— part of the site was a portion of the dissolved Priory of
St. Augustine, where the " New Museums " now stand. The
last relic of the " physic garden " is a splendid specimen
of the Sophora chinensis, which yields the dye for the
imperial yellow Court clothing of the Chinese, and which in
summer somewhat darkens the windows of the Pathological
Laboratory. The building of the Fitzwilliam Museum was
then incomplete. The massive and forbidding gaol stood,
as J.'s mother mentioned, on the south side of Parker's Piece
where Queen Anne's Terrace now stands. The "handsome
and commodious shirehouse" on Castle Hill had been erected
in 1842, and had involved the destruction of the romantic
gate-house of the old castle, a piece of vandalism but too
typical of Early Victorian methods.

In those days there were no public parks. Horsemen can-
tered over Parker's Piece, or undergraduates played football
there " without uniform or regular organisation," and for many
years afterwards Christ's Piece, enclosed by a rough fence, was
used for grazing sheep. Jesus College owned the Lammas rights.

The Corn Exchange was not built, and Corn Exchange
Street, then called Slaughter House Lane, was flanked on the
western side by rows of slaughter-houses, whose site is now
occupied by the Exchange, the Anatomical and Physiological
Schools, and by part of the Medical School.

^ Cooper's Memorials, i. p. 133.



Trinity College 8 3

Boating in the early fifties was greatly hampered by the
strings of barges proceeding along the narrow river course.
After passing Midsummer Common, the horse was cast off and
the barges were punted past the backs of the Colleges by stout
poles called "spreads" to discharge their cargoes at the hythes
between Magdalene Bridge and St. John's College, or more
usually in the Mill Pool above Queens'. The bargee, too, was
still a social factor, as readers of Thackeray's " Codlingsby " will
remember. Within the last few years, punting has been re-
sumed on " the backs " not with the happiest results, — " qtiieta
non movere'"'' applies very literally to the bottom of the Cam.

Even in the seventies Cambridge would have seemed odd
to our eyes. The earlier fashions lingered, I believe, longer at
St. John's than in other Colleges. There cap and gown were
compulsory until 11 a.m., and the lectures began at 8 o'clock
in the morning. Some of the Dons had very marked individu-
alities, and held very strong opinions which they did not
hesitate to express. One of these gentlemen who married late
in life, returning to his church after a honeymoon of six
weeks, publicly thanked God "for three weeks of unalloyed
connubial bliss." The same gentleman once defined his religious
and political position in these words: "I, sir, am a High-
Churchman and a Tory, and I fail to see how a gentleman and
a Christian could be anything else." There are still left those
who heard and remember a sermon of his in the Colleffe
Chapel ; when passionately declaiming, " The centuries ask us,
What is Faith ? " he startled his hearers by thundering out,
" But, the answer is A^o." He once rebuked a Junior Fellow,
who was smoking a pipe in the Wilderness, with the remark,
"No Christian gentleman smokes a pipe, or if he does he
smokes a cigar."

J. came up to Trinity in 1852, and thus began his associa-
tion with the College which lasted for nearly sixty years. He was
always very proud of his connexion with Trinity, and, though on
occasions he would say a bitter word with regard to some action
of the College Council, he would be the first to defend his



84 Foreign Travel and College Life

College from the attacks of others. In 1903, by way of making
some return for what he felt he owed to Trinity, he presented
the College with a copy (purchased in Spain) of Antonio Moro's
well-known portrait of Queen Mary. Of this picture J. used
characteristically to remark that it proved that, whatever other
failings Philip of Spain had, he was at any rate a gentleman :
for after seeing the original picture (which was specially painted
for him) he still married the lady !

1852 was also the year of the publication of the " Report of
the Commissioners for Inquiring into the State, Discipline, and
Revenues of the University and Colleges of Cambridge." Until
the new Statutes, which were adopted as the result of this in-
quiry, were promulgated, there had been little or no change at
any of the Colleges since the time of the original Statutes drawn
up by the Founders. At Chrisfs College, Lady Margaret's
Statutes governed us for 350 years. But the publication of the
Report just mentioned marked the end of the old University
and College life and the beginning of the modern academic
Cambridge. With this beginning, " enter J. "

He came into residence in October. It was a spacious and a
leisurely age, and apparently one did not at that time look very
far ahead. Only on the 9th October did his father "go to
Mr. Cooper in the morning, and found that 1 could have
rooms." Two days later J. " went down early to Mr. Cooper,
and talked some time with him. After luncheon, went with
Mamma and Papa to my rooms and arranged what was
wanted. Then went to shops and sent things in."

