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LINCOLN COLLEGE.
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a Rector and seven Fellows, but the actual number
of Fellows seldom exceeded five. There were be-
sides a few Commoners (' commensales seu sojor-
nantes '), graduates resident in College and paying
for their rooms and diet : thus, a charter of the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, 19th Feb., 1450- 1, is addressed
' Rector 7, Soctis, et Commensalibus,' and gives such
of them as are in priest's orders ' licentia celebrandi
in capella ' or elsewhere in College. There were also
some undergraduates, ' poor scholars,' rendering
menial service to the graduates. For example, the
bible-clerk acted as a man-servant of the Rector ; he
was nominated by the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln,
who generally took this opportunity of sending one of
their choristers to the University.
The visible relics of this first period of the history of the College are the louvre through which the smoke from the fire in the centre of the hall found its way out, a fragment of the original mullions of a window over the new fire-place in the hall, and the beacon and tun (Beckington's rebus) on the buttress on the east front of the Rector's lodgings.
SECOND FOUNDATION, 1474-1480— In 1474 William Dagvyle, sometime Mayor of Oxford, gave by his will the reversion of his considerable property in All Saints parish, including the old possession of his family, the hostelry known then as Dagvyle's Yn, but henceforth as the Mitre. In 1475, Thomas Rotheram, translated to the Bishopric of Lincoln in 1472, gave the College the churches of Long Combe near Woodstock, and of Twyford in Bucks, besides other revenues. Perhaps because the College was now well worth plundering, the old accusation of illegality was revived ; and the charter of 1 Edw. IV. was found, whether by intention or carelessness, to be so faultily written as to give very insufficient pro- tection. Rotheram came to the rescue, moved, ac- cording to the fine tradition, by a sermon preached before him in Oxford, when he came there in his Visi- tation of his Diocese, by the Rector or one of the Fellows, on the text ' Behold and visit this vine which thou hast planted.' He obtained from the king a new charter, dated 16th June, 1478, which finally estab- lished the College ; and he further settled the College by giving a written code of statutes, the original copy of which, with his autograph signature, is still pre- served in the College archives. These statutes were given nth Feb. 1479-80: in Sept., 1480, Rotheram was translated to the Archbishopric of York.
A pleasant memorial of the second foundation has come down to us in the college vine. In Loggan's view (1675) a vine is seen growing luxuriantly over the west wall of the hall. Its successor flourishes in the chapel quadrangle, near the window of the room traditionally regarded as John Wesley's. It bears numerous and heavy clusters of small dark-coloured grapes, some bunches of which are always presented at the college gaudy on All Saints' Day. From time to time wine even has been made from its grapes. In allusion to this vine, and to the duty incumbent on Lincoln men to give in their maturity good fruit to the world of their nurture here, these lines have been written : —
Vitis ut accrescit, sic nos accrescere jussit Fundator : palmes, scilicet, uva, merum.
SECOND PERIOD, 1481-1536.— During the years following Rotheram's settlement of the College, the endowments were augmented by the large benefac- tions of William Smyth, Bishop of Lincoln, and Edmund Audley, Bishop of Salisbury, so that before
1 5 18 the College had acquired 1300 acres of land in
addition to its former 500 acres.
The College now consisted nominally of thirteen persons, the Rector and twelve Fellows, eight from the county and diocese of Lincoln, one from the county of Somerset, and four from the county and diocese of York ; but the actual number of Fellows was generally nine. Graduate commoners, as before, resided in College ; and also undergraduates to such a number that Rotheram's statutes instituted two Tutors for their instruction.
THIRD FOUNDATION, 1537.— In 1537 Edmund Darby, Archdeacon of Stow, formerly Fellow of the College, gave money with which the College bought 669 acres of land in Yorkshire ; and arranged that three new Fellowships should be established, one for the county of Oxford, one for the county of Leicester or Northampton, and one for the archdeaconry of Stow.
The College now consisted of a Rector, fifteen Fellows, two Chaplains (of All Saints and S. Michael's), and one Bible-clerk, served by a manciple (who had charge of the buttery), a cook, a barber, and a laundress.
It was soon found that the College revenues could not support sixteen Members of the Foundation ; the number was from time to time provisionally re- duced, and finally in 1606 a Visitor's Order limited the Foundation to a Rector and twelve Fellows.
LATER BENEF CTIONS, 1538-1892. -The earlier benefactors of the College belonged to two classes. There were, first of all, laymen, and especially parishioners of All Saints, whose object was to provide for masses and anniversary services for the repose of their own and their kinsfolks' souls. There were, secondly, ecclesiastics, who added to that object a desire to advance the interests of the Church in an age when the Church was greatly assailed. These two classes of benefactors soon ceased ; but very early in the history of the College, a third class arose, old members of the College, inspired by love for the house itself which had been sometime their home. Hardly a generation has passed in which the College has not received something from this source ; and it may well be proud of the multitudinous benefactions of its old members, ranging from the MSS. given to the library by Thomas Gascoigne in 1432 to the contributions given in 1 891 and 1892 for the restor- ation of the hall.
The more important of these later benefactions took the form of scholarships or exhibitions, and point to the continuous growth of the modern idea of a College as a place for the higher education of young men. The following is a list of the older scholarship founda- tions, with dates, and their yearly values : —
1568, Traps' scholars, four in number, value £$ 6s. 8d., one by preference to be chosen from Sandwich School, Kent.
1633, Smith's exhibitioner one, value ,£15.
1640, Hayne's scholars, two in number, value ,£3 per annum : but this never took effect, perhaps owing to the confusion caused by the outbreak of the great Civil War.
1688, Marshall's scholars, four in number, value £6 10s. per annum.
1717, Lord Crewe's exhibitioners, twelve in number, value £20 per annum.
1 78 1, Hutchins' scholars, three in number.
The foundations of this century are the Tatham (1847), Radford (185 1 ), and Matthews (1857), scholarships.
