SCIENCE AND POLITICS 137 



As regards your second question, although I am much 

 gratified that you should think of me even for a moment, 

 I cannot but be sensible that I am very unfit for such a 

 post. Having been actively engaged in the City ever 

 since I was fourteen, I have not had the advantage of 

 any University training ; and especially as regards 

 Classics and Mathematics I am deficient in qualifications 

 which a Vice-Chancellor ought to possess. You will 

 excuse my troubling you with these details, but if, as I 

 gather from your note, some of my Colleagues have 

 done me the honour to think of me, I cannot but feel 

 that they do so in ignorance of the real state of the case. 

 Had it not been for these considerations I should have 

 asked you to allow me to consult you with reference to 

 the duties of the office before giving a reply, for I should 

 esteem it a very high honour to be put in nomination 

 for the Vice- Chancellorship ; an honour the more gratify- 

 ing to me in consequence of my father's old connexion 

 with the University. 



15th June 1872. 



My dear Lord Granville — I have, as you sug- 

 gested, seen Dr. Carpenter on the subject of the Vice- 

 Chancellorship of the London University. Though I 

 am much gratified at being thought of for such an 

 appointment, I still feel very strongly the objections 

 which I mentioned to you, and which you kindly 

 promised to reconsider, but in other respects I see no 

 difficulty, and I shall be quite content to leave myself 

 in your hands, should you find that my election would 

 be agreeable to the Senate. 



If you wish to see me before Wednesday I will keep 

 any appointment you may make. — Believe me, yours 

 very sincerely, John Lubbock. 



The Right Hon. Earl Granville. 



Lord Granville overruled his objections, and 

 on the motion of Lord Derby he was unanimously 

 elected Vice-Chancellor, and was afterwards re- 

 elected annually until he resigned the office in 

 1880, when he became Member of Parliament 

 for the University. 



At the request of the Society of Arts he 



