also Regius Professor of History
at Oxford during the last eight years of his life, and thus the head
of the historical faculty in his own university which he dearly loved.
That he was less effective as a teacher than as a writer may be partly
ascribed to his having come too late to a new kind of work, and one
which demands the freshness of youth; partly also to the cramping
conditions under which professors have to teach at Oxford, where
everything is governed by a system of examinations which Freeman was
never tired of denouncing as ruinous to study. His friends, however,
doubted whether the natural bent of his mind was towards oral
teaching. It was a peculiar mind, which ran in a deep channel of its
own, and could not easily, if the metaphor be permissible, be drawn
off to irrigate the adjoining fields. He was always better at putting
his own views in a clear and telling way than at laying his intellect
alongside of yours, apprehending your point of view, and setting
himself to meet it. Or, to put the same thing differently, you learned
more by listening to him than by conversing with him. He had not the
quick intellectual sympathy and effusion which feels its way to the
heart of an audience, and indeed derives inspiration from the sight of
an audience. In his election meetings I noticed that the temper and
sentiment of the listeners did not in the least affect him; what he
said was what he himself cared to say, not what he felt they would
wish to hear. So also in his lecturing he pleased himself, and chose
the topics he liked best rather than those which the examination
scheme prescribed to the students. Perhaps he was right, for he was of
those whose excellence in performance depends upon the enjoyment they
find in the exercise of their powers. But even on the topics he
selected, he did not take hold of and guide the mind of the students,
realising their particular difficulties and needs, but simply
delivered his own message in his own way. Admitting this deficiency,
the fact remains that he was not only an ornament to the University by
the example he set of unflagging zeal, conscientious industry, loyalty
to truth, and love of freedom, but also a stimulating influence upon
those who were occupied with history. He delighted to surround himself
with the most studious of the younger workers, gave them abundant
encouragement and recognition, and never grudged the time to help them
by his knowledge or his counsel.

M