112

HIST01IY OF ENGLAND.

Cuap.

VIII.

issT.

First, had been members of the college. Another prince ofthe blood, the last and best of the Roman Catholic Arch-bishops of Canterbury, the gentle Reginald Pole, had studiedthere. In the time of the civil war Magdalene had been trueto the cause of the crown. There Rupert had fixed his quar-ters; and, before, some of his most daring enterprises, histrumpets had been heard sounding to horse through thosequiet cloisters. Most of the Fellows were divines, and couldaid the King only by their prayers and their pecuniary contri-butions. But one member of the body, a Doctor of CivilLaw, raised a troop of undergraduates, and fell fightingbravely at their head against the soldiers of Essex. Whenhostilities had terminated, and the Roundheads were mastersof England, six sevenths of the members of the foundationrefused to make any submission to usurped authority.They were consequently ejected from their dwellings anddeprived of their revenues. After the Restoration thesurvivors returned to their pleasant abode. They had nowbeen succeeded by a new generation which inherited theiropinions and their spirit. During the Western rebellion suchMagdalene men as were not disqualified by their age or pro-fession for the use of arms had eagerly volunteered to fight forthe crown. It would be difficult to name any corporation inthe kingdom which had higher claims to the gratitude of theHouse of Stuart*.

The society consisted of a President, of forty Fellows, ofthirty scholars called Demies, and of a train of chaplains,clerks, and choristers. At the time of the general visitationin the reign of Henry the Eighth the revenues were far greaterthan those of any similar institution in the realm, greater bynearly one half than those of the magnificent foundation ofHenry the Sixth at Cambridge, and considerably more thandouble those which William of Wvkeham had settled on hiscollege at Oxford. In the days of James the Second the richesof Magdalene were immense, and were exaggerated by report.The college was popularly said to be wealthier than the weal-

* Wood's Atbenae Oxonienses; Walker’s Sufferings of the Clergy.

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