AEGROTAL.  Latin, aegrotus, sick.  A certificate of illness.  Used in the Univ. of Cam., Eng.

A lucky thought; he will get an “aegrotal,” or medical certificate of illness.—­Household Words, Vol.  II. p. 162.

AEGROTAT.  Latin; literally, he is sick.  In the English universities, a certificate from a doctor or surgeon, to the effect that a student has been prevented by illness from attending to his college duties, “though, commonly,” says the Gradus ad Cantabrigiam, “the real complaint is much more serious; viz. indisposition of the mind! aegrotat animo magis quam corpore.”  This state is technically called aegritude, and the person thus affected is said to be aeger.—­The Etonian, Vol.  II. pp. 386, 387.

To prove sickness nothing more is necessary than to send to some medical man for a pill and a draught, and a little bit of paper with aegrotat on it, and the doctor’s signature.  Some men let themselves down off their horses, and send for an aegrotat on the score of a fall.—­Westminster Rev., Am.  Ed., Vol.  XXXV. p. 235.

During this term I attended another course of Aristotle lectures, —­but not with any express view to the May examination, which I had no intention of going in to, if it could be helped, and which I eventually escaped by an aegrotat from my physician.—­Bristed’s Five Years in an Eng.  Univ., Ed. 2d, p. 198.

Mr. John Trumbull well describes this state of indisposition in his Progress of Dullness:—­

 “Then every book, which ought to please,
  Stirs up the seeds of dire disease;
  Greek spoils his eyes, the print’s so fine,
  Grown dim with study, and with wine;
  Of Tully’s Latin much afraid,
  Each page he calls the doctor’s aid;
  While geometry, with lines so crooked,
  Sprains all his wits to overlook it. 
  His sickness puts on every name,
  Its cause and uses still the same;
  ’Tis toothache, colic, gout, or stone,
  With phases various as the moon,
  But tho’ thro’ all the body spread,
  Still makes its cap’tal seat, the head. 
  In all diseases, ’tis expected,
  The weakest parts be most infected.” 
    Ed. 1794, Part I. p. 8.

AEGROTAT DEGREE.  One who is sick or so indisposed that he cannot attend the Senate-House examination, nor consequently acquire any honor, takes what is termed an AEgrotat degree.—­Alma Mater, Vol.  II. p. 105.

ALMA MATER, pl. ALMAE MATRES.  Fostering mother; a college or seminary where one is educated.  The title was originally given to Oxford and Cambridge, by such as had received their education in either university.

It must give pleasure to the alumni of the College to hear of his good name, as he [Benjamin Woodbridge] was the eldest son of our alma mater.—­Peirce’s Hist.  Harv.  Univ., App., p. 57.