12 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY 



Artium ad Baptistam, and consequently, by the regula- 

 tions then in force, was reckoned as a bachelor of 1853. 



" In 1697 the Rev. Drue Drury bequeathed to Magda- 

 lene College the perpetual advowson of the vicarage of 

 Steeple Ashton, Wilts, and the impropriate parsonage of 

 the said place, to found a Travelling Fellowship for a 

 ' gentleman's son of Norfolk.' In 1847 the value of 

 the Fellowship was 366 gross, 268 net." * 



Owing to the fortunate circumstance mentioned 

 above of Mr. Newton holding the commission of the peace 

 for Norfolk, although a resident in Suffolk, and thanks to 

 the good offices of the then Master, George Neville- 

 Grenville (appointed Dean of Windsor in the same year), 

 Alfred Newton was elected in the spring of 1853 to the 

 Drury Travelling Fellowship, which happened to be 

 vacant. Unfortunately the church at Steeple Ashton 

 was sadly in need of repair at that time ; funds were 

 diverted to pay the cost of restoring the chancel, and the 

 slender emoluments of the Travelling Fellow compelled 

 him to stop at home. He stayed in residence at Cam- 

 bridge until the autumn of 1854, when he went to Elveden, 

 which was his home until the place was sold in 1863 after 

 the death of his father. 



For some years now he had been corresponding on 

 Natural History subjects, chiefly ornithological, with 

 naturalists all over the country ; among these may be 

 mentioned Yarrell, Gould, J. H. Gurney, and Sir William 

 Jardine, to whom he had become known through his 

 contributions to the pages of the Zoologist. But his most 

 important correspondence was with John Wolley. The 

 two men had been corresponding for some three years, 

 and in October, 1851, Wolley first called on Newton in his 

 rooms at Cambridge, after which their acquaintance 

 ripened into a firm friendship. Wolley 's work was 



* From "Magdalene College," by E. K. Parnell. (F. E. Robinson & Co.) 



