For the first ten years the colleges directed their courses of study towards the degrees of the University of London. Their students did well, but the desire for their own University and their own degrees never faded from the minds of Welshmen. A few eager spirits met again and again in conference, then followed meetings of educationalists all over the principality, and in 1891 the main lines of a university were laid down by public conference, details were discussed by a representative committee, referred back to the conference, then to the colleges, and the sixteen Welsh county councils; lastly, the press and the general public were called upon for an opinion, and then the scheme was laid before the President of the Council. If ever there was a national University, the Welsh may claim to have established one. In November 1893 the royal seal was affixed to the charter, and in June 1895 the University held its first Matriculation Examination.
The degree course of the University of Wales is a complicated one, and is by no means planned so that he who runs may read. It has a twofold, or rather a threefold aim. The University not only takes cognisance of residence, but also lays down very careful directions as to the manner in which students shall obtain their knowledge. Not only does it demand a three years’ course in a constituent college of the University, but it also prescribes the nature of the courses, and the number of lectures to be attended. After Matriculation, which must be passed in five subjects, three compulsory, and two optional, and may be taken in one year or in two, the regulations require each student to pursue not less than ten courses, of which one must be in elementary Logic, and one, at least, a course of Latin or Greek. Apart from the Logic, the nine courses must be chosen in not less than three, or more than six departments. The possible courses are designated according to their degree of difficulty, as intermediate, ordinary, and special; four, at least, must be of higher grade than intermediate. In order to distribute them evenly over the whole term of residence, no candidate may take more than four in any one year, or more than seven in the first two years. A course is held to include not less than eighty lectures, and the corresponding examination; and since, in most subjects, the intermediate course must be pursued before the higher ones are attempted, every student has to attend some very elementary lectures before proceeding to anything at all like university work. As sixteen is the college age of admission, this arrangement is probably intentional; the colleges are meant to continue school work for one year at least, and gradually lead the student on to more arduous labours.