R,CHARD MONCKTON MILNES was born in the year - OUDL Home

250 W. E. Heitlandby a junior Fellow of St John's. Fawcett was not singularin this respect.The period of the 'seventies may be described as thetime of fermentation in which the aspirations of reformerswere taking a clear and practical form. This meant thatthe attention of our resident members was concentratedon our internal problems to an unusual extent. It mayfairly be said that this decade was not specially remarkablefor literary productivity, whether serious or playful,in Cambridge itself. The work of Munro and W. H.Thompson, perhaps hardly 'literature' in the vulgaracceptation, was of earlier date: so were the wit andhumour of Calverley and G. O. Trevelyan, and the SaintPaul of F. W. Myers had appeared in 1867. It should benoted that Cambridge was well represented outside,though mainly in Science. Still there was the PoetLaureate at the head; and among many others there wereSeeley, whose Ecce Homo appeared in 1865, and SamuelButler, who since 1864 was back from New Zealand andwas incubating the subtle ironies of Erewhon (1872) andthe Fair Haven (1873). Our non-residents were meanwhileturning critical eyes on their old University. Barristers,Professors, Schoolmasters, Journalists and School-inspectorstook various points of view. Leslie Stephen'sSketches from Cambridge by a Don (1865) was a vividdescription of Cambridge life with its fashions and foibles,reprinted from a London paper. But most of this criticismdid not find its way into print; and yet was not whollywithout effect. A clique of Progressive Rugby masters,and a few of the same colour from other schools, wereactive allies of Sidgwick and other residents. To them theinternal academic difficulties, ever real to the men on thespot, seemed trivial, and they were sometimes out ofpatience with the slow advance of residents. A Rugbymaster, dining in Hall and hearing talk of some question