The Duke's speech in reply, on a portion of which
we have commented in another column, was pithy as well as dignified. As the son of the late Chancellor, he said, he must not pay the customary tribute to his predecessor, who owed his own elevation in great measure to his academical attainments, but who had, nevertheless, been the most modest of men. For his own short stay at Cambridge he apologised, on the ground that when he graduated, the University had not inaugurated the system of giving honours in those schools of modern history and law which are the best training for politicians and statesmen. He was aware that he owed the selection of his name as successor to his father partly to his social position, partly to his father's popularity in the University, but he thought the Universities right in endeavouring to connect themselves with the political world through the person of their highest official. In that way they could best keep in touch with the popular feeling and wants of the day. And certainly no statesman can better help them to keep in sympathy with public opinion than the Duke of Devonshire.
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