TABLE showing the NUMBER of NOMINATIONS, &c., in 1857 and 1858,

* Candidates who were found to be ineligible as to age, health, or character are not here included amongst the examined, although some of them went through the examination.

Report of her Majesty's Commissioners appointed to inquire into the State of the Universities of Aberdeen, with a view to their Union.

THE commission was issued on the 6th April, 1857, to Colonel Mure, of Cardwell; William Sterling, Esq., M.P.; and Cosmo Innes, Esq.; and after having examined the principal and professor of King's College, the principal and professors of Marischal College, and other witnesses, they reported as follows:

The University of King's College, in Old Aberdeen, was founded by Papal Bull and Royal Charter, in the year 1494. It was invested with the power of granting degrees in theology, law, medicine, and the liberal arts. The King's College, in the narrower sense, was founded by William Elphinstone, Bishop of Aberdeen, 1505. The distinction between college and university appears, in the instance of this foundation, originally to have been, that the collegiate body was restricted to those members of the university who participated in its endowments, and were permanently resident at its seat of instruction. These were the principal, professors, and doctors, officially engaged in teaching or enforcing discipline, together with a certain number of poor students, for whom, during their curriculum, an adequate sustentation was provided by the charter from the college funds. The university comprised, in addition to the members of the college, all other persons connected with it by office or education, the chancellor, rector, deans of faculties, and other honorary functionaries, the graduates, students, and alumni.

Marischal College was founded and endowed in 1593, by a charter of

George Earl Marischal, confirmed by an Act of James VI. Although not in these earlier writs entitled "university," it was invested with university powers, being authorized to grant the degree of master to scholars duly qualified in theology, physiology, Aristotelian philosophy, anatomy, chronology, geography, Hebrew, and the other learned languages. Hence, within no distant period after its foundation, the practice of styling it "university" gradually became prevalent, both in familiar usage and in public documents; and during the last and present century, the increase of its endowments and chairs, with the zeal and ability of its teachers, has obtained for its degrees as general a recognition as that enjoyed by the degrees of the sister college.

The existence, within the liberties of a single provincial town, and about a mile distant from each other, of two distinct universities, each with its separate body of professors, teaching the same branches of education, and each conferring degrees, seems, not long after the foundation of Marischal College, to have been regarded, both by the Scottish Government and the portion of the public connected with the two institutions, as a misapplication of the educational resources of the country. The propriety of uniting them became, accordingly, at an early period, an object of serious attention. In 1642, a charter, constituting them a single university, was passed by Charles I., and confirmed by Act of Parliament. The details of this enactment throw no light on the mode in which the functions of the new academical body were to be exercised, in reference to granting degrees or otherwise, being entirely devoted to the distribution of certain additional endowments provided for the colleges. The single university of Aberdeen, with its two colleges, continues to be noticed in the public documents relating to them until towards the close of the century, when the charter of 1642 seems to have become a dead letter, and each establishment resumed its separate independence of character and interests.

In 1747, the year in which the union of the St. Andrew's Colleges were effected, in 1754, 1770, and 1786, negotiations for a similar union also took place between the colleges of Aberdeen. The terms on which, in 1754 and 1786, and, it would appear, by unanimous consent of the contracting parties, the proposed object was to be attained, have been preserved. They provide for a complete amalgamation or fusion of the two institutions, in respect to property, government, instruction, and discipline. The funds were to be incorporated in one common stock, the double professorships, where such existed in the several branches, were to be reduced to single chairs, and each of the higher academical offices, of chancellor, rector, principal, and dean, were to be similarly consolidated into one. But owing to subsequent disagreements on points of detail, or to other obstacles, these various schemes successively fell to the ground.

The question of union received its due share of attention from the prolonged and searching University Commission of 1826, commonly called Sir Robert Peel's Commission. The report of that commission recommended a union or fusion of a no less extensive nature than that contemplated in the schemes of the previous century. The buildings of Marischal College had been reported, about this time, to be in so dilapidated a state as to be incapable of repair, unless at a cost equal to that of a new structure. The Commission therefore suggested that the seat of the new university should be King's College, that the buildings of Marischal College should be sold, with the area belonging to them; and that the price obtained, which

from their being situated in the centre of the town, was expected to be considerable, should be applied to the augmentation and improvement of the buildings of King's College, or to other beneficial purposes for behoof of the new university.

No attempt was made by Government to give effect to these recommendations; and, shortly afterwards, the course proposed in regard to Marischal College was virtually superseded by a Government grant of about 20,000l. for the repair of its buildings-a sum which, with upwards of 7,000l. subscribed from local sources, sufficed for their reconstruction in their existing state of integrity.

