PROFESSOR MATHEWS SUCCESSOR.

Press, Volume LVI, Issue 10269, 11 February 1899, Page 8

PROFESSOR MATHEWS SUCCESSOR.

_«» AN INTERVIEW WITH MR ARNOLD WALL. UNIVERSITY WORK AT HOME. The successor of Professor Mathew to the chair of English nt Canterbury College is Professor Arnold Wall, an M.A. of London University, and a B.A. of Cambridge. Professor Wall arrived oy tho Gothic in New Zealand on Tuesday, and reached Christ- , church on Thursday night. Yesterday he courteously granted an interview to a representaive of the Christchurch ."Press" on the : more modern ideas prevailing among University men at Home. The advances made in University work • was the tenor of the first question. In reply. Professor Wall expressed emphatically the opinion that most important i, advances had been made in University work. He explained that liaving been particularly connected with Cambridge, it was that University on which he was most qualified to " speak. Cambridge had taken the lead m establishing a course which was called "tiie post graduate course." It allowed men from other Universities to take a degree in Cambridge in the short period of two years. ■ These men were enabled to enter the University without passing amy matriculation i examination. The degree was obtained by two years' residence and passing the ordinary tripos examination, or else simply by research work, namely, sonding in a thesis as the result of scientific research of some kind. The new regulations were chiefly for the • benefit of scientific men. "The first man to take a degree in this way," continued Professor Wall, "was Mr . Rutherford, of New Zealand, and a Mr Townsend. I was the third. We all did scientific research of one kind and another. I obtained my research degree a term or two after Mr Rutherford. The system offers . great encouragement to men to specialise. Another very important tendency in CamI bridge is evidenced by the falling off in the numbers of men who take subjects other than ' scientific. The science tripos is gaining at , the expense of the others. Cambridge is an old-fashioned place, and the tendency is to [ modernise it. The mathematical tripos, for instance, has lost a great deal. People want I newer and fresher subjects, more practical things. I know that Oxford has established the same system." In answer to a question as to his work before leaving Home, Professor Wall said '„ he had been working in the Welsh Univer sity for the last ye:ir or so. The University ' was made up of three constituent Coiieges. It was something like the New Zealand UniL varsity, and the examinations were held on j the lines of the London University. One College was at Cardiff, another at Bangor, - and the third at Aberystwyth, where Professor Wall was stationed. They gave degrees Ito women. Like London, women were as 5 free to the University as men, and some had seats on the Senate. "Have there been any innovations in the • system of imparting University instruction?" "No; there have not. lam sorry to say " it, because I do not at all approve of the . system in vogue in Cambridge at present. I do not like the coaching system. The real . work is done by the coaches, who have no official recognition in tho University. They - are simply crammers, and I am averse to the system of cram. Tlie worst of Cambridge in that respect is that; as the result , of the system, many of the Professors who are paid to do the work do not do it. There has been some suggestion lately to cut down 1 the whole of the expenses. The University has had to send round the hat recently, and they require to raise more money; in fact it was feared they would not be able to . carry on. They propose to do away with the Masters; purely social functionaries and - ornamental.* They get very large salaries, and do practically nothing. Another suggestion is to alter the prize fellowships given for good places in examinations. It is pro- : posed to make a man do work for his fellowship money. At present it is practically a - gift, and a man is not even compelled to live in the College. The bast movement that'l*, know of in Cambridge, however, is the research movement. It gave mc the only opi partunity I ever had in that way." '"How are colonial men regarded in the Home Colleges?" "Mr Rutherford and a man from Melbourne are really the only men I knew intimately," said Mr Wall, "but as far- as I can judge, men who come from the colonies to the big English Universities, stand very very much in the same position as men from the provincial Coiieges in England and Wales. There has been a great impetus given lately to the foundation of provincial Colleges and Universities at Home. For instance, the Birmingham University will be ' an. accomplished fact before long." Interrogated regarding the English system cf Extension Lectures, Professor Wall rephed that a great deal had been done in that way 1 at-Home. Oxford, Cambridge, and the ! Welsh Universities bad a regular system of extension lecturing. "In my opinion," lie continued, *it is a splendid thing if the best . : -men can be got to do tht> work, but it is not easy to get the best Ken to go round and lecture. At Cambridge, the arrangement was to get a great number of people up in the long vacation. They were given a series of lectures, and shown round the plafe generally. The movement is an extremely popular one. In England, however, the establishment of provincial Colleges will tend to make the system rather superfluous. At present it is possible for men to get the London degree -without attending any University lectures at all. I did so myself. I never attended a single lecture of the regular courses. They have altered that a little lately, and are going to make a distinction between students who have attended lectures and those who have not." "You think," remarked the interviewer, . "that the tendency then is to decentralise education?" : , -■ ' "Well, yes. People are growing prouder lof their provinces. The provincial Press s lias risen in importance a great deal, and county rivalry, even in cricket and football, ' has made the feeling stronger. The tendency is in the same direction as the German system, where they have a single solid University—not two ot tliree constituent Colleges— 1 in almost every town. 1 Speaking of Cambridge University itself, ! Professor Wall said there were many restrictions which were irksome. Men who came up there for research purposes —men long past their studentship days—had to fall in with the regulations, wear their gowns after a certain hour, not smoke in t!ie streets, be indoors by ten o'clock, etc. The fees, too, at Cambridge, were shockingly heavy. The College made a profit out of everything, even meat and drink. It was certainly not a poor man's University.