Squibs and Snobs: Science in Humorous British Undergraduate Magazines around 1830

The gownsman, 19 November 1829, 23.

Cooter Roger , The cultural meaning of popular science: Phrenology and the organization of consent in nineteenth-century Britain (Cambridge, 1984); Desmond Adrian , The politics of evolution: Morphology, medicine and reform in radical London (Chicago, 1989); Porter Roy (ed.), Patients and practitioners: Lay perceptions of medicine in pre-industrial society (Cambridge, 1985); Shteir Ann B. , “Botany in the breakfast room: Women and early nineteenth-century British plant study”, in Abir-Am Pnina and Outram Dorinda (eds), Uneasy careers and intimate lives: Women in science, 1789–1979 (New Brunswick, N. J., 1987), 31–43; and Secord James A. , “Newton in the nursery: Tom Telescope and the philosophy of tops and balls, 1761–1838”, History of science, xxiii (1985), 127–51.

The gownman, 31 December 1829, 66.

Rudwick Martin J. S. , “Caricature as a source for the history of science: De la Beche's anti-Lyellian sketches of 1831”, Isis, lxvi (1975), 534–60.

Hall J. T. D. (ed.), The Tounis College: An anthology of Edinburgh University student journals, 1823–1923 (Edinburgh, 1985).

Chainey Graham , A literary history of Cambridge (Cambridge, 1985). See also Whibley Charles (ed.), In cap and gown: Three centuries of Cambridge wit (London, 1889), and Marillier Harry C. , University magazines and their makers (London, 1902).

A complete listing of magazines published at Oxford and Cambridge universities is given in Marillier , University magazines (ref. 6), 71–93.

Standard sources for the expansion of the book and periodical trade and the development of a mass reading market are Altick Richard , The English common reader: A social history of the mass reading public, 1800–1900 (Chicago, 1957); Ellegard Alvar , The readership of the periodical press in mid-Victorian Britain (Acta Universitatis Gothobergensis, 63, no. 3; Goteberg , 1957); and Shattock Joanne and Wolff Michael (eds), The Victorian periodical press: Samplings and soundings (Leicester, 1982). Further useful sources are Manton A. A. , “Development of European scientific journal publishing before 1850”, in Meadows A. J. (ed.), Development of scientific publishing in Europe (Amsterdam, 1980), 1–22; Kronick David A. , A history of scientific and technological periodicals: The origins and development of the scientific and technological press, 1665–1790 (Metuchen, N. J., 1976); Graham Walter , English literary periodicals (London, 1930); and Bond Richmond P. (ed.), Studies in the early English periodical (Chapel Hill, N. C, 1957). See also, however, Flower Desmond , A century of best sellers, 1830–1930 (London, 1934); Cruse Amy , The Englishman and his books in the early nineteenth century (London, 1935); Webb Robert , The British working-class reader, 1790–1838: Literary and social tension (London, 1955); Barnes James J. , Free trade in books: A study of the London book trade since 1800 (Oxford, 1964); Gross John , The rise and fall of the man of letters: Aspects of English literary life since 1800 (London, 1969); Eisenstein Elizabeth L. , The printing press as an agent of change (Cambridge, 1979); Plant Marjorie , The English book trade: An economic history of the making and sale of books, 3rd edn (London, 1974); Cross Nigel , The common writer: Life in nineteenth century Grub Street (Cambridge, 1985); Klancher Jon P. , The making of English reading audiences, 1790–1832 (Madison, 1987); and Feather John , A history of British publishing (London, 1988).

New lapsus linguae, 24 January 1825.

University maga, 19 March 1835, 3.

Howe E. , “From Bewick to half tone: A survey of illustration processes during the nineteenth century”, Typography, iii (1937), 19–23; Wakeman Geoffrey , Victorian book illustration: The technical revolution (Newton Abbot, 1973); and Harthan John , The history of the illustrated book: The Western tradition (London, 1981).

Hall , The Tounis College (ref. 5), 28–31, 42. The first case involved John Leslie, professor of natural philosophy, whose avarice was attacked in the Lapsus linguae in 1824. Leslie had already taken the editor of Blackwood's magazine successfully to court. For further discussion of Leslie's “care of his fortune”, see Morrell J. B. , “Science and Scottish reform: Edinburgh in 1826”, The British journal for the history of science, vi (1972), 38–56. The question of anonymity is considered by Maurer O. , “Anonymity versus signature in Victorian reviewing”, University of Texas studies in English, xxvii (1948), 1–27, and Hillier M. R. , “The identification of authors: The great Victorian enigma” in Vann J. D. and Van Arsdel R. T. (eds), Victorian periodicals: A guide to research (New York, 1978), 123–48. See also Secord James R. , “Behind the veil: Robert Chambers and Vestiges” in Moore James R. (ed.), History, humanity and evolution: Essays for John C. Greene (Cambridge, 1989), 165–94.