" My rooms " during the next four years were H.6, New
Court. On taking his degree he moved to D.4, in Nevile's
Court, and two years later to D.5. When living in D.4, he
had in the rooms opposite one who remained his friend through-
Jr out life — Charles Gray, now Rector of West Retford. These
sets of rooms were over those occupied by Mr. W. G. Clark,
the Shakespeare scholar, and of Mr. IMartin, the Bursar. Even
as late as 1870 J. had rooms in College, R.7 Great Court,
and these he occupied, although he had ceased to be a Fellow,

i . —



I



y,^s Tutors 85

in virtue of the fact that he was working at the College
muniments.

J.'s first Tutor was John Cooper, 33rd Wrangler and 7th
in Class I of the Classical Tripos of 1835. He gained his
Fellowship in 1837. Cooper left Cambridge in October 1855,
and two years after J. took his degree was instituted into
the College living of Kendal, and became Canon of Carlisle
and Archdeacon of Westmoreland. He appears to have been
an amiable, right-minded man, of no particular force. In
those days, however. Tutors of Colleges had few dealings with
their pupils beyond sending in their terminal College bill. In
that matter I gather they were precise.

The following extract from Professor James Stuart's admir-
able account of Cambridge as he found it in 1862, shows us that
the Tutor of fifty years ago thought it no part of his duty to
inform a candidate for a scholarship of the result of his exam-
ination. " After having sat for that, and before the result was
known, I went to Harrow to pay a visit to my uncle, James Stuart.
Being somewhat of an Evangelical Churchman, he took in the
Record^ and about a week after I saw in it, accidentally, a
notice of the names of those who had gained the minor scholar-
ships, including my own. The incident, I think, shows the
rather slipshod method in which college tutors then conducted
their business. I wrote to Mr. W. G. Clark, my college tutor,
saying I had noticed my name in a list given in the Record of
such and such a date, and asking him if it were correct. He
wrote back a very short letter, consisting of the following
words : ' My dear sir, the Record has in this instance spoken
the truth."' I afterwards learned that he was not of the Evan-
gelical persuasion, and read the Guardian.'''' ^

It was a Trinity tutor, somewhat senior to Mr. Cooper, who,
having told his servant to ask one of his pupils to wine, and
being reminded by that functionary that the gentleman in
question was dead, replied in a voice of thunder, " You ought
to tell me when my pupils die.""

1 Reminiscences, by James Stuai-t^ pp. 144-5.



86 Foreign Travel and College Life

From 1850 William Colliiigs Mathison had been associated
with Mr. Cooper in the direction of his " side," and when
Cooper left in 1855 he became solely responsible for it, and
J.'s later bills are made out in his name. He was an accom-
plished musician, and, to those whom he liked, generous and
kind ; but there were others, and on the whole I do not gather
that the junior members of Trinity suffered much when he
married and retired to a college living in Norfolk. There he
presently died. Tom Taylor lived in the rooms above Mr.
Mathison's if I am right in identifying the latter as " the small
precise Don " ; and he it was, according to Bristed, who used to
put mice into the Tutor's milk jug.^

We have seen that J. was not altogether a happy school-
boy, and that he did not derive all the benefit he might
from Eton. When he came up to the University, however,
things were different. He was lucky enough to get into a
remarkably nice reading set, and I gather he thoroughly
enjoyed his undergraduate days. It is only sixty years ago,
yet almost the only member of this set whose name I have been
able to retrieve is William Court Gully, afterwards Speaker
of the House of Commons, who took his degree in 1856.

J. soon learnt that his father, who always had a high opinion
of his boy''s ability, had set his heart on his getting a Fellow-
ship. J. himself thought he had no possible chance; but he
worked hard, " probably as hard as ever man did," and, thanks
to the aid of Lightfoot and Lempriere Hammond (the latter of
whom, J. said, "• made me "), he obtained a first class in the
Tripos.

J. has drawn for us the day's work of a reading man when
he was " up," and we can safely assume that it is a sketch of a
day in his own student life. He took, I believe, little part in
formal athletics ; but, as his mother wished, he rode regularly,
and, as was the habit of the age, took long walks. On wet
afternoons the members of the University " resorted to the
cloister in Nevile"'s Court, Trinity, which from two to four

^ C. A. Bristedj Five Years in an English University (New York, 1852).



