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UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 



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Vol.4 



OCTOBER, 1934 



No. 1 



CONTENTS 

AN AMAZING SCIfiNTIFIC DISCOVERY ... 1 
Wayland Cedarqiiist 

ON LIVING IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY 1 

Morris Green 

MY FAVORITE FOREIGN COUNTRY .... 2. 
Jean Leslie 

TO CANTER 3 

Jerome Trowe 

QUEEN OF SPORTS 5 

Sylvia Stieren 

BLUE POINT MOMENTS 6 

Irraa Jane Stout 

TACT 6 

Margaret Van Home 

THE AUSTRALIAN CRAWL 7 

Morris Siegel 

A TENSE MOMENT 8 

Richard Redfern 

A TRIP THROUGH THE MOUNTAINS 

IN WINTER 10 

Herbert Paszotta 

GERMAN LIFE IN A HUNGARIAN VILLAGE . 11 
L. K. Offenbecker 

TRAINING A HORSE 13 

Herbert Appleman 

THE WOOD PIGEON 16 

E. L. Albin 

HAZLITT AND EMERSON— A COMPARISON . . 19 
Maurace Henry Wells 

TWO BOOK REPORTS 22 

Grace Liesendahl 

LOBSTER COVE 23 

F. Marshall Smith 

MY FIRST LOVE 24 

Ruth Wheeler 

TOO CLOSE 25 

Joe Daly 

NIGHT CARGO 26 

F. Schurecht 

A GREAT SURGEON 29 

Dale Lindsay 



J 



{ 



\ 



PUBLISHED BY THE RHETORIC STAFF, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA 



810,5 



An Amazing Scientific Discovery 



Wayland 
Rhetoric I, Proficiency Exam 

/'^OLUMBUS crossed a seemingly 
^^-^ endless waste of heaving billows 
guided by a little needle. Centuries have 
passed, but men still trust their very lives 
to that little needle. Ponderous ocean 
liners with all their complicated instru- 
ments still rely on that little needle to 
lead them. Man's supremacy over the 
elements depends upon this piece of 
metal in the compass more than most 
people realize. 

In this light, might it not be of great 
interest to discover just what turns the 
needle to an axis running north and 
south? Of course, you exclaim, the earth 
is magnetic ! It has two poles, and one 
needle of iron must point to these when 
hung in air ! Yes, a scientist would say, 
but if we wish really to understand the 
matter, how can we explain that terres- 
trial magnetism? 

To answer this question, many theories 
have been presented. Few, however, seem 



Cedarquist 

ination, September 1934, Fart 3 

SO entirely satisfactory as the recent 
"spinning body" explanation. Years ago, 
when experimenting with centrifugal 
force, a scientist happened upon this phe- 
nomenon: an iron ball, when spun with 
great speed, possesses an appreciable 
amount of magnetism. Continuous ex- 
perimentation has proved the point. The 
molecular arrangement of the iron seems 
to be disturbed by rotation and thrown 
into an arrangement resembling that of a 
bar magnet. 

To apply this amazing discovery, we 
need but realize that much of our earth is 
composed of iron. This enormous mass 
is revolving all the time at a speed tre- 
mendous for its proportions. There can 
be no reason, therefore, why the earth 
should not be magnetic. Furthermore, as 
in the case of the balls, the poles of the 
magnetic force lie at their respective ends 
of the axis — as do the North and South 
magnetic poles of the earth. 



On Living in the Twentieth Century 

Morris Green 
Rhetoric /, Proficiency Examination, September 1934, Part 3 



npHIS is the year nineteen hundred 
* and thirty-four. Man has piled stone 
and steel a quarter of a mile into the air ; 
he has made wings for himself and 
flown; he has constructed thousands of 
miles of smooth roads and has made cars 
to speed over them faster than the wind ; 
he has spanned rivers and conquered 
almost every corner of the world. Com- 
ing to things simpler but more immedi- 



ately important to man personally, we 
find he has electric lights for reading, 
houses that are cool in summer and 
warm in winter; the entertainment and 
latest news of the world at his command ; 
machines to clean his clothes, wash his 
dishes (and break them, too), clean and 
wax his floors, clean his furniture, mix 
his drinks, in fact, to do almost anything. 
The water he drinks is pure, as is the 



[1] 

I I 77267 



food he eats. He seldom gets sick, and 
when he does, it is usually a mere incon- 
venience. Today man looks around him 
and thinks, "What a wonderful world I 
am living in !" 

Well, man is right, but he is also 
wrong. He does live in a wonderful 
world, even down to such things as 
smoother razor blades and softer soap. 
But consider the things we have men- 
tioned: roads, buildings, bridges, houses, 
radios, machines. They are all material 
things ; do such things make up the whole 
of life? 

Look again at the world of today. Not 



far from the comfortable homes you will 
find miserable shanties with residents 
just as miserable. The kings of old are 
gone, but harsh dictators rule half the 
world, their whim commands. Every 
few years a war arises, and men stand up 
like fools to kill and be killed, all the 
while shouting joyously, "For country 
and for God!" I don't think God 
would care much for war, do you? 
But we call ourselves progressive and 
civilized. 

Yes, man has conquered the world, but 
he still has himself to conquer. It's about 
time he began on this latter conquest. 



My Favorite Foreign Country 

Jean Leslie 
Rhetoric I, Proficiency Exaimuation, September 1934, Pari 3 



PALESTINE, with its oriental tradi- 
* tions, its Mohammedan spirits, its 
walled cities and Arabian inhabitants, is 
a land of mystic enchantment and grip- 
ping realities. Outside the little Catholic 
altars with their candles and incense 
burning are lepers whose fingers are 
gradually dropping off. An European- 
clad Arabian merchant walks side by 
side with a half-blinded baggage carrier. 
A gorgeous mosque with its many mina- 
rets stands near a mud hut. English- 
piped water runs near an old well where 
dozens of women fill their jars. One 
finds the constant conflict of the old with 
the new, and recognizes the victory of 
the new as Arabian women walk by, bal- 
ancing Standard Oil cans on their shoul- 
ders, as well-groomed men wear high red 
hats with dangling black tassels, as up- 



right pianos are carried on the backs of 
common laborers, and as Jewish villages 
grow steadily on the hills, and Arab 
hovels remain unchanged in the valleys. 

It is a land of great beauty. Little 
donkeys cling securely to bare rock cliffs, 
beautiful in their very nakedness. From 
an altitude far below sea level, the path 
leads higher and higher, and as the vis- 
itor climbs steadily, the walls of Jerusa- 
lem, the capital, seen in the twilight, bless 
liim with an invitation mysteriously in- 
viting. The silhouette of the city is one 
of mosque domes and graceful minarets. 

The traveler in the Holy Land is 
awed. Great men in histor}' had their 
rise in that great Eastern land ; shep- 
herds have tended their flocks there for 
centuries ; Mohammedan priests have 
summoned their people to worship, have 



C2] 



knelt in their fashion facing Mecca ; He- 
brews have prayed and kissed at the 
Wailing Wall; all have looked out over 
the hills and valleys. For a minute at 
least one realizes that the present is not 
everything; that far behind lies the past 
and far ahead the future; that what is 



now is a part of the glamorous past, and 
a part-to-be of the unknown future. 

Palestine is a force — growing to take 
its place in the world of today. It is 
not solely a land of mystic enchantment 
and gripping realities, but a land of 
promise. 




To Canter 



nrO CANTER! 

