Account of a Tour in Normandy, Volume 2Turner, Dawson
History
Account of a Tour in Normandy, Volume 2
Turner, Dawson
Architecture -- France -- Normandy; Normandy (France) -- Antiquities; Normandy (France) -- Description and travel
In the estimation, at least, of the inhabitants, the university of Caen
ranks at present the third in France; Paris and Strasbourg being alone
entitled to stand before it. The faculty of law retains its old
reputation, and the legal students are quite the pride of the
university. Since the peace, many young jurisprudents from Jersey and
Guernsey have resorted to it. Medical students generally complete their
education at Paris, where it is commonly considered in France, that,
both in theory and practice, the various branches of this faculty have
nearly attained the acmè of perfection. The students, who amount to just
five hundred, are under the care of twenty-six professors, many of them
men of distinguished talents. The Abbé de la Rue fills the chair of
history; M. Lamouroux, that of the natural sciences. They receive their
salaries wholly from the government; their emoluments continue the same,
whether the students crowd to hear their courses, or whether they
lecture to empty benches. It is strictly forbidden to a student to
attempt to make any remuneration to a professor, or even to offer him a
present of any kind. The whole of the dues paid by the scholars go to
the state; and the state in its turn, defrays the expences of the
establishment.
There is likewise at Caen an Academy of Sciences, Arts and Belles
Lettres, which has published two volumes; not, strictly speaking, of its
Transactions, but exhibiting a brief outline of the principal papers
that have been read at the meetings. The antiquarian dissertations of
the Abbé de la Rue, which they contain, are of great merit; and it is
much to be regretted, that they have not appeared in a more extended
form. A chartered academy was first founded here in the year 1705; and
it continued to exist, till it was suppressed, like all others
throughout France, at the revolution. The present establishment arose in
1800, under the auspices of General Dugua, then prefect of the
department, who had been urged to the task by the celebrated Chaptal,
Minister of the Interior.--Some interesting, letters are annexed to the
second part of the poems of Mosant de Brieux, in which, among much
curious information relative to Caen, he describes the literary meetings
that led to the foundation of the first academy. The town at that time
could boast an unusual proportion of men of talents. Bochart, author of
_Sacred Geography_; Graindorge, who had published _De Principiis
Generationîs_; Huet, a man seldom mentioned, without the epithet
_learned_ being attached to his name; and Halley and Ménage, authors
almost equally distinguished, were amongst those who were associated for
the purposes of acquiring and communicating information.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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