Chapter III (17)

"By the time the hour of the exercises has arrived, the hall is densely packed with undergraduates and professional students. The President, who is a non-appointment man, and probably the poorest scholar in the class, sits on a stage with his associate professors. Appropriate programmes, printed in the college style, are scattered throughout the house. As the hour strikes, the President arises with becoming dignity, and, instead of the usual phrase, 'Musicam audeamus,' restores order among the audience by 'Silentiam audeamus,' and then addresses the band, 'Musica cantetur.'

"Then follow a series of burlesque orations, dissertations, and disputes, upon scientific and other subjects, from the wittiest and cleverest men in the class, and the house is kept in a continual roar of laughter. The highest appointment men frequently take part in the speeches. From time to time the band play, and the College choir sing pieces composed for the occasion. In one of the best, called AUDACIA, composed in imitation of the Crambambuli song, by a member of the class to which the writer belonged, the Wooden Spoon is referred to in the following stanza:--

'But do not think our life is aimless;
O no! we crave one blessed boon,
It is the prize of value nameless,
The honored, classic WOODEN SPOON;
But give us this, we'll shout Hurrah!
O nothing like Audacia!'

"After the speeches are concluded and the music has ceased, the President rises and calls the name of the hero of the evening, who ascends the stage and stands before the high dignitary. The President then congratulates him upon having attained to so eminent a position, and speaks of the pride that he and his associates feel in conferring upon him the highest honor in their gift,--the Wooden Spoon. He exhorts him to pursue through life the noble cruise he has commenced in College,--not seeking glory as one of the illiterate,--the [Greek: oi polloi],--nor exactly on the fence, but so near to it that he may safely be said to have gained the 'happy medium.'

"The President then proceeds to the grand ceremony of the evening, --the delivery of the Wooden Spoon,--a handsomely finished spoon, or ladle, with a long handle, on which is carved the name of the Class, and the rank and honor of the recipient, and the date of its presentation. The President confers the honor in Latin, provided he and his associates are able to muster a sufficient number of sentences.

"When the President resumes his seat, the Third Colloquy man thanks his eminent instructors for the honor conferred upon him, and thanks (often with sincerity) the class for the distinction he enjoys. The exercises close with music by the band, or a burlesque colloquy. On one occasion, the colloquy was announced upon the programme as 'A Practical Illustration of Humbugging,' with a long list of witty men as speakers, to appear in original costumes. Curiosity was very much excited, and expectation on the tiptoe, when the colloquy became due. The audience waited and waited until sufficiently _humbugged_, when they were allowed to retire with the laugh turned against them.

"Many men prefer the Wooden Spoon to any other college honor or prize, because it comes directly from their classmates, and hence, perhaps, the Faculty disapprove of it, considering it as a damper to ambition and college distinctions."

This account of the Wooden Spoon Exhibition was written in the year 1851. Since then its privacy has been abolished, and its exercises are no longer forbidden by the Faculty. Tutors are now not unfrequently among the spectators at the presentation, and even ladies lend their presence, attention, and applause, to beautify, temper, and enliven the occasion.

The "_Wooden Spoon_," tradition says, was in ancient times presented to the greatest glutton in the class, by his appreciating classmates. It is now given to the one whose name comes last on the list of appointees for the Junior Exhibition, though this rule is not strictly followed. The presentation takes place during the Summer Term, and in vivacity with respect to the literary exercises, and brilliance in point of audience, forms a rather formidable rival to the regularly authorized Junior Exhibition.--_Songs of Tale_, Preface, 1853, p. 4.

Of the songs which are sung in connection with the wooden spoon presentation, the following is given as a specimen.

"Air,--_Yankee Doodle_.

"Come, Juniors, join this jolly tune
Our fathers sang before us;
And praise aloud the wooden spoon
In one long, swelling chorus.
Yes! let us, Juniors, shout and sing
The spoon and all its glory,--
Until the welkin loudly ring
And echo back the story.

"Who would not place this precious boon
Above the Greek Oration?
Who would not choose the wooden spoon
Before a dissertation?
Then, let, &c.

