MEMORIALS OF OLD OXFORDSHIRE.
• Memorials of Old Oxfordshire. Edited by P. H. Ditchfield, M.A. (Bemrose and Sons. 15s.)—This beautiful book contains an exhaustive history of "the wondrous Oxford with its annals of seven centuries of University life and changing manners, the .home of learning, the Saxon and Norman stronghold that played a great part in the Danish strife, the Civil War of the twelfth, and the drama of the seventeenth centuries." The great interest of the capital has thrown that of the county into the shade, "and therefore," our author continues, "our eyes will wander most often to the hills and forests of the shire. Earthworks, cromlechs, camps, and roads tell us of its earliest inhabitants," of the Dobuni, a warlike Celtic race, who extended their territory to the Severn. Of them there are left many traces in the strange blocks of stone called the B,ollright Circle, which were probably destined to the same purpose as those of Stonehenge. Conquered in turn by the Romans, the latter have left many evidences of their occupation. Coins, walls, hypocausts, roads, still remain, but their luxurious villas were swept away, leaving few remains, by the Saxons, and Oxfordshire became part of the kingdom of Wessex. Christianity was first preached by St. Bernie in the seventh, and Edward the Confessor was born and christened in the shire in the eleventh, century. The Norman Kings loved to hunt in its forests. The twelfth century saw the rise of the religious houses which subsequently expanded into the famous University. Vast changes took place under the Tudors. Henry VIII. suppressed the monasteries with a cruelty which was only surpassed by that of Queen Mary. Eliza- beth loved Oxfordshire well, although she had twice been im- prisoned within its limits; and Shakespeare took the name of Cymbeline from that of a warlike chieftain of the Debora. Fiction also has made us familiar with the name of the un- fortunate Amy Robsart, whose tomb is at Cumnor. Every one knows the prominent part taken by Oxford under the Stuarts and during the Commonwealth. The poets, from Chaucer to Williani Morris, have sung its praises, but it is chiefly as a University that Oxford is known all over the world, the Alma Mater to which so many distinguished scholars and politicians look back with affection. We must refer the reader to the volume itself for the many excellent descriptions and illustrations by various competent hands of the stately houses and fine old churches within the shire, and only wish that we had space to quote extracts from its interesting pages.
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