LORD RECTOR OF ABERDEEN 119 



(Coll. Essays, viii, p. 37). It explained the aims of the 

 Challenger expedition, which had started on December 21, 

 1872, and gave a popular account of the various kinds of 

 apparatus employed. As a member of the Challenger 

 Committee of the Royal Society, Huxley had had a great 

 deal to do both with arranging the programme of the 

 expedition, and laying down the methods to be employed. 



1874. 



With health fairly well re-established, the work 

 accomplished during 1874 was of increased amount. 

 The most important event that took place in the early 

 part of the year was the Rectorial Address on " Univer- 

 sities : Actual and Ideal," given at Aberdeen (Coll. 

 Essays, iii, p. 189). — This compares to their disadvan- 

 tage— 



"... the host of pleasant, moneyed, well-bred young gentlemen, 

 who do a little learning and much boating by Cam and Isis," 

 with " many a brave and frugal Scotch boy, spending his summer 

 in hard manual labour, that he may have the privilege of wend- 

 ing his way in autumn to this University, with a bag of oatmeal, 

 ten pounds in his pocket, and his own stout heart to depend 

 upon through the northern winter." 



The contrast is perhaps a little overdone, and reminds 

 one of the more recent utterance of a well-known noble- 

 man, who described a newly-established University as 

 adapted to '* the hard and even horny-handed workman," 

 at the first meeting of the Court of that University. 



The address describes the ideal University as one in 

 which all subjects of study are impartially treated, and as 

 to the student : — 



** . . . the very air he breathes should be charged with that 

 enthusiasm for truth, that fanaticism of veracity, which is a 