"Some pore o'er classic works jejune,
Through all their life at College,--
I would not pour, but use the spoon
To fill my mind with knowledge.
So let, &c.

"And if I ever have a son
Upon my knee to dandle,
I'll feed him with a wooden spoon
Of elongated handle.
Then let, &c.

"Most college honors vanish soon,
Alas! returning never,
But such a noble wooden spoon
Is tangible for ever.
So let, &c.

"Now give, in honor of the spoon,
Three cheers, long, loud, and hearty,
And three for every honored June
In coch-le-au-re-a-ti.[88]
Yes! let us, Juniors, shout and sing
The spoon and all its glory,--
Until the welkin loudly ring
And echo back the story."
_Songs of Yale_, 1853, p. 37.

WRANGLER. In the University of Cambridge, Eng., at the conclusion of the tenth term, the final examination in the Senate-House takes place. A certain number of those who pass this examination in the best manner are called _Wranglers_.

The usual number of _Wranglers_--whatever Wrangler may have meant once, it now implies a First Class man in Mathematics--is thirty-seven or thirty-eight. Sometimes it falls to thirty-five, and occasionally rises above forty.--_Bristed's Five Years in an Eng. Univ._, Ed. 2d, p. 227.

See SENIOR WRANGLER.

WRANGLERSHIP. The office of a _Wrangler_.

He may be considered pretty safe for the highest _Wranglership_ out of Trinity.--_Bristed's Five Years in an Eng. Univ._, Ed. 2d, p. 103.

WRESTLING-MATCH. At Harvard College, it was formerly the custom, on the first Monday of the term succeeding the Commencement vacation, for the Sophomores to challenge the Freshmen who had just entered College to a wrestling-match. A writer in the New England Magazine, 1832, in an article entitled "Harvard College Forty Years Ago," remarks as follows on this subject: "Another custom, not enjoined by the government, had been in vogue from time immemorial. That was for the Sophomores to challenge the Freshmen to a wrestling-match. If the Sophomores were thrown, the Juniors gave a similar challenge. If these were conquered, the Seniors entered the lists, or treated the victors to as much wine, punch, &c. as they chose to drink. In my class, there were few who had either taste, skill, or bodily strength for this exercise, so that we were easily laid on our backs, and the Sophomores were acknowledged our superiors, in so far as 'brute force' was concerned. Being disgusted with these customs, we held a class-meeting, early in our first quarter, and voted unanimously that we should never send a Freshman on an errand; and, with but one dissenting voice, that we would not challenge the next class that should enter to wrestle. When the latter vote was passed, our moderator, pointing at the dissenting individual with the finger of scorn, declared it to be a vote, _nemine contradicente_. We commenced Sophomores, another Freshman Class entered, the Juniors challenged them, and were thrown. The Seniors invited them to a treat, and these barbarous customs were soon after abolished."--Vol. III. p. 239.

The Freshman Class above referred to, as superior to the Junior, was the one which graduated in 1796, of which Mr. Thomas Mason, surnamed "the College Lion," was a member,--"said," remarks Mr. Buckingham, "to be the greatest _wrestler_ that was ever in College. He was settled as a clergyman at Northfield, Mass., resigned his office some years after, and several times represented that town in the Legislature of Massachusetts." Charles Prentiss, the wit of the Class of '95, in a will written on his departure from college life, addresses Mason as follows:--

"Item. Tom M----n, COLLEGE LION,
Who'd ne'er spend cash enough to buy one,
The BOANERGES of a pun,
A man of science and of fun,
That quite uncommon witty elf,
Who darts his bolts and shoots himself,
Who oft has bled beneath my jokes,
I give my old _tobacco-box_."
_Buckingham's Reminiscences_, Vol. II. p. 271.

