s morning and an hour or two in the afternoon have also, if he is an
industrious student, been devoted to lectures, and he has not been
neglectful of private study. He has enjoyed the numerous holidays
afforded by the Feasts of the Church, and several vacations in the
course of the year, including ten days at Christmas, a fortnight at
Easter, and about six weeks in the autumn. After five years of study,
if he is a civilian, and four if he is a canonist, the Rector has
raised him to the dignity of a Bachelor by permitting him to give
"extra-ordinary" lectures--and after two more years spent in this
capacity he is ready to proceed to the doctorate. The Rector, having
been satisfied by the English representative in his Council that the
"doctorand" has performed the whole duty of the Bolognese student,
gives him permission to enter for the first or Private Examination,
and he again takes the oath of obedience to that dignitary. The doctor
under whom he has studied vouches for his competence, and presents him
first to the Archdeacon and some days afterwards to the College of
Doctors, before whom he takes a solemn oath never to seek admittance
into the Bolognese College of Doctors, or to teach, or attempt to
perform any of the functions of a doctor, at Bologna. They then (p. 031)
give him a passage for exposition and send him home. He is followed to
his house by his own doctor who hears his exposition in private, and
brings him back to the august presence of the College of Doctors and
the Archdeacon. Here he treats his thesis and is examined upon it by
two or more doctors, who are ordered by the University statutes not to
treat any victim of this rigorous and tremendous examination otherwise
than if he were their own son, and are threatened with grave penalties,
including suspension for a year. The College then votes upon his case,
each doctor saying openly and clearly, and without any qualification,
"Approbo" or "Reprobo," and if the decision is favourable he is now a
Licentiate and has to face only the expensive but not otherwise
formidable ordeal of the second or Public Examination. As a newly
appointed Scottish judge is, to this day, admitted to his office by
trying cases, so the Bologna doctor was admitted to his new dignity by
an exercise in lecturing. The idea is common to many medieval
institutions, and it survived at Bologna, even though the licentiate
had, at his private examination, renounced the right of teaching