The Highland monthly - National Library of Scotland

St2ident Life at Aberdeen. 173
shillings. If the tenants chose to spend the vacation in
residence, they had their rooms for that time rent free.
Rising in the morning, as we have seen, about five,
ad tintinnabuli sonitii})i, the student's first dut\- was to
" make the bed," sweep the chamber, fetch water, and,
generally, be his own housemaid. Tt was not until the
middle of the eighteenth century that two men-servants
were engaged to relieve them of part of such menial work.
No student was allowed to have his doors bolted before ten
at night, in order that the Masters might have ready access
to his rooms and inspect his behaviour. By eleven o'clock
all fires and lights had to be extinguished, and everybody
in bed. To prevent any possibilit}- of accident in the night-
time, a servant was emplo\-ed to ring one of the great bells
at two in the morning, and then go round all the rooms
and passages to see that nothing was wrong. What
purpose the ringing of a bell at such an hour can have
served I cannot conjecture, unless it was to inform the
rudeh'-awakened student that he had still three hours of
sleep before hirri.
A student is nothing unless he is well fed, and the
students of the olden days had certainly nothing to
complain of in the way of diet. In order that it might be
" wholesome and good, at an easy rate, and be regularly
and decently served at Table," the Masters each year con-
tracted with an economist to supply a weekly bill of fare
for breakfast, dinner, and supper, both for the first and the
second table. At the beginning of the session, every
student had to intimate to this economist at which table he
intended to sit. Those who sat at the first paid for their
board £2 15s 63^d sterling per quarter ; those who sat at
the second paid /.2 sterling. Both tables were served in
the same room, and the economist was head waiter, assisted
by "a number of other men-servants of good behaviour and
qualified to serve." It was the duty of the bursars to ask
a blessing and return thanks. If the College accounts do