The fame which Mr. Mason had acquired while in College for bodily strength and skill in wrestling, did not desert him after he left. While settled as a minister at Northfield, a party of young men from Vermont challenged the young men of that town to a bout at wrestling. The challenge was accepted, and on a given day the two parties assembled at Northfield. After several rounds, when it began to appear that the Vermonters were gaining the advantage, a proposal was made, by some who had heard of Mr. Mason's exploits, that he should be requested to take part in the contest. It had now grown late, and the minister, who usually retired early, had already betaken himself to bed. Being informed of the request of the wrestlers, for a long time he refused to go, alleging as reasons his ministerial capacity, the force of example, &c. Finding these excuses of no avail, he finally arose, dressed himself, and repaired to the scene of action. Shouts greeted him on his arrival, and he found himself on the wrestling-field, as he had stood years ago at Cambridge. The champion of the Vermonters came forward, flushed with his former victories. After playing around him for some time, Mr. Mason finally threw him. Having by this time collected his ideas of the game, when another antagonist appeared, tripping up his heels with perfect ease, he suddenly twitched him off his centre and laid him on his back. Victory was declared in favor of Northfield, and the good minister was borne home in triumph.

Similar to these statements are those of Professor Sidney Willard relative to the same subject, contained in his late work entitled "Memories of Youth and Manhood." Speaking of the observances in vogue at Harvard College in the year 1794, he says:--"Next to being indoctrinated in the Customs, so called, by the Sophomore Class, there followed the usual annual exhibition of the athletic contest between that class and the Freshman Class, namely, the wrestling-match. On some day of the second week in the term, after evening prayers, the two classes assembled on the play-ground and formed an extended circle, from which a stripling of the Sophomore Class advanced into the area, and, in terms justifying the vulgar use of the derivative word Sophomorical, defied his competitors, in the name of his associates, to enter the lists. He was matched by an equal in stature, from that part of the circle formed by the new-comers. Beginning with these puny athletes, as one and another was prostrated on either side, the contest advanced through the intermediate gradations of strength and skill, with increasing excitement of the parties and spectators, until it reached its summit by the struggle of the champion or coryphæus in reserve on each of the opposite sides. I cannot now affirm with certainty the result of the contest; whether it was a drawn battle, whether it ended with the day, or was postponed for another trial. It probably ended in the defeat of the younger party, for there were more and mightier men among their opponents. Had we been victorious, it would have behooved us, according to established precedents, to challenge the Junior Class, which was not done. Such a result, if it had taken place, could not fade from the memory of the victors; while failure, on the contrary, being an issue to be looked for, would soon be dismissed from the thoughts of the vanquished. Instances had occurred of the triumph of the Freshman Class, and one of them recent, when a challenge in due form was sent to the Juniors, who, thinking the contest too doubtful, wisely resolved to let the victors rejoice in their laurels already won; and, declining to meet them in the gymnasium, invited them to a sumptuous feast instead.

"Wrestling was, at an after period, I cannot say in what year, superseded by football; a grovelling and inglorious game in comparison. Wrestling is an art; success in the exercise depends not on mere bodily strength. It had, at the time of which I have spoken, its well-known and acknowledged technical rules, and any violation of them, alleged against one who had prostrated his adversary, became a matter of inquiry. If it was found that the act was not achieved _secundum artem_, it was void, and might be followed by another trial."--Vol. I. pp. 260, 261.

Remarks on this subject are continued in another part of the work from which the above extract is made, and the story of Thomas Mason is related, with a few variations from the generally received version. "Wrestling," says Professor Willard, "was reduced to an art, which had its technical terms for the movement of the limbs, and the manner of using them adroitly, with the skill acquired by practice in applying muscular force at the right time and in the right degree. Success in the art, therefore, depended partly on skill; and a violation of the rules of the contest vitiated any apparent triumph gained by mere physical strength. There were traditionary accounts of some of our predecessors who were commemorated as among the coryphæi of wrestlers; a renown that was not then looked upon with contempt. The art of wrestling was not then confined to the literary gymnasium. It was practised in every rustic village. There were even migrating braves and Hectors, who, in their wanderings from their places of abode to villages more or less distant, defied the chiefest of this order of gymnasts to enter the lists. In a country town of Massachusetts remote from the capital, one of these wanderers appeared about half a century since, and issued a general challenge against the foremost wrestlers. The clergyman of the town, a son of Harvard, whose fame in this particular had travelled from the academic to the rustic green, was apprised of the challenge, and complied with the solicitation of some of his young parishioners to accept it in their behalf. His triumph over the challenger was completed without agony or delay, and having prostrated him often enough to convince him of his folly, he threw him over the stone wall, and gravely admonished him against repeating his visit, and disturbing the peace of his parish."--Vol. I. p. 315.