* words bring many different impres- 
sions to as many different minds. For 
some there flash into view the crashing 
waves of a seashore beach, with the ris- 
ing sun throwing its train upon the 
waters in a glittering, sight-shattering 



Jerome Trowe 

Theme 1, Rhetoric II, 1934-1935 

To canter ! Those a green haze ; and the occasional sharp 

clack of a hoof hitting a stone breaks 
into the whole mood of greenery and 
leaf-filtered sunlight. But for these im- 
pressions to come to a rider while he is 
cantering, the rider must be at ease on 
his horse and be moving in the compara- 



brilliance ; the "pluffing," sand-deadened tively slow, smooth movement that is the 
sound of the horses' hoofs plays the correct canter. 



theme to this picture. Others, at the 
magic words "to canter," lose themselves 
mentally in a cool, leaf-floored forest, 
whose low-hanging branches swish by in 



A canter is the most comfortable gait 
for the rider; if one rides correctly he 
feels as if he were in a rocking chair, 
floating on a smooth sea. Some people. 



[3] 



however, as the horse changes from a 
trot to a canter, stop their posting and 
sit placidly in the saddle. This placidity- 
is ver}' short-lived, for immediately the 
movement of the horse throws the rider 
up and down like a dead weight, as if he 
were attached to the end of a trip ham- 
mer. This sort of riding might easily 
result in internal injuries for the rider. 
Then there is the rider who will stand up 
in his stirrups and lean far forward over 
the neck of his horse in imitation of a 
racing jockey. This position, although 
quite incorrect, will slightly enable the 
rider to absorb the vertical shaking 
through his legs ; but this position is 
very dangerous, as the slightest decrease 
in speed or even the merest mis-step of 
the horse will send the rider sailing 
headlong over the animal's neck. Finally 
there is the group of riders who, while 
cantering, sit back in their saddles and 
grip the sides of the horse with their 
knees. This manner of cantering is, of 
all three, the most nearly correct, but its 
fault lies in that a prolonged canter will 
eventually chafe the knees painfully. 

T have shown you the most prevalent 
forms of mistakes in cantering and their 
accompanying dangers and drawbacks. 
If you recognize your position among 
these, don't be discouraged, for there is 
a correct way to canter. As soon as you 



feel your horse going into a canter, 
either from a very fast gallop or from a 
trot, sit back in your saddle and push 
your stirrups forward, holding your toes 
pointed slightly inward ; the reins should 
be pulled fairly taut, with the hands rest- 
ing just in front of the saddle. Your 
pushing your stirrups forward enables 
you to keep a firm seat, while holding the 
reins taut enables you to control your 
horse more efftciently so that you can 
rein in from a fast to a slow canter. The 
position generally resembles that of an 
auto driver pressing his feet on both the 
brake and the clutch pedals. The correct 
position is so easy to attain and so com- 
fortable when attained that it is foolish 
and ridiculous to canter in any other way. 
So, to prevent chafed knees, broken 
necks, and saddle sores in peculiar places 
just learn to canter in the latter way. As 
for myself, whether in an English, an 
Army, or a Western saddle, I fully en- 
joy my horse-back riding. I feel as the 
Centaurs of old must have felt. From 
this time on, whether you are riding near 
the Atlantic surf, or on a forest bridle- 
path, T hope you will enjoy your canter 
and also enjoy the scenery. For the feel- 
ing of oneness with the horse which pos- 
sesses the rider in the canter is a feeling 
that even the gods miss, and, missing, 
envy. 




[4] 



Queen of Sports 

Sylvia Stieren 
Them^e 1, Rhetoric II, 1934-1935 



]\ /T ANY a person has intimated to me 
-^ ' *■ that in the matter of sports my 
taste is remarkable for bad quahty. Con- 
sequently, just as a matter of self -vindi- 
cation, I should like to leave on record 
these words in explanation of my opin- 
ion that walking is Queen of Sports. 

Since we children were reared under 
the shadow of that outworn Emersonian 
cant, "The soul is everything," we were 
very early diverted from our games to 
relaxation of an intellectual nature. 
Mother would have regarded us w^ith 
displeasure if we had appeared other- 
wise than condescending and supercilious 
at the mere mention of sports. This lit- 
erary regime worked out very well until 
we ran amuck of ■Mother Xature in my 
eighteenth year. 

Eighteen brought cosmic consciousness 
and poignant restlessness. As persist- 



the time to better advantage. I didn't 
walk far at first, but far enough to set 
the red corpuscles to leaping and to let 
the rhythm of a wide stride have its way 
in my muscles. Ye gods, it is glorious 
thus to satisfy the needs of the body, to 
plant the feet, like the roots of a tree, in 
the soil, to lift the head to the clouds, 
and leave the rest free as an Aeolian 
harp to passing winds ! 

Often as I walk, my thoughts turn to 
the words, "Man is a land animal." I 
deeply enjoy walking in wooded or rural 
places because it is then that this kinship 
to the soil comes most clearly home to 
me. "No one else, unless it be the tiller 
of the earth, realizes his affinity to the 
land as well as he who strays far in his 
love of pedestrianism," says John Bur- 
roughs. The crowning point of the long 
walk comes to me when, weary with 



ently as the distress from a thorn in the exertion, I reach a secluded spot. There 



side came a voice from nowhere. It gave 
me peace neither day nor night with its 
demand, "What about your body?" 

"Yes, what about it?" answered my 
tired, dusty, musty mind. 

Thus, just as a matter of escaping 
parental platitudes and the homilies of 
home, I started to take walks, although 



I lie, to rest in the arms of Nature and 
to hold holy communion with the soil 
from whence I came and to which I shall 
return. 

These are the reasons I feel the siren 
call of walking. I've tried other sports, 
but I remain loyal to my first and last 
love because it brings me muscular exer- 



my family thought I should have used cise, peace, and kinship with Nature. 



[5] 



Blue Point Moments 



Irma Jane Stout 
Theme 11, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 

IT is with great hesitation, dear reader, white horse-radish 
that I reveal to you a description of 



myself in a characteristic moment of 
blissful, solitary pleasure. You are 
seated at a table, and as I enter the res- 
taurant, you merely get an impression of 
a young girl seeking a table in order to 
be served. Her step does not seem to 
you to be hurried nor are you especially 
impressed by the eagerness in her eye. 

To me the impression is very different. 
My step is light and a bit hurried with 
the anticipation of the episode. I usually 
choose a table without hesitation, and 
picking up a menu, printed from top to 
bottom with names of delicacies to tempt 
the appetite, I appear to be undecided as 
to my choice. My mind, however, is 
always fully made up before I glance at 
the menu suggestions. The waiter stands 
staunch and placid at my side, but I feel 
that he is wondering with uncommon in- 
terest what the outcome will be. Finally 
with a brief and knowing smile I order 
a dozen blue points. 

During the following moments I con- 
sider whether I will cover the oysters 
with blankets of red ketchup or with 



As they are set be- 
fore me, my mouth actually waters at the 
sight of the slippery little morsels cud- 
dled in the pearly depths of their shells. 
It seems a shame to spoil the symmetry 
of their design. The crystals of ice sur- 
rounding the shells crackle as I poke the 
first victim w^th the tiny prong of the 
fork. A bit stubborn, this one ! It offers 
quite a battle before it can be retrieved 
from its cozy bed. The punishment for 
such resistance is a good sound ducking 
in ketchup. The next two I adorn with 
flaky bits of horse-radish, and so it goes 
until eleven shells stand empty and for- 
lorn. The twelfth is always the prize 
because there is much ceremony neces- 
sary before it enters the rosy gap of de- 
struction. I prefer this one to be un- 
adorned and eaten just as nature in- 
tended it should be. 

