sizars--SERVITORS at Oxford--(a very pretty and gentlemanlike title).
A distinction is made in their clothes because they are poor; for which
reason they wear a badge of poverty, and are not allowed to take their
meals with their fellow-students.

When this wicked and shameful distinction was set up, it was of a piece
with all the rest--a part of the brutal, unchristian, blundering feudal
system. Distinctions of rank were then so strongly insisted upon, that
it would have been thought blasphemy to doubt them, as blasphemous as it
is in parts of the United States now for a nigger to set up as the equal
of a white man. A ruffian like Henry VIII. talked as gravely about the
divine powers vested in him, as if he had been an inspired prophet.
A wretch like James I. not only believed that there was in himself a
particular sanctity, but other people believed him. Government regulated
the length of a merchant's shoes as well as meddled with his trade,
prices, exports, machinery. It thought itself justified in roasting a
man for his religion, or pulling a Jew's teeth out if he did not pay a
contribution, or ordered him to dress in a yellow gabardine, and locked
him in a particular quarter.

Now a merchant may wear what boots he pleases, and has pretty nearly
acquired the privilege of buying and selling without the Government
laying its paws upon the bargain. The stake for heretics is gone; the
pillory is taken down; Bishops are even found lifting up their voices
against the remains of persecution, and ready to do away with the last
Catholic Disabilities. Sir Robert Peel, though he wished it ever so
much, has no power over Mr. Benjamin Disraeli's grinders, or any means
of violently handling that gentleman's jaw. Jews are not called upon
to wear badges: on the contrary, they may live in Piccadilly, or the
Minories, according to fancy; they may dress like Christians, and do
sometimes in a most elegant and fashionable manner.

Why is the poor College servitor to wear that name and that badge still?
Because Universities are the last places into which Reform penetrates.
But now that she can go to College and back for five shillings, let her
travel down thither.

CHAPTER XIV--ON UNIVERSITY SNOBS

All the men of Saint Boniface will recognize Hugby and Crump in these
two pictures. They were tutors in our time, and Crump is since advanced
to be President of the College. He was formerly, and is now, a rich
specimen of a University