6 SEPTEMBER 1873, Page 20

CURRENT LITERATURE.

The Cambridge Undergraduates' Journal, of which the two first numbers lie before us, is begun in a sensible and spirited manner, which should promise it a future. Being written by undergraduates for undergraduates, such a paper might well create an interest beyond the walls of the University itself for many old Cambridge men ; and many more who were never Cambridge men at all aro concerned to know what is at any particular time the drift of University opinion and taste. If successful and popular in its own special sphere, an outside circulation is more likely to be gained by such a paper than by almost any other local journal. This sort of consideration, however, seems, wisely enough, to be absent from the mind of the editor, who sets about his work with a single eye to the Cambridge in the midst of which he finds himself. He says, in the course of a pithy and sub-humorous programme, "It will not be denied, we believe, that there is room for us, or that if our duty is well performed we shall supply a want. The Undergraduates of this University are, at present, compelled to turn to the Field or Bell's L;fe for information about their own sports and their own boat-races ; they have no opportunity of hearing the College news which is usually most interesting to them; above all, they have no means of appealing to a sympathising public for the reduction of their bands,' the abolition of their gate bills, or the relief of their unhinged morality. It is for us to do our duty in this respect, and for our fellow- undergraduates to accord to us the support and sympathy which have enabled a contemporary in the sister University to live and make itself useful We desire to supply a channel of information, other than the sporting papers, for University news ; we offer the opportunity of airing grievances and blowing up tho flames of controversy, and we intend to keep a corner as a safety-valve for the literary energies which have hitherto been pont up in obscurity." We shall look further into this "corner" in the forthcoming numbers of the next term, and also especially to a discussion which seems opening as to the position and prospects of the " Union Society."