552 



NATURE 



\Oct. 19, 1876 



time does not now allow of my repeating it. Suffice it to 

 say that the present operation of these valuable prizes 

 is directly antagonistic to their supposed objects. In- 

 stead of promoting science and learning they serve only 

 to make the university an arena in which young men con- 

 tend for money prizes, and those who should be teachers 

 are engrossed in training, handicapping, and settling 

 the conditions of the race. The operation of emulation, 

 honours, and prizes as a stimulus in school education is 

 somewhat doubtful. But in the highest stage of liberal 

 education it is necessary, if science and letters are to 

 work with their cultivating effect on the mind, that they 

 should be disengaged from all mercenary attractions. 

 But when prizes of such magnitude as Fellowships are 

 employed to attract students they become themselves the 

 all-engrossing objects of pursuit. In Oxford and Cam- 

 bridge, taken together, an amount of not less than 

 150,000/. a-year is spent on prizes. The sum is in itself 

 an insignificant fraction of the national income, but it far 

 exceeds the whole outlay which the country makes on 

 science and learning. The bestowal of these lavish 

 prizes corrupts instruction at its sources. No re- 

 form, having for its object to make the universities the 

 home of science and learning, can be effectual which 

 does not begin by suppressing this wholesale pensioning 

 of youthful sinecurists. I have reminded you of one old 

 academical saying ; there is another which recurs now to 

 my recollection, * A Fellowship is the grave of learning.' 

 I have spoken only of our old Universities, or rather of 

 Oxford, because I know it best. But I must not forget 

 that there are younger institutions which are struggling 

 upwards towards the ideal of a university, as I have 

 described it in Prof. Huxley's words, 'a corporation which 

 has charge of the interests of knowledge as such.' At the 

 head of these I must place Owens College, not only 

 because it is in Lancashire, but because in its staff of 

 Professors it possesses a body of men who are truly repre- 

 sentative of knowledge in a variety of its most important 

 departments. In a single generation we have seen this 

 College rise from humble beginnings to a position in 

 which it can put forward a claim to be incorporated as a 

 univeisity, with the privilege of giving degrees. Its 

 capitalised sources are, indeed, small. In addition to the 

 original 100,000/- of Owens' bequest, about 220,000/. has 

 been contributed by voluntary subscribers, an insignificant 

 sum when compared with the wealth of the great manu- 

 facturing metropolis. These funds, too, have been raised 

 almost exclusively in a very small circle and by a very 

 few public-spirited individuals ; they have not been drawn 

 from the general mass of manufacturing wealth in Man- 

 chester or the neighbouring district. With material 

 means so inadequate, the scientific eminence attained 

 by this young institution is a remarkable example of intel- 

 lectual vigour, which must dispose us to regard favour- 

 ably its claims to incorporation. But there is, besides, 

 an immediate practical requirement which compels Owens 

 College to seek without delay the right of conferring degre es. 

 It is this : that as longasits students are under the necessity 

 tff graduating through the University of London, they must 

 pass through the examinations required for the London de- 

 gree. Consequently the professors of Owens College can 

 never take the free and independent position of teachers of 

 science. It is inevitable [that they must prepare their 

 pupils for examination, and every true teacher knows too 

 well that this process is incompatible with genuine in- 

 struction in letters and science. The efficiency of a local 

 university is not to be measured by the amount of its 

 annual income, nor its success by the number of its 

 pupils. Does it profess to teach and represent human 

 knowledge in all its main branches and in its most com- 

 plete forms ? Is each great department occupied by men 

 who are in possession of the long tradition of the past 

 and zealous in searching out what still remains unex- 

 plored ? Is liberal culture recognised as its basis, and 



progressive science as its aim ? Where these conditions 

 are fulfilled it would be hard to say why such an institu- 

 tion should not be entrusted by the State with the privi- 

 lege of marking its students with the public stamp of 

 certified acquirement. If it were merely a question of 

 comparative qualification it would be difficult to main- 

 tain that Durham possesses, and that Owens College 

 does not possess, the capacities, extensive and intensive, 

 which I have supposed to be required. But if in the 

 next twenty years the growth of Owens College is in pro- 

 portion to its advance in the last twenty, the question 

 will by that time have settled itself" 



No words of ours could add to the force of this address, 

 coming as it does from one in the position of its author. 

 When we contrast the actual state of things in our English 

 Universities with the ideal which appears in the above 

 address and in that of Prof. Huxley at Baltimore— an ideal 

 which has almost become a reality in America — any well- 

 wisher of his country and of learning cannot but feel 

 regret at the opportunities that have been lost, and the 

 almost hopelessness of any rapid improvement. 



THE FIFTH MEETING OF RUSSIAN 

 NATURALISTS 



THE fifth meeting of Russian Naturalists was opened 

 September 12 at Warsaw. The Russian Naturahsts 

 are not yet organised intoapermanentassociation, although 

 it is their wish, repeatedly expressed, to found an asso- 

 ciation on the same principles as the British. A special 

 imperial permission must still be obtained before each 

 meeting, the rules of the meeting being settled by im- 

 perial decree, and a sum of money allowed for expenses 

 and publications. The sittings of the sections are open 

 only to members and persons introduced by them, mem- 

 bership being allowed only to those who have made 

 direct contributions to science, as ordained by the rules. 

 The meetings of the united sections for the transaction 

 of general business and for lectures of general interest, 

 are held in public, usually in presence of a numerous 

 audience. The meeting (for it can hardly be called an 

 association) publishes a daily bulletin of transactions, 

 and issues, in the course of the year, one or two large 

 volumes of memoirs {Troody) containing lectures, and 

 longer papers in extenso, together with such contributions 

 as separate societies of naturalists have found too expen- 

 sive to publish in their journals. 



The Warsaw meeting was largely attended by natu- 

 ralists from all parts of Russia, but especially from St. 

 Petersburg, Moscow having but few representatives. 

 The number of members was about three hundred, the 

 sections of Scientific Medicine and Chemistry being 

 especially full. There were very few foreign naturalists, 

 the organising committee not being allowed by the rules 

 to send invitations abroad. Prof. Brodofsky, president 

 of the Committee, was elected president of the meeting, 

 and the St. Petersburg professors, Mendel^eff and But- 

 leroff, vice-presidents. The ten sections of the meeting 

 transacted a great deal of business during the nine days 

 the Naturalists were assembled, and we may give after- 

 wards some account of the papers read, referring now 

 only to lectures delivered at public meetings. 



At the first meeting Prof. Dobrzycki read an interesting 

 medical paper, " On the Principles of Research into the 

 Causes of Diseases." Several propositions as to the per- 

 manent organisation of future meetings, the opening of a 

 Society of Naturalists at the Warsaw University on the 

 principles adopted for the societies already existing in 

 connection with all universities in Russia, the holding of 

 an international meeting of naturalists, and the publica- 

 tion of an international daily scientific paper, were read 

 and referred for discussion to the sections. 



The second public meeting was especially crowded 

 with the public, Two papers were read by Prof. Goy^r 



