Newnham College
XXII
THE UNIVERSITY BUILDINGS
Fond tradition would compel us to accept the so-called School of Pythagoras as the fons et origo of the medieval University. However, the legend does not go for very much, and we may suppose that, until the foundation of several colleges brought about the necessity of a common centre, education was carried on in the numerous monastic houses or by private teachers at their own lodgings. The present schools, within the limits of the University Library, are probably in part of the fourteenth century, but, for the most part, belong to the latter half of the next century. They are not very conspicuous, and probably ninety-nine out of a hundred Cambridge men have never been inside them, as the majority of public examinations are held in the Senate House and the various large halls of which the town is full. They are, moreover, so incorporated in the Library as to form part of the building, and have no very distinctive mark.
