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A. Thanks to the richness, he was able to hire servants to help with the daily life. B. So he paid five and a half pence extra each day to have vegetables. C. He enjoyed the kind of comfortable university life that most of today's students can only dream about. D. He had several people to help him to deal with the daily housework. E. When you look at the ledgers, you can find there were many rich students in Cambridge. F. The bills were paid by his wealthy father, Robert Darwin, a doctor. |
Two hundred years after Darwin's birth, studies have found new details of his life at the University of Cambridge. Six learner-centered ledgers （账本） discovered in the university show this
He lived in the most expensive rooms provided for a rich student at his time. . He had someone to clean his room, make his bed and take care of the fire in his bright rooms. He hired a dishwasher, a clothes washer and a man who cleaned his shoes. A tailor, hatter and barber made sure he was well presented. A chimney cleaner and a coalman kept his fire going. Christ's College's basic food was meat and beer.
Darwin's bill topped 636 pounds during his three years of study at Cambridge. Later he described this time as the most joyful of his happy life. That large sum（金额）would have been fairly common for a student at Cambridge in the 19th century.
In those days, Cambridge was full of rich students living a pretty good life and Darwin was just one of them. And so he had plenty of time for socializing（交际）or private study. He would be out shooting, collecting beetles, doing his scientific hobbies or visiting friends. He played cards and drank wine at night, just like students always have.
