for the Walks in Oxford, Published by R.Pearson, High Street, 1817.

OXFORD,

PRINTED BY W. BAXTER,

FOR R. PEARSON, HIGH STREET:

SOLD ALSO BY LAW AND WHITTAKER, AVE MARIA LANE, LONDON.

Fifth Day's Walk.

HAVING, on our four preceding Walks, visited the Colleges and Halls, this of the Fifth Day will embrace the more important PUBLIC BUILDINGS attached to the University. Most of these are situated in the very heart of the City, forming, under the distinctive local appellation of The Buildings, a matchless group of large and splendid edifices, devoted to purposes connected with education.

THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS,

within the limits of which is comprehended a part of the

BODLEIAN OR UNIVERSITY LIBRARY, claim to be first visited. They form a quadrangle of moderate size, the principal entrance into which is by an arched gateway in the centre of the east front. This front stretches along the western side of Cat-Street, opposite to Hertford College. Over the gateway rises a superb tower, rich, even to redundancy, in ornament, and lofty enough to join its claims to the admiration of the approach

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ing traveller, to those put forth by the oft celebrated group of Oxford steeples.

Magnificent as is this tower, it nevertheless affords a conspicuous example of architectural incongruity. Although the quadrangle, and even the tower itself, are in the style erroneously denominated Gothic, yet on the latter, the five classic orders are introduced, in couplets of columns which rise successively from the base to the summit. Between the couplets of Doric, Ionic, and Composite columns, large square windows are introduced, elegantly divided by munnions and transoms into a number of trefoil headed lights. The other windows of the quadrangle are of a similar kind, but without transoms. In the Corinthian compartment is a piece of sculpture representing James I. regally habited, enthroned beneath a canopy, and presenting his works to Fame, who, in the act of sounding her trumpet, appears at the right hand of his Majesty. Figures emblematic of Justice, Peace, and Plenty, are placed over the head of the King. From the angles of the tower ascend crocketted pinnacles, a species of decoration which is also continued round the quadrangle. It is scarcely possible to view this very elegant appendage to the Schools, without regretting, that, as is too frequently observable in similar structures, the uniformity, and consequently the