CHAPTER XV 



WORK AT CAMBRIDGE 



From the time of his election to the Professorship of 

 Zoology in 1866 until the end of his life, Newton never 

 left Cambridge for more than a few weeks at a time, 

 and for the greater part of that time, until within a few 

 years of his death, when he appointed Mr. William 

 Bateson, F.R.S., to be his deputy, he delivered a course 

 of lectures in two terms of every year. 



I began holding forth to-day and had a pretty good 

 audience — 30 or 40 at least — and 14 men were kind 

 enough to inscribe their names on a board, which means 

 as many pounds in my pocket ! I gave them some very 

 heretical notions (according to some people's ideas) but 

 wrapped up so judiciously that I believe even Clayton 

 would not have been shocked.* 



Dr. Shipley has mentioned in another chapter 

 (p. 104), Newton's apparent shyness in lecturing : this 

 was probably an expression not so much of shyness as 

 of a strong distaste for the business of lecturing. 



If I could afford it I would to-morrow give up part of 

 my salary to pay a lecturer who would be more com- 

 petent than myself, and such a man I could find easily 

 enough, because I know that I am one of the worst of 

 lecturers. In the first place, I never found myself 

 getting any real good from lectures when I had to listen 

 to them, and disbelieve totally in them. A man who 

 does believe in them might, or assuredly would, do 



* Letter to H. B. Tristram, October 22, 1866. 

 250 



