ILLUSTRATION.  That which elucidates a subject.  A word used with a peculiar application by undergraduates in the University of Cambridge, Eng.

I went back,... and did a few more bits of illustration, such as noting down the relative resources of Athens and Sparta when the Peloponnesian war broke out, and the sources of the Athenian revenue.—­Bristed’s Five Years in an Eng.  Univ., Ed. 2d, p. 51.

IMPOSITION.  In the English universities, a supernumerary exercise enjoined on students as a punishment.

Minor offences are punished by rustication, and those of a more trivial nature by fines, or by literary tasks, here termed Impositions.—­Oxford Guide, p. 149.

Literary tasks called impositions, or frequent compulsive attendances on tedious and unimproving exercises in a college hall.—­T.  Warton, Minor Poems of Milton, p. 432.

Impositions are of various lengths.  For missing chapel, about one hundred lines to copy; for missing a lecture, the lecture to translate.  This is the measure for an occasional offence....  For coming in late at night repeatedly, or for any offence nearly deserving rustication, I have known a whole book of Thucydides given to translate, or the Ethics of Aristotle to analyze, when the offender has been a good scholar, while others, who could only do mechanical work, have had a book of Euclid to write out.

Long impositions are very rarely barberized.  When college tutors intend to be severe, which is very seldom, they are not to be trifled with.

At Cambridge, impositions are not always in writing, but sometimes two or three hundred lines to repeat by heart.  This is ruin to the barber.—­Collegian’s Guide, pp. 159, 160.

In an abbreviated form, impos.

He is obliged to stomach the impos., and retire.—­Grad. ad
Cantab., p. 125.

He satisfies the Proctor and the Dean by saying a part of each impos.—­Ibid., p. 128.

See BARBER.

INCEPT.  To take the degree of Master of Arts.

They may nevertheless take the degree of M.A. at the usual period, by putting their names on the College boards a few days previous to incepting.—­Cambridge Calendar.

The M.A. incepts in about three years and two months from the time of taking his first degree.—­Bristed’s Five Years in an Eng.  Univ., Ed. 2d, p. 285.

INCEPTOR.  One who has proceeded to the degree of M.A., but who, not enjoying all the privileges of an M.A. until the Commencement, is in the mean time termed an Inceptor.

Used in the English universities, and formerly at Harvard College.

And, in case any of the Sophisters, Questionists, or Inceptors fail in the premises required at their hands ... they shall be deferred to the following year.—­Laws of 1650, in Quincy’s Hist.  Harv.  Univ., Vol.  I. p. 518.