occasional manifestoes, which a few professors sign and publish, of any great importance. But it is through the press and through Parliament that the voice of young Oxford is heard. It is through the minds and the examples of those statesmen and administrators, who have imbibed their principles of life and action within her precincts, and have been trained in her schools and on her river or playing-fields, that the influence of the University is reflected on the outer world. Nor is it only the men like Lord Salisbury, Lord Rosebery and Mr Gladstone, who guide the country at home, or like Lord Milner and Lord Curzon, who give their best work to Greater Britain, that are the true sons of the University; it is the plain, hard-working clergymen and civilians, also, who, by their lives of honest and unselfish toil, hand on the torch of good conduct and high ideals which has been entrusted to them. Oxford had some share in the events which led to the deposition of Edward II. The King wrote to the Chancellor, masters and scholars calling upon them to resist his enemies. On the approach of Roger de Mortimer, a supporter of the Queen, he wrote again enjoining them not to allow him to enter the city, but to keep Smith Gate shut, lest he should enter by that way. But when the King was a refugee in Wales, the Queen came to Islip. She would not come to Oxford till "she saw it secure." But when the burghers came to her with presents she was satisfied. She took up her residence at the White Friars, and the Mortimers theirs at Osney. And a sermon was preached by the Bishop of Hereford, who demonstrated from his text, "My head grieveth me," that an evil head, meaning the King, not otherwise to be cured, must be taken away. The majority of scholars apparently agreed with him. The terrible scourge of the Black Death, which carried off half the population of England, fell hardly on Oxford. Those who had places in the country fled to them; those who remained behind were almost totally swept away. The schools were shut, the colleges and halls closed, and there were scarcely men enough to bury the dead. The effect upon learning was disastrous. There were not enough students forthcoming to fill the benefices, and the scarcity of students affected the citizens severely. The disorder of the time, which was to issue in Wat Tyler's Rebellion, was shadowed forth at Oxford by the extraordinary riot of S. Scholastica's Day (1355). The story of this riot, which was to bear fruit in further privileges being vouchsafed to the University at the expense of the town, has been recorded with infinite spirit by Wood.