‘Take a bike ride in the sunshine into Oxford tomorrow,” a helpful reader from South Oxfordshire suggested in a telephone call to me last Thursday. “I think you will be surprised at how few of the colleges will be flying the flag of St George.” I did and I was.
In a near-complete survey from the saddle, I saw the flag of England’s patron saint unfurled over only five colleges. These were Balliol, Magdalen, Merton, St Antony’s and Christ Church. A few were displaying the Union Flag, a couple of others flags I didn’t recognise, most of them no flag at all. I did not venture as far north as Wolfson and accidentally omitted Lady Margaret Hall.
It cannot be, surely, that so many members of our intellectual elite accept the absurd belief – widely held, according to a survey last week – that it is only right-wingers who wish to show the red and white flag. If it is the case, I think it very sad.
I took a far from scientific approach, incidentally, to my tour of the colleges, the first time I have attempted such a survey. The names of the commendable quintet of patriotic institutions is given above in the order in which I visited them.
My outing prompts me to ask whether any reader knows – or is able to work out – the route one needs to take to visit all 38 colleges in the shortest possible distance. The knowledge could prove useful next St George’s Day.
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