27 FEBRUARY 1847, Page 2

The contest which rages in Cambridge University for the Chancellorship

is a public scandal. Its motives are scarcely concealed, and they appear to be paltry. According to the routine in inch matters, the Earl of Powis was a propercandidateenough. He is of high rank and mature age; has a seat in the House of Peers ; and has used it successfully for ecclesiastical purposes, in obliging Government to abandon the junction of St. Asaph and Bangor. But he was put forward, with haste, by St. John's Col- lee; and that sufficed to provoke antagonism in Trinity. To seize an advantage over Lord Powis's adherents, the highest gen- tleman in the land was pitched upon—Prince Albert. He de- clined to mingle in the strife but the Anti-Powis party would not give him up. Whatever die issue of the contest may be, the oppositionists have done their best to expose Prince Albert's name to insult : if he be beaten, that is an awkward pass for the Con- sort of the Sovereign; - if the other candidate be beaten, the win- ners will be obliged to carry their squabble once more into the Royal presence, and will force upon the Prince the unpleasant alternative of retracting, or of administering a disagreeable re- fusal. This is unseemly. But why should the learned bodies he at all obliged to go about hunting for titled patrons ?—for that is where the false position has its beginning.