BOOKS.

DR. WHEWELL.*

Mits. STAIR DOUGLAS has shown much tact, judgment, and ability in the performance of a task which presented some un-• usual difficulties. It would appear that when the memoirs of Dr. Whewell were first projected, they were intended to consist of three separate parts—scientific, academic, and personal— which were to be undertaken by three different hands. This- plan has not altogether succeeded. Three years ago, indeed, two volumes of Dr. Whewell's scientific correspondence were edited by Mr. Todhunter, of Cambridge ; but the biographer's. art was in this case so manifestly lacking, and the letters were presented in such a bald and disconnected form, that they excited little interest or attention. It seems, moreover, that the expected history of Dr. Whewell's academic career has not been forthcoming, and Mrs. Stair Douglas (aided by the advice of the late Mr. J. L. Hammond) has interwoven the records of his public life with his intimate correspondence. We cannot but think that the original scheme—involving, as it did, three

parallel lives of the same person—was too extensive, and that even now the most judicious course would be to suppress the• separate volumes of scientific letters, and to incorporate the more interesting of them in Mrs. Douglas's Life.

As things now stand, this Life, which is a book likely to be widely read, and to afford such information as to Dr. Whewell as a busy world may still demand, necessarily leaves untouched the main sources of his public reputation,. and dwells with unavoidable disproportion on his private feelings and history. From one point of view, indeed, this mode of treatment will be of real advantage to Dr. Whewell's memory- This volume will show him in a character of which the world saw but little,—as a man, namely, who lived mainly in the affections, and was capable of strong and chivalrous attachments,, which give to his intimate letters the interest of the unre- strained self-revelation of a most simple and loving heart. There is, indeed, scarcely any trace iu these letters of the grave defect which was so unfortunately conspicuous in Dr. Whewell's public demeanour. His tendency to blustering impatience was, per- haps, the only stain—it was a serious one—which his obscure origin and rough up-bringing had left on a nature in many, ways refined, and even noble. Ho had never " learnt manners," and though his massive violence of scorn might sometimes seem impressive and fitting when ho was exposing some charlatanism or resenting some injustice inflicted upon others, it served too. often merely to defeat or obscure his own reasonable aims. The question of the maintenance of order in the Senate House may servo as an illustration of what wo say. The Undergraduates, whether of Cambridge or Oxford, who howl, shout, and make other disturbances during public ceremonies, are far from carrying Undergraduate opinion with them. They are mainly members of the obscurer Colleges, and belong to the lowest of the social strata into which a tacit judgment divides the Under- graduate world. The judicious ruler of a large body of high- spirited young men ought in such a matter to be able to support himself by the sympathy of the best bred and most sensible among them, in his restraint of the rest. But Dr. Whewell, as Vice- Chancellor in 1856, managed to set them against him as one man.

During a contested election, he shut them out of the Senate House. "They screeched and howled outside," he says, "till they were tired ; and when I went home at four, they were assembled in groat numbers, and hooted me all the way to Trinity. This was really music to my ears, for though I was sorry to vex the men, I was glad to hear them own themselves beaten." Vigour of this kind may succeed, perhaps, with navvies, but hardly with Undergraduates; and it shows in strange contrast to the touching allusions to his recent bereavement (in the death of his first wife), which fill his letters about this time. While ho was conferring Degrees, iu the midst of the tumult, " Tears," he says, " wore trickling down my face great part of the time. So unlikely a thing in a Vice-Chancellor in

• The Life of William Wilmot% D I.E. Isle Mastor of Trinity Coitepe, Cambridge. 33y Mrs, Stair Douglas. Loudon ; 0. K. Paul and Co. 1881.

his chair, that probably nobody saw it; I hope so. And now,

darling, I tell it to you, that I may not feel so lonely, nor life so very worthless." This letter is to a favourite niece by

marriage, to whom many of the most pleasing pages in the -volume are addressed. It is, indeed, remarkable with what an -energy and comprehensiveness of affection he seems to have thrown himself into the family of his first wife, a Miss Marshall, of Hal'steads. To his own relations he seems to have been uniformly kind and faithful, and their affection for him was evidently very strong ; but his introduction to a group of

persons of easier position and wider outlook on life appears to have developed in him a fresh brood of sympathies, which con-

tinued to increase in depth and vividness till his life's cud. All the force and massiveness of his nature poured itself readily into emotional channels, and like many men whose combativeness and self-confidence make a serious barrier between them and their ordinary male acquaintance, he was at his best with women, for whom he had an endless store of tenderness, chivalry, and respectful esteem. Two brief quotations will do much to reveal these two aspects of his character :—

" To-day," ho writes to the Marchesa Spineto, in 1836, "we had several strangers in ball, and it happened that your friend — sat

next me. I recollected his kind reports with regard to me, and was

looking out for some opportunity to rend him a lesson. So, when lie happened to pay me a very extravagant compliment, I told him that

he overwhelmed me ; that we wore not in college accustomed to com- pliments; that wo were straightforward, plain-spoken men, some times, perhaps, too much so ; that we never thought of saying much good of one another to our faces, though we might think a great deal; that we rather inclined to dwell on the points where we dif- fered, and liked to fight these out in a resolute and uncompromising

way, which excited no shade of because it wont upon the supposition of a common love of truth and a mutual esteem ; that this kind of robust argumentation might seem rude to strangers, but that it was, in fact, one of the great privileges and happinessos of college life. All this, and a good deal more, I discoursed to him, in a quiet and a good-humoured manner (I assure you it is true, and you may ask him if you like) ; and he appeared to be much edified, for be listened with some deference, and assented with groat cordiality. He even declared that he had been witness of such disputes with great pleasure. Still, I have great doubts whether he has yet got right notions; I think his mind is too shallow to bold them."