As it slips softly downward into my 
throat the waiter steps forward and with 
a stiff bow inquires if I will have any- 
thing more. Do you wonder that he loses 
his staunchness and placidity w'hen I in- 
nocently order again, one dozen blue 
points? 



Tact 

Margaret Van Horne 
Theme 1, Rhetoric II, 1934-1935 

A GREAT many would-be socialites negative, and tact a positive, virtue. Po- 

^~^ entertain the illusion that politeness liteness is merely avoiding trampling on 

and tact are the same thing. That is why another person's toes, while tact is placing 

they are only would-bes. Politeness is a a Persian carpet under people. Nations 



[6] 



send representatives to other nations to 
keep friendly relations, or, more com- 
monly, to get something away from the 
other nations, by using tact. For tact is, 
after all, just a drawing-room version 
of diplomacy, and diplomacy is a civil- 
ized expression of the instinct of self- 
preservation. Men used to seize their 
neighbor's possessions if they happened 
to want them ; now they persuade their 
neighbors that they would be much better 
off without some of their possessions. 
That is tact, and much prettier and 
neater it is than seizing. 

Some people proudly boast of their 
lack of tact and of their total adherence 
to the truth. These same people, how- 
ever, would be horrified at the suggestion 
that they go without clothes, or steam 
heat, or running w-ater, or policemen, or 
burglar alarms, or corn healers, or mouth 
wash, or the Saturday Evening Post. 



Yet tact, like all these necessities, is one 
of the trappings of civilization, without 
which a person cannot live, at the pres- 
ent time, any more than he can live with- 
out protection from the elements. The 
fundamentals of human nature do not 
change, but its environment does. This 
change of environment, which is called 
civilization, makes man ashamed of his 
fundamental instincts ; so he seeks to 
clothe them with all sorts of coverings, 
and finally succeeds in making himself 
believe that his instincts no longer exist. 
Tact is just one of the many coverings 
he uses to clothe his nature. In other 
words, he possesses his soul in patience 
and obtains what he wants by soft words 
instead of by blows. After all, it makes 
ver}' little difference how he gets what 
he wants as long as he gets it, but tact 
does make the bitter pill of truth easier 
to take. 



The Australian Crawl 

Morris Siegel 
Theme 1, Rhetoric II, 1934-1935 



npHE Australian Crawl, although it is 
•^ the stroke most commonly used by 
swimmers of all types, takes the most 
time and energy to master. When mas- 
tered to its highest degree, this stroke is 
the most graceful of all swimming styles, 
and it gives the best results in speed rec- 
ords. Only perfect coordination of the 
arm and leg movements, together with 
the breathing functions, brings about 
these results. 

Since the lungs are more difficult to 
accustom to the water than any other 
part of the body, incorrect breathing is 



the first difficulty to overcome. The 
movement is very simple, but the lungs 
must be developed to that state where 
they will react normally. As the head is 
turned slightly to the left, air must be 
taken in through the mouth. By way of 
the nose the air is forced out under the 
water. This movement must be worked 
in coordination with the arm and leg 
movements. 

The arm movements of the Australian 
Crawl will bring back memories of the 
ancient wind-mill. The ease and loose- 
ness of the arms in their movements are 



[7] 



the main qualities of a good stroke. 
As the right hand is raised over 
the head and into the water, the left 
hand is following it at a very short 
interval. To produce more resistance 
the palms should be cupped with the 
fingers together. firmly but not 
rigidly. 

The kick in the crawl stroke is almost 
a replica of the motion of the propeller 
on a motor boat. The knees must not be 
bent at any time during the stroke. This 
does not mean that they should be kept 
stiff, for rigidity will only bring about 
fatigue in the legs after a very short 
period of activity. The kick must be per- 
fectly timed with the movement of each 



arm to produce a steady pace. Most 
great swimmers kick the feet three times 
to each arm movement. The feet, toes 
pointing inward, beat the water with in- 
cessant motion and propel the swimmer 
through the water. 

Constant practice and perseverance are 
necessary when one is trying to master 
the Australian Crawl. The ease in move- 
ment of the arms, coupled with the 
steady beat of the kick, exhibit to an on- 
looker the picture of a human being 
gracefully gliding through the water on 
its surface. The fastest records in swim- 
ming are held by swimmers who have 
mastered the free and easy Australian 
Crawl. 



A Tense Moment 

Richard Redfern 
Theme 13, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



"TpILDEN was serving. The score of the 
' game was advantage, Vines and Gled- 
hill. Unless Bill and his partner, Chapin, 
could win the point, the game and the 
first set would be their opponents'. 

Attempting to win the point in the 
easiest and shortest way, Tilden un- 
corked one of his famous cannon-ball 
serves of the kind that few could touch 
ten years ago, when he was singles cham- 
pion of the United States and of the 
world. By a combination of luck and 
keen eyesight, as I thought, Gledhill 
managed to see the ball in time to return 



dashed back against the retaining net 
several yards behind the baseline and, in 
the manner of a centerfielder backing up 
against the bleacher-wall to catch a fly. 
lobbed back the ball. And what a lob! 
The ball went high, high in the air. It 
sailed up through the network of girders 
that support the ceiling and started on 
its downward fall, still evading the nu- 
merous steel obstructions. Tilden watched 
the path of the ball, fascinated by its un- 
interrupted arc, and then, thinking that 
the sphere would light several feet be- 
hind the baseline, loosened the grip on 



it, high in the air. Chapin, standing his racket and turned away, still looking 



poised by the net, waited until the ball 
came down to a point racket-high over 
his head, and then he "killed" it. Every- 
one except the irrepressible Vines 
thought that Chapin's smash could not 
possibly be returned. "Elly," however. 



back half-heartedly to see how far out 
the ball would land. Imagine his embar- 
rassment and the crowd's merriment 
when the ball lit exactly on the line, and 
he was too much off balance and out of 
reach to play it. 



[8] 



The playing of that point presented 
some good tennis in the space of less 
than a minute. In the first place, Til- 
den's serve was marvelous. The specta- 
tors thought that he had the point won 
when they saw, or rather did not see, his 
serve. They were amazed when Gledhill 
returned it. They held their breath, and 
they roared as they saw Chapin's hard 
drive. Everyone relaxed, and then was 
drawn to the edge of his seat again when 
Vines made one of the most difficult 
shots of the evening to return Chapin's 
smash. The position of the four men 
when Vines's shot was in the air was in- 
teresting to note. Vines himself was still 
standing by the retaining-net, quite out 
of a playing position. Gledhill was in 



charge of the court for the two Califor- 
nians, but he was standing open-mouthed 
almost in the middle while craning his 
neck to follow the course of the ball. 
Chapin, likewise, was risking a stifif neck, 
but he was backing up to take the ball if 
it should light in the court. Big Bill, 
however, shouted to Chapin that he 
would "take it," and then he stood there 
flat-footed and watched the game and set 
bound away on that ball because he mis- 
judged its landing-place. The crowd was 
silent for a moment, and then a mixture 
of applause and laughter broke forth — 
applause for Vines and Gledhill, sympa- 
thetic laughter at Tilden's discomfiture, 
which he openly manifested although he 
was half laughing himself. 