Smyly Josiah G. , Contributors to “Hermathena”, 1873–1943 (Dublin, 1944).

Of the many studies relating to small-scale jobbing publishers, see particularly Grant James , The newspaper press (London, 1871), and Brown Philip , London publishers and printers (London, 1982). A full bibliography of sources is given by Madden Lionel and Dixon Diana , “The nineteenth century periodical press in Britain: A bibliography of modern studies”, Toronto Victorian periodicals newsletter, 1975. See also, Myers Robin and Harris Michael (eds), Author/publisher relations during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (Oxford, 1983).

Lapsus linguae, 17 March 1824, 122.

Sypher Francis Jacques (ed.), Undergraduate papers: An Oxford journal (1857–58). A facsimile reproduction with an introduction (Delmar, N.Y., 1974), p. iv.

Monsman Gerald C. , “‘Old Mortality’ at Oxford”, Studies in philology, lxvii (1970), 359–89.

Hall , The Tounis College (ref. 5), 35.

The history of the university natural history museum — the personal fiefdom of the professor of natural history, Robert Jameson — is described briefly in Hall D. B. , A short history of the University of Edinburgh, 1556–1889 (Edinburgh, 1967). See also Grant Alexander , The story of the University of Edinburgh during the first three hundred years (London, 1884), and Eyles Victor , “Robert Jameson and the Royal Scottish Museum”, Discovery, April 1954, 155–62. Further accounts that touch on the museum are given by Morrell , “Science and Scottish university reform” (ref. 12); Ritchie James , “A double centenary: Two notable naturalists, Robert Jameson and Edward Forbes”, Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Section B (Biology), lxvi (1956), 29–58; and Secord James A. , “The discovery of a vocation: Darwin's early geology”, The British journal for the history of science, xxiv (1991), 133–57.

Lapsus linguae, 12 January 1824, 12.

Leslie's natural philosophy class for women, and a second class in chemistry run the following year by Thomas Charles Hope, are discussed by Morrell , “Science and Scottish reform” (ref. 12).

The Cheilead, December 1826, 118.

Cooter , Cultural meaning of popular science (ref. 2), 22–24.

University medical and quizzical journal , January 1834, 19–22. The article is attributed to Edward Forbes in an annotated copy in the British Library.

The academic, 5 January 1826, 12.

Richardson Ruth , Death, dissection and the destitute (London, 1987), and Edwards Owen Dudley , Burke and Hare (Edinburgh, 1981).

The Cheilead, January 1827, 168.

Whibley , Cap and gown (ref. 6), p. xix.

The variable fortune of the stethoscope in medicine is discussed by Reiser Stanley J. , Medicine and the reign of technology (Cambridge, 1978). See also Nicolson Malcolm , “The introduction of percussion and stethoscopy to early nineteenth-century Edinburgh”, in Bynum W. F. and Porter Roy (eds), Medicine and the five senses (Cambridge, forthcoming).

Melville Lewis , Thackeray: A biography (London, 1910), 54, also repeated in Ray's edition of the letters: See Ray Gordon N. (ed.), The letters and private papers of W. M. Thackeray (London, 1945), i, 79. Ray later corrected this mistake in Thackeray: The uses of adversity (1811–1846) (London, 1955), 457, n. 26.

An incident not discussed by Winstanley D. A. , Early Victorian Cambridge (Cambridge, 1940). See, however, Clark John Willis and Hughes Thomas McKenny (eds), The life and letters of the Reverend Adam Sedgwick (Cambridge, 1890), i, 335–7.

The British Library and Cambridge University Library both attribute The gownsman to Thackeray. In fact, an article by Wright John P. , “The Light blue: A Cambridge University magazine”, Christ's College magazine, xxviii (1913), 7–13, describes a meeting with Williams (Wright's uncle) in which he confirmed his editorship of both journals.

“Science at Cambridge”, Punch, 11 November 1848, 201.

Forster Margaret (ed.), William Makepeace Thackeray: Memoirs of a Victorian gentleman (London, 1978), 27.

The snob, 30 April 1829, 22.

Williams Astley , Notes and queries, 6th ser., x (1884), 419.

On that basis, Louis Melville reprinted Thackeray's fugitive pieces for The snob and The gownsman in idem (ed.), Stray papers by William Makepeace Thackeray: Being stories, reviews, verses and sketches (1821–1847) (London, 1901), 1–14.

Williams was at that time employed as Thackeray's mathematics tutor for the summer vacation and the two young men had gone to Paris, fondly believing their parents would think they were working; they took lodgings in a small English-run boarding-house recommended to them by Sedgwick (“a friend of Williams's”) from which they sallied forth for dancing lessons and soirées and all the other non-mathematical pleasures catalogued in Thackeray's autobiography. In the same letter Thackeray stated that Sedgwick was staying at their pensione (see Ray, Letters and papers (ref. 30), i, 84–85). Sedgwick's own diary of the Continental tour he made that summer, however, seems to make the conjunction impossible. See Clark and Hughes , Life and letters of Sedgwick (ref. 31), i, 349–52.

