IN PRAISE OF CAMBRIDGE.
In Praise of Cambridge : an Anthology in Prose and Verse. Edited by Sydney Waterlow. (Constable and Co. 5s. net.)— There can be no lack of material for a Cambridge anthology, and Mr. Waterlow has made good use of his opportunities. He is extremely catholic in his selection, and some will oven be prepared to fall foul of his inclusion of one or two specimens of the senti- mentality of " Alan St. Aubyn." On the whole, however, his extracts will be found to be well worth reading. They are con- veniently classified under such headings as "The River," "The Studious Life," " Cambridge versus Oxford," and "The Lighter Side." Some particularly good quotations are to be found in the chapter upon " Dress." It is amusing to contrast the extravagant clothes of the sixteenth century with the sobriety of the nineteenth. A petition dated 1572 complains of the students who " go verye disorderlie in Cambrodge waring for the most part their hattes and continually verye unseemly ruffes at their handes and greate Galliguskens and Barreld hooese stuffed with horse tayles with skabilonians and knitt netherstockes too fine for schollers." On the other hand, an American writer in 1852 remarks that "the Cantab's garb generally consists of a not too new black coat (frock or cutaway), trousers of some substantial stuff, grey or plaid, and a stout waistcoat, frequently of the same pattern as the trousers." Signs of a reaction towards the elaboration of the earlier fashion are to be seen in the streets of Cambridge to-day, and will hardly be resented. As a repre- sentation of Cambridge at many different periods, Mr. Waterlow's collection is a fascinating one. And it is perhaps the appreciations from the earliest dates that will give most pleasure, both because they are the least known and because they show that a satisfying continuity may be traced in the feelings which the University has aroused in its admirers from the very beginning of its existence.
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