4 MARCH 1905, Page 17

[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—The author of the

joke which you are inclined to attribute to Dean Manse' (Spectator, February 25th) was the Rev. Thomas Chatters, an eccentric Fellow and Tutor of Brasenose, who was a Classical Examiner in the "fifties." He was said to have addressed Mr. Field Flowers Gee at the close of his vivd voce as follows : "Sir, you are ploughed for your first, you are plucked for your second, and now you may do your third." It ought to be explained that no such cruel fate as his name invited overtook the worthy undergraduate, who became in due course a respected London rector, and subsequently an ornament of the Australian Episcopate. The joke, like many of a similar kind, was probably perpetrated in Common Room by his

playful Examiner.—I am, Sir, tic., R. D.