]
Every college had some legend or story connected with it, and University
College claimed to have been founded by King Alfred the Great, but this
is considered a myth; King Alfred's jewel, however, a fine specimen of
Saxon work in gold and crystal, found in the Isle of Athelney, was still
preserved in Oxford. Guy Fawkes's lantern and the sword given to Henry
VIII as Defender of the Faith were amongst the curios in the Bodleian
Library, but afterwards transferred to the Ashmolean Museum, which
claimed to be the earliest public collection of curiosities in England,
the first contributions made to it having been given in 1682 by Elias
Ashmole, of whom we had heard when passing through Lichfield. In the
eighteenth century there was a tutor named Scott who delivered a series
of lectures on Ancient History, which were considered to be the finest
ever known, but he could never be induced to publish them. In one of his
lectures he wished to explain that the Greeks had no chimneys to their
houses, and created much amusement by explaining it in his scholarly and
roundabout fashion: "The Greeks had no convenience by which the volatile
parts of fire could be conveyed into the open air.
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