To the same purport is the evidence given by Mr H.A.  Roberts, Secretary of the Cambridge Appointments Board (see Minutes of Evidence taken before the Royal Commission on the Civil Service, 22nd November 1912-13th December 1912, pp. 66-73).  The whole of this testimony deserves careful study.  For some few years past the heads of the great business firms, in this country and abroad, have been applying in ever increasing numbers to Cambridge (and to Oxford also, though in this case statistics do not appear to be available) for men to take charge of departments and agencies; to become, in fact, “captains of industry.”  In the year before the war (1913-14) about 135 men were transferred from Cambridge University to commercial posts through the agency of the Board[1].  One might naturally suppose that the majority of these were science men; on the contrary, owing no doubt to the greater number of other posts open to them, they were fewer than might have been expected.  Graduates from every Tripos are found in the 135 in numbers roughly proportional to the numbers in the various Tripos lists.  Shortly before the war an advertisement of an important managership of some works—­in South America, if I remember rightly—­ended with the intimation that, other things being equal, preference would be given to a man who had taken a good degree in Classical Honours.

That most of such men are successful in their occupations might be deemed to be proved by the steady increase in the number of applications made for their services.  There is, however, more definite evidence available.  A member of one of the largest business firms in the country testified to the same Royal Commission that of the 46 Cambridge men who had been taken into his employment during the previous seven years 43 had done excellently well, two had left before their probationary period was ended to take up other work; and one only had proved unsatisfactory.  This evidence could easily be supplemented did space permit.  It is clear, then, that in many callings what is wanted—­to begin with, at any rate—­is not so much technical knowledge as trained intelligence.

Another reason for thus choosing university men is not difficult to discover.  When Mr W.L.  Hichens (Chairman of Cammell, Laird and Co.) addressed the Incorporated Association of Headmasters in January last he declared that in choosing university graduates for business he looked out for the man who might have got a First in Greats or history, if he had worked—­a man who had other interests as well, who was President of the Common Room, who had been pleasant in the Common Room, or on the river, or rowed in his college “Eight,” or had done something else which showed that he could get on with his fellow-men.  In business getting on means getting on with men.