Leslie Stephen to GE, Cambridge, 6 May 1875
Title
Leslie Stephen to GE, Cambridge, 6 May 1875
Title
Leslie Stephen to GE, Cambridge, 6 May 1875
Sender
Leslie Stephen
Recipient
George Eliot
Date(s)
- 1875-05-06
Place
Cambridge
Letter Content
Leslie Stephen to GE, Cambridge, 6 May 1875
MS: Alderman Library, University of Virginia. Hitherto unpublished.
Cambridge | 6.5.75.
Dear Mrs. Lewes
I have been at Cambridge for a few days and have taken the opportunity to ask a few questions as to the resignation of scholarships problem. 241 The result is as follows -- Sidgwick confirms my opinion that such a combination as you suggested would be impossible at Trinity. I find, however, that the following case actually happened at Trinity Hall (my college) and might happen, I presume, at other colleges. A. was first in the examination in May and B and C were bracketed second. A. left the University before October, i.e. the end of the vacation and his scholarship was thereupon divided between B and C.
The objection which occurs to me in regard to using this precedent is this: that the first scholarship was in this case worth about £50 a year and the second worth £30. If therefore A had left the University for the benefit of B, he would only have secured for him £20 a year extra. This, or something like this, would be the ordinary case and the sacrifice seems too small to be worth making.
There is, however, another case which not only may, but frequently does happen and which might, I think, answer your purpose, if otherwise suitable. At all the colleges, now, it is customary to give exhibitions to youths on entrance, and these are sometimes of sufficient value to be really important to a poor man, say, £50 to £70 or even £80 a year. A successful candidate often declines to take one of these when it is offered to him, and in that case it is given, as a matter of course, to the second in the examination. I have heard of a scholarship of £50 a year being thus passed on through two or three candidates.
The ordinary motive, of course, is that the successful candidate thinks that he can get something better elsewhere. Perhaps he has done better than he expected and fancies that he will have a chance for some exhibition which he had previously supposed to be beyond his powers; or he might have expected to get the first exhibition and has only received an offer of the second. Anyhow the case is a common one; and, if your hero is not forced to be already an undergraduate when the case occurs, he might refuse the scholarship without causing any particular remark and with the certainty that it would be given to his friend. He might say, for example, that he wished to go to another college or not to go to the University at all.
I hope this may be of some service to you. I shall be glad to answer any other questions to the best of my ability when I have the pleasure of seeing you again. 242
Yours very truly,
L. Stephen.
MS: Alderman Library, University of Virginia. Hitherto unpublished.
Cambridge | 6.5.75.
Dear Mrs. Lewes
I have been at Cambridge for a few days and have taken the opportunity to ask a few questions as to the resignation of scholarships problem. 241 The result is as follows -- Sidgwick confirms my opinion that such a combination as you suggested would be impossible at Trinity. I find, however, that the following case actually happened at Trinity Hall (my college) and might happen, I presume, at other colleges. A. was first in the examination in May and B and C were bracketed second. A. left the University before October, i.e. the end of the vacation and his scholarship was thereupon divided between B and C.
The objection which occurs to me in regard to using this precedent is this: that the first scholarship was in this case worth about £50 a year and the second worth £30. If therefore A had left the University for the benefit of B, he would only have secured for him £20 a year extra. This, or something like this, would be the ordinary case and the sacrifice seems too small to be worth making.
There is, however, another case which not only may, but frequently does happen and which might, I think, answer your purpose, if otherwise suitable. At all the colleges, now, it is customary to give exhibitions to youths on entrance, and these are sometimes of sufficient value to be really important to a poor man, say, £50 to £70 or even £80 a year. A successful candidate often declines to take one of these when it is offered to him, and in that case it is given, as a matter of course, to the second in the examination. I have heard of a scholarship of £50 a year being thus passed on through two or three candidates.
The ordinary motive, of course, is that the successful candidate thinks that he can get something better elsewhere. Perhaps he has done better than he expected and fancies that he will have a chance for some exhibition which he had previously supposed to be beyond his powers; or he might have expected to get the first exhibition and has only received an offer of the second. Anyhow the case is a common one; and, if your hero is not forced to be already an undergraduate when the case occurs, he might refuse the scholarship without causing any particular remark and with the certainty that it would be given to his friend. He might say, for example, that he wished to go to another college or not to go to the University at all.
I hope this may be of some service to you. I shall be glad to answer any other questions to the best of my ability when I have the pleasure of seeing you again. 242
Yours very truly,
L. Stephen.
Signature
L. Stephen.
Citation
Leslie Stephen, Leslie Stephen to GE, Cambridge, 6 May 1875, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/95524