In the “Life of Edward Baines, late M.P. for the Borough of Leeds,” is an account of a barring-out, as managed at the grammar school at Preston, England.  It is related in Dickens’s Household Words to this effect.  “His master was pompous and ignorant, and smote his pupils liberally with cane and tongue.  It is not surprising that the lads learnt as much from the spirit of their master as from his preceptions and that one of those juvenile rebellions, better known as old than at present as a ‘barring-out,’ was attempted.  The doors of the school, the biographer narrates, were fastened with huge nails, and one of the younger lads was let out to obtain supplies of food for the garrison.  The rebellion having lasted two or three days, the mayor, town-clerk, and officers were sent for to intimidate the offenders.  Young Baines, on the part of the besieged, answered the magisterial summons to surrender, by declaring that they would never give in, unless assured of full pardon and a certain length of holidays.  With much good sense, the mayor gave them till the evening to consider; and on his second visit the doors were found open, the garrison having fled to the woods of Penwortham.  They regained their respective homes under the cover of night, and some humane interposition averted the punishment they had deserved.”—­ Am.  Ed. Vol.  III. p. 415.

BATTEL.  To stand indebted on the college books at Oxford for provisions and drink from the buttery.

Eat my commons with a good stomach, and battled with discretion. —­Puritan, Malone’s Suppl. 2, p. 543.

Many men “battel” at the rate of a guinea a week.  Wealthier men, more expensive men, and more careless men, often “battelled” much higher.—­De Quincey’s Life and Manners, p. 274.

Cotgrave says, “To battle (as scholars do in Oxford) etre debteur an college pour ses vivres.”  He adds, “Mot use seulement des jeunes ecoliers de l’universite d’Oxford.”

2.  To reside at the university; to keep terms.—­Webster.

BATTEL.  Derived from the old monkish word patella, or batella, a plate.  At Oxford, “whatsoever is furnished for dinner and for supper, including malt liquor, but not wine, as well as the materials for breakfast, or for any casual refreshment to country visitors, excepting only groceries,” is expressed by the word battels.—­De Quincey.

  I on the nail my Battels paid,
  The monster turn’d away dismay’d.
    The Student, Vol.  I. p. 115, 1750.

BATTELER, BATTLER.  A student at Oxford who stands indebted, in the college books, for provisions and drink at the buttery.—­Webster.

Halliwell, in his Dict.  Arch. and Prov.  Words, says, “The term is used in contradistinction to gentleman commoner.”  In Gent.  Mag., 1787, p. 1146, is the following:—­“There was formerly at Oxford an order similar to the sizars of Cambridge, called battelers (batteling having the same signification as sizing).  The sizar and batteler were as independent as any other members of the college, though of an inferior order, and were under no obligation to wait upon anybody.”