Cambridge

For I have known them all already, known them all,
Have known the left-side lanes, the dread, the doubts,
I have measured out my drive with roundabouts

Not T. S. Eliot

Several months ago I got an email from some UD Computer Science students who said that they might be traveling to England on their ten-day (spring break for UD students studying on the Rome campus) and if I’m there it would be neat to meet up. So I timed my visit to Cambridge to coincide with their visit there, and made the pleasant drive from Oxford.

We grabbed dinner and a pint at the Eagle Pub. As you can see on the sign, this pub used to be called “Eagle and Child.” Fortunately, unlike the pub of that name in Oxford, this one was open! This is also the first place on the planet where Watson and Crick announced their discovery of the double-helix structure of DNA, which is why Luke and Ryan (left and right resp. in the 2nd picture) suggested it. The meals were decent, and they had draught Guinness. It was great to hear stories of their exotic adventures in Spain and Morocco and some of the interesting characters that they met. They had to return to Rome the next day, so we did not stay out late. I include that 3rd picture because when I saw it in the pub (in an anonymous location) I finally became convinced that all of the “upside-down” switches that I have encountered in England were in fact “right-side-up,” according to English standard.

We met outside the King’s College Chapel, where Luke and Ryan were going to attend a Beethoven concert. While waiting for them I chatted with an elderly gentleman who told me that he used to be a student at King’s College, and how neat it was to come back so many years later to see his campus (still the most beautiful!) and how much it has changed (not much). I asked how the Beethoven was, and he said it was very nice. I learned later that the Beethoven concert had been canceled, and so they performed vespers instead. Sheesh! Probably he made up that he was a student there, too!

The first picture shows the front of the chapel that evening. The next two show front and back views of the chapel that I took the next day. I was not able to go into the chapel, but you should look online at the interior. Inside and out, it is remarkable!

Like Oxford University, the University of Cambridge consists of several colleges, King’s College being one of them. Another is Trinity College, founded by the awful Henry VIII.

Look at those beautiful gates, grounds and buildings! The 4th picture shows Trinity Bridge over the River Cam, together with some punters taking tourists for a river ride. Also, one fellow learning the art of punting. The architecture is varied and often beautiful, the founding dates of the various colleges being so different. Saint Edmund’s College is Catholic, and is one of the newer colleges, founded very gradually starting in 1896, twenty-five years after it became legal again for Catholic students to attend the University of Cambridge. It had been illegal ever since the time of the awful Henry VIII. It became a full Cambridge college in 1996.

If we followed those punters for about a half-mile they would pass under these two bridges:

The first is called the Mathematical Bridge, for reasons that are not quite known. It was built in 1749 and designed by William Etheridge. The right side of the bridge abuts the Riverside Building, of Queen’s College – the oldest building along the river in Cambridge. This picture was taken from the bridge shown in the second picture. Notice how much more beautiful the Mathematical bridge is!

About the same time as St. Edmund’s was being founded, the parish church of Our Lady of the Assumption and the English Martyrs was built. This is shown in that first picture. As is not uncommon in England the church has two names. The first part comes from the feast of Our Lady of the Assumption, which is the day on which the ballet dancer, Mrs. Yolande Marie Louise Lyne-Stephens, promised to completely fund the construction of the church! The second part was added by the church’s first pastor who wanted to commemorate the many Catholic martyrs who perished during the English Reformation. I was very lucky to attend Mass here on Sunday morning: I was hurrying to 8:15 Mass at the Franciscan Friary about 2 miles from my Airbnb (one does not try to park in central Cambridge, so I was going on foot) when I passed this church and saw others going in, a man handing out bulletins, and a sign saying “Catholic Mass.” It was 7:53, and Mass started at 8. What luck! This church had not come up on my Google Maps search for Catholic churches in the area.

The second church shown there is St. Giles, an Anglican church built about the same time, but on the site of a Catholic parish founded in 1096, by the wife of the then-sheriff. I was impressed by the imposing crucifix, and the name “Chesterton,” who is one of my favorite authors. (The great Gilbert Keith Chesterton.)

If you head south along Bridge Street you come to St. John’s College which has an interesting means of advertising events to students.

The third picture was taken on St. John’s Street, and is representative of the streets in the University area.

I said at the start that the drive to Cambridge was pleasant, and that was true, tempered only by the surprising frequency of roundabouts (traffic circles). The trip was only about 95 miles each way, but I estimate that I encountered 50 roundabouts. Over and over, after exiting one roundabout, my GPS would say “continue for 800 feet to the roundabout and take the second exit.” Then “continue for 1000 feet to the roundabout and take the first exit.” Even so, I prefer them to all of the US’s stop signs, which one does not see here.

If you are a fan of Monty Python you might remember the sketch involving Mr. Smoketoomuch who can not say the letter “C.” He pronounces a “B” whenever there should be a hard “C.” His interlocutor, Mr. Bounder, asks if he can pronounce the letter “K.” “Oh yes!” he exclaims. “Khaki, Kettle, King’s Bollege Bambridge.” (Here is that sketch on stage, or this one from the Flying Circus TV show where it’s “Keble Bollege Oxford” instead.)

Walking around Cambridge, I suppose I was primed to recall that sketch when I saw the alliterative “Kim’s Cafe,” followed by “Kim’s Bulgogi.” (Bulgogi is Korean for “fire meat.”)

The middle picture is the Hills Road War Memorial in Cambridge, which commemorates the two world wars. I was curious that WWI was referred to as “the great war,” and sure enough it was originally a WWI memorial, erected in 1922, but with mention of the second war added after WWII. I was also surprised to find this memorial so close to my place in Cambridge, when I also pass one close to my house each day here in Oxford. That one is shown in the third picture. It commemorates only WW1.

Let us hope and pray that no more engraving need be done on these war memorials.