94 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES. 
Cambridge has found it possible to organise a mixed Board of Studies 
to manage a Final School of Geography, the Board being composed 
of representatives of both the Arts subjects and the Natural and Mathe- 
matical Sciences; and this acts apparently to the general satisfaction 
even in the absence of a Professor of the special subject, for whose 
teaching and testing it was formed. Why, then, should Oxford not do 
likewise? If Cambridge has not waited for the endowment of a 
Professorial Chair in Geography, need Oxford wait? I am well 
aware that, when at the latter University the School of English came 
into existence, there were ‘already two ‘Chairs appropriated to its 
subject; and I grant that Oxford will not have the very best of all 
guarantees that a high standard will be maintained in the instructional 
courses and the examinations in Geography, until there is a Professor 
ad hoc. But guarantees sufficient for all practical purposes she could 
obtain to-morrow by composing a Board out of her existing teachers 
of Geography and kindred sciences. 
For the last time, then, let me rehearse the too familiar ‘ vicious 
circle.’ The supply of good students depends on a supply of good 
teachers; the supply of good teachers depends on a supply of good 
students. If either supply fails, it is not Geography alone, but all 
sciences and studies that will be damnified; for all require the best 
of the help she can give in proportion as her science grows and im- 
proves. History will be able to call but indifferent Geography to 
her assistance, if this science has been understaffed and discouraged by 
official reluctance to allow it a place of its own in the sun. Is there 
not still some such reluctance on the part of the Board of Education, 
of some of our Universities, and of the Civil Service Commissioners ? 