[9 J 



A Trip Through the Mountains in Winter 



Herbert Paszotta 
Theme 15, Rhetoric II, 1932-1924 



A LREADY long before the lazy Jan- 



/\ 



uary sun had crept forth behind the 



snowy tops of the mountain range of the 
Schwabische Alb, we were on our way to 
the NeufTen, one of the most beautiful 
peaks in the entire range. A hike to the 
NeufFen was nothing extraordinary in 
summer ; but we had decided to visit the 
Neuflfen in winter, when all the ways 
were deeply covered with snow, and no 
person of a normal amount of intelli- 
gence would risk the chance of getting a 
heavy cold. But we thought we had an 
unusual amount of intelligence, and thus 
we got ready. Knapsacks with all kinds 
of provisions had been prepared quite a 
while before ; our boots were well oiled 
against the moisture of the snow, which 
has the ugly habit of getting into the 
most waterproof boots, in spite of all 
preparations. Besides, we were wrapped 
up in all possible and impossible gar- 
ments, for it is often frightfully cold on 
the Swabian Alb. Indeed, we did not 
repent once that we came wrapped up as 
we were, for the morning and the eve- 
ning around the Neuffen were extremely 
cold. 

Thus we marched ofT, and, quite in 
contrast with our summer hikes, we did 
not talk much, for a mean wind was 
blowing into our faces. But full of good 
courage, we climbed on, for we had 
hopes to reach the top of the mountain 
in four hours. After we had left the 
small village, at the base of the peak, the 
way became more and more invisible ; we 
soon went ahead not caring whether the 
road was there or not, for we decided 
that as long as we were going upwards 
we would have necessarily to hit the top. 
Thus we walked through pines, heavily 
laden with snow; then we passed 
through oak and beech woods, which 



were delightfully green in summer, but 
which raised now, in the depth of win- 
ter, their naked branches up to the gray- 
ish morning sky. It was very quiet. Oc- 
casionally the hoarse cries of a raven 
sounded through the trees, and occasion- 
ally we heard the strange call of a deer. 
But this was all ; only the monotonous 
crunching of our boots against the deep 
layer of frozen snow remained audible, 
and only between long intervals we 
threw a few short words at each other. 
Then we passed again through deeper 
pine woods, deeply covered with the 
shimmering snow, and it seemed that we 
entered a realm of such beauty as we 
could only imagine as children, when our 
parents told us of the white palace of the 
Christ child and its faithful helper, Saint 
Xicolaus. The snow was deep and per- 
fect; only occasional traces of a roe or a 
deer told us that there were living beings 
besides ourselves up here. At noon we 
reached the shelter on the top of the 
Neuffen ; this shelter was close to the old 
ruin of the castle of the lords of Neuf- 
fen. which now looked as bright and 
mysterious to us as only the most exqui- 
site fairy tale castles might have seemed 
to us in former days. We spent a long 
time up on top of the peaks and enjoyed 
the beautiful sight from there as well as 
a meal which we prepared at a quickly 
started fire. But then we had to hurry, 
for the trip downwards was dangerous, 
particularly as the night arrived soon 
after the dim sun hid behind the darken- 
ing hills and peaks. 

But we reached the little station 
safely, just a quarter of an hour before 
the train arrived which took us home 
again, away from the beautiful, mysteri- 
ous mountain, back to the gray, hustling, 
and realistic city. 



[10] 



German Life in a Hungarian Town 



L. K. Offenbecker 
Theme 11, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



ON the south plain of Hungary, near 
the Danube, are many towns which 
have been inhabited by Germans ever 
since the reign of Maria Theresa in the 
eighteenth century. Because the men 
were settled there with their families to 
be a fighting, perpetual bulwark against 
enemies from the East, they had, during 
the World War, gone to serve on the 
various fronts, in Serbia, in Montenegro, 
in Galicia, in Poland, and in Roumania. 
The women, children, and the few re- 
maining men in the town, not active bel- 
ligerents, lived simple lives while the 
great conflict raged. 

Because the men were away, the 
women did the heavy manual labor and 
the necessary work around the house. In 
common with the inhabitants of all the 
other towns of Hungary the people went 
outside of the town to till their fields. 
On the days when the small farms and 
vineyards needed attention, the women 
and the few men rose early, about three 
or four in the morning, and walked or 
rode in a wagon out of the town to the 
fields. Some of them still used primitive 
methods — as a scythe for cutting wheat 
— in hoeing, planting, or reaping; others 
used modern machines, such as tractors ; 
but more often they used a combination 
of the two. After working a few hours, 
till seven, they ate breakfast from lunch 



usually kept a garden in the rear of the 
house, which provided the fruits and 
vegetables for every-day use. Cattle, 
swine, and horses were kept in barns 
opening upon the court-yards which each 
house possessed. 

Just as in the summer the people 
worked mainly in the open, so in winter 
they worked inside the houses. The few 
men not at the front occupied themselves 
with making the necessary repairs of 
fences, harness, wagons, or roofs. The 
women almost invariably spent their time 
in sewing, embroidering, or crocheting — 
tasks at which they were adept. Their 
embroidery and crochet work, intricate 
and delicate in construction, was of 
many types, colors, and forms. Pillows, 
blankets, table-cloths, and dresses dis- 
played this artistic skill. So they spent 
their working days, but on one day of 
the week they labored not. 

Because the people worked hard dur- 
ing every week-day, Sunday was truly 
the day of rest and recreation. No one 
worked. Rising late, the people went to 
church and then spent the morning in 
reading and in family discussions. After 
the noon meal, the chief repast of the 
day, consisting of noodle soup, a little 
meat, vegetables from the garden, and 
kilchcn or fruit for dessert, the people 
gathered in groups at their neighbors' 



baskets. After working until noon they houses to gossip, sing, and play cards. 



had lunch, and then laid themselves in 
the shade of a nearby linden, poplar, or 
acacia for a few hours siesta away from 
the direct heat of the noonday sun. 
About four they resumed work and 
labored till dusk; then they returned to 
town for the evening meal and almost 
immediately went to bed — too exhausted 
to do anything else. Each family, also, 



The women discussed all the news of 
the week, gossiping as women will 
the world over; the men smoked, 
listened, and played cards. The older 
boys and girls gathered at the Wirtshaus 
— a unique institution in Europe, con- 
sisting of a dance hall and a refreshment 
bar — where they danced and drank beer 
and wine. When it began to grow dark, 



[11] 



the adults and adolescents returned home 
to eat supper and, by lamp-light, to dis- 
cuss the work for the following week. 
As usual, winter and summer, they went 
to bed early, not only to save light but 
also to be prepared to work strenuously 
on the following day. 

Five regular events broke the monot- 
ony of this life: the weekly fair, wed- 
dings, troop festivals, church festivals, 
and the annual cattle and swine slaugh- 
tering. Among the more important was 
the weekly fair. Held in the public mar- 
ket place before the courthouse, the fair, 
which attracted the Slavs, Magyars, and 
other Germans from the neighboring 
towns, offered to the prospective cus- 
tomers everything from horses to shawls 
and dates. The Hungarians used to 
come with the men leading horses and 
with women having baskets balanced on 
their heads, bringing shawls, embroid- 
ered silks and linens ;the Serbs, Slovenes, 
and Croats came with roses, perfumes, 
fruits, and crochet work ; the Germans 
came with farm implements and manu- 
factured wares. Every Thursday morn- 
ing the whole town attended the fair and 
carried on a brisk trade, l)uying, barter- 
ing, or selling. If the fair was exciting, 
a wedding was more so. If the parents 
of the groom and bride had the means, 
they made a great occasion of the wed- 
ding: an elaborate church ceremony ac- 
companied the taking of the marriage 
vows ; a prolonged dance, later, put the 
guests in a merry mood ; and, finally, a 
great feast gave the guests an excuse to 
indulge their appetites. Because food 
was scarce on account of the war, the 
people keenly enjoyed such an occasional 
feast. Resides weddings, another occa- 
sional source of entertainment was the 
festival given to every new detachment 
of soldiers departing for the front. 



