A deputation of great influence, headed by the Marquis of
Ripon, and representing mainly the North of England, waited on the Duke of Richmond and Gordon on Thursday, to request that if a new University is instituted at the request of Owens College, it may be a University confederating a variety of Northern Colleges in different counties, and that the name given to such University should not be a purely local one. The idea evidently was that, so far as Owens College has made out its case, it is a case for all Colleges of the same type,—all Colleges which may be called the Colleges of a busy, manufacturing population,—and that to erect a University for one such College alone, or even for one such place as Manchester, and call it "the University of Manchester," would be to encourage a considerable number of other Colleges of the same type—present or future—to ask for a separate University status for themselves sooner or later. This might easily issue in a reckless and mischievous multiplication of Universities, where one University, consisting of many colleges, would suffice, or more than suffice,—would do the work much better. This is very much the view we have always taken. We can see the case for a Uni- versity more closely associated with the teaching bodies whence it derives its students, than the University of London has lately been, but as the Government evidently think, it is by no means certain that such a connection might not be restored, and the object of Owens College, in great part, assured, without the creation of any new University at all. Certainly no good University could be created with so small a college as Owens College as its sole educational constituent, Sir Stafford Northeatels remarks,—as
for the Duke of Richmond and Gordon, be seemed to find the subject highly transcendental,—pointed towards a better use of the Universities we have, rather than the creation of a new one.
Previous page
