pre-requisite to the comfortable future that, barring this or that family financial disasters, they have good reason to look forward to. 

For relaxation, as you know, I have always preferred outdoor exercise -- cricket, football -- (or piano!) to reading -- even Aristotle!

And Hardie is helping me improve my golf!

And, ever since I can remember, it has been from people (such as Aristotle, or now, Hardie, or Smith at Clifton) rather than from text-books (his books) that I have got my 'education.'

So it is not only to save my venerable institution from one day being blamed for the absence of intellectual qualities in this or that philosopher, but also as a shrewd judge of character that President Warren published after I left Oxford a generous but somewhat apologetic report upon my progress.

"Bookish he will never be: not a 'Beauclerk,’ still less a ‘British Solomon,’ ” he warned, adding, however, . . all the time he was learning more and more every day of men, gauging character, watching its play, getting to know what Englishmen are like, both individually and still more in the mass. 

If by “learning ... of men” Warren had in mind that along with English literature, modern languages, and constitutional law, there was a bright leavening of all forms of amusement, Oxford certainly lived up to its reputation as a teacher. 

I was initiated into the more sophisticated pleasures of carousing and even indulged in mild games of roulette. 

The stakes are not high.

But the conspiratorial atmosphere in which these games of chance are conducted adds to the excitement.

In this ’way I get to know some men whose upbringing had been a good deal less strict than mine. 

There are plenty of excuses for celebration. 

If the College Eight had “bumped” itself to “head of the river” on the Isis, the Oxford stretch of the Thames, during Eights Week, the feat would be celebrated with festive “bump supper” in “Hall” that would climax with a bonfire inside the walks, fed with furniture tossed out of the rooms of undergraduates who had incurred their classmates’ displeasure. 

Birthdays by custom called for a party, and, eventually, the carrying out of those who could no longer walk by those who thought they could. 

And on Sunday evenings after dinner in “Hall” everybody who counts for something repairs to ‘"Gunner’s,” a musty little taproom at the foot of the stairway leading to the Junior Common Room, where Gunstone, the steward, a plump, red-faced, bald-headed old-timer, dispenses beer and other drinks. 

There with mounting enjoyment we listen to his rough stories and never leave until he has performed his famous banana trick-inserting a banana in the neck of a bottle filled with burning paper and watching the vacuum suck it down with a thud. 

The only time my father came to Oxford to see me I had Gunner perform this feat for his special benefit. 

“By God,” said Papa appreciatively, “that is one of the darnedest tricks I have ever seen.” 

Whatever the occasion, Corpus celebrations always ended the same way. 

Arms linked together, the celebrants would head for the President’s house, to stand swaying under his bedroom window, chanting in chorus, ‘"Well row^ed, the Free.” 

Wholly aside from his literary leanings, President Warren’s corpulence would have removed him from any conceivable athletic connection.

Nevertheless, all through the night little bands of pupils would deviate from their way to bed to pay the President this incongruous compliment. 

It is characteristic of collegiate memories that in reminiscence the hell-raising side momentarily overshadows the daily plodding drudgery I always associated with 'study,' as in "Studies in the way of words"!

Oxford is a somewhat serious place.

And the truth is that my days by and large are sober, tranquil, and, shall we say, 'studious.'

In the winter my leisure is given to cricket, football, beagling with the New College, Magdalen, Trinity packs, and riding.

In the summer I punt on the Cherwell and for this or that 'natural-history' walk.

At these pursuits and in the company of the small groups who foregather in mine or other men’s rooms when the evening work is over, I am forming new friendships that compensate in part for the uprooted attachments of the Navy. 

The experiment of sending me to France the year before having apparently had no ill effects, it was my mother’s idea that I should go to Germany during the Easter and summer vacations in 1913. 

The purpose of these two trips was to improve my German and to teach me something about these vigorous people whose blood flows so strongly in my veins. 

For I was related in one way or another to most of the many Royal houses that reigned in Germany in those days.