who chose that city because of its pleasant climate and surroundings, and because they could there enjoy each other’s society.  In some of the cities named—­particularly Athens and Alexandria—­there were endowed professorships (though not endowed by the Roman emperors) of which the benefit was enjoyed, not only by the local student but also by those from other parts of the Roman world who chose to resort to such established teachers.  This does not mean that such students paid no fee, nor that there was any lack of lecturers unendowed.  The student was free to take his choice.  Where there was endowment, as at Athens, there was control by the local authorities over the behaviour of students and also of their teachers; but it is evident that a professor’s audience was by no means always a very well-ruled or docile body.  As in the German universities, the visiting students were men, and some of them fairly advanced in years, and, also as in Germany, they followed their own tastes in study and changed from university to university at will.  They, as it were, “sampled” the professors and made their own election.  The teacher not only lectured to them, but also lectured them; while, on their side, they were entitled to catechise, and in a sense “badger,” the lecturer, to propound difficulties, and to make more or less pronounced exhibition of their sentiments.

In the philosophic lecture-room the student, possessing his share of the vivacity and excitability of the south, would stamp, spring from his seat, shout and applaud, calling out in Greek “splendid!” “inimitable!” “capital!” “prettily said!” and so forth.  Plutarch writes a little essay on the proper manner of behaving in the lecture-rooms, and he tells us:  “You should sit in a proper manner and not lounge; you should keep your eyes on the speaker and show a lively interest; maintain a composed countenance and show no annoyance or irritation, nor look as if you were thinking of other things.”  Such an attitude was the ideal and orthodox; but he tells us also that there were some who “scowled; their eyes wandered; they sprawled, crossed their legs, nodded and whispered to their neighbour, smiled, yawned sleepily, and let their heads droop.”  This was not necessarily because the lecturer was dull, but because he might be giving lessons which were unwelcome to some among his audience.  The cap fitted them too well, as it sometimes does when offered by a modern preacher.  But, says the same Plutarch, if you did not like these direct and rough-tongued monitors, you could find other professors, poseurs, who were all suavity; gentlemen whose philosophical stock-in-trade was grey hair, a pleasant voice and delivery, graceful language, and much self-appreciation.  These were the Reverend Charles Honeymans of the period, and their following was like unto the following of that popular pulpiteer.

[Illustration:  FIG. 96—­Papyri and Tabulae. (From Dyer’s Pompeii.)]