France and Germany 87

o'clock would be quite thronged with pairs of dons and under-
graduates pacing backwards and forwards." ^

One echo of the time, which shows his established love of
play-acting, has come down to me. Then, as now, societies
existed for the weekly reading of Shakespeare's plays. Some
one once told me that the first time he saw J. was on enter-
ing a room where one of these gatherings was soon to begin.
J., who had apparently been allotted the roles of one or two
" walking gentlemen," was bitterly exclaiming, " I wonder what
fool has cast me for these parts ! " In fact, if J. had the gift
of light verse — and this he had not — he might have said with
Calverley, who occupied the other end from J. of Class I in the
Classical Tripos of 1856 : —

"" When within my veius the blood ran,
And the curls were on my brow,
1 did, oh ye undergraduates.
Much as you are doing now."

In 1853 he went abroad with his parents, and, after a day
or two at Paris, made an extensive tour in Germany. As
usual when abroad, he kept a very detailed diary, and some
excerpts from this are here appended : —

" Tuesday, June 21. — Went after breakfast to the Mint,
which. was somewhat disappointing, except the stamping
of the coins, which interested me much. Then to Notre
Dame to see the Funeral of the Pope's Nuncio. The
Cathedral was hung with black, and the choir and the
portion under the centre carpeted with the same. At the
intersection of the Nave and Transepts an immense Cata-
falque had been raised, with Statues at each corner, and with
a hundred lighted Tapers and three great candelabra. . . .
The black hangings were then drawn aside, and showed
another candelabrum behind lighted. From the Catafalque
to the choir was a line of priests on each side and some
soldiers in front of them. There seemed about 300 priests

1 " A Septuagenarian's Recollections of St. John's," The Eagle, xxx.,
1909, pp. 16, 17.



88 ForeigJi Travel and College Life

altogether. The Archbishop officiated in a black cope em-
broidered with silver, and wore his mitre. The music was
most impressive, and one part of the service especially so,
viz. when the Host was raised the whole congregation fell
on their knees, including the soldiers, and they played a
rappel on their drums."

" 1853, Jxdy 5, Dresden. — Which is right, Rome or the
English Church .f* All seems so unreal, so unsatisfactory.
A sort of pageant — a troop of actors professing certain
ideas — and day after day repeating what they have been
told to say — while the world goes on in its sin and its
misery, getting neither better nor worse, except in the
cases of a few rare men, who seem to have solved the
problem of Life, and to understand why they are here.
There's the rub. What is my vocation here ? How am I
to employ myself usefully ? "

" Wednesday, July 6th. — Worked at Agamemnon till
one. . . . Went into the Catholic cemetery. It is the most
charming place I ever saw. The gravestones are nearly all
plain crosses, and the whole plot is thickly planted with
roses, which grow in wild luxuriance about, and yet seem
cared for and carefully cultivated. . . . Went afterwards
into the Lutheran cemetery ; it is just like the Catholic one,
only not so thickly planted with flowers, and does not look
such a holy place. And then I like the large crucifix so
— looking over the whole graveyard ; emblem of how
Christ watches over the faithful departed till they rise
again."

" Friday, Jidy Sth. — At six there was a short but severe
thunderstorm, with very vivid lightning. When it was
over, walked ... in the connnon near Friedrichstadt. I
never heard anything like the frogs — they had the true
Athenian croak — I could really at times distinguish the
/3peK6Ke^ quite loud, and the x^"-$ very often."

" Friday, July 9,^th. — AVent to the Opera to see The
Huguenots. I never remember to have seen in a theatre
any piece that gave me so much pleasure. In scenery,
music, acting, and dramatic power it surpasses everything
I have before witnessed, and quite comes up to my ideal of
an Opera."

" Tuesday, August 9,nd. — Went to hear Lucrezia Borgia.
It was grander than I had expected, tho' I heard so much
in its praise from Sutton. The actress who took the part



Germany 89

of Lucrezia acted and sang extremely well. One scene
particularly struck me. When Orsino sings the drinking
song, all of a sudden the sounds of the Mass for the dead
are heard. The lights are all extinguished, and the guests
cry out in horror, ' Who has done this ? ' All of a sudden
the doors at the back of the stage are thrown open, and in
the doorway is seen standing Lucrezia, pale as death, in a
long black di'ess, with not a bit of white to break its
solemnity, and a servant on each side holds up a light.
In answer to their question, she answers triumphantly,
' I, Lucrezia Borgia ! ' I never saw such magnificent
acting."

