RISE OF MODERN STUDIES 187 



speak of the University of Newton and Charles 

 Darwin, of Maxwell and Rayleigh, as still shrouded 

 in medieval shadow. 



It cannot be too often repeated that since the Com- 

 mission of 1850, or rather since the promulgation of 

 the new statutes in 1856, the University has advanced 

 without pause to claim as her own the whole field of 

 modern knowledge ; and that it is the rapidity of her 

 advance which has depleted her treasury. The state 

 of things before 1850 need here be referred to only for 

 purposes of contrast. The only avenue to an honours 

 degree was then the Mathematical Tripos, or, for 

 students of classics, the Mathematical combined with 

 the Classical Tripos. Science formed no part of the 

 regular course of instruction. Adam Sedgwick him- 

 self, pre-eminent geologist as he afterwards became, 

 knew nothing of geology when admitted to his pro- 

 fessorship. When he was appointed to his chair, 

 classics, mathematics, and, in a less degree, theology 

 and law, were well endowed ; but effective provision 

 for modern studies or for science there was none. 

 In 1851 was founded the Disney professorship of 

 archaeology, and the creation of this chair may fairly 

 be considered to be the first step towards the recog- 

 nition of the sciences of ethnology and anthropology. 

 The imperial value of ethnological and anthropological 

 research is incontestable, and to this research no more 

 important contribution has been made than by the 

 bands of Cambridge travellers and students. 



Mention has been made in the first place of the 

 studies more closely related to the ' humanities/ 

 because it does not seem generally to be realized how 

 thoroughly even the ancient learning is to-day im- 

 bued by the scientific spirit. But, so early as the 

 year 1851,* new avenues to an honours degree were 



* The dates given for the triposes are those of the first 

 public examinations held. 



