kinsfolk at Achlossen, amounted to little more than £420 Scots. This included board paid to the Economus for two quarters (£80 a quarter), furniture for chambers, fee to the Regent (£30 Scots), fire and candle, clothes (including a muffe' and a four-tailed coat'), washing, and a few customary fees to servants, and to the printer £6. 8s.' 66 The change from the old academic economy has been gradual. For more than a century after Hugh Rose had occupied his simply furnished apartment, the students continued to lodge in chambers within the walls of the College, and to take their meals in the College hall; but as no imperative rule prevented those who pleased from having lodgings in the town, a class of boarding-houses seems to have grown up, which were preferred by the young men to the restraint of a college life; and the change was not discouraged by the masters Gradually the number remaining within the College diminished, till, in 1788, the masters withdrew the salary which had hitherto induced the Economus to give his attention to the domestic arrangements of the College; and, in the beginning of the present century, the ancient and honoured collegiate practice disappeared. It may be impossible to return to it, with the altered numbers of students, and after so long an interval; but some change, which should bring the students more under the master's eye, and establish something of a domestic relation between the teachers and the taught, would be of more importance in our Scotch Universities than any improvement in the mere teaching of classes. It has been already mentioned that in Aberdeen, as in other universities of old, the student, entering under the Regent, continued under him during his whole course of study; and although the authors of the "new foundation," and subsequent reformers at The family of Kilravock," Spalding 8th September, 1788. Some few students. Club, P. 351. lived in Coilege down to 1820. 2 Minutes of Senatus, 25th August, 1779, several times, sought to alter that system, it was maintained till the end of last century. The present practice, which gives to each master the province of teaching that to which he has peculiarly devoted himself, was introduced in 1798-9.1 It seems not impossible to retain the manifest advantages of the present practice while recalling in part the old, which, like the system of tutors in the Colleges of the English Universities, established in each master a feeling of personal interest and responsibility in a limited number of students. Of the course of study immediately before Rowe became Principal we derive some valuable information from the proceedings of a sort of University Court-an institution that might be imitated. with great advantage at the present time. In 1647-8, the Commissioners appointed by the four Universities of Scotland-St. Andrews, Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Edinburgh-met at Edinburgh and adopted measures for promoting a correspondence among them and a uniform course of study. Some of their resolutions are worthy of notice. It was fund expedient to communicat to the generall assemblie 1647, 28th Aug. no more of our Universitie afaires but such as concerned religion or that had some evident ecclesiastick relatione. That everie student subscryve the nationall covenant, with the 30th Aug. League and Covenant. It is fund necessar that ther be a cursus philosophicus drawin up be the four Universities and printed, to the end that the unprofitable and noxious paines in writeing be shunned; and that each Universitie contribute thair travellis thairto, and it is to be thocht upon, aganist the month of Merch ensewing, viz, that St Androis tak the metaphisicks; that Glasgow tak the logicks; Aberdine the ethickis and mathematickis, and Edinburgh the physicks. 'Minutes 21st March, 1798, 16th March, and 23d March, 1799. 1648. 17th July. It is thought convenient that quhat beis found behoveful for improving of learneing in schooles and colledgis be represented to the Parliament in Merch nixt." "It is aggreid that all the Universities concur with and assist ane another in everie comone caus concerning the commonweill of all the Universities. The former agreement is renewed, "that no delinquent in any College sall be received into another College befor he give testimony that he have given satisfaction to the College from quhich he came." To facilitate the establishment of a uniform course, each University gave in a report of the studies actually followed. The statement of King's College is very short. "Courses taught yeirly in the King's College of Aberdine :The Colledge sitteth downe in the beginning of October, and for the space of a moneth till the studentis be weill convened, both masters and schollaris are exercised with repetitiones and examinationis, quhich being done, the courses are begun about the first or second day of November. 1. To the first classe is taught Clenard, Antesignanus; the greatest part of the New Testament; Basilius Magnus his epistle; ane oration of Isocrates; ane other of Demosthenes; a buik of Homer; Phocyllides: some of Nonni paraphrasis. 2. To the second classe, Rami dialectica; Vossii retorica ; some elements of arithmetick; Porphyrie; Aristotill his categories, de interpretatione and prior analyticks, both text and questiones. 3. To the third classe, the rest of the logicks; twa first books of the ethicks; five chapteris of the third, with a compend of the particular writtis; the first fyve books of the generall phisicks, with some elements of geometrie. 4. To the fourt classe, the bookes de cœlo, de ortu et interitu, de anima, the meteoris; sphera Jo. de Sacro bosco, with some beginningis of geography and insight in the globs and mappes. This is to be understood, ordinarly, and in peaceable tymes."1 The report of the course of St. Andrews is longer and more in detail. Students of the first year were taught Greek and the elements of Hebrew. In the last year, the students were to learn "some compend of anatomy." Then, "because the dyteing of long notes have in tyme past proven a hinderance, not only to other necessarie studies but also to the knawledge of the text itselff it is thairfor seriouslie recommendit by the Regentis to the Deane and Facultie of Arts that the Regents spend not too much time in dyteing of thair notts; that no new lesson be taught till the former be examined; that everie student have the text of Aristotill in Greek, and that the Regent first analyse the text viva voce." In Edinburgh, in the third year's course, "anatomia humani corporis describitur." This is the only Scotch University which notes any attention to prosody. In the classis humaniorum literarum— "docentur classici auctores historici, oratores, poetæ ; transferunt themata a Latino in vernaculum et a vernaculo in Latinum sermonem. In versibus etiam exercentur." The effect of Principal Rowe's discipline in the study of his house, we do not learn otherwise than in the continued and increasing attendance of students. Something of the vigilance of the more ancient academic discipline appears from a few scraps which were found scattered and loose in the Archives of the College, and which it has been 'Though this brief report of the studies of Aberdeen says nothing of Anatomy which is joined in the Philosophical course in St. Andrews and Edinburgh, it must be remembered that the Medicus was one of the endowed members of Elphinstone's founda tion. In 1636 Dr. William Gordon, "medicus et alchymista," having long practised his scholars in the dissection of beasts, obtained the means of demonstrating from the human subject.-Spald, Miscel., 11., p. 73. thought proper to subjoin to this Preface. This "Censura studiosorum" gives briefly the character of every student of the University, and his relative position when compared with others. Unfortunately, it extends only over a few years; but in the fourth or highest class it gives us the names of the students of one year earlier than the earliest list of entrants preserved in the Album.' A few words must be allowed, of the fabric of our College. Its retired and pretty, rural situation, contrasting with the bustle of the neighbouring town, is now more admired than the edifice itself, which called forth the extravagant praise of its historians in past times. Perhaps no part of the building is entirely as it was left by the founders, Bishops Elphinstone and Dunbar: but the plan and foundations-in many parts the walls-are nearly as at first. Beside the door which entered under the west window of the Church, (now the library) is inscribed per serenissimum illustrissimum ac invictissimum J. 4. R. quarto nonas aprilis anno millesimo et quingentesimo hoc insigne collegium Iatomi inceperunt edificare. There is no reason to doubt that this inscription is nearly of the date it records, and that the Church, so far as its masonry is concerned, is now as it was left by its venerable founder. Hector Boece, whose book was printed only eight years after Elphinstone's death, records that that Bishop built the Church, the towers, and Appendix to the Preface, No. II.—It may be necessary to explain its method. The students are placed either in linea recta, that is, in the order in which their names are written, or in circulo-in groupes where all are equal. The first year, 1603, gives as Primi ordinis, the Bajans of that year; . |