The Colleges of Oxford: Their History and Traditions: XXI Chapters Contributed by Members of the Colleges
History
The Colleges of Oxford: Their History and Traditions: XXI Chapters Contributed by Members of the Colleges
University of Oxford -- History
The return of the King brought back Head and Fellows. A blank page in
the College Register is followed by a lease signed by “R. Baylie,”
without note or comment on his deprivation or return. The first results
of the Restoration were works of piety. Before long the body of the
aged Juxon was laid near the founder beneath the altar in the chapel.
It was now possible to carry out the last wish of Laud himself, who in
his will had desired “to be buried in the chapel of S. John Baptist
College, under the altar or communion table there.” All was done
privately, as he had himself directed. Yet the stillness of night,
the torches and the flickering candles, the reverence of the restored
foundation to the greatest and most loyal of its sons, must have given
a unique solemnity to the scene. “The day then, or rather the night,”
says Anthony Wood, “being appointed wherein he should come to Oxon,
most of the Fellows, about sixteen or twenty in number, went to meet
him towards Wheatley, and after they had met him, about seven of the
clock on Friday, July 24th, 1663, they came to Oxon at ten at night,
with the said number before him, and his corpse lying on a horse litter
on four wheels drawn by four horses, following, and a coach after that.
In the same way they went up to S. Mary’s Church, then up Cat’s Street,
then to the back-door of S. John’s Grove; where, taking his coffin out,
they conveyed [it] to the chapel; when Mr. Gisbey, Fellow of that house
and Vice-President, had spoke a speech, they laid him inclosed in a
wooden coffin in a little vault at the upper end of the chancel between
the founder’s and Archbishop Juxon’s.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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