A fasciculus of" scribbling" and scribbled paper, which a student
of Cambridge has published under the title of Letters from that University,* is scarcely worthy of that celebrated place of education. We confess that its frivolous details strongly reminded us of the paltry work to which its author Mr. Wright gave the name of Alma Mater, and for the composition of which he was branded by the eloquence of Mn Brougham and the verdict of a jury. We must, however, do the author of the Cambridge Letters the justice to say that it is free from the personalities which made Mr. Wright's work so odious and so disgraceful ; and that on the ground of falsehood or misrepresentation, as in the former case, no objection can lie against him. We object simply to the want of importance in his information, and the want of entertainment in his anecdotes. It is utterly useless to inform the world that the men of Trinity wear a blue gown, while black gowns are the livery of' all other colleges ; that the " town" and " gown," under these appellations, set-to in the streets ; that hasty reading for a particular object is called "cramming ;" that " gyps" are usually knavish waiters in college, but that an exception is to be
made in favour of one Thomas Robson of Trinity Lane. The insignificance of the information is not compensated by any agreeableness of manner or elegance of style : on the contrary, we recognize the forced wit and unmirthful raillery of the hard reading, but idealess lads among the sizars and inferior pensioners of the first two or three years of a Cambridge life. A solid work on this or on either University, would be an acceptable book. It should show the present state of education, examine the system now in use, trace its effects, discuss the advantages of endowments, and inquire generally into the acquirements of those who hold them, and who maintain the position of tutors and guardians in the University. The moral condition of the students should be ascertained, and the general fitness of the preparation of a University life for the business of the world. With reference to a point which has been much discussed in relation to the London University, we will bear our testimony to the fact, that in this assemblage of religious foundations at Cambridge, no religion is taught—little felt ; and that any open or marked profession of it is rather discountenanced than otherwise. The members and students who almost alone pay any regard to religion and its precepts, are men who voluntarily form themselves into a society for frequenting of a particular parish-church, which has nothing to do with the Universities, and might just as well be found elsewhere. Chapel is a bugbear, and a mockery even to the pious: divinity lectures are a sleepy form. After a time, students and fellows who intend to go into orders, and are on the eve of it, draw up a little, and assume more regular or serious habits : with this exception, there never was a body of men who were less influenced by the spirit of religion. The spirit of the place is a mathematical one. There is certainly an enthusiasm for distinction in science ; this is the salt which serves as a condiment for all the low habits of drunkenness, profaneness, and immorality, so common among every rank of Cambridge-men. We can safely aver, that over either the morals or the religion of young men who go to Cambridge from school, there is no other cheer: than what may arise from the deficiency of money or credit.
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Among the gayer part of the students, there s not even the sweetening power of a prevailing good taste or elegance of pursuit. We know that their most common and approved occupations are beastly drinking to a speedy intoxication, low amours, cat-hunting, dog-fighting, tandem-driving, and billiard-playing. In the lives of such men, in order to pass the Senate-house, a space of three or four months are laid aside for a tardy application to the acquisition of a few algebraical and geometrical conundrums, the rule of three, and sonic of the commonest sums of practice and fractions : if the faculties are not wholly blunted by a course of infatuating and stupifying dissipation, the student contrives to blunder through an easy examination, and departs a B. A. from Cambridge, to shoot on his paternal estates, or to dangle about the theatres and saloons of London ;—for such men are rarely to be found in better places until the filthy wine-stains of Cambridge port are thoroughly washed away. To those who really know Cambridge—and we add, Oxford—all that has been said about the absence of religious instruction in the London University has appeared in its true light of ignorance or cant. Let those who talk of Carmarthen-street walk up and down the streets of Cambridge in the evening : let them follow the half-intoxicated student to Barnwell, a village colonized by crowds of women of ill fame : let them inquire into the character of the serving-girls in all the lodging-houses of the town : let them watch the lurking student—aye ! and even the Fellow or the ALA. —about the doors of tradesmen in the dusk, lying in wait for his prey : let him then pursue any of the streets into the fields in the precincts of the venerable University—and he will know what to think of the men who are so facetious on the site of the building which is now rising so beautifully in the neighbourhood of Bedford and Russel Squares. It is not, however, the proximity of the abodes of immoral women that produces the immorality of Cambridge : it is the absence of all innocent amusement—of all society of a various and enlivening description. The student, after a day of monastic seclusion and study, runs into crime from the absolute necessity of finding diversion : the gay man, as he is called, who never reads at all, in any other place but Cambridge— certainly not in the capital—would not be driven to the indulgence of low tastes in the lowest and most injurious society. Control can never keep men virtuous : it may diminish opportunity : it can do that in London—it cannot do it at Cambridge : if men were too closely restricted within its dull walls, an University Asylum must be established for students who would :73cro mad from sheer ennui.
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