The peculiarities of Thomas Mason were his most noticeable characteristics. As an orator, his eloquence was of the _ore rotundo_ order; as a writer, his periods were singularly Johnsonian. He closed his ministerial labors in Northfield, February 28, 1830, on which occasion he delivered a farewell discourse, taking for his text, the words of Paul to Timothy: "The time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness."

As a specimen of his style of writing, the following passages are presented, taken from this discourse:--"Time, which forms the scene of all human enterprise, solicitude, toil, and improvement, and which fixes the limitations of all human pleasures and sufferings, has at length conducted us to the termination of our long-protracted alliance. An assignment of the reasons of this measure must open a field too extended and too diversified for our present survey. Nor could a development of the whole be any way interesting to us, to whom alone this address is now submitted. Suffice it to say, that in the lively exercise of mutual and unimpaired friendship and confidence, the contracting parties, after sober, continued, and unimpassioned deliberation, have yielded to existing circumstances, as a problematical expedient of social blessing."

After commenting upon the declaration of Paul, he continued: "The Apostle proceeds, 'I have fought a good fight' Would to God I could say the same! Let me say, however, without the fear of contradiction, 'I have fought a fight!' How far it has been 'good,' I forbear to decide." His summing up was this: "You see, my hearers, all I can say, in common with the Apostle in the text, is this: 'The time of my departure is at hand,'--and, 'I have finished my course.'"

Referring then to the situation which he had occupied, he said: "The scene of our alliance and co-operation, my friends, has been one of no ordinary cast and character. The last half-century has been pregnant with novelty, project, innovation, and extreme excitement. The pillars of the social edifice have been shaken, and the whole social atmosphere has been decomposed by alchemical demagogues and revolutionary apes. The sickly atmosphere has suffused a morbid humor over the whole frame, and left the social body little more than 'the empty and bloody skin of an immolated victim.'

"We pass by the ordinary incidents of alienation, which are too numerous, and too evanescent to admit of detail. But seasons and circumstances of great alarm are not readily forgotten. We have witnessed, and we have felt, my friends, a political convulsion, which seemed the harbinger of inevitable desolation. But it has passed by with a harmless explosion, and returning friends have paused in wonder, at a moment's suspension of friendship. Mingled with the factitious mass, there was a large spice of sincerity which sanctified the whole composition, and restored the social body to sanity, health, and increased strength and vigor.

"Thrice happy must be our reflections could we stop here, and contemplate the ascending prosperity and increasing vigor of this religious community. But the one half has not yet been told,--the beginning has hardly been begun. Could I borrow the language of the spirits of wrath,--was my pen transmuted to a viper's tooth dipped in gore,--was my paper transformed to a vellum which no light could illume, and which only darkness could render legible, I could, and I would, record a tale of blood, of which the foulest miscreant must burn in ceaseless anguish only once to have been suspected. But I refer to imagination what description can never reach."

What the author referred to in this last paragraph no one knew, nor did he ever advance any explanation of these strange words.

Near the close of his discourse, he said: "Standing in the place of a Christian minister among you, through the whole course of my ministrations, it has been my great and leading aim ever to maintain and exhibit the character and example of a Christian man. With clerical foppery, grimace, craft, and hypocrisy, I have had no concern. In the free participation of every innocent entertainment and delight, I have pursued an open, unreserved course, equally removed from the mummery of superstition and the dissipation of infidelity. And though I have enjoyed my full share of honor from the scandal of bigotry and malice, yet I may safely congratulate myself in the reflection, that by this liberal and independent progress were men weighed in the balance of intellectual, social, and moral worth, I have yet never lost a single friend who was worth preserving."--pp. 3, 4, 5, 9, 10, 11.

