LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE RECONSTITUTION OF LONDON UNIVERSITY. [To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTAT011.] SIR,—The last scheme for the reconstitution of the University of London having now become a public document, and being in process of conversion into a draft charter for the con- sideration of Convocation at its May meeting, may I again be. allowed to invite the attention of your readers to one or two. aspects of this difficult question P
It will be remembered that the Royal Commission which sat on this subject in 1888, and whose report has been more or less the inspiration of the present scheme, was equally divided as. to whether the present University should take up the new work, or whether a better solution would be the establishment of a second Metropolitan University. The lawyers on the Commission were for compromise with the present University; the teachers "doubted the possibility" of such plan. The thorny experiences of the Senate in evolving their latest revised scheme would appear to justify the teachers in the opinion they recorded. To meet the demands of University and King's Colleges, a powerful infusion of their representa- tives upon the Senate was provided for ; this at once shifted the centre of gravity of the Senate so far from the interests of the Provincial Colleges, which sent up many more candi- dates to Burlington Gardens than the two ambitious Metro- politan Colleges, that a new scheme grafting on provincial senators had to be devised. The Medical Colleges at first were jealous of any infringement of their virtual monopoly of London medical qualifications, and stood out of the ring until the M.B. examination was practically thrown over to them, in spite of the unanimous condo- sion of the Commission against empowering the Corpora- tions to confer degrees. Moreover, this gradual expansion of the Senate to conciliate outsiders has proportionately reduced the representation of Convocation to the miserable fraction of ten Fellows out of a total of fifty-two. Convocation is naturally a jealous body,—jealous of the introduction of external influence, jealous that the high standard of the degrees be maintained, and jealous as to the traditions of the Univer- sity. The result is a revolt on the part of members of Convoca- tion against this last scheme of the Senate, in the production of which they have had scarcely any hand. A circular has been sent to every member of Convocation severely criticising the many weak points in the new scheme, and, while courteously inviting an expression of dissent from the Senate's proposal, obviously indicating a determination to wreck the scheme. Is it too late to revert to the more matured opinion of the teachers on the Commission, who foresaw the injury which the present University must incur by so profoundly altering its work, which was admittedly well done P Is it not possible to allow the University of London to maintain its old position, imperial, impersonal, with high-standard degrees open to all, and to allow external Colleges to agree among themselves upon some method of "branding their own herrings," and turning out doctors in such profusion as the so-called" medical grievance" may require P—I am, Sir, &c.,
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