232 UNIVERSITIES: ACTUAL AND IDEAL vill 



contrary, the soil must have been carefully 

 prepared, and the Professor should find that the 

 operations of clod-crushing, draining, and weeding, 

 and even a good deal of planting, have been done 

 by the Schoolmaster. 



That is exactly what the Professor does not 

 find in any University in the three Kingdoms 

 that I can hear of the reason of which state of 

 things lies in the extremely faulty organisation of 

 the majority of secondary schools. Students 

 come to the Universities ill-prepared in classics 

 and mathematics, not at all prepared in anything 

 else ; and half their time is spent in learning that 

 which they ought to have known when they 

 came. 



I sometimes hear it said that the Scottish 

 Universities differ from the English, in being to 

 a much greater extent places of comparatively 

 elementary education for a younger class of 

 students. But it would seem doubtful if any 

 great difference of this kind really exists ; for a 

 high authority, himself Head of an English 

 College, has solemnly affirmed that : " Elementary 

 teaching of youths under twenty is now the only 

 function performed by the University ; " and that 

 Colleges are "boarding schools in which the 

 elements of the learned languages are taught to 

 youths." 1 



1 Suggestions for Academical Organisation, with Especial 

 Reference to Oxford. By the Rector of Lincoln. 