_Y_.

YAGER FIGHTS. At Bowdoin College, "_Yager Fights_," says a correspondent, "are the annual conflicts which occur between the townsmen and the students. The Yagers (from the German _Jager_, a hunter, a chaser) were accustomed, when the lumbermen came down the river in the spring, to assemble in force, march up to the College yard with fife and drum, get famously drubbed, and retreat in confusion to their dens. The custom has become extinct within the past four years, in consequence of the non-appearance of the Yagers."

YALENSIAN. A student at or a member of Yale College.

In making this selection, we have been governed partly by poetic merit, but more by the associations connected with various pieces inserted, in the minds of the present generation of _Yalensians_. --_Preface to Songs of Yale_, 1853.

The _Yalensian_ is off for Commencement.--_Yale Lit. Mag._, Vol. XIX. p. 355.

YANKEE. According to the account of this word as given by Dr. William Gordon, it appears to have been in use among the students of Harvard College at a very early period. A citation from his work will show this fact in its proper light.

"You may wish to know the origin of the term _Yankee_. Take the best account of it which your friend can procure. It was a cant, favorite word with Farmer Jonathan Hastings, of Cambridge, about 1713. Two aged ministers, who were at the College in that town, have told me, they remembered it to have been then in use among the students, but had no recollection of it before that period. The inventor used it to express excellency. A _Yankee_ good horse, or _Yankee_ cider, and the like, were an excellent good horse and excellent cider. The students used to hire horses of him; their intercourse with him, and his use of the term upon all occasions, led them to adopt it, and they gave him the name of Yankee Jon. He was a worthy, honest man, but no conjurer. This could not escape the notice of the collegiates. Yankee probably became a by-word among them to express a weak, simple, awkward person; was carried from the College with them when they left it, and was in that way circulated and established through the country, (as was the case in respect to Hobson's choice, by the students at Cambridge, in Old England,) till, from its currency in New England, it was at length taken up and unjustly applied to the New-Englanders in common, as a term of reproach."--_American War_, Ed. 1789, Vol. I. pp. 324, 325. _Thomas's Spy_, April, 1789, No. 834.

In the Massachusetts Magazine, Vol. VII., p. 301, the editor, the Rev. Thaddeus Mason Harris, D.D., of Dorchester, referring to a letter written by the Rev. John Seccombe, and dated "Cambridge, Sept. 27, 1728," observes: "It is a most humorous narrative of the fate of a goose roasted at 'Yankee Hastings's,' and it concludes with a poem on the occasion, in the mock-heroic." The fact of the name is further substantiated in the following remarks by the Rev. John Langdon Sibley, of Harvard College: "Jonathan Hastings, Steward of the College from 1750 to 1779,... was a son of Jonathan Hastings, a tanner, who was called 'Yankee Hastings,' and lived on the spot at the northwest corner of Holmes Place in Old Cambridge, where, not many years since, a house was built by the late William Pomeroy."--_Father Abbey's Will_, Cambridge, Mass., 1854, pp. 7, 8.

YEAR. At the English universities, the undergraduate course is three years and a third. Students of the first year are called Freshmen, and the other classes at Cambridge are, in popular phrase, designated successively Second-year Men, Third-year Men, and Men who are just going out. The word _year_ is often used in the sense of class.

The lecturer stands, and the lectured sit, even when construing, as the Freshmen are sometimes asked to do; the other _Years_ are only called on to listen.--_Bristed's Five Years in an Eng. Univ._, Ed. 2d, p. 18.

Of the "_year_" that entered with me at Trinity, three men died before the time of graduating.--_Ibid._, p. 330.

YEOMAN-BEDELL. At the University of Cambridge, Eng., the _yeoman-bedell_ in processions precedes the esquire-bedells, carrying an ebony mace, tipped with silver.--_Cam. Guide_.

At the University of Oxford, the yeoman-bedels bear the silver staves in procession. The vice-chancellor never walks out without being preceded by a yeoman-bedel with his insignium of office.--_Guide to Oxford_.