The snob, 14 May 1829, 29–31.

The gownsman, 19 November 1829, 17–20. The journal is sometimes incorrectly catalogued as having been published in June to November 1830, an easy mistake due to the issue of an editorial preface dated June 1830 that is customarily bound at the front of a collected run of numbers, when it was in fact an afterword, bringing the series to a close. The issues themselves do not carry the year.

Secord James A. , Controversy in Victorian geology: The Cambrian-Silurian debate (Princeton, 1986), and Speakman Colin , Adam Sedgwick: Geologist and dalesman, 1785–1873 (London and Cambridge, 1982).

Clark and Hughes , Life and letters of Sedgwick (ref. 31), i, 285, 290, 357. Sedgwick's memoirs (only very sketchy) are in Cambridge University Library Archives, Add 7652. III, H2.

Schaffer Simon and Fisch Menachem (eds), William Whewell: A composite portrait (Oxford, 1991). Laudan Rachel , From mineralogy to geology: The foundations of a science, 1650–1830 (Chicago, 1987). Whewell's mineralogy is given some attention in a paper by Burke John G. , “Mineral classification in the early nineteenth century”, in Schneer Cecil J. (ed.), Toward a history of geology (Cambridge, Mass., 1969), 62–77.

Whewell William , An essay on mineralogical classification and nomenclature (Cambridge, 1828).

Whewell William , “A general method of calculating the angles made by any planes of crystals, and the laws according to which they are formed”, Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London, cxv (1825), 87–130.

Clark and Hughes , Life and letters of Sedgwick (ref. 31), i, 515.

Sedgwick's syllabus for his geology course was published in 1821. An extensively revised edition was issued in 1831.

Jameson's syllabus for 1827 or thereabouts is in the Edinburgh University Archives, X 623/20, as are several incomplete sets of student notes. One of these, with a further set in the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine Archives, MS 3358, indicate that at least some of the advertised topics, particularly the invertebrates and the “philosophy of zoology” including the “origin of species”, were not delivered. See also Secord James A. , “Edinburgh Lamarckians: Robert Jameson and Robert E. Grant”, Journal of the history of biology, xxiv (1991), 1–18, p. 17.

Barlow Nora (ed.), The autobiography of Charles Darwin, 1809–1882 (London, 1958), 59–60, and the recollections of John Maurice Herbert, Darwin Archive, University Library Cambridge, DAR 112 (ser. 2), 67.

Lapsus linguae, 28 November 1825, 21–23.

Anti-Nemo, 30 November 1832, 3.

University maga, 29 January 1835, 5–6.

New lapsus linguae, 10 January 1825, 49–50.

Mulkay Michael , On humour: Its nature and its place in modern society (Cambridge, 1988). Durant John and Miller Jonathan (eds), Laughing matters: A serious look at humour (Harlow, 1988).

A useful, though elderly, study is given by Wright Thomas , A history of caricature (London, 1865). See Carretta Vincent , The snarling muse: Verbal and visual political satire from Pope to Churchill (Philadelphia, 1983); Dickinson Harry Thomas , Caricatures and the constitution, 1760–1832 (Cambridge, 1986); Duffy Michael (ed.), The English satirical print, 1600–1832 (Cambridge, 1986); Galligan Edward , The comic vision in literature (Athens, Georgia, 1984); Houfe Simon , John Leech and the Victorian scene (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1984); Millar John , Religion in the popular prints, 1600–1832 (Cambridge, 1986); and Storey Mark , Poetry and humour from Cowper to Clough (London, 1979).

Many of these separate publications are reprinted in Whibley, Cap and gown (ref. 6). For Oxford, see The Oxford spectator, 1867.

Shattock and Wolff , The Victorian periodical press (ref. 8). In addition to the works cited in ref. 8, see Curwen Henry , A history of booksellers, the old and the new (London, 1873); James Louis , Fiction for the working man, 1830–1850 (Oxford, 1963); Neuberg V. E. , Popular literature (Harmondsworth, 1977); Sheets-Pyenson Susan , “From the north to Red Lion Court: The creation and early years of the Annals of natural history”, Archives of natural history, x (1981), 221–49; and Young Robert M. , “Natural theology, Victorian periodicals, and the fragmentation of a common context”, in idem, Darwin's metaphor: Nature's place in Victorian culture (Cambridge, 1985), 126–63.

Altick , The English common reader (ref. 8), 323.

McDowell R. B. and Webb David , Trinity College Dublin, 1592–1952: An academic history (Cambridge, 1982), 499–508.

Evidence, oral and documentary, taken and received by the Commissioners for visiting the Universities of Scotland, Parliamentary papers, xxxv (1837), Appendix, 128–9.

Morgan Alexander , “Matriculations in the Faculty of Medicine prior to 1858”, University of Edinburgh journal, viii (2) (1936–37), 124–5.