Autobiography of Sir George Biddell AiryAiry, George Biddell
Science
Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy
Airy, George Biddell
Airy, George Biddell, 1801-1892; Astronomers -- Great Britain -- Biography; Autobiographies; Royal Greenwich Observatory
"For a week or more before the annual examination I was perfectly
lazy. The Classes of my year (Junior Sophs) were not published till
June 11. It was soon known that I was first with 2000 marks, the next
being Drinkwater with 1200 marks. After a short holiday at Bury and
Playford I returned to Cambridge on July 18th, 1821. My daily life
went on as usual. I find that in writing Latin I began Cicero De
Senectute (retranslating Melmoth's translation, and comparing). Some
time in the Long Vacation the names of the Prizemen for Declamations
were published: I was disappointed that not one, English or Latin, was
assigned to me: but it was foolish, for my declamations were rather
trumpery.
"My former pupil, Rosser, came again on August 14th. On August 29th
Dr Blomfield (afterwards Bishop of London) called, to engage me as
Tutor to his brother George Beecher Blomfield, and he commenced
attendance on Sept. 1st. With these two pupils I finished at the end
of the Long Vacation: for the next three terms I had one pupil,
Gibson, a Newcastle man, recommended by Mr Peacock, I believe, as a
personal friend (Mr Peacock being of Durham).
"The only classical subject appointed for the next examination was the
5th, 6th and 7th Books of the Odyssey: the mathematical subjects all
the Applied Mathematics and Newton. There was to be however the
Scholarship Examination (Sizars being allowed to sit for Scholarships
only in their 3rd year: and the Scholarship being a kind of little
Fellowship necessary to qualify for being a candidate for the real
Fellowship).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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