See BEADLE.

YOUNG BURSCH. In the German universities, a name given to a student during his third term, or _semester_.

The fox year is then over, and they wash the eyes of the new-baked _Young Bursche_, since during the fox-year he was held to be blind, the fox not being endued with reason.--_Howitt's Student Life of Germany_, Am. ed., p. 124.

A LIST OF AMERICAN COLLEGES

REFERRED TO IN THIS WORK, IN CONNECTION WITH PARTICULAR WORDS OR CUSTOMS.

AMHERST COLLEGE, Amherst, Mass., 10 references. ANDERSON COLLEGIATE INSTITUTE, Ind., 3 references. BACON COLLEGE, Ky., 1 reference. BETHANY COLLEGE, Bethany, Va., 2 references. BOWDOIN COLLEGE, Brunswick, Me., 17 references. BROWN UNIVERSITY, Providence, R.I., 2 references. CENTRE COLLEGE, Danville, Ky., 4 references. COLUMBIA [KING'S] COLLEGE, New York., 5 references. COLUMBIAN COLLEGE, Washington, D.C., 1 reference. DARTMOUTH COLLEGE, Hanover, N.H., 27 references. HAMILTON COLLEGE, Clinton, N.Y., 16 references. HARVARD COLLEGE, Cambridge, Mass., 399 references. JEFFERSON COLLEGE, Canonsburg, Penn., 8 references. KING'S COLLEGE. See COLUMBIA. MIDDLEBURY COLLEGE, Middlebury, Vt., 11 references. NEW JERSEY, COLLEGE OF, Princeton, N.J., 29 references. NEW YORK, UNIVERSITY OF, New York., 1 reference. NORTH CAROLINA, UNIVERSITY OF, Chapel Hill, N.C., 3 references. PENNSYLVANIA, UNIVERSITY OF, Philadelphia, Penn., 3 references. PRINCETON COLLEGE. See NEW JERSEY, COLLEGE OF. RUTGER'S COLLEGE, New Brunswick, N.J., 2 references. SHELBY COLLEGE, Shelbyville, Ky., 2 references. SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE, Columbia, S.C., 3 references. TRINITY COLLEGE, Hartford, Conn., 11 references. UNION COLLEGE, Schenectady, N.Y., 41 references. VERMONT, UNIVERSITY OF, Burlington, Vt., 25 references. VIRGINIA, UNIVERSITY OF, Albemarle Co., Va., 14 references. WASHINGTON COLLEGE, Washington, Penn., 5 references. WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY, Middletown, Conn., 5 references. WESTERN RESERVE COLLEGE, Hudson, Ohio., 1 reference. WEST POINT, N.Y., 1 reference. WILLIAM AND MARY COLLEGE, Williamsburg, Va., 3 references. WILLIAMS COLLEGE, Williamstown, Mass., 43 references. YALE COLLEGE, New Haven, Conn., 264 references.

THE END.

FOOTNOTES:

[01] Hon. Levi Woodbury, whose subject was "Progress."

[02] _Vide_ Aristophanes, _Aves_.

[03] Alcestis of Euripides.

[04] See BRICK MILL.

[05] At Harvard College, sixty-eight Commencements were held in
the old parish church which "occupied a portion of the
space between Dane Hall and the old Presidential House."
The period embraced was from 1758 to 1834. There was no
Commencement in 1764, on account of the small-pox; nor
from 1775 to 1781, seven years, on account of the
Revolutionary war. The first Commencement in the new
meeting-house was held in 1834. In 1835, there was rain at
Commencement, for the first time in thirty-five years.

[06] The graduating class usually waited on the table at dinner
on Commencement Day.

[07] Rev. John Willard, S.T.D., of Stafford, Conn., a graduate
of the class of 1751.

[08] "Men, some to pleasure, some to business, take;
But every woman is at heart a rake."

[09] Rev. Joseph Willard, S.T.D.

[10] The Rev. Dr. Simeon Howard, senior clergyman of the
Corporation, presided at the public exercises and
announced the degrees.

