As other Fellows do of Trinity.”
My last character shall be Dr. Farmer, Master of Emmanuel, a most amiable and delightful man. We make his acquaintance as curate of the parish of Swavesey, a village with a most beautiful church, then a place much larger and more prosperous than it is at present. Almost all the parishes around Cambridge were served by fellows of the colleges, who went over on Sunday to take the prayers, and they were rarely visited on any other day by a clergyman. Sunday was a great day in the colleges, as these clergymen met after its labours, and ate most jovial suppers. Farmer was regarded as a model of punctiliousness in the performance of his duties, as he made a point of never missing a Sunday at Swavesey and of dining after service at the inn, to which meal he usually invited one or more of the farmers. He then rode back to Cambridge, slept an hour or so, and appeared in the Emmanuel “parlour,” where he was the delight of the whole party. People used to come for the week end from London for the pleasure of hearing Farmer’s conversation; and Mr. Pitt was much attached to him. He was fond of rushing up to London to dine; and one Ash Wednesday morning he announced to his Vice-Chancellor that he had to make haste to get to the University church in time, for at “three o’clock this morning I was blowing my pipe with the worshipful company of pewterers.” Dr. Farmer became Master of Emmanuel; and Gunning suggests that he might have become Head of Trinity for the asking; but when Mr. Pitt sought his advice as to whom he should choose, he simply replied, “If you want to oblige the society, appoint Postelthwaite.” He was a great admirer of Shakespeare, and never missed a performance when a play of his was acted.
But we must leave these quaint personages for a more general view of the life of the University. It had its splendid as well as its sordid side. Dress, as I have already hinted, played a great part in the pageant of the old place. Here is Gunning’s description of the fêtes at Commencement at the end of the summer term:
“On Commencement Sunday, the college walks were crowded. Every doctor of the University wore his scarlet robes during the whole day. Every nobleman wore his splendid robes, not only in St. Mary’s and in the college halls, but also in the public walks. Their robes (which are now uniformly purple) were at that time of various colours according to the taste of the wearers; purple, white, green, and rose colour were to be seen at the same time.”
There was also a good deal of ceremonial at other times; and the barbaric was occasionally mingled with the magnificent, as, for example, at the opening of Stourbridge Fair. This Fair, now a poor and insignificant gathering, was once the most famous in England and had ranked among the great fairs of Europe. In Gunning’s early days much of its splendour remained. At its opening the Vice-Chancellor with his Bedels and Commissary, the Registrary, the Proctors, and the Taxors, met in the Senate House at eleven, where everybody drank sherry and ate cakes. After this all drove to the Common, and the Vice-Chancellor proclaimed the Fair to be open, the Yeomen Bedels on horseback repeating his words at different parts of the assembly. Then followed a devouring of oysters in what was known as the Tiled Booth, after which the University magnates strolled about the Fair till dinner was ready. It was no easy task to get into the dining-room, because the people outside would not budge to allow the procession to pass, the University being very unpopular because they supplied the mugs in which the beer was sold and these held notoriously short measure. This was the only effort in the direction of temperance we meet with at this period, and that was dishonest. The dinner consisted of boiled pork, herrings, goose, apple-pie, and beef. The wine was bad, but everyone enjoyed himself, despite the heat and discomfort of the Tiled Booth. At half-past six they all went to the theatre. How they got home is not recorded!
Of intellectual pursuits Gunning has little to record. The disputations for degrees continued from the Middle Ages, in which he took part frequently as disputant and, knowing the rules of logic, he was often able to overthrow men of admittedly more learning than himself. There were good scholars and learned men at Cambridge; but we hear more of their schemes, their quarrels, and their amours than of their achievements in the schools.
Porson, the most famous Grecian since Bentley, is hardly if ever mentioned!
It is a strange record of the days of old, and the Cambridge therein described seems to have been in another world than this. Yet some of us were alive when Henry Gunning died, and I can myself remember characters almost as strange as he depicts. But in all the book there is no one so strange as the writer himself. In it we have the record, not of a diarist, but of an old, old man in his last illness, a man by his own account not devoid of piety or good feeling, yet recollecting every slight, every injury, he had sustained nearly sixty years before, the dislikes of his youth for men long gone to their account being as green and vigorous as they were when he first formed them. One cannot even like him, but nevertheless it is impossible to deny that he can not only amuse but instruct, and that much would have been forgotten but for his dictated notes about the Cambridge of his youth.
It was a nobler University before that age, and it has risen perhaps even to greater heights since. Gunning saw the University of Beverley and the Seniors of Trinity shine once more as the University of Whewell and Macaulay, of Darwin, Tennyson, and scores of great and good men.[24]
That the improvement in days to come may equal if not surpass that which Gunning witnessed is the prayer of him who has made the “Reminiscences” the subject of this lecture.