non-stipendiary) of one of the most distinguished colleges in the university! It was wholly monstrous.
‘When would you have been here last, sir?’
This was a type of question which often got George confused. He was no good at dates. So he ducked this issue.
‘I only want . . .’ he began.
‘You can apply at Admissions, sir.’ Sir Thomas Bodley’s Janus spoke a shade impatiently this time. There was a small queue of readers, authenticating tickets in hand, formed up behind George. ‘First doorway beyond the passage to Radcliffe Square, sir.’
So George, not being sure that he had comported himself quite courteously, produced one of his apologies and withdrew into open air. Halting by the little railing that surrounds the statue of Lord Herbert, runner-up as the putative lovely boy of Shakespeare’s Sonnets, he considered his position. In a small way, he had made a fool of himself. He remembered that when as a young man he had worked for a time in the British Museum, and even though the nature of his researches had entitled him to do his reading in the privileged area known as the North Library, he had been issued with a ticket which he had shown up every day on entering, at least until the door-keepers had got to know him. And at Cambridge, he had recently read, they now charged wandering scholars a fee for admission to the University Library. He decided that the man in the lidless box represented a praiseworthy precaution on the part of the Oxford authorities against evilly disposed persons. Most irrationally, he felt rebuffed, all the same.
The remedy against this improper emotion was at once to go through the drill required to regularise his position as a reader in the Bodleian. Somehow he no longer much wanted to inquire into the present state of affairs within that wide sphere of reference constituted by Jacobus Baradaeus of Edessa and his carryings-on 1,300 years ago. But he ought to seek out Admissions, nevertheless.
And, just beyond the tunnel-like approach to Radcliffe Square, there was a bright new board beside a doorway, saying ‘Admissions’ in letters so large that there was no overlooking them. (The doorway also said, in rather bogus-faded hues, Schola Musicae.)
George entered. There was a notice with a pointing arrow. It said, ‘Applicants for admission to the library are earnestly requested to take a seat behind the screen, and there attend upon the ringing of a bell.’ George did as he was bid. He took a seat and attended upon.
Nothing happened. On the other side of the screen there must be a business area with a brisk traffic going forward. But no sound indicative of this came from the arcanum or adytum from which he was now sundered by a full six feet. George began to think of his train, although he knew that its departure was still a couple of hours off. Then he did a very scandalous thing. Unsummoned by any bell, he stood up and peered round the screen. He saw the remainder of the small room in which this important admissions transaction was conducted. An elderly lady in an M.A. gown was seated at a table upon which stood several miniature filing-cabinets. She appeared to be asleep.
George was confounded. He couldn’t possibly disturb this learned person’s repose. Behind her were no doubt several hours of exhausting labour during which she had been struggling with clouds of exigent postulants for readership, any one of whom might have been secreting incendiary devices (backed up by fragmentation bombs) in his or her pockets. George could only stand and wait.
‘Do please sit down,’ the lady said, in tones every phoneme of which suggested Somerville or Lady Margaret Hall. She had presumably merely been resting her eyes even from the crepuscular light which alone penetrated to this Bodleian semi-dungeon. ‘Shall you be in Oxford for long?’
This question, which might perhaps have been better phrased, seemed to admit only of the answer, ‘Until about half-past five’, and
‘When would you have been here last, sir?’
This was a type of question which often got George confused. He was no good at dates. So he ducked this issue.
‘I only want . . .’ he began.
‘You can apply at Admissions, sir.’ Sir Thomas Bodley’s Janus spoke a shade impatiently this time. There was a small queue of readers, authenticating tickets in hand, formed up behind George. ‘First doorway beyond the passage to Radcliffe Square, sir.’
So George, not being sure that he had comported himself quite courteously, produced one of his apologies and withdrew into open air. Halting by the little railing that surrounds the statue of Lord Herbert, runner-up as the putative lovely boy of Shakespeare’s Sonnets, he considered his position. In a small way, he had made a fool of himself. He remembered that when as a young man he had worked for a time in the British Museum, and even though the nature of his researches had entitled him to do his reading in the privileged area known as the North Library, he had been issued with a ticket which he had shown up every day on entering, at least until the door-keepers had got to know him. And at Cambridge, he had recently read, they now charged wandering scholars a fee for admission to the University Library. He decided that the man in the lidless box represented a praiseworthy precaution on the part of the Oxford authorities against evilly disposed persons. Most irrationally, he felt rebuffed, all the same.
The remedy against this improper emotion was at once to go through the drill required to regularise his position as a reader in the Bodleian. Somehow he no longer much wanted to inquire into the present state of affairs within that wide sphere of reference constituted by Jacobus Baradaeus of Edessa and his carryings-on 1,300 years ago. But he ought to seek out Admissions, nevertheless.
And, just beyond the tunnel-like approach to Radcliffe Square, there was a bright new board beside a doorway, saying ‘Admissions’ in letters so large that there was no overlooking them. (The doorway also said, in rather bogus-faded hues, Schola Musicae.)
George entered. There was a notice with a pointing arrow. It said, ‘Applicants for admission to the library are earnestly requested to take a seat behind the screen, and there attend upon the ringing of a bell.’ George did as he was bid. He took a seat and attended upon.
Nothing happened. On the other side of the screen there must be a business area with a brisk traffic going forward. But no sound indicative of this came from the arcanum or adytum from which he was now sundered by a full six feet. George began to think of his train, although he knew that its departure was still a couple of hours off. Then he did a very scandalous thing. Unsummoned by any bell, he stood up and peered round the screen. He saw the remainder of the small room in which this important admissions transaction was conducted. An elderly lady in an M.A. gown was seated at a table upon which stood several miniature filing-cabinets. She appeared to be asleep.
George was confounded. He couldn’t possibly disturb this learned person’s repose. Behind her were no doubt several hours of exhausting labour during which she had been struggling with clouds of exigent postulants for readership, any one of whom might have been secreting incendiary devices (backed up by fragmentation bombs) in his or her pockets. George could only stand and wait.
‘Do please sit down,’ the lady said, in tones every phoneme of which suggested Somerville or Lady Margaret Hall. She had presumably merely been resting her eyes even from the crepuscular light which alone penetrated to this Bodleian semi-dungeon. ‘Shall you be in Oxford for long?’
This question, which might perhaps have been better phrased, seemed to admit only of the answer, ‘Until about half-past five’, and
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