In 1835, a bill, founded in part on the report of Sir R. Peel's Commission, was brought into Parliament by Mr. Bannerman, member for Aberdeen. It provided for the same complete and comprehensive union of both colleges and universities, with the exception that the buildings of each college were to be preserved entire, and adapted, under new regulations, to the accommodation of the united faculties and teachers. The classes of law, medicine, and arts were to be taught in Marischal College, those of divinity in King's College; the public meetings of the university to be shared between the two. The bill also contained the scheme of a constitution for the new academical body, on the popular principle of admitting the graduates to a voice in the election of the ruling officers. This measure met with strong opposition in the House of Commons, and was withdrawn.

In 1836, another Royal Commission was appointed, specially for investigating the state of the Aberdeen universities, and more particularly, "How far it would be for the benefit of the said universities of Aberdeen, and for the advancement of science and learning, that they should be united into one university." Before commencing their labours, the commissioners invited each of the colleges to submit to them such regulations as to each might seem expedient for their future government. In compliance with this invitation, Marischal College drew up and sent in the Heads of a Scheme" of union, which was printed, in extenso, in the appendix to the report.

This commission expressed a unanimous opinion " in favour of the principle of uniting the universities, which was so strongly recommended by the late commission " (of 1826); the principle, namely, of complete amalgamation. Keeping in view, however, the repugnance entertained by the several sections of the local public connected with each college to any serious encroachment on their property, or separate integrity, and in the hope of reconciling conflicting interests, the commissioners reported in favour of a more modified plan of union, embodying in substance the "Heads of a Scheme" drawn up by Marischal College. It was recommended that the two universities, with their faculties, should be united, but that the colleges should separately retain the administration of their property and funds; that the duplicate professorships in each faculty should be suppressed, with the exception of those in the faculty of arts, one class in each branch of which should continue to be taught in each college; that the classes in the faculties of law and medicine should be taught in Marischal College; those of the theological faculty in King's College. The basis of a constitution for the new academical body was also laid down, on the same popular principle as in the bill of 1835. This plan also proved abortive, owing to non-acquiescence on the part of King's College.

The question of union seems to have remained comparatively dormant

until 1854, when, on the suggestion of King's College, the project of complete amalgamation or fusion of the two establishments, their property, functions, and privileges, was renewed, and a plan of union, equal or little inferior in extent to that embodied in Mr. Bannerman's bill, was drawn up and agreed to by a majority of each collegiate body. This plan provided that the duplicate professorships should be reduced, that the classes of law and medicine should be taught exclusively in Marischal College, those of divinity and of arts exclusively in King's College. The measure was favourably viewed by the Government of Lord Aberdeen, by the provost and magistrates of the city, by its representative in Parliament, Mr. Thompson, and by many, perhaps the greater number, of those members of the local community who were most competent to form an impartial judgment on its merits. It was, however, keenly opposed, on various grounds, as well by the great mass of the town population, as by the graduates and alumni of the two colleges, comprising a large portion of the clergy and educated classes in the northern counties of Scotland. The portion of the scheme against which the most active and most reasonable opposition was directed, was the limitation of the elementary classes of Latin, Greek, and mathematics to single chairs, and the appropriation of those chairs to King's College, which would, it was objected, impose on the youth of the city the hardship of being obliged to seek, at upwards of a mile's distance, those lessons which had hitherto been delivered in the immediate neighbourhood of their own homes. It was also urged, that the union of the classes in those branches, would render them inconveniently large for the proper conveyance of instruction by a single professor. To obviate this difficulty it was proposed by those favourable to the scheme, that in each of the elementary branches two sets of professors should be retained, one in each college. But this concession failed to conciliate the adverse interest; and, after a prolonged agitation on the subject, the promoters of the measure, whatever their sense of its intrinsic value, did not consider it expedient to force it into operation against the wishes of the community for whose benefit it was intended.

The question of union was again taken up early in 1856, and, for the first time since the abortive charter of Charles I., under the immediate auspices of the Imperial Government. By invitation from the Crown officers, each college, in the spring of that year, drew up certain conditions as the basis, for their respective interests, of a legislative measure, which was accordingly introduced by the Lord Advocate in that session of Parliament. The enactments of this bill were substantially the same as those recommended by the commission of 1836. They provided for a union of the universities, and of their several faculties; for the suppression of the duplicate professorships, with the exception of the elementary chairs in arts; for the restriction of the theological faculty to King's College, of the faculties of law and medicine to Marischal College, the faculty of arts remaining common to the two; each college to retain undisturbed the administration of its property and funds. The heads of a liberal scheme of university government were also laid down; all matters of detail not provided for in the Act, were to be settled by a commission to be specially appointed for the purpose. The fundamental provisions of this bill appeared to be generally acceptable to the various interests which they affected, and to hold out a fair prospect of harmonious settlement. Difficulties, however, having arisen as to special points, the measure was, like its predecessors,