66 ENGLISH MEN OF SCIENCE. [CHAP. 



easy to extend the list considerably, if I took 

 a slightly lower level of celebrity for my 

 limit. 



Every one of these 13 men when he died, 

 was, or would have been, if he had not pre- 

 viously outlived his reputation, the subject of 

 numerous obituary notices, and his death an 

 e^vent of sufficient public interest to warrant his 

 being reckoned as an "eminent man." I formerly 

 calculated, and have since seen no reason to 

 doubt my conclusions, that the annual obituary 

 of the United Kingdom does not include more 

 than 50 men who are eminent in that sense. 

 Therefore this small band of 660 individual^ 

 contains almost one-fourth as much eminence as 

 is annually produced by the United Kingdom. 

 A different criterion of 'eminence may be found 

 in the number of celebrated men reared in the 

 universities, whither a large proportion of the 

 brightest youths of the nation find their way. 

 I examined the list of honours at Cambridge 

 in the ten years 1820-9 inclusive, and also the 

 four years 1842-5, of which I happen to have 

 some personal knowledge, whence it appeared 



