July 9, 1896] 



A'A rURE 



227 



science scholarships, and therefore the scholarships are 

 not attardefi. 



Oxford fosters the exclusive study of classics in the 

 public schools, and it also docs its best to shut its gates 

 against those who have received what is called a modern 

 education in other schools. The burden of matriculation 

 and responsions is not a very heavy one to a fair classic, 

 but it is sufficient to keep out many who have had an ex- 

 clusively classical education, and is quite prohibitive to 

 most " modern " boys. They go either to Cambridge, 

 where the burden, especially as regards matriculation, is 

 much lighter, or to one of the newer universities. In in- 

 tention Oxford is possibly right. The product of a 

 modern education is often wofully illiterate. He has the 

 credit of knowing an extensive range of facts, and of 

 having clear ideas about a large number of phenomena ; 

 but he is often incapable of stating his facts in plain 

 English, and is so deficient in expression and in the 

 power of arrangement, that clearness is the very last 

 epithet which can be applied to his expositions on paper. 

 His orthography and grammar are too often villainous. 

 This sort (Oxford has determined to have nothing to do 

 with, and no true friend of science « ould wish to shake the 

 determination. It may be doubted, however, whether the 

 particular means of exclusion which are adopted, viz. 

 insistence on a knowledge of Greek accidence, are alto- 

 gether appropriate. It is quite possible for a man to 

 have plenty of miscellaneous information, a good literary 

 style, and originality of thought, without knowing as much 

 of the Greek irregular verbs as would enable him to pass 

 the ordinary college matriculation examination or respon- 

 sions. The fact is tacitly admitted : for, with a strange 

 inconsistency, the same section of the University which 

 shudders at the idea of abolishing the Greek test for 

 men, has lately opposed the admission of women to 

 the 13. -A., degree for this reason, amongst others : that 

 it would involve their having to go through the same 

 Greek course as men, instead of being exempt from it as 

 at present. But if it is asked why Greek is essential to 

 the culture of men and unessential to the culture of 

 women, no answer is vouchsafed. 



The amount of Greek required for responsions is only 

 acquired by some — probably by the majority — of boys at 

 the cost of an amount of time utterly disproportionate to 

 the results obtained. For in the end, though they may 

 scrape through examinations, they really know no Greek 

 worth mentioning, and what little knowledge of it they may 

 have acquired is so fugitive that in a year or two after the 

 examination they could not conjugate a Greek verb, and 

 would be lost if they attempted to construe the easiest 

 passages from Xenophon. It is idle to say that this 

 modicum of fugitive knowledge is essential to culture. 

 The CJreek test is in a great number of instances a com- 

 plete failure, and the imposition of it serves only to pre- 

 vent many boys from attaining to culture by means suited 

 to their natural aptitudes. 



It is largely due to Greek that the numbers of the 

 science school at Oxford are kept in check. If the Uni- 

 versity seriously wished the school well, it would allow 

 elementary science, together with a modern language, to 

 be ofiered as an alternative to Greek in responsions, and 

 colleges would follow suit in their entrance examinations. 

 \\'ere this done, a large number of boys, freed from the 

 trammels of a study which is repellent to them, would be 

 able to learn enough of science to qualify for a science 

 scholarship, and would in addition be able to acquire a 

 knowledge of English and French or German literature 

 sufficient to entitle them to the designation of scholar in 

 the widest sense of the term. 



To turn to the question of fellowships. They may be 

 regarded as possible encouragements to science in two 

 ways — prospective and actual. No doubt the prospect of 

 obtaining one out of a considerable number of fellowships 

 in any given subject will attract clc\er undergraduates to 



NO. 1393, VOL. 54 I 



that subject. The actual holder of a fellowship may be 

 supposed to exercise considerable influence in his college 

 in favour of the subject which he professes. Nearly all 

 the science professorships are attached to fellowships in 

 one college or other, and in addition there are thirteen 

 scientific Fellows receiving emolument in various colleges. 

 Therefore it would appear that, in point of influence in 

 college counsels, Oxford is not so very badly off. But the 

 outside world is apt to over-estimate the influence which 

 a Professor- Fellow or an ordinary Fellow exercises in 

 educational matters, unless indeed he be a man of excep- 

 tional force of character. Educational questions rarely 

 come before a full college meeting. The control of 

 studies in each college is vested in the few Fellows who 

 are tutors, whose function it is to exeicise a general 

 supervision over the moral and intellectual well-being of 

 undergraduates. This supervision has been formed into 

 a system of which it is not too much to say that it is in 

 the highest degree inimical to science. It is quite unlike 

 the system which exists under the sarne name at Cam- 

 bridge, and exercises a much greater pressure on under- 

 graduates. 



Every freshman on arrival is assigned to a tutor, whose 

 business it is to set him on a course of study, to see 

 that he goes to the proper lectures, that he is punctual 

 in his attendance at them, and attentive to his reading. 

 A tutor may or may not, as the case may be, undertake 

 also the private instruction of his own pupils. Since 

 there are many avenues to the art's degree, it might be 

 supposed that the tutor would point out to each fresh- 

 man the various courses of study open to him, would 

 give him the choice of any one of them, and the necessary 

 information as to the proper mode of following up his 

 choice when made. Were this done, there is reason to- 

 belie\e that a much larger proportion would select 

 natural science. But the freshman is not in\ited to 

 make a selection. Scholars, whether classical, mathe- 

 matical, or scientific, are sent at once to their respective 

 subjects. A commoner, if of more than average ability, 

 is told that he must read for honours in classical modera- 

 tions, and afterwards for " greats " ; if of average 

 capacity, then law or history is indicated ; if of lesser 

 ability, the prescription is pass moderations with tw» 

 pass classical schools, and probably political economy 

 for the third. Neither honour men nor pass men hear of 

 science unless they make particular inquiries about it ;, 

 and if they do, they are as often as not told that it will 

 not give them the breadth of education necessary for 

 their future careers. Instances can be cited of fresh- 

 men anxious to read science having been ordered to 

 take a classical school instead. 



Obviously this state of things would not exist if science 

 were adequately represented on the tutorial staffs of 

 colleges. It is most inadequately represented. Christ 

 Church is the only college which shows to advantage in 

 this respect. By reason of special endowments, it main- 

 tains three science lecturers, known as Lee's Readers, 

 and of these the two senior are also tutors. There is 

 a science tutor at Keble. (It is interesting, by the way, 

 to note that the two most distinctively religious founda- 

 tions in Oxford are those which give the most substantial 

 recognition to science : it has not been discovered that 

 their religious character suffers thereby.) In no other 

 college is there a science tutor. There are lecturers, but 

 the powers of a lecturer are not those of a tutor, either 

 in theory or in practice. In some cases, indeed, the in- 

 dividuality of the lecturer may give him an influence 

 coequal with that of the tutors, as is the case at Balliol 

 and Trinity, and elsewhere, as at Merton, New College, 

 Magdalen, and St. John's some considerable freedom of 

 action is conceded to science lecturers ; but in other 

 cases, the duties of the lecturer are limited to the arrange- 

 ment of the work of such men as the tutors may send to 

 them. Speaking generally, it may be said that the tutors. 