[11] See under THESIS and MASTER'S QUESTION.

[12] The old way of spelling the word SOPHOMORE, q.v.

[13] Speaking of Bachelors who are reading for fellowships,
Bristed says, they "wear black gowns with two strings
hanging loose in front."--_Five Years in an Eng. Univ._,
Ed. 2d, p. 20.

[14] Bristed speaks of the "blue and silver gown" of Trinity
Fellow-Commoners.--_Five Years in an Eng. Univ._, Ed. 2d,
p. 34.

[15] "A gold-tufted cap at Cambridge designates a Johnian or
Small-College Fellow-Commoner."--_Ibid._, p. 136.

[16] "The picture is not complete without the 'men,' all in
their academicals, as it is Sunday. The blue gown of
Trinity has not exclusive possession of its own walks:
various others are to be discerned, the Pembroke looped at
the sleeve, the Christ's and Catherine curiously crimped
in front, and the Johnian with its unmistakable
'Crackling.'"--_Bristed's Five Years in an Eng. Univ._,
Ed. 2d, p. 73.

"On Saturday evenings, Sundays, and Saints' days the
students wear surplices instead of their gowns, and very
innocent and exemplary they look in them."--_Ibid._, p.
21.

[17] "The ignorance of the popular mind has often represented
academicians riding, travelling, &c. in cap and gown. Any
one who has had experience of the academic costume can
tell that a sharp walk on a windy day in it is no easy
matter, and a ride or a row would be pretty near an
impossibility. Indeed, during these two hours [of hard
exercise] it is as rare to see a student in a gown, as it
is at other times to find him beyond the college walks
without one."--_Ibid._, p. 19.

[18] Downing College.

[19] St. John's College.

[20] See under IMPOSITION.

[21] "Narratur et prisci Catonis
Sæpè mero caluisse virtus."
Horace, Ode _Ad Amphoram_.

[22] Education: a Poem before [Greek: Phi. Beta. Kappa.] Soc.,
1799, by William Biglow.

[23] 2 Samuel x. 4.

[24] A printed "Order of Exhibition" was issued at Harvard
College in 1810, for the first time.

[25] In reference to cutting lead from the old College.

[26] Senior, as here used, indicates an officer of college, or
a member of either of the three upper classes, agreeable
to Custom No. 3, above.

[27] The law in reference to footballs is still observed.

[28] See SOPHOMORE.

[29] I.e. TUTOR.

[30] Abbreviated for Cousin John, i.e. a privy.

[31] Joseph Willard, President of Harvard College from 1781 to
1804.

[32] Timothy Lindall Jennison, Tutor from 1785 to 1788.

[33] James Prescott, graduated in 1788.

[34] Robert Wier, graduated in 1788.

[35] Joseph Willard.

[36] Dr. Samuel Williams, Professor of Mathematics and Natural
Philosophy.

[37] Dr. Eliphalet Pearson, Professor of Hebrew and other
Oriental Languages.

[38] Eleazar James, Tutor from 1781 to 1789.

[39] Jonathan Burr, Tutor 1786, 1787.

[40] "Flag of the free heart's hope and home!
By angel hands to valor given."
_The American Flag_, by J.R. Drake.

[41] Charles Prentiss, who when this was written was a member
of the Junior Class. Both he and Mr. Biglow were fellows
of "infinite jest," and were noted for the superiority of
their talents and intellect.

[42] Mr. Biglow was known in college by the name of Sawney, and
was thus frequently addressed by his familiar friends in
after life.

[43] Charles Pinckney Sumner, afterwards a lawyer in Boston,
and for many years sheriff of the county of Suffolk.

[44] A black man who sold pies and cakes.

[45] Written after a general pruning of the trees around
Harvard College.

[46] Doctor of Medicine, or Student of Medicine.

[47] Referring to the masks and disguises worn by the members
at their meetings.

[48] A picture representing an examination and initiation into
the Society, fronting the title-page of the Catalogue.

[49] Leader Dam, _Armig._, M.D. et ex off L.K. et LL.D. et
J.U.D. et P.D. et M.U.D, etc., etc., et ASS.

