54 



The whole history which Sir J. E. Smith here gives, — and which I 

 shall relate somewhere else, as characteristic of the English Univer- 

 sities, the question being one which affects the botanical world and 

 the pubhc at large, — is briefly as follows : 



The present Professor of Botany at Cambridge, Mr. Thomas 

 Martyn, having been for many years prevented from lecturing by 

 illness, confided his office of Professor, in so far as it was the 

 foundation of Walker, to the most eminent botanist in England, 

 the President of the Linnaean Society, Sir J. E. Smith. Most of 

 the members of the University were well pleased with this choice, 

 inasmuch as it advanced the celebrity of the high school at Cam- 

 bridge. In compliance with the desire of Martyn, Smith sacrificed 

 his leisure, went to Cambridge, and there proposed to renew the 

 lectures on botany, which for many years had been discontinued. 

 But the Pro-rector of this University, Mr. Monk, formally laid an 

 interdict on the Knight and President of the Linnaean Society, Sir 

 J. E. Smith, prohibiting him from ascending the rostrum, because 

 he was, — a Dissenter ! — that is, a Christian of a different persuasion 

 from Mr. Monk. What would be said of a German University 

 which for such a reason should exclude so distinguished an indivi- 

 dual as Smith ? Had Cambridge been now in the situation of 

 France, groaning under the rod of such an obscure fanatic as the Bishop 

 of Hermopolis ; or had Sir James, in any of his publications or in any 

 part of his conduct, shown the least trace of irrehgion, — then the 

 University would have been justified in this procedure : but not only 

 have all the works of Smith testified their author to be, in the highest 

 sense of the word, a religious character ; but his whole life has been 

 a series of the exercise of Christian virtue and elevated piety. 

 Who would have believed that an University within the walls of 

 which the immortal Erasmus Roterodamus once taught, and which 

 had produced such a man as Milton, should ever, and even in the 

 twentieth year of the nineteenth century, sink to such a depth of 

 barbarity ! (bestialit'dt !) But " omnia jam Jient " &c. ; and we must 

 not wonder that in this island, as well as on the continent, there 

 should be instances of the existence of dull heads and infected hearts 

 in Universities, when the direction of these institutions is entrusted 

 to the learned corps offreres ignorantins. 



