'When I was at Oxford in the year 1715, we--I mean pupils, tutors, barbers, shoe-cleaners, and bed-makers--minded nothing but Politics; the Muse stood neglected; nay meat and drink, balls and ladies, had all reason to complain in their turns that we minded Scotland and Preston more than the humane, softer, and more delicate entertainments of Genius and Philosophy. This was a most unhappy time, and I have often lamented it.' And he concludes with the strong Conservative opinion: 'If I can see anything in our English history, 'tis that the poor nation is always the worse for alterations, tho' particular persons may be the better, that is, the richer or more powerful.' His amusing description of a journey home from the University with Sir John St. Aubyn, in 1722, is given hereafter in the chapter on that family. Two years after he was ordained priest, and (his father having bought for him the next presentation) he was presented to the living of Ludgvan, by Charles, first Duke of Bolton, through the influence, as Nichols inaccurately tells us, of Sir William Morice, of Werrington--a family with whom the St. Aubyns intermarried. This living he held for fifty-two years.[74] When Borlase settled in his Rectory, the retired situation of the place did not altogether prevent his indulging in the mild social dissipations of the neighbourhood; notably there was a bowling-green club, formed in 1719, which proved an agreeable means of meeting with his friends, and afforded Mr. Gwavas--one of the latest writers in the old Cornish language, and a member of the party--an opportunity of composing a set of verses in Cornish in honour of the foundation of the club. There can be little doubt, from what we know of his surroundings and proclivities, that Borlase was already making notes of the neighbouring antiquities, and dipping into his favourite authorities--the best of the day--for information, which he was afterwards to apply in a somewhat too speculative manner, to his pet subject--the Druids. He seems to have relied mainly for this purpose upon several passages in Julius Cæsar, Pliny, Elias Schedius de Diis Germanis, Smith's 'Syntagma de Druidis;' a collection of the French and German writers in Frickius de Druidis, Sheringham, Sammes, Montfaucon, Mons. Martin's 'Religion of the Ancient Gauls,' Toland's 'History of the Druids,' Rowland's 'Mona Illustrata,' Dr. Stukeley in his 'Stonehenge and Abury,' and Keysler in his 'Antiquities.'[75]