Wearing their best civilian clothes for 
the last time and having long ribbons of 
the imperial colors — red, white, and red 
— streaming from their hats, the soldiers 
received the toasts and well-wishes of 
the townspeople who fully appreciated 
that this might be the soldiers' last cele- 
bration: "eat, drink, and be merry, for 
to-morrow we die" was only too com- 
mon a fate for the men of the town. The 
church, too, did its share to prevent the 
people from thinking of the ever-increas- 
ing list of dead and wounded and the 
shortage of food by holding periodical 
church festivals. While singing the sol- 
emn and impressive hymns for which 
the Catholic Church is noted, the men, 
women, and children participated in elab- 
orate parades in which all delighted. 
They prolonged the ceremonies for hours 
in the enjoyment of the music, the col- 
ored banners, and the flowing robes. 
Although the people immensely enjoyed 
these religious celebrations, they were 
nothing compared to the merriment of 
the annual slaughtering of swine. Every 
one who had a full-grown hog or sow 
slaughtered it in the late fall or early 
winter. All the friends and relatives 
were invited to do the actual work: the 
killing of the animals, the dressing of the 
meat, and the smoking of the sausages. 
Then all feasted on the fresh meat ; the 
j)eople ate until they could eat no more, 
for the occasion was reserved for just 
tliis eating. The remainder of the meat 
was used sparingly throughout the year, 
preserved in the cellar or chimney 
nook. 

So the people lived their lives, peace- 
fully, but always amid the realization of 
the nearness and omnipresence of the 
war: working, loving, and playing, — liv- 
ing their lives simply but with occasional 
breaks in the monotonv. 



[12] 



Training a Horse 



TJORSES are perhaps the most diffi- 
■^ ^ cult of domestic animals to train. 



While intelligent and generally docile, 
they seem to feel that only one type of 
function is theirs, that of transportation. 
They appear to resent any additional 
duties ; so patience and firmness must be 
the trainer's chief attributes. 

Under the age of five months, a colt 
hardly responds to training. Its temper 
is too volatile, its spirit too frisky, and 
its heels too nimble. But above that age, 
it develops a rapid affection for its mas- 
ter, and begins to take more seriously the 
business of living. At that time it will 
begin to await the periods of instruction, 
to anticipate the arrival of the trainer, 
and to relish the rewards of its labor. 

Two opposite means of training should 
properly be applied coordinately — pun- 
ishment and reward. Punishment is not 
cruel if employed only to check mis- 
chievous actions and rebellious displays. 
Reward, though small, should follow 
each successful execution of any trick, 
if at all difficult. The rewards should 
never be lavish nor too frequent; other- 
wise they lose a proper value in the 
horse's mind. Sugar is the accepted gift ; 
a handful of oats is a proper substitu- 
tion ; flattery and caresses are always 
serviceable. 

Caresses, like sugar, should never be 
too freely given. Animal trainers say 
that elephants detest baby talk and great 
shows of affection. In this respect 
horses are very similar. The man who 
is constantly mumbling to them, mouth- 
ing strange jargon, and seeming to wor- 
ship them as the Hindu would the white 
cow, disturbs and irritates them. Also in 
this is the female of the species more 
deadly than the male; they are more dif- 



Herbert Appleman 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 

ficult to train and much more apt to 
break a routine. 

The first thing to teach a colt is to ap- 
proach when called. He will easily learn 
this when he discovers that the extended 
hand contains sweet white sugar pellets. 
If a rider will mount him while another 
whistles, he can be taught to approach at 
different gaits according to various sig- 
nals. It is a very pretty sight to watch a 
well-trained horse shift from a pace to 
a rack, and then to canter as his master 
calls. 

And as a well-bred man would raise 
his hat upon his arrival, so must a horse 
display breeding by a bow. One leg bent 
will suffice in greeting a man, but both 
knees must be bent before a woman. 
This trick, while rudimentary, is difficult, 
and the horse must be forced to assume 
these positions until he understands what 
is expected of him. Most horses will 
want to lie down and roll over, but this 
is soon overcome by light punishment. 
Rolling is a vulgar habit and should be 
broken early. Upon rising, he should 
nod his head vigorously and proudly. 
Dignity should appear in this action, as 
a bow is not a servile obeisance, but a 
gentlemanly greeting to a friend and 
comrade. 

While such tricks as counting and 
dancing are amusing, we must remember 
that there is a limit to the animal's learn- 
ing capacity and to the trainer's time. It 
is best at this stage to teach the various 
paces and gaits. I shall not describe the 
gaits themselves, the chief of which are 
the walk, the trot, the rack, the pace, the 
single-foot, the canter, and the gallop, 
but I shall merely tell how to shift from 
one to another. 

The chief aids to pace-setting are the 



[13] 



reins, the legs, and the weight of the 
body. A horse instinctively quickens step 
when the pressure of the legs is tight- 
ened and the weight of the body is 
moved forward. Conversely, he slows up 
when the weight is moved backward and 
the reins tightened. If one alternately 
tightens one leg and then another, it is 
not difficult to change from a rack to a 
pace or single-foot. It is important to 
assist the horse by posting — that is, 
moving the body weight forward and up- 
ward as the right, or left, front foot 
strikes the ground. This gives confidence 
to the horse and makes his work much 
easier. 

A walk, for example, must be brisk, 
with the head held high, indicative of 
pride and vigor. As this is increased to a 
trot, the pace must be kept down to a 
firm even stride. Thus with the canter, 
every young horse, feeling the surge of 
youth and young strength in its body, 
wishes to gallop and run pell-mell till ex- 
hausted. This must be most carefully 
avoided, as fatigue discourages a horse 
and makes him dread the future training 
periods. There is no grace in a break- 
neck run, but a smooth moving canter is 
a very pretty gait for display. 

Jumping is another part of the train- 
ing that must be handled gradually. First, 
conduct the horse to a stick lying on the 
ground, and have him step over it until 
he no longer fears the strange object. 
Then have the stick gradually elevated a 
few inches each time. In a few months, 
four and even five feet will become a 
matter of course to a well-bred beast. 
Patient, very patient, must be the trainer, 
carefully conducting the horse up to the 
jump, exercising great care to see that 
he does not stop short or run out after 
the jump has been completed. Shying at 
objects or dancing while approaching 



jumps must be overcome — or timidity 
and lack of confidence will result in both 
horse and rider. 

Whether the horse is being guided by a 
rider, or whether he is doing solo jumps, 
it is essential that he should not be 
allowed to refuse a jump — that is, ap- 
proach the jump and stop, or run out. 
If he continues this, he must be punished 
severely, and literally forced to take the 
hurdle. But don't rush the jumper.* 
Always give him plenty of time to study 
the obstacles so that he will realize there 
is nothing to fear, and also make the in- 
creases in height so gradual as to be un- 
noticeable. The Golden Rule is an excel- 
lent one to remember and apply; put 
yourself in the position of the horse 
(not too literally) and treat him accord- 
ingly. 

I have tried to point out only a few 
aids to the training of a horse in gait- 
ing and jumping. It is well to train a 
number of horses at the same time, or at 
least not keep one animal busy more than 
two hours a day at this work. If the 
rider wishes to spend more time, he 
should condition the horse by long cross- 
country rides daily. But a horse, like a 
person, enjoys play-time, especially since 
colts are usually trained in this manner. ■ 
A gentler, finer horse is produced by giv- 
ing him plenty of time to romp and run 
free. 

The horse, remember, will reflect the 
character of the trainer. Nervousness 
breeds irritability, impatience produces 
instability, and lack of confidence reflects 
itself in bad temper. The trainer must 
recall that he is handling an infant of a 
few months with but small powers of cal- 
culation — that the animal becomes pre- 
cisely what he makes of it. 

