Altogether, Mr. Green did not particularly enjoy the journey. Besides the dogs and cigars, which to him were equal nuisances, little Mr. Bouncer was perpetually producing unpleasant post-horn effects, - which he called "sounding his octaves," - and destroying the effect of the airs on the guard's key-bugle, by joining in them at improper times and with discordant measures. Mr. Green, too, could not but perceive that the majority of the conversation that was addressed to himself and his son (though more particularly to the latter), although couched in politest form, was yet of a tendency calculated to "draw them out" for the amusement of their fellow-passengers. He also observed that the young gentlemen severally exhibited great capacity for the beer of Bass and the porter of Guinness, and were not averse even to liquids of a more spirituous description. Moreover, Mr. Green remarked that the ministering Hebes were invariably addressed by their Christian names, and were familiarly conversed with as old acquaintances; most of them receiving direct offers of marriage or the option of putting up the banns on any Sunday in the middle of the week; while the inquiries after their grandmothers and the various members of their family circles were both numerous and gratifying. In [30 ADVENTURES OF MR. VERDANT GREEN] all these verbal encounters little Mr. Bouncer particularly distinguished himself. Woodstock was reached: "Four-in-hand Fosbrooke" gave up the reins to the professional Jehu; and at last the towers, spires, and domes of Oxford appeared in sight. The first view of the City of Colleges is always one that will be long remembered. Even the railway traveller, who enters by the least imposing approach, and can scarcely see that he is in Oxford before he has reached Folly Bridge, must yet regard the city with mingled feelings of delight and surprise as he looks across the Christ Church meadows and rolls past the Tom Tower. But he who approaches Oxford from the Henley Road, and looks upon that unsurpassed prospect from Magdalen Bridge, - or he who enters the city, as Mr. Green did, from the Woodstock Road, and rolls down the shady avenue of St. Giles', between St. John's College and the Taylor Buildings, and past the graceful Martyrs' Memorial, will receive impressions such as probably no other city in the world could convey. As the coach clattered down the Corn-market, and turned the corner by Carfax into High Street, Mr. Bouncer, having been compelled in deference to University scruples to lay aside his post-horn, was consoling himself by chanting the following words, selected probably in compliment to Mr. Verdant Green. "To Oxford, a Freshman so modest, I enter'd one morning in March; And the figure I cut was the oddest, All spectacles, choker, and starch. Whack fol lol, lol iddity, &c.