''^ Blaiikenburg\ Tuesday, Sept. 26th. — Went in the
morning to see the ducal Schloss : it contains a lot of
ugly pictures ... a good deal of ordinary furniture,
and other usual appurtenances of a country gentleman's
house. The best thing there is the collection of stuffed
birds and animals, which are worth going to see alone ; I
never saw such expression given to stuffed creatures : they
were done bv Mans of Brunswick. Wild cats are still shot
in the Harz : two are preserved there which the Duke
shot near."

*' Wednesday, Sept. 9nth. — Went by rail from Magdeburg

to Leipsic, as was anxious to see the annual fair,

now going on there.

"• I did not see such a variety of costumes as I had
expected. One Armenian passed us, and there were a
good many Tyrolese, one of whom was very friendly to
us, and saluted us with 'meine Liebe.' In the evening
went to the theatre, where they performed Ctmv und
Zimmerman. It was well enough, better than I had
expected."



to"'



In the following year (1854) "Johnny went in for a Trinity
scholarship,"" but was unsuccessful. He came out fifth in his
year in the annual examination at Trinity, but was only
awarded a Second Class. On 24th June he came of age. In
February 1855 "Johnny declaimed in Latin in the Trinity
College Chapel," and on 20th April he was elected a Scholar
of his College.

J. took his degree in 1856, bracketed last in Class I of



90 Foreign Travel and College Life

tlie Classical Tripos. Brown of Trinity was Senior, Calverley
of Christ's second, Horton-Smith ^ of St. John's bracketed
fourth. The previous year Montagu Butler of Trinity had been
Senior Classic, and in the following year, 1857, Moule of Corpus,
Seeley of Christ's, F. T. Piatt of Trinity, and Snow (later
Kynaston) of St. John's were all bracketed Senior, while in
1856 Fawcett of Trinity Hall had been seventh Wrangler, and
Bonney of St. John's was bracketed twelfth.

In the Long Vacation after taking his degree J. travelled
in Norway and Sweden in company with J. W. Dunning.
They wrote an account of this tour, which was printed, with-
out the authors' names, in 1857.

J. was in Cambridge most of 1857, though the early part
^ of the Long Vacation was spent in a short tour in France.
The Long Vacation must have been different then, for in what
is now the deadest time of the academic year, when only the
plumber and the paper-hanger prevail in College, the Univer-
sity was peopled with Dons and undergraduates : —

_y' " Wednesday, Sept. 23r^, 1857. — Wrote to mamma and

to papa. Called on Mrs. Pryme. She told me some
curious stories about old Cambridge. The Duke of
Gloucester was here for some years, and used to go out
to tea, like the rest of the world, with his tutor ; among
other places he went one Sunday to Jesus Lodge, where
after tea they played at blindman's buff", in the course
of which he kissed Mrs. Bcadon : ^ which kiss procured
her husband a Bishopric. But this story is apocryphal,
as the Duke probably never had influence enough to
procure anyone a Bishopric. When he came again here,
as Prince William, his old friends called on him at
Trinity Lodge; among others old Mrs. Thackeray went
with two of her young children, Mrs. Pryme, and one of
her brothers. The children were told to walk in the
court till mamma came down. The Duke received her
very graciously, and asked after her children. " Oh, they
are below," said she, and pointed to them through the

' Xow 'I'reasurer of Lincoln's luii.

- Wife of Richard Beadon, Master 1781-1789.



Fellow of Trinity 91

window. There was some plum cake on the table, and
the Duke took two pieces, wrapped them in paper, and
gave them to her for the children, who were, of course,
mightily pleased with the present, and cherished the
fragments of cake and the paper till they fell to pieces
from age."

