Of all groves, downwards from that where Hercules cut his club, none perhaps has been more fruitful in the article in question than those of Alma Mater. Political clubs, clubs literary, hunting and boating clubs, clubs for encouraging agriculture by devouring beef-steaks, clubs to perpetuate the dress of the seventeenth century, archery clubs, private debating clubs, and clubs for ‘natation’ as the French call it, have all in their turns, some for a season, others perpetually, flourished in the University.

The history of societies like these is a task hard to perform, owing to the fleeting nature of its subject and the great difficulty of ascertaining any thing about it except for the last few years. If our grandfathers had their clubs, any records regarding them can only be found by accident, and in default of access to stores of manuscript referring to the last century we must leave to our readers the puzzling problem as to when clubs were first established here, and why.

For the last half century, the youth of our Universities have been continually advancing in manly habits. Instead of boy-bishops of thirteen or non-descripts of sixteen, the students of the present age rarely appear before eighteen at the earliest. A great change in our habits has been the consequence, aided of course by the altered fashions of the world without.

There is a remarkable point of view on the South Eastern side of Christ's College gardens, at the right-hand of the bowling green; it represents in succession the spire of Trinity Church, the Tower of Great St. Mary's, and the pinnacled gothic roof of King's College Chapel, the whole displaying a panorama embraced in a beautiful framework of foliage such as Nature rarely furnishes even to one of her choicest pictures. Often have we seen the stranger in Cambridge, who has been led into these gardens to pay his respects at Milton's tree, arrest suddenly his footsteps, as if startled with surprise, as soon as he had reached the spot which commands this lovely prospect; and we question, unless perhaps he be some enthusiastic admirer of Liberty or Poetry, some devoted worshipper of Republicanism, or wrapt child of song, we question whether he has not returned considering himself better repaid for his visit by this passing and unexpected treat, than by the recollections or meditations which the Spirit of the Great Bard himself might evoke.

Much depends in all cases upon the day and the hour, the time and place, at which an object of interest is first presented to our consideration: the first impressions are like first love, generally the most durable, because they are the deepest;—they are sealed, as it were, on the soft vermillion of the heart, whose surface, though in after days seared and broken by less pleasing occurrences, retains faithfully to the last the precious stamp of early and dear remembrances.

The Cambridge Press, is, like that of the Sister University, of great, though disputed antiquity. Its undoubted existence reaches back for a period of 319 years, and it has claims to a duration still more extended. Among the κειμήλια equeathed by Archbishop Parker to Corpus Christi College is to be found a quaint old folio, commencing “Fratris laurencii gulielmi de saona ordinis minorum sacre theologie doctoris prohemium in novam rhetoricam,” and concluding “compilatum autem fait hoc opus in alma universitate Cantabrigie, Anno Domini 1478. Die. et. 6. Julii. quo die festum sancte Marthe recolitur. Sub protectione Serenissimi regis anglorum Eduardi quarti.” This colophon is, as the reader will perceive, conclusive only as to the date of the composition of the work in question. The absence however of pagination, signatures, or catch-words, points it out as printed very little later than the date of its composition; so the only thing to be settled is, where it, in point of fact, was printed, which may as well have been at Cambridge as any where else; at least the chances in favour of the supposition bear a relation, which may be ascertained, to those against it, and a relation much greater than might at first have been supposed from the mode of stating the question, inasmuch as Friar Laurence was clearly at that time a resident in the University of Cambridge, probably a lecturer there.

The suspension of a portrait is a mode of erecting a monument to a person in his life time, which has been long prevalent. In no single College will the expectation of finding a resemblance to the person of the Founder be disappointed: and such is the peculiar interest attaching to the idea, that in time past a collection of the portraits of the several Founders, engraved in mezzotint, was made and published under the title of Faber's Founders ;— a thin folio volume for Oxford in 1712, and one for Cambridge in 1714.

The eagerness to obtain a portrait of a Founder or Benefactor, might impede the exercise of due caution in receiving it: and hence in a few instances the authenticity of the portrait is not well established. But this is not the case with the instance now presented: every circumstance of warranty is clear on the face of it; except the name of the artist, which, in spite of the merely fashionable compliment to him in the last line of the inscription, has been kept back without any injury to his reputation.

The painting is, like many of its date, on panel, 2ft. 8in. by 2ft. 3in. It is the original of Faber's engraving in which the figure is reversed and the expression not well preserved. This may be said also of the latest copy, probably taken from Faber, in Pettigrew's Medical Portraits.

The position of ‘Great St. Mary's’ and the rank it holds among the buildings of the place, together with its character as the University Church, are amply sufficient to draw attention and excite enquiry.

The present edifice has succeeded to more than one bearing the same name and occupying the same ground. This church was begun A. D. 1478; and finished A. D. 1519. The first stone of the West Tower was laid in 1491; but the Tower itself remained a long time unfinished. Up to that date the whole cost had amounted to £795., a sum contributed by Members of the University exclusively. When Caius wrote in 1573, the work was incomplete in consequence of the low state of the University finances: the want of some generous benefactor to supply the defect is feelingly deplored by the Historian. In 1576, however, as if roused by this appeal, a subscription was commenced, by which a sum of £107. 10s. was raised. Still some years elapsed before the whole work was accomplished. Had the fabric eventually come forth from the hand of the architect vast and regular and stately, like the Temple that crowned the brow of Moriah, there had been some excuse for the delay. The Temple of Solomon was raised in thirteen years: the Temple of Herod in forty and six.

Behold the mark is gained, which announces to the traveller that the measure of his journey is run out, and a peculiar train of feeling is kindled at the sight. Should the traveller be a son of the University, returning after a long absence from this home of his student's affections, with him anticipation is distinctly modified by experience and recollection. The bridge at Trumpington Ford is the critical scene of a well known legend; the pathway before him was the line for promenaders–of those who sought recreation in seeing others, and were pleased to purchase it at the price of being seen; of the student confined by a zeal impatient of cessation to limited time and space, and delicately desirous of dry footing. He remembers when first, with the deference of a freshman, he learnt that here was the Senior Wrangler's walk. Imagination peoples the scene with its proper characters. That stone is not the rude monument of barbarian calculation, standing on some wide void plain, such as doubtless once was here, a landmark to the way-worn and way-lost passenger; it bears traces of the hand of art and of the design of science, and declares the march of civilization.

On the right hand he recognises the common, ‘empty’ as ever, though once mentioned, in a proposal for supplying the town with water, for the site of a reservoir–one of the few remaining traces of the open field of Cambridge, and continually threatened by the conduit-stream above.

On a small grass-plot at the extremity of the gardens of Christ's College there grows a very remarkably decrepit old Mulberry Tree. One glimpse is sufficient to convince the most incurious observer that this tree is not as other trees are. Its age is marked out, not so much by its size, which is rather diminutive, as by the sturdy proportion of its limbs; by their abruptly tapering towards their extremities; and by their almost invariably striking off from each other at right angles.

Yet, short as the branches are, it has been found necessary to support them with a number of strong timber props; which are carefully disposed around, with much more attention to the preservation of the structure, than to the gracefulness of its appearance. The necessity for these crutches arose from the decay of the main trunk; the interior of which has long been stuffed with a rich composition of manure; while the outside has been encrusted with a covering of sheet-lead. The bark, which alone survives, would of itself be utterly insufficient to support the superincumbent weight.

These several precautions, however, have proved so effectual, that a tempest which some time ago threw down many younger and stouter trees, merely twisted the old Mulberry round on its axis; props and all taking a part in the pirouette.