One can well imagine the discomfiture of the too flattering stranger, whose most abject deference could not save him from the loud exposition and emphatic disapproval of the Doctor• ,Formidabilis beside whom an unkind fate had placed his chair. But with this naive exposition of the advantages of bluff plain-speaking, and the pleasure of a stand-up fight, we may contrast a letter written to Mrs. Austin in 1856, soon after the death of his first wife, which shows the craving for sympathy -which accompanied Dr. Whewell's combative spirit :— " It seems to me," ho says, "at present at least, doubtful whether literary and intellectual occupations will over supply any largo portion of such relief. I have been led to feel that the main value of such employments is the points of sympathy which they supply with those with whom we live. Thinking itself seems a very aimless and useless employment, when there is no one to whom one is in the habit of imparting one's thoughts."

Turning from these indications of private character to the

xecords of public work which are included in this volume, we find much of interest with regard to the development of University and college institutions. It is not often realised how large a part of the fabric of Academic life is a creation of this century ; and the late Master of Trinity's voice was loudly raised on one side or the other of almost all the questions to which this growing life gave rise. The Moral and Natural Science Triposes at Cambridge owed their existence mainly to him, and he foreshadowed the important changes in the Classical Tripos which have since been carried out. On the

other hand, his extreme self-confidence, and his fondness for absolute rule, made him less useful in high positions than a

man of his force and energy might have been expected to be. If the University of Cambridge were to weigh the merits of the

Heads of Colleges whom she has known during this century, it it is not the virtzts Scipiadae, but the mills sapient-ia Lad': that she would be likely to regret the most,—not the brilliant and commanding Master of Trinity, but rather her latest loss, the cautious and impersonal wisdom of Dr. Batoson, of St. John's.

Dr. Whewell's memoir contains only two correspondences on speculative matters ; one, namely, with Mr. Spedding on Bacon, and one with Mr. Myers, of Keswick, on the foundations of morality. Both of these will be read with interest. But the attractiveness of the book before us does not depend on any subtlety or novelty of the ideas which Dr. Whewell's letters contain. It lies in the spectacle of the simple tendernesses of a robust nature,—of a certain buoyant confidence in the possi- bility and permanence of virtue, which places the following lines, trivial as they may seem, among the most characteristic of their author's compositions:-

" To Miss KATE MALCOLM, ON HER TENTH BIRTHDAY.

"Though, dearest Kate, this ancient College Has never seen you, to .its knowledge,— Ne'or saw you shako your clustering hair Within its battlemented square, Nor ope delighted oyo to gaze Upon its odd collegiate ways, Yet know this College views you still With deep respect and warm good-will ; And hearing (walls, you know, can hear) Your honoured birthday now is near, It bids, its high behest to fill, My artless fingers hold the quill, And write, and lay (as is most moot) Its best good-wishes at your foot.

For an historian tolls, dear Kate, In history of ancient date, How on a lady's birthday once, Who lived in joy and innocence, A friend, her best and dearest one, With mild, benignant eyes looked on ; And sighing, as she sometimes would,

For alto was not so gay as good,

Oh, might nine years, dear ohild,' she said, Roll over thy beloved head, As free from care, and grief, and sin, As those that have already been!' And how, in turn, the lady raised Her head, and somewhat gravely gazed, As wondering whence the sigh began, And asked, ' And pray, why not, Ma-man ?'

Now you, dear Kato, an ago can claim Far above this historic dame ; Yet if a birthday wish you hoar, That still may be for many a year Happy as hitherto your lot, Sure you may ask, like her,—' Why not ?'

Why should not beaming smiles continuo To make their radiant dwelling in you, Undimmed their shine, though changed their trace

From infant glee to maiden grace F Why should not peaceful thoughts and pure

In your unfolding heart endure, And shed their sunshine on your way From childhood's dawn to woman's day ?

And tho' no more the baby figure— We see the little fairy bigger— Why should not all around you yet

Greet you with looks affectionate, And still about your pathway press With thoughts of love and tenderness ?

Oh, dearest Kate ! be still your lot, To wonder, and to ask, Why not ?'"

Trifling and playful as these verses are, they show the inner, the truer man. A husk of roughness and violence too often concealed him from the world ; but beneath all this, the 'san- guine and vigorous temperament threw itself into benevolence and aspiration, and the strong man kept through all the battles of life the upright simplicity, the clinging affections of the child.