He was an empiric, who had offices at Boston and
Philadelphia, where he sold quack medicines of various
descriptions.

[50] Christophe, the black Prince of Hayti.

[51] It is said he carried the bones of Tom Paine, the infidel,
to England, to make money by exhibiting them, but some
difficulty arising about the duty on them, he threw them
overboard.

[52] He promulgated a theory that the earth was hollow, and
that there was an entrance to it at the North Pole.

[53] Alexander the First of Russia was elected a member, and,
supposing the society to be an honorable one, forwarded to
it a valuable present.

[54] He made speeches on the Fourth of July at five or six
o'clock in the morning, and had them printed and ready for
sale, as soon as delivered, from his cart on Boston
Common, from which he sold various articles.

[55] Tibbets, a gambler, was attacked by Snelling through the
columns of the New England Galaxy.

[56] Referring to the degree given to the Russian Alexander,
and the present received in return.

[57] 1851.

[58] See DIG. In this case, those who had parts at two
Exhibitions are thus designated.

[59] Jonathan Leonard, who afterwards graduated in the class of
1786.

[60] 1851.

[61] William A. Barron, who was graduated in 1787, and was
tutor from 1793 to 1800, was "among his contemporaries in
office ... social and playful, fond of _bon-mots_,
conundrums, and puns." Walking one day with Shapleigh and
another gentleman, the conversation happened to turn upon
the birthplace of Shapleigh, who was always boasting that
two towns claimed him as their citizen, as the towns,
cities, and islands of Greece claimed Homer as a native.
Barron, with all the good humor imaginable, put an end to
the conversation by the following epigrammatic
impromptu:--

"Kittery and York for Shapleigh's birth contest;
Kittery won the prize, but York came off the best."

[62] In Brady and Tate, "Hear, O my people."

[63] In Brady and Tate, "instruction."

[64] Watts, "hear."

[65] See BOHN.

[66] The Triennial Catalogue of Harvard College was first
printed in a pamphlet form in the year 1778.

[67] Jesse Olds, a classmate, afterwards a clergyman in a
country town.

[68] Charles Prentiss, a member of the Junior Class when this
was written; afterwards editor of the Rural
Repository.--_Buckingham's Reminiscences_, Vol. II. pp.
273-275.

[69] William Biglow was known in college by the name of Sawney,
and was frequently addressed by this sobriquet in after
life, by his familiar friends.

[70] Charles Pinckney Sumner,--afterwards a lawyer in Boston,
and for many years Sheriff of the County of Suffolk.

[71] Theodore Dehon, afterwards a clergyman of the Episcopal
Church, and Bishop of the Diocese of South Carolina.

[72] Thomas Mason, a member of the class after Prentiss, said
to be the greatest _wrestler_ that was ever in College. He
was settled as a clergyman at Northfield, Mass.; resigned
his office some years after, and several times represented
that town in the Legislature of Massachusetts. See under
WRESTLING-MATCH.

[73] The Columbian Centinel, published at Boston, of which
Benjamin Russell was the editor.

[74] "Ashen," on _Ed.'s Broadside_.

[75] "A pot of grease,
A woollen fleece."--_Ed's Broadside_.

[76] "Rook."--_Ed.'s Broadside_. "Hook."--_Gent. Mag._, May,
1732.

[77] "Burrage."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[78] "That."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[79] "Beauties."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[80] "My."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[81] "I've" omitted in _Ed.'s Broadside_.

Nay, I've two more
What Matthew always wanted.--_Gent. Mag._, June, 1732.

[82] "But silly youth,
I love the mouth."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[83] This stanza, although found in the London Magazine, does
not appear in the Gentleman's Magazine, or on the Editor's
Broadside. It is probably an interpolation.

[84] "Cou'd."--_Gent. Mag._, June, 1732.

[85] "Do it."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[86] "Tow'rds Cambridge I'll get thee."--_Ed.'s Broadside_.

[87] "If, madam, you will let me."--_Gent. Mag._, June, 1732.

[88] See COCHLEAUREATUS.