University of Virginia catalogue

The Junior Course, which will embrace the work to be done by
candidates for the degree of Bachelor of Arts, consists of lectures on
the elements of grammar and syntax, during which, by practice in reading
aloud and by numerous examples given in illustration of what is
taught, the student is trained in learning how to pronounce correctly.
He is next gradually familiarized with translations from Readers first,
and then from easy authors, while he is made to write exercises carefully
adapted to the lectures. A certain amount of private reading is
also prescribed, and an outline of the history of the language and its
literature closes the course.

The Senior Course, required for graduation and also for candidates
for the degree of Master of Arts, begins with the reading of classic
writers in each language and teaches fluent and prompt translation
into idiomatic English. In illustration and practical application of the

rules taught in the lectures, weekly exercises are written, carefully corrected
and fully explained to the class. The treatment of the idiom is
now mainly historical, the words, the sentences and the general structure
being exhibited as they gradually develop themselves from the infancy
of the language to its so-called Golden Age.

At stated times the Professor reads aloud so as to train the student's
ear; at others he dictates extracts from foreign writers, for the same purpose,
and to increase familiarity with the language. The course closes
with a series of lectures treating of the history of Spanish and Italian,
and explaining for each idiom its forms, its structure and its spiritual characteristics.
Opportunity is thus given to acquaint the student with the
fundamental laws of the Science of Language, Comparative Philology,
to which due attention is given. Lectures on the Literature of each
idiom finally include sketches of the successive epochs and accounts of
the lives with criticisms on the works of the leading authors. Much
attention is also given to the parallelism between the national development
of a people and its literary proficiency.

In the Class of Anglo-Saxon the study of the language is mainly
pursued in its aspect as the mother of English, furnishing the student
the means of tracing the history of his native tongue from its earliest
beginning. Much attention is given to the illustration of the history of
words, their birth, their fate under the rule of the Norman, and their
subsequent modification. Extracts from Anglo-Saxon writers are read,
and the bearing of their works on the history of our race is explained.

The following text-books are used:

Spanish.—The Professor's Grammar; Seoane's Dictionary; Velasquez' Reader;
Breton's La Independencia; Calderon's El Principe Constante; Lope's Estrella
de Sevilla; Cervantes' Don Quijote; Galdos's Trafalgar; Caballero's La Familia
de Alvareda; Ticknor's History of Spanish Literature. In default of the Professor's
Grammar, now out of print, Knapp's Spanish Grammar will be used.

Italian.—Cuore's Grammar; Foresti's Reader; Manzoni's I Promessi Sposi;
Tasso's Gerusalemme Liberata; Pellico's Le Mie Prigioni; Petrarca; Dante's La
Divina Commedia.

Anglo-Saxon.—Shute's Manual of Anglo-Saxon, or Sweet's Primer; The Professor's
Studies in English; March's Anglo-Saxon Grammar (for reference); the
Anglo-Saxon Gospels.

University of Virginia Library

Spanish, Italian and Anglo-Saxon.

Professor Schele De Vere.