1 847 LECTURE PREPARATIONS 117 



my lecture at night. Hutton every day strikes me 

 with astonishment. Lyell does not do him half 

 justice.' He had never had any practice in public 

 speaking, and was uncertain how far he could trust 

 to notes, or how much he ought to write fully out. 

 But he possessed the best qualification for a successful 

 lecturer : he was full of his subject. To wide reading 

 in it he could bring the priceless advantage of that 

 personal acquaintance and vivid perception which 

 years of practical work in the field could alone have 

 given him. 



A professor's first course of lectures is always 

 the most arduous. The preliminary gathering and 

 arranging of notes, and the planning and execution 

 of diagrams and other illustrations, leave him generally 

 prepared for, at least, the first few lectures, perhaps 

 for the larger proportion of the series. But he is 

 probably seldom able to get all his material in hand 

 for the completed course before he actually begins 

 to lecture. Most usually he comes to the end of 

 his arranged notes when there is still a formidable 

 part of the term in front of him, and when, therefore, 

 he has to sit late and rise early to get ready for the 

 prelection of each day as it comes. Then there is 

 the feeling of uncertainty which arises in his mind 

 as to his facility of expression, when, for perhaps the 

 first time in his life, he finds himself addressing that 

 exacting audience an assemblage of lads, many of 

 them much readier to seek amusement than instruction, 

 careless yet critical, who have to be attracted and 

 interested before they can be instructed. 



With but little knowledge of students and student- 

 life, with scarcely any previous practice in public 

 speaking, and with no experience in teaching, Ramsay 



