Pearls & Parasites

by Sir A. E. Shipley

‘I have but recently become a member of the University, and, like a good many others, I at one time doubted the possibility of founding a thoroughly satisfactory school of agriculture in one of the old English Universities. But I no longer doubt; and as one who, before coming to Cambridge, was a teacher or student in five British Universities, I will venture to say that nowhere else do such opportunities exist. Apart altogether from the exceptional facilities for the study of science possessed by the University, and apart, too, from the exceptional practical skill of the farmers in the surrounding counties, the old University appears to me to be more disposed to extend a helping hand to agriculture than many of her younger sisters; and nowhere has a more friendly reception been given than at Cambridge to the new organization fostered by the activity of the Board of Agriculture....

‘American experience leaves no room for doubt that modern scientific methods are capable of greatly increasing the prosperity of agriculture, and that the farmer has no better ally than the laboratory worker. But, if we wish to make these benefits ours, we must cease to be satisfied with imported information; ... we must aim at securing for agriculture the services of British specialists, men who will give their whole time to the study of one subject under the conditions which prevail in our own country. To the extent of our resources this has been the policy of our agricultural department in Cambridge.

‘We are in the centre of the finest land in England; we already have an organization by which we reach the farmer; we know his wants; and the University has supplied us with well-qualified teachers of applied science. If we were in possession of suitable laboratories, properly equipped for research, we should find competent investigators and willing assistants among the younger members of the University who are always ready to engage in original work, either with the view of gaining knowledge or in order to qualify themselves for appointments.’

In considering the development of all these departments, and the foundation of the chairs and other teaching posts made necessary by them, it must be remembered that the professorships already existing before 1850 included, among others, those of chemistry, anatomy, botany, geology, mineralogy, medicine, physic, political economy, moral philosophy, modern history, Arabic, and music; that these chairs had, before the Commission of 1850, no very important duties attached to them; and that in the last fifty years each has been adapted to its place in the University system, and each has in turn become a new centre of activity round which, to use a convenient term unfamiliar in Cambridge, a ‘faculty’ has crystallized. To many important developments it has been possible to allude only in the most cursory manner. The merest mention must suffice for the diploma in geography; the diploma in mining engineering, with its provision for practical experience in mines in this country or abroad; the diploma in forestry, which is a logical outcome of the development of the botanical and agricultural schools; the provision for military studies, and the Day Training College for teachers. The latter has both a primary and a secondary department, and the certificate given by the University in the theory, history, and practice of education, and for practical efficiency, attracts teachers in great numbers from all parts of the country.

Development so wide and so rapid as that which we have sketched has been of necessity costly. The expenditure since 1862 on buildings devoted to science alone must have considerably exceeded £300,000, the greater part having taken place in the latter years of the period; and it must be remembered that the University has had also to equip and maintain the observatory, the cost of which is not included in the amount just mentioned, and to spend large sums on the University library. Except in one or two cases, in which a special benefaction fund had been appropriated to adornment by the desire of the benefactor, these buildings have been erected with the strictest regard to economy. The amount expended cannot be said to be an inordinate sum for a modern University to have spent on scientific buildings and equipment. Yet even this expenditure would have been impossible without external help.

The cost of the maintenance of the buildings erected and of the very inadequately paid staffs, now presses on the limits of the available income; and it is contended that but little more can be attempted for many years, if ever, without external aid. We will proceed, then, to a rough analysis of the resources of the University and colleges, and of the allotment of these resources. Before doing so, however, it may be well to state that the colleges provide adequately, but not extravagantly, for the teaching of classics and mathematics, for elementary teaching in many other subjects, and for individual assistance to the student and supervision of his work in the subjects taught in the University. The collegiate system also ensures a close contact and intercourse between teacher and student not otherwise or elsewhere attainable. The University, in its teaching aspect, may be regarded as an organization for providing instruction in all those branches of knowledge the teaching of which cannot be economically undertaken by the colleges. Thus, for the teaching of science, and for the provision of costly laboratories, the University is responsible; and the higher and more specialized teaching in most other departments is also provided by the University. The ancient endowments are, in the main, college endowments; but the history of the development of modern subjects is also the history of the development of the University; and it is the University rather than the colleges which is at present in need of substantial financial help. But to suppose that the colleges do not heartily co-operate in the University teaching would be erroneous; at the present time one college may be better organized than another for this particular purpose, but the colleges may safely be trusted soon to come into line.

The corporate income of the seventeen colleges is, roughly, £310,000 per annum. This, with a sum of about £52,000 (called the Tuition Fund), received annually from the lecture and laboratory fees of the 3,200 students, and £30,000 received annually by the University for degree and other fees, constitutes the whole available income for college as well as University purposes, if we except certain Trust Funds for the endowment of some professorships, and those funds of the nature of charities of which the colleges are merely administrators.

The corporate income of the colleges consists of (1) endowments, usually in the form of estates, which bring in £220,000 a year; (2) fees, rent of rooms, profits on kitchens, and so forth, which bring in £90,000. But the colleges are great landowners and have the outgoings of landowners. Though the expenses of the estate management are only about 7 per cent. of the revenues arising from the estates, yet £130,000 a year are spent on management, repairs, and improvements on the estates, rates and taxes,[17] interest on loans, and the maintenance of the costly college buildings in Cambridge. Many of the latter are national monuments of surpassing interest, the proper care of which is a duty to the nation. When allowance has been made for the inevitable expenditure under these heads, there is left only £180,000 for all other purposes. The fellowships and the stipends of the heads of houses absorb £78,000; and the contributions of the colleges towards scholarships, as determined in the main by statute, and as distinct from any separate endowment, account for £32,000.

An analysis of the distribution of the fellowship money may conveniently be deferred for the moment; but it may be stated that the sum spent on scholarships finds, inside the University at least, many critics. The expenditure on scholarships is undoubtedly, however, in the main, a fulfilment of the intentions of their founders, and, if we may judge by the recent expenditure of County Councils, is in accordance with public feeling. After deduction of fellowships and scholarships, there is left of the corporate income a sum of £70,000. Of this sum, £32,000,[18] or nearly one-half, is paid as a direct contribution to the University; but, as will be seen immediately, the colleges contribute to the University in many other ways. Of the £38,000 remaining, £4,000 goes to supplement the Tuition Fund of £52,000 received from the students as fees; the sum of £56,000 so obtained is applied to the provision of college and University lecturers. A large proportion of these fees is paid to the scientific departments of the University; and of the fees so paid the greater part is assigned as a contribution to the maintenance of the several departments, and not, directly at least, to the payment of lecturers.

Deducting the sum of £4,000, contributed by the colleges to the Tuition Fund, we have left over of the corporate income a sum of £34,000, or about £2,000 per college, available for the payment of college officers and servants, the expenses of the college libraries, printing, and other expenses. If, then, it can be shown that the £78,000 spent on the fellowships is not extravagantly allotted—and of this more below—it is clear that the colleges can contribute but little more than they do at present to the University teaching.