ore, lest a worse thing happen to you.'" [286]

These proceedings might seem sufficiently unjust and violent. But the
King had already begun to treat Oxford with such rigour that the rigour
shown towards Cambridge might, by comparison, be called lenity. Already
University College had been turned by Obadiah Walker into a Roman
Catholic seminary. Already Christ Church was governed by a Roman
Catholic Dean. Mass was already said daily in both those colleges.
The tranquil and majestic city, so long the stronghold of monarchical
principles, was agitated by passions which it had never before known.
The undergraduates, with the connivance of those who were in authority
over them, hooted the members of Walker's congregation, and chanted
satirical ditties under his windows. Some fragments of the serenades
which then disturbed the High Street have been preserved. The burden of
one ballad was this:

"Old Obadiah Sings Ave Maria."

When the actors came down to Oxford, the public feeling was expressed
still more strongly. Howard's Committee was performed. This play,
written soon after the Restoration, exhibited the Puritans in an odious
and contemptible light, and had therefore been, during a quarter of
a century, a favourite with Oxonian audiences. It was now a greater
favourite than ever; for, by a lucky coincidence, one of the most
conspicuous characters was an old hypocrite named Obadiah. The audience
shouted with delight when, in the last scene, Obadiah was dragged in
with a halter round his neck; and the acclamations redoubled when one of
the players, departing from the written text of the comedy, proclaimed
that Obadiah should be hanged because he had changed his religion. The
King was much provoked by this insult. So mutinous indeed was the temper
of the University that one of the newly raised regiments, the same which
is now called the Second Dragoon Guards, was quartered at Oxford for the
purpose of preventing an outbreak. [287]

These events ought to have convinced James that he had entered on a
course which must lead him to his ruin. To the clamours of London he
had been long accustomed. They had been raised against him, sometimes
unjustly, and sometimes vainly. He had repeatedly braved them, and
might brave them still. But that Oxford, the scat of loyalty, the head
quarters of the Cavalier army, the place where his father and brother
had held their court when they thought themselves insecure in their
stormy capital,