SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK.
[Under this heading we notice such Books of the week as have not been reserved for renew in other forms.] A Versatile Professor. Edited by the Rev. G. Cecil White. (R. Brimley Johnson. 55. net.)—The "versatile Professor" was Edward Nares, who was Regius Professor of History at Oxford from 1814 up to his death in 1841, when be was succeeded by Dr. Arnold, himself fated to hold the post for one year only. to most people Dr. Nares is known only through some very uncom- plimentary remarks by Lord Macaulay, and it seemed a doubtful attention in a descendant—Mr. G. C. White is a grandson—to give a record of his life. But it is only fair to say that the book is an interesting one, and that it leaves the reader with no little respect for its subject. Had Edward Nares flourished in an age when there was a more strenuous spirit in academic life, he might have accomplished more. He was evidently a man of very considerable ability. " Versatile" is not a bad word to describe his powers; perhaps it was a misfortune that the substantive which it has to qualify is one that, at least to the present age, means so much as Professor. Professorships in the early days of the last century were for the most part academic sinecures, or, if not quite that, offices which did not imply any close connection between the holder and the subject from which his chair took its name. There was, for instance, a Professorship of Anglo-Saxon, which regularly went the round of the Colleges, and was often, of course, held by men who knew practically nothing of the subject. Dr. Nares was really above the average of his class. He had con- tinued to lecture up to six years of his death,—Stanley in his " Life of Arnold " makes the period " twenty." And for a time at least he had commanded quite unusual audiences. He does not come up to our ideal; but then nothing that we find in this curious picture of the time does so come up. Nares himself obtained his fellowship at Merton without examination, and when he was Principal of the Post-Masters of that College had three exhibitions in his gift. But he was certainly better than his time. If he was not learned, he had industry and intellectual interests. We feel as we read his Life, which is very agreeably written, that he was put at a disadvantage by the circumstances to which he had to accommodate himself. One of the little characteristic traits of the manners of the time is so charming that we must give it. Dr. Nares bad married a daughter of the Duke of Marlborough, not a little to her father's annoyance. But he was a favourite with the bride's relatives generally. One of them, Lady Bateman, made a point of paying the wedding call in a carriage and sir, though four of the horses had to be taken off before the door could be reached, and she was always afraid when she rode behind them.
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