When one rides a show horse for 
demonstration, it is well to have him 



[14] 



trained to make a display of spirit. Paw- 
ing the earth, holding his head high, 
rearing, are all proper stunts to be thus 
included. They are easily taught, but not 
by the punishment method under any 
circumstances. A few lumps of sugar 
and application of the aids to riding will 
produce an appearance of fire deceiving 
to the average spectator. 

Bronchos in rodeos, while usually un- 
tamed and unmanageable, are often 
special stunt horses. One gigantic beast 
vividly called the "Red Devil," I recall 
clearly. A deep bay, with a scintillating 
spirit — he was the star of any exhibition. 
He bucked ferociously, sunfished, pan- 



caked, cartwheeled, and jumped stiff- 
legged till it seemed the riders would be 
snapped into unconsciousness. However, 
the animal was quite gentle; he had but 
received an excellent training. This, to- 
gether with his natural attributes, made 
him a prince of bucking horses. Raised 
as a derby colt and found lacking in 
speed, he was put into a corral with an 
unbroken stallion. In a few weeks he 
had mastered all the tricks of the mus- 
tang and added innovations. Gradually, 
experience taught him how to simulate 
fierceness, until the bravest of the Ken- 
tuckians would have shuddered to at- 
tempt his mastery. 




[15] 



The Wood Pigeon 

E. L. Albin 
Thenve 6, Rhetoric 11, 1933-1934 



AS the prairie schooner rolled west- 
ward across the plains and the flat- 
boat floated down the rivers, the develop- 
ment of American resources began. The 
American pioneer has always been very 
wasteful and ruthless as he pushed into 
the wilderness to find a home. He has 
dissipated more of the resources than he 
has used. He has never thought of the 
future or of the consequence of any of 
his exploiting acts, nor has he cared. The 
soil and mines have been wasted. The 
forests and wild game have been almost 
completely destroyed. 

Every schoolboy has heard of the buf- 
falo being almost exterminated in the 
'eighties, but who has even heard the 
name of the wood pigeon, once the most 
numerous species of birds in the United 
States ? There are few people now living 
who know the bird, and no one has seen 
one in the last forty years. 

The passenger pigeon was a large, 
beautiful, varicolored bird, sixteen to 
seventeen inches long, with a graduated 
tail nearly as long as the wings. The 
male was of a bronze metallic lustre on 
the back that gradually turned into a 
light pink on the sides and changed to 
pure white on the abdomen and under 
side of the tail, while the nape and side 
of the head were glossed with crimson 
splotches. His feet, beak, and eyes, like 
those of a domestic pigeon, were colored 
pink. The female was similar, but with 
more brown on the head and back, and 
the neck less iridescent. Both the male 
and the female weighed about one pound. 

A century ago, before the country was 
thickly settled, the wood pigeon ap- 
peared in huge flocks all over the Eastern 



half of the United States. He was a gre- 
garious bird, living either in the wooded 
uplands or swamps and constantly mi- 
grating en masse in the search of food. 
The large number of pigeons in one flock 
was astounding. Often more than two 
billion birds were in one flock, flying, 
always flying onward in search of enough 
food to feed the horde. 

The early writers were greatly inter- 
ested in the gigantic flocks of pigeon, and 
Baron de la Hontan, describing the flight 
of these birds around Lake Champlain 
in 1703 says, "One would have thought, 
that all the Turtle-Doves on Earth had 

chose to pass thro' this place The 

trees were covered with that sort of fowl 
more than with leaves."^ A Canadian 
naturalist, Ross King, speaks of a flight 
at Fort Mississisay that filled the air and 
obscured the sun for fourteen hours. ^ 
Another naturalist, Audubon, asserts that 
he saw the biggest flight of wood 
pigeons he had ever seen in the autumn 
of 1813 while journeying to Louisville, 
Kentucky. He estimated the number of 
birds, passing overhead at the rate of one 
mile per minute, to be over one billion 
and writes "the light of the noonday was 
obscured as by an eclipse."^ He also ob- 
served that many trees two feet in di- 
ameter were broken off far from the 
ground and that the branches of many of 
the largest and tallest trees had broken 
away. 



'Forbush, E. W., "Passenger Pigeons," Birds of 
Massachusetts, Berwick and Smith Co., Norwood, 
Mass., Vol. II, 1927, p. 56. (Forbush took the quota- 
tion from la Hontan, IJaron de: Some New Voyages 
to North America, Vol. I, 1703, pp. 61-62.) 

Hbid., p. 57. (Forbush took the quotation from: 
King, W. Ross: The Sportsman and Naturalist of 
Canada, 1866, pp. 121-122.) 

Ubid., p. 64. 



[16] 



In 1803 the Reverend T. M. Harris 
made a journey into the Ohio Territory, 
which was still sparsely settled, and made 
the following remark: "A large forest of 
several hundred acres had been killed as 
a consequence of the vast flocks of 
pigeons alighting upon it."* The numbers 
of passenger pigeons that once inhabited 
Eastern United States can only be esti- 
mated, but there is no doubt there were 
many billions of them. The fate of so 
many birds is incomprehensible unless 
some account of their destruction is 
given. 

During the first two centuries after the 
landing of the Mayflower, the wood 
pigeon was cruelly attacked. At first the 
settlers used them only for food because 
they were so plentiful that anyone could 
kill many of them. Later, after the popu- 
lation had greatly increased, pigeons were 
in great demand. The feathers were used 
to make fans, to make matting, and to 
decorate ladies' hats ; the meat was fried 
or made into pot-pie. The Indians even 
roasted the oil from the fat squabs and 
stored it in their villages. If the pigeons 
could not be sold, they were fed to the 
hogs, and often the only reason for kill- 
ing pigeons was to provide cheap hog 
feed. 

As the demand for pigeons became 
greater, fowlers began to roam over the 
country and do nothing but catch and 
kill wood pigeons. They made lucrative 
profits by following the pigeons in their 
flights and massacring them by the mil- 
lion. At night the pigeons were brought 
to the ground by burning sulphur pots 
under the roosts and suffocating them 
with sulphur-dioxide. The bark on the 
dead trees was also lighted so that the 
young squabs in the nests would be 



*Ibid., p. 57. (Forbush quoted from: Mason, 
Thoddeus, The Journal of a Tour into the Territory 
Northwest of the Alleghany Mountains, 1805, pp. 179- 
180.) 



scorched and, in agony, would jump from 
their nests. At the great nesting-places 
the hunters would cut down the largest 
trees, felling them so that the smaller 
trees would be brought down, and there- 
by throwing the helpless squabs from the 
nests. In the morning the men went 
about the mechanical job of pulling off 
the heads of the squabs and throwing 
them into a waiting wagon. Large droves 
of hogs were then turned in to feed on 
those crippled or too small to be used. 

The pigeons which remained in the 
trees would leave immediately the next 
morning, but the fowlers would follow 
and set nets, luring the ignorant birds to 
the ground with decoys and with wheat 
thrown out as bait. Thus the men fol- 
lowed the pigeons until they captured 
most of them, and those few that were 
left were constantly attacked by hunters, 
farmers, and Indians. When a nesting- 
place (usually covering a forest fifteen 
by forty miles wide) was found, as many 
as two and three thousand people would 
gather there to kill pigeons. In 1848 
forty tons of these birds were shipped to 
market from Cattaragus County, New 
York. Since other Eastern localities 
made similar reports, it is no wonder that 
the passenger pigeon disappeared from 
the territory east of the Ohio River by 
1870. 

