To the University there come each year about 900 new men: there are in residence about 2,800; of these each College has from 40 to 300. During his first and second year the student is generally required to live in College, while in his third he may (except in a few instances) and often _must_ go out into ‘digs’, that is, into ‘licensed lodgings’ in the town. The life of the College is real Oxford life. It was this which Cecil Rhodes cherished most in his reverence for his University; it was this which gave him his confidence in the ‘Oxford System’. As with individuals so with these Colleges—the longer one’s acquaintance, the better one realizes that each College is independent, has its individuality, its own traditions, and its own personal character. This makes College life again a difficult subject upon which to generalize. Certain technical characteristics, however, are common to all. The College buildings are arranged in quadrangles, in each of which are several ‘stairs’. On each stair are a number of suites of rooms, eight suites being perhaps the average. There are no corridors, so that each stair is as it were a house by itself. Each student has rooms to himself, a ‘sitter’, which serves as living and dining room, and a ‘bedder’ always; while often a ‘thirder’ adds the convenience of a separate study-room. Each suite has also a small cupboard-pantry, and there is usually on each stair a ‘scout’s pantry’ (or kitchen). Each stair has a ‘scout’ and one or two ‘scout’s boys’, who are servants-in-general to all the men on the stair. The system of breakfasting, lunching, and entertaining in one’s rooms makes the undergraduate at once a host and a householder. When at rare intervals a student wishes to be left alone with his books or his thoughts he may ‘sport his oak’, that is, he may slam the heavy oaken outer door, well known to readers of _Tom Brown_, whose inside spring-lock bars entrance even to friends who may be familiar enough to ignore the suggestion of its closing. The great elasticity of the tutoring and examination system further makes it possible for the undergraduate to study or not as he may choose, and to dispose of his time practically at his own sweet will. In these respects the Oxford student enjoys an independence which is almost unknown elsewhere—excepting in some of the German Universities. [Sidenote: The Oxford day.] As the activities of Oxford readily resolve themselves into scholastic, athletic, and social, so the Oxford day, the natural Oxford day, in respect to morning, afternoon, and evening, approximately adopts this order.