24 LIFE OF 



Medicine being distasteful, Edinburgh had no other 

 distinctive charms to offer to young Darwin, and he was 

 entered at Christ's College, Cambridge, early in 1828, 

 with the idea of his becoming a clergyman of the Church 

 of England. It might have been thought that there was 

 scant stimulus for a biological student in the Cambridge 

 of that period ; but although the old literary and mathe- 

 matical studies were still the only paths to a degree, there 

 were men of original force and genius at work preparing 

 the ground for a coming revolution. Sedgwick was 

 teaching geology with the fire of a prophet, and Henslow 

 as a botanist was showing that lessons of enthralling inte- 

 rest were to be learned from the humblest flower. Henslow 

 especially attracted young Darwin, who never forgot his 

 old teacher. In the preface to the journal of his voyage 

 in the Beagle he returns his most sincere thanks to 

 Professor Henslow, " who," he says, " when I was an un- 

 dergraduate at Cambridge, was one chief means of giving 

 me a taste for natural history ; who, during my absence, 

 took charge of the collections I sent home, and by his 

 correspondence directed my endeavours and who, 

 since my return, has constantly rendered me every 

 assistance which the kindest friend could offer." 



No better idea of Darwin's Cambridge days can be 

 given than that which is derived from reading his 

 account of Professor Henslow, contributed to the Rev. 

 L. Jenyns's "Memoirs" of that accomplished man. There 

 can be no doubt, also, that in thus pourtraying the 

 character of another, he was at the same time, as Mr. 

 Romanes puts it, " unconsciously giving a most accurate 

 description of his own." 