At this time the Northwest Territory 
was still sparsely settled, and the wood 
pigeon was just as numerous there as 
ever. The railroads, however, were being 
built, the Cumberland Road was finished, 
and many steamboats sailed on the navi- 
gable rivers. The Middle West was 
rapidly settled and developed. 

As this new territory was opened, the 
pigeoners also came, and the destruction 
of the passenger pigeon continued. Gene 
Stratton- Porter writes of her childhood 
when she lived close to the Wabash 



[17] 



River: "In my childhood it was custom- 
ary for men to take long poles and 
big bags and lanterns and go searching 
through the woods until they found one 
of these perching places of the pigeons. 
Then half a dozen men would flash the 
lanterns in such a manner that the lights 
would blind the birds, and with clubs 
others would beat the birds from the 
limbs, striking them down, and gathering 
them by the bagfull."'* Shooting clubs 
were organized and carloads of passen- 
ger pigeons were used as flying-targets 
at trap-shooting contests. 

Thus the pigeons were always pursued 
and destroyed. After 1890 the pigeons 
were scarce, but the price and demand 
increased, stimulating the greedy fowlers 
to kill the few remaining birds. It was 
now rumored that large flocks of pas- 
senger pigeons had been blown to sea 
and perished in the storm ; that the severe 
snowstorms in the north had starved 
them to death ; that the forest fires had 
burned most of the nests and young 
squabs ; and even that they had migrated 
to California and Australia. People from 
California often maintained that they had 
seen wood pigeons, but in 1910 S, A. 
Stephens, General Manager of the Cin- 
cinnati Zoo, wrote to Gene Stratton- 
Porter: "I have been misinformed a 



number of times, the same as you have, 
by people in California who claim they 
could get wild passenger pigeons for us 
.... I really believe that the wild pas- 
senger pigeons are extinct. I am oflrering 
$1000.00 for a pair of them, not injured, 
but am almost positive that I will never 
succeed in getting them."® Stephens' 
offer has not yet been accepted, and there 
is no doubt that the passenger pigeon 
is extinct. The thoughtless, wasteful 
pioneer has succeeded in killing them all. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Audubon, J. J., "Passenger Pigeon," Smith- 
sonian Institute Report, (1911), 407-424. 
Chapman, F. M., "Tale of the Passenger 

Pigeon," Country Life, 50. (Sept. 1926), 49- 

50. 
Encyclopedia Britannica, "Pigeons," 14th ed., 

London, 1929. 
FoRBUSH, E. W., "Passenger Pigeon," Birds 

of Massachusetts, Berwick and Smith, Nor- 
wood, Mass., 1925. 
Hales, "Passenger Pigeon," Prairie Birds, 

Macmillan Company, Ltd., Toronto, Canada, 

1927. 
Knoweton and Ridgw.w, "Passenger Pigeons," 

Birds of the World, H. Holt and Company, 

New York, 1909. 
Porter, G. S., "Last Passenger Pigeon," Good 

Housekeeping, 79 (Aug. 1924), 54-55. 
Shufeldt, R. W., "Death of the Last of the 

Wild Pigeons," Scientific American, 78 

(1917), 25-30. 
Taverner, p. A., "Passenger Pigeon," Birds 

of Canada, J. de L. Tache, Ottawa, Canada, 

1919. 
Weeds and De.\rbourn, "Passenger Pigeon," 

Birds In Their Relation To Man, J. B. 

Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, 1903. 



•Stratton-Porter, Gene, "The Last Passenger 
Pigeon," Good Housekeeping, August 1924, pp. 78-79. 



'Ibid. 




/ft*v?i. 



[18] 



Hazlitt and Emerson — A Comparison 



Maurace Henry Wells 
Theme 10, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



WILLIAM Hazlitt and Ralph Waldo 
Emerson are usually considered to 
be unrelated literary figures and, conse- 
quently, they are seldom discussed to- 
gether. A moment's reflection, however, 
serves to remind one that these writers 
were contemporaries for twenty-seven 
years, and thus were a part of the same 
culture, and were linked in thought and 
spirit by the developments of the same 
era. Nevertheless, these temporal con- 
nections do not form the basis of this 
correlation. Briefly put, this comparative 
discussion arises from my keen pleasure 
in reading these essayists, and from my 
desire to understand them better by ob- 
serving their dissimilarities, and by at- 
tempting to define those fundamental 
qualities which, I believe, are common to 
both. 

The dift'erences in the prose of the two 
men are obvious. The most readily ap- 
parent divergence is the matter of their 
"style." The original treatment of their 
subject matter is one of the factors which 
place these men high in the ranks of the 
world's great essayists, yet this individu- 
ality of technique expresses itself differ- 
ently in each man. Hazlitt writes a free, 
unhampered, moving sort of prose, which 
comes from his deepest convictions and 
emotions. Frequently he is the propa- 
gandist, burning with a desire to make 
his ideals prevail, and it is this almost 
living fervor which holds the interest of 
the common man. At other times he 
grips us by the intensity of his bitterness 
and passion. Caustic with sarcasm is this 
fiery passage from one of his later 
essays : 

The pleasure of hating, like a poisonous 
mineral, eats into the heart of religion, and 



turns it to rankling spleen and bigotry; it 
makes patriotism an excuse for carrying 
fire, pestilence, and famine into other lands: 
it leaves to virtue nothing but the spirit of 
censoriousness, and a narrow, jealous, in- 
quisitorial watchfulness over the actions 
and motives of others. What have the dif- 
ferent sects, creeds, doctrines in religion 
been but so many pretexts set up for men 
to wrangle, to quarrel, to tear one another 
to pieces about, like a target as a mark to 
shoot at? Does any one suppose that the 
love of country in an Englishman implies 
any friendly feeling or disposition to serve 
another bearing the same name? No, it 
means only hatred to the French or the in- 
habitants of any other country that we 
happen to be at war with at the time. Does 
love of virtue denote any wish to discover 
or amend our own faults ? No, but it atones 
for obstinate adherence to our own vices by 
the most virulent intolerance to human 
frailties.* 

In his more serene moods, Hazlitt's 
style is a fluent, mellow prose — familiar, 
intimate, almost confidential. In many 
places it is brilliant with epigram and 
eloquent with beautiful figures of rheto- 
ric. It charms us, too, by its ease and 
grace — by the naturalness and simplicity 
which bring it so near to the beauty of 
common speech. How appealing is his 
account of his first meeting with Coler- 
idge. 

On the Tuesday following, the half- 
inspired speaker came. I was called into 
the room where he was, and went half- 
hoping, half-afraid. He received me very 
graciously, and I listened for a long time 
without uttering a word. I did not suffer 
in his opinion by my silence. 'For those two 
hours,' he afterwards was pleased to say, 
T was conversing with W. H.'s forehead !" 

Emerson's appeal is altogether differ- 
ent. His style neither grips us with its 



i"On the Pleasure of Hating." 
'"My First Acquaintance with Poets.' 



[19] 



passion nor Hatters us with its famili- 
arity. Rather, he challenges us by the 
directness of his speech, and by the 
economy of words with which he phrases 
his deepest thoughts. Emerson speaks in 
sentences rather than in paragraphs. This 
condensation, this ability to say much in 
little space, does not make for ease in 
reading, and on that account Emerson 
does not find a wide audience ; neverthe- 
less, there is in this conciseness of ex- 
pression an insight and penetrating 
vision, which, when caught, produces a 
precious sense of mental stimulation and 
pleasure. This appeal to "Man Thinking" 
(as he named one of his most famous 
addresses) is illustrated in this paragraph 
from '"Self-Reliance": 

Whoso would be a man must be a non- 
conformist. He who would gather immortal 
palms must not be hindered by the name of 
goodness, but must explore it if it be good- 
ness. Nothing is at last sacred but the in- 
tegrity of your own mind. Absolve you to 
yourself and you shall have the suffrage of 
the world. 

