194 MEMOIR OF MR GREGORY. 



Two years of his life were passed at the Edinburgh Academy ; 

 when he left it, being considered too young for the University, 

 he went abroad and spent a winter at a private academy in 

 Geneva. Here his talent for mathematics attracted attention; 

 in geometry, as well as in classical learning, he had already 

 made distinguished progress at Edinburgh. 



The following winter he attended classes at the University 

 of Edinburgh, and soon became a favourite pupil of Professor 

 Wallace's, under whose tuition he made great advances in the 

 higher parts of mathematics. The Professor formed the highest 

 hopes of Mr Gregory's future eminence : those who long after- 

 wards saw them together in Cambridge, speak with much in- 

 terest of the delighted pride he shewed in his pupil's success and 

 increasing reputation. 



In 1833, Mr Gregory's name was entered at Trinity College 

 in the University of Cambridge, and shortly afterwards he went 

 to reside there. He brought with him a very unusual amount 

 of knowledge on almost all scientific subjects: with Chemistry 

 he was particularly well acquainted, so much so that he had 

 been at Cambridge but a few months when it was proposed to 

 him by one of the most distinguished men in the University to 

 act as assistant to the professor of Chemistry ; which for some 

 time he did. Indeed, it is impossible to doubt that, had not 

 other pursuits engaged his attention, he might have achieved 

 a great reputation as a chemist. He was one of the founders 

 of the Chemical Society in Cambridge, and occasionally gave 

 lectures in their rooms. 



He had also a very considerable knowledge of botany, and 

 indeed of many subjects which he seemed never to have studied 

 systematically : he possessed in a remarkable degree the power 

 of giving a regular form, and, so to speak, a unity to knowledge 

 acquired in fragments. 



All these tastes and habits of thought Mr Gregory cultivated, 

 to a certain extent, during the first years of his residence in 

 Cambridge, of course in subordination to that which was the 

 end principally in view in his becoming a member of the 

 University, namely, the study of mathematics and natural 

 philosophy. 



He became a Bachelor of Arts in 1837, having taken high 

 mathematical honours : more, however, might, we may believe, 