Of the thirteen men who appeared in Class I of the
Classical Tripos of 1856, twelve were elected to Fellowships,
and three of the second Class had a similar success. In those
days the University was small, the avenues to Honour degrees
but four, and when two years later E. C. Clark, now Regius
Professor of Law and the Senior Classic of 1858, was not elected
to a Trinity Fellowship — (he was elected the next year) — there
was a good deal of comment. Never having lived in an old
ladies' almshouse, I cannot estimate the extent or the range of
their gossip, but I doubt if in intensity and minuteness it sur-
passed that of the Combination Rooms before 1881, when, by
the merciful intervention of Parliament, dons were allowed
to marry. J. himself always said, " I never ought to have got
a Fellowship, but there happened to be eight vacant that year,
and they gave me one." To the dons of those days it was
a problem, and a much discussed problem, why the last of the
First Class of the Classical Tripos of 1856 received a Fellowship
in 1858, one year before the Senior Classic of 1858. " Ifs the
metaph^mcs that did it,"" as old Francis France of St. John's
explained, showing a humorous contempt both for the Papers
on Moral Science which Dr. Whewell had introduced into the
examination for Trinity Fellowships, and a sound appreciation
of J.'s fundamental and whole-hearted incapacity for any kind
of Mental Philosophy.

Whilst he was an undergraduate J. was not extravagant ;
three of his College bills lie before me, and the terminal
average is about X''33. Of course there was Scroope House
to fall back upon for hospitality to his friends and himself,
but J. was, when I knew him, ever careful of money. Often
he was generous, often he spent considerable sums on what



92 Foreign 'Travel and College Life

seemed to him worth expenditure, and even those who knew
him intimately would have been surprised had they known
of the sums he lent to friends, in all walks of life, who found
themselves in financial difficulties. He was accustomed to say
with pretended cynicism, "Never spend any money," but more
than most men he carried out the injunction not to let his
right hand know what his left hand did.

We now come to a time when our material fails us. Whilst
an undergraduate, J.'s home was less than a mile from his
rooms ; thus there were no letters to his father or mother, or
hardly any that remain. Few of his intimate friends survive,
and although such as I have been able to get in touch with
have done their very best to help, I have gleaned but little.



CHAPTER V

J. AS A BACHELOR

J. has recorded that after his steady and strenuous work
for his degree, and then for his Fellowship, " for the first
time in my life I discovered that there was such a thing as
amusement," and he amused himself. His father allowed
him a liberal income, although I gather that J. thought it
inadequate. He hunted, he danced, he dined, and was the
cause of the dining of others; he took an active part in many
of the social clubs of Cambridge and especially in the A.D.C.
He had a certain skill in sketching, and thought he should like
to be an artist ; he knew — for the period — a good deal about
anatomy, and, I have been told, would like to have succeeded
his father in his Chair ; " I planned this and I planned that —
amongst other things an edition of Aristotle's De Partihus
Animalkim,'''' but nothing came of it all. He regretted that he
had not qualified as a doctor, but as a potential patient I am glad
he did not. He worked hard at French, which he had first learnt
as a child at Boulogne, and which he always alluded to as the
" native language." He spoke it with ease and pleasure.

At the instigation of his friend. Dr. Luard, he at this
time began to collect the long series of tracts recording Dr.
Richard Bentley's quarrels with Trinity. This developed ; and
he soon found himself collecting Cambridge literature of all
periods and upon every subject, with the result that by the
end of his life he had brought together a unique local collec-
tion. This collection he bequeathed to the University.

J. liked travelling, but never ventured very far afield. He
liked moving about in the Latin countries, especially in France,
which he always spoke of as " La Patrie " or " Le sol sacre."

93



94 y. as a '^Bachelor



He was fond of making in French what on the stage are called
" asides," and he affected to believe that no one except the
person for whose benefit the " aside " was made understood
him. Sometimes he used to excuse his sudden burst into
French by adding, " Je dis quelquefois des choses etranges."
Perhaps it was as a result of this that Mrs. J. used to declare
that the parlourmaid at Scroope House had purchased a
French dictionary, so as to be able to follow J.'s table-talk.
Certain it is that on one occasion he was somewhat taken
aback by a Cambridge cabman, whom he had just engaged, saying
that he thought it was only fair to tell him at the beginning of
their drive that he understood the French language !

He was less happy in Northern Germany, particularly after
1870, and thenceforth he classed all Germans as " plunderers
from Prussia"; but for him Vienna and Munich were by no
means places to be passed by. The year he was elected to his
Fellowship he spent largely abroad, visiting France and Italy
in the winter of 1858-59. I reproduce one of his letters written
to his mother in the spring of the latter year : —

Naples, Saturday, 12th March 1859.

" Spent the whole day in ascending Vesuvius. Before
starting I had just time to go to the Church of the
Incoronata to see Giotto's frescoes. They more than
come up to my idea of his beauties.

" Left the Inn at 11 a.m., drove to the Hermitage, or
rather as far as the lava would allow us, and then crossed