From Fred Calvert   11 April 1848

Whatfield

11 April 1848

My dear Henslow,

I am painfully sensible of some of the defects of the present Cambridge system, of which I see no chance of a remedy as long as D. r Whewell, and D. r Hymers can impose their own books however carelessly or however unintelligibly written on the students of their respective great Colleges, and by consequence on those of all the minor ones colleges of the University.

I have no right however to presume that the Queens commissioners would see matters in the same light that I do; – on the contrary I think it very probable that by extending the subjects further in they would be disposed to extend the subjects of University examination, whereas I think a reference to Deighton’s alarming list of publications for the use of Students in the University should rather suggest the propriety of a limitation – in order to a more logical and consistent course of study [underlined by JSH]

Should the Queen’s commissioners only break the egg instead of hatching a new chicken then

not all the Queen’s Horses nor all the Queen’s [Men]

could set Humpty Dumpty on the wall again

and as this might happen, if some of the names which I see on your list made themselves busy with the egg, I dare not venture to sign the Petition. Our best regards to all yours

Yrs very sincerely| Fred Calvert

[In JSH’s handwriting: 2 nd Wrangler & Rector of Whatfield]

Please cite as “HENSLOW-332,” in Ɛpsilon: The Correspondence of John Stevens Henslow accessed on 29 March 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/henslow/letters/letters_332