Here, in any one of these four con- 
secutive sentences, is enough material to 
develop an entire essay. How like the 
tinkle of sleigh-bells is much of Hazlitt's 
style, compared to the solemn toll of 
Emerson's prose ; yet each in its own way 
is beautiful. 

Also, the essays of Hazlitt and Emer- 
son are essentially opposite in their point 
of view. Hazlitt is primarily subjective 
in outlook; Emerson is wholly objective. 
Hazlitt, though he writes about abstract 
ideas and about the world around him, 
colors it all with his own personality and 
his own prejudices. He makes his likes 
and dislikes clear to us in every essay. 
He leaves no room for doubt about his 
tastes in literature when he writes, "I 
do not think altogether the worse of a 
hook for having survived the author a 
generation or two. I have more confi- 



dence in the dead than in the living."' 
This personal, almost autobiographical, 
element of Hazlitt's essays reveals his 
character when he complains: 

Even in the common affairs of life, in 
love, friendship, and marriage, how little 
security have we when we trust our happi- 
ness in the hands of others ! Most of the 
friends I have seen have turned out the 
bitterest enemies, or cold, uncomfortable 
acquaintance. Old companions are like 
meats served up too often, that lose their 
relish and their wholesomeness.* 

Quite different is the point of view of 
Emerson, who, looking at life, speaks his 
reflections with the voice of an oracle. 
His entire concern is to find Truth by ex- 
pressing his deepest wisdom. (As he 
words it in his definition of genius: "to 
believe that what is true for you in your 
private heart is true for all men.") Thus, 
he comments upon life from within; 
Hazlitt, on the other hand, comments 
upon himself from without. 

In regard to their moods, Hazlitt at 
times is full of the joy of living and his 
essays overflow with bubbling spirits and 
high good humor ; just as frequently, 
however, he is disillusioned and unhappy. 
In surprising contrast to the light-hearted 
air of "On Going a Journey" is the cyni- 
cal tone of "On the Ignorance of the 
Learned" and the savage bitterness of 
"On the Pleasure of Hating." Ever un- 
perturbed, Emerson, on his part, main- 
tains a high strain of optimism for the 
future and a steadfast faith in the essen- 
tial nobility of man. His confidence in 
the truth he speaks so transcends doubt 
and opposition that never is there in him 
the discouragement or frustration which 
characterizes as much of Hazlitt. 

Deep and fundamental elements are 
common to both Hazlitt and Emerson — 
bonds that imite those characteristics 



»"On Reading Old Books." 
<"0n Living to One's-Self." 



[20] 



which make them great. An important 
reason for their preeminence is their 
acutely developed critical faculty. Haz- 
litt's critical essays on painting, litera- 
ture, and drama are masterpieces of 
astute observation and sound judgment. 
His is the ability to see the whole of any 
subject and to define clearly its parts. 
He penetrates the most abstract subjects 
to find in them a world of meaning, and 
to clarify them by concrete examples. 

Similarly, Emerson gets to the heart of 
his ideas in a single phrase and makes 
crystal clear their inference. His amaz- 
ing insight enables him to picture in vivid 
terms his most profound thoughts. He 
says in "The Over-Soul," "A man is the 
fagade of a temple wherein all wisdom 
and all good abide." How simply stated 
is this comparison, yet how complex are 
its implications ! Emerson's appraisal of 
men sees beyond their achievements and 
character to find in them the fundamental 
nature of mankind. Shakespeare, though 
"inconceivably wise," was primarily a 
common man, and thereby his works 
possess their magnificent universality. 
Napoleon, "man of stone and iron," was 
great because he was an average mortal 
cast in a heroic mold. 

There is in both Hazlitt and Emerson 
intellectual integrity: absolute sincerity, 
honesty, and independence in their beliefs 
and purposes. In both men, fidelity to 
what they "believed to be true for them 
in their private hearts" cost them misun- 
derstanding and opposition, and, in the 
case of Hazlitt, even mockery and abuse. 
But it is in the realm of ideals that Haz- 
litt and Emerson are in the closest har- 
mony. Each has the same faith in the 
fundamental excellence of the individual 



which causes them to be tireless workers 
for democracy. This spirit led them to 
sympathize with the principles of the 
French Revolution, and enabled them to 
see the advance of democracy in the 
works of as absolute a ruler as Napoleon. 
Each admired in the man those qualities 
which gave to France an extension of the 
liberties for which it had been struggling. 
Though he recognized Bonaparte's faults, 
Emerson said of him: "He was the agi- 
tator, the destroyer of prescription, the 
internal improver, the liberal, the radical, 
the inventor of means, the opener of 
doors and markets, the subverter of mo- 
nopoly and abuse. "^ This opinion of Na- 
poleon, fair and just though it is, was 
uttered by both Emerson and Hazlitt at 
times when it was universally unpopular, 
and illustrates again their splendid in- 
dependence. 

It is, I believe, this quality of courage 
which appeals most to me in the essays 
of Hazlitt and Emerson. That, coupled 
with the insight and wisdom of their ob- 
servations, makes their essays a source of 
endless inspiration and satisfaction to me. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Emerson, R. W., Essays — 1st Series, Houghton 

Mifflin Co., 1903. 
, Essavs — 2nd Series, Houghton Mifflin 

Co., 1903. ■ 

-, Representative Men, Houghton Mifflin 



Co., 1903. 

-, Selected Essays and Addresses, ed. bj' 



E. D. Holmes. Macmillan Co., 1931. 

-, Essays and Poems, ed. by Stuart P. 



Sherman. Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1921. 
Hazlitt, Wm., Essays, ed. by Percy V. Shelly. 

Charles Scribners Sons, 1924. 
, Best Essays, ed. by P. P. Howe. Geo. 

H. Doran, 1923. 

-, Selected Essays, ed. by Geo. Sampson. 



Cambridge University Press, 1926. 
, Table Talk. E. P. Button & Co., 1908. 



^"Napoleon; or the Man of the World." 



[21] 



Two Book Reports 

Grace Liesendahl 
Theme 18, Rhetoric I, 1933-1934 



1. MY ANTONIA 

r 

ANTONIA — the woman with such a 
great capacity for living that she 
overshadows all the other characters in 
Willa Gather's My Antonia. Gertainly 
she is not an idealistic character ; she 
makes mistakes, a fact which adds to her 
reality, and she lives above them, a fact 
which makes her all the more admirable. 

Antonia's nature is as broad and wild, 
as strong and rugged as the Nebraskan 
plains that taught her to live ; and yet she 
is sensitive to every beauty of those 
plains and of their people. She is inde- 
pendent almost to the point of stub- 
bornness. But it is this independence, this 
fighting spirit that makes her endure that 
first winter of suffering that brought the 
death of her father, her long hours of 
labor in the field, the disgrace and hu- 
miliation of her unhappy love aflfair, and 
her family's scorn. 

Her capacity for happiness is great. 
She loves to be happy, a merry rollicking 
happiness that endears her to everyone. 
She is generous and loving, and nothing 
is too fine for those she loves ; her gentle 
sisterly love for Jim Burden shows a 
loyalty that few people possess. Above 
all, she is a mother, or perhaps one 
should say, all these things together make 
her a mother — the mother of strong sons 
and fine daughters, the sort of people 
that build a nation. She represents the 
children of pioneers, those who suflfered 
and sacrificed with their parents in a new 
