Penny Magazine

No. 104 - THE PENNY MAGAZINE - Nov. 16, 1833

OF our three great public schools, Eton, Westminster, and Winchester, the first has always been considered to hold the highest rank. It is the only one of the three to which it is usual to give the name of a College. It is, we believe, the richest foundation of the three.

Windsor and Eton, though situated on opposite sides of the Thames and in different counties, form in .appearance only one town. The bridge over the 'river is the only interruption to the line of houses. At the farther extremity of the town of Eton, and separated from it, stands the college. The buildings of this institution,—the

——"antique towers,
That crown the watery glade,"

show best from a distance, where they are set off by the natural beauties of their situation. They form a conspicuous and highly ornamental object in the splendid view from the terrace of Windsor Castle. Seen from their immediate neighborhood, they are not very imposing. They consist of two quadrangles, built partly of freestone, but chiefly of brick, in a style somewhat resembling that of the north front of St. James's palace. In the one quadrangle are the school and the chapel, with the lodgings for the scholars; the other contains the library, the provost's house, and the apartments of the fellows. The chapel, which is built of stone, is the part in which the architecture is most ambitious; it is externally a handsome structure, though very plain in the interior. It is one hundred and seventy-five feet in length, including an ante-chapel which is sixty-two feet long. In the centre of the first-mentioned quadrangle stands a bronze statue of Henry VI. which was erected in the early part of the last century by Dr. Godolphin, the provost of the college. There is another statue of the same king in the chapel, the work of the late John Bacon.

Eton College was founded by Henry V I. The foundation charter is dated at Windsor, on the twelfth of September, in the nineteenth year of his reign, that is, in the year 1440. The original establishment was a provost, ten priests, four clerks, six choristers, twenty-five poor grammar scholars, and the like number of poor men. It now consists of a provost, six other fellows, two schoolmasters, two conducts, seven clerks, seventy king's scholars, ten choristers, and a number of inferior officers and servants. Besides the scholars on the foundation, the school is always attended by a much larger number of others, called oppidans. The oppidans generally amount to between 300 and 400, and have exceeded 500.

From the seventy king's scholars a certain number are annually selected and put on a roll for admission to King's College, Cambridge. The election is made, after examination of the upper class, by the provost and two fellows of King's College, assisted by the provost, vice-provost, and head master of Eton. The successful candidates, however, are not immediately transferred to Cambridge, but remain at school until vacancies occur on the foundation of King-s College. The supply is prevented from outrunning the demand by the regulation that at the age of nineteen an Etonian is superannuated, as it is called, or is not allowed to remain longer at school. On their removal to Cambridge the Eton scholars are received on the foundation of the college and maintained from its funds; and after three years they succeed to fellowships. Here then is an opportunity by which the poorest man's son may obtain the best education which the country affords, and be put on the road to the highest preferments in the national church. The admission to Eton is not clogged with any necessity for patronage; although the incidental charges attending the education of a king's scholar are greater than is compatible with the character off a charitable e foundation.

Mr. Britton, in the second volume of his ' Architectural Antiquities of Great Britain,' has printed, from manuscripts in the British Museum, some accounts of the expenditure on the building of Eton College, which curiously illustrate wages and prices in former times. The work appears to have been commenced in the beginning Of July, 1441. The first week there were employed seventeen carpenters, seven stone-masons, fifteen sawyers, and thirty-one common labourers. In the second week two more masons! and twenty-five more labourers were added. By December we find thirty-five free masons and two row masons employed. The-wages of masons and carpenters were sixpence a-day, and those of labourers two-pence. Many days were lost, however, both to the men and to the progress of the work, as being holydays of the church. The first year the entire expenditure was, usually from £8 to £9 per week. The second year there was paid for labour alone £712 19s. ld., and for materials £1447 4s. That year 457 tons of stone were imported from Caen, in Normandy, which appear to have been paid for at the rate of 5s. 8d. per ton at the quarry, 4s. more for carriage to London, and 1s. 4d. more for carriage to Eton: the total cost, therefore, was 11s. per ton. Most of our old buildings, we may remark, from the Conquest down to the end of the fifteenth century, were constructed of stone from Caen. The portion of Eton College which is of brick was not begun till 1443. That year 100,000 bricks were used, which cost 10d. the thousand. In five years there were consumed 1,637,750 bricks. The brick-kiln was near Slough, m a field now the property of the College, but which was then rented at twenty shillings per annum. The building suffered considerable interruptions before it was completed; and the great tower gateway, indeed, called Lupton's Tower, which was the last part erected, was not finished till the year 1523, in the reign of Henry VIII.

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