Note 27 — Chapter V · THE MEDIÆVAL STUDENT
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“When that is done,” Hearne adds, “they knock at all the Middle Chambers where most of the Seniors lodge, of whom they demand crowns apiece, which is readily given, then they go with twenty or thirty torches upon the leads of the College, where they sing their song as before. This ended they go into their Common Rooms and make themselves merry with what wine every one has a mind to.”
According to tradition, a mallard was found in a drain when the foundations of the college were laid, and Prof. Burrows has ingeniously explained the origin of this tradition as arising from the discovery of a seal with the impression of a griffin, Malardi Clerici, when a drain was being dug.