He was removed from school early, and in 1825 went to Edinburgh to study medicine—a subject for which he seemed to be unfitted by nature. The methods of instruction by lectures did not benefit him; he was disgusted at dissection, and could not endure to witness an operation. And yet here it was evident, as it became afterwards at Cambridge, that Darwin—although seeming to be by no means above the average when judged by ordinary standards—possessed in reality a very remarkable and attractive personality. There can be no other explanation of the impression he made upon distinguished men who were much older than himself, and the friendships he formed with those of his own age who were afterwards to become eminent.
Thus at Edinburgh he was well acquainted with Dr. Grant and Mr. Macgillivray, the curator of the museum, and worked at marine zoology in company with the former. Here, too, in 1826, he made his first scientific discovery, and read a paper before the Plinian Society, proving that so-called eggs of Flustra were in reality free-swimming larvæ. And it is evident from his “Autobiography” that he took every opportunity of hearing and learning about scientific subjects.
Darwin’s love of sport remained as keen as ever at this period and at Cambridge, and he speaks with especial enthusiasm of his visits in the autumn to Maer, the home of his uncle, Josiah Wedgwood, who afterwards exerted so important an influence upon his life.
AT CAMBRIDGE.
After Darwin had been at Edinburgh for two sessions, his father realised that he did not like the thought of the medical profession, and suggested that he should become a clergyman. With this intention he was sent to Cambridge in the beginning of 1828, after spending some months in recovering the classics he had learnt at school.
He joined Christ’s College, and passed his final examination in January, 1831, being tenth in the list of those who do not seek honours. The immense, and in many respects disastrous, development of the competitive examination system since that time has almost banished from our universities the type of student represented by Darwin—the man who takes the easiest road to a degree and obtains it with the minimum of effort, but who all the time is being benefited by residence, studying, without any thought of examinations, the subjects which are of special interest to him, and seeking personal contact with older men who have reached the highest eminence in those subjects.
He seems to have led a somewhat double life at Cambridge, his intense love of sport taking him into a pleasure-loving set, while his intellectual interests made him the intimate friend of Whitley, who became Senior Wrangler, and of Professor Henslow, to whom he was introduced by his second cousin, W. Darwin Fox, who also first interested him in entomology. He became so keen a collector of beetles that his successes and experiences in this direction seem to have impressed him more deeply than anything else at Cambridge. Entomology, and especially beetles, form the chief subject of those of his Cambridge letters which have been recovered.
Darwin’s friendship with Henslow, which was to have a most important effect on his life, very soon deepened. They often went long walks together, so that he was called “the man who walks with Henslow.” This fact and the subsequent rapidly formed intimacy with Professor Adam Sedgwick, indicate that he was remarkable among the young men of his standing.
One of his undergraduate friends, J. M. Herbert, afterwards County Court Judge for South Wales, retained the most vivid recollection of Darwin at Cambridge, and contributed the following impression of his character to the “Life and Letters”:—
“It would be idle for me to speak of his vast intellectual powers ... but I cannot end this cursory and rambling sketch without testifying, and I doubt not all his surviving college friends would concur with me, that he was the most genial, warm-hearted, generous and affectionate of friends; that his sympathies were with all that was good and true; and that he had a cordial hatred for everything false, or vile, or cruel, or mean, or dishonourable. He was not only great, but pre-eminently good, and just, and loveable.”