the university. During the civil war he was elected one of the standing extraordinary delegates of the university for public business. He preached several times before the court, was favourably regarded by the king, and in 1646 was offered, but appears to have refused, his grace of bachelor of divinity. Through a part of this period he acted as college bursar (cf. Smith, manuscript Transcripts, x. 210). In July 1648 the master and fellows were ejected by the parliamentary commissioners. Walker appears to have gone abroad, visiting Rome, and ‘improving himself in all kinds of polite literature’ (Smith, Annals of University College). On the recommendation of John Evelyn about 1650, he became tutor to Henry and Charles, sons of Henry Hildyard of Horsley in Surrey (Evelyn, Diary, ed. Bray, iii. 22), and the early perversion of his pupil to the church of Rome may probably be regarded as one of the results of his tuition. On the Restoration he was reinstated as fellow of his college; ‘after having been,’ as he wrote to a friend in 1678 (Smith, manuscript, Transcripts, x. 192), ‘heaved out of my place and wandred a long time up and down, I am at last, by the good providence of God, set down just as I was.’ Soon, however, he again left Oxford, and again travelled to Rome, as tutor to a young gentleman. The college gave him leave of absence for four terms, in August 1661, on 31 Jan. 1663, and 23 March 1664, and for two terms on 14 Jan. 1665 (Univ. Coll. Reg. pp. 79–82).
On the death of the master, Dr. Thomas Walker, in 1665, Obadiah declined to contest Clayton's election to the vacant office. He now, however, resided again in the college as senior fellow and tutor. He was a delegate of the university press in 1667, and through his influence an offer was made to Anthony à Wood (whose acquaintance about this time he had accidentally made in the coach on the way to Oxford) for the printing of the ‘History and Antiquities of Oxford’ (Wood, Life and Times, ii. 173). The mastership became again vacant by the death of Dr. Clayton on 14 June 1676, and Obadiah Walker was elected on 22 June 1676 by the unanimous consent of the fellows (Univ. Coll. Reg. p. 99). Though, when writing to a friend on 20 Nov. 1675, he complained of old age (Smith, manuscript Transcripts, x. 199), he soon proved himself an active head of the college. With energy he canvassed old members of the college for subscriptions towards the rebuilding of the big quadrangle, which was completed in April 1677. The same year the college, under the auspices of their new master, undertook an edition in Latin of Sir John Spelman's ‘Life of Alfred;’ this they did ‘that the world should know that their benefactions are not bestowed on mere drones’ (letter from O. W. 19 April 1677, ib. p. 192). This publication, though often attributed to Walker alone, was a joint production, ‘divers of the society assisting with their pains and learning’ (ib.); it was dedicated to Charles II with a fulsome comparison of that monarch to Alfred. The character of some of the notes in the volume, and Walker's connection with Abraham Woodhead's ‘popish seminary’ at Hoxton (Woodhead, who died in May 1678, left by will the priory at Hoxton to Walker), caused the master's conduct to be noted in the House of Commons towards the latter end of October 1678, when ‘several things were given in against him by the archdeacon of Middlesex’ (Hist. MSS. Comm. 12th Rep. App. vii. 150). He was ‘much suspected at this time to be a papist’ (ib.), and, says Wood, ‘had not Mr. Walker had a friend in the house who stood up for him, he would have had a messenger sent for him’ (Wood, Life and Times, ed. Clark, ii. 421); the same authority gives it that two of the fellows of the college made friends in the parliament-house to have the master turned out that one of them might succeed. Whatever inclination Walker entertained at this time towards the Roman church, on the heads of houses being called on 17 Feb. 1679 to make returns to the vice-chancellor of all persons in their societies suspected to be papists, he categorically denied that he knew of any such in his college. But in April of the same year his name was mentioned in Sir Harbottle Grimston's speech calling the attention of the house to the printing of popish books at the theatre at Oxford (ib. p. 449); and in June 1680 complaint was made to the vice-chancellor of the popish character of a sermon preached by one of his pupils at St. Mary's, and the booksellers in Oxford were forbidden to sell his book, ‘The Benefits of our Saviour Jesus Christ to Mankind,’ because of the passages savouring of popery (ib. p. 488). The course he was steering began to render him unpopular both in the town and university, where his main friends and supporters were Leybourne and Massey, and among the fellows Nathaniel Boys and Thomas Deane.
On the accession of James II Walker's attitude soon became clear, for on 5 Jan. 1686 he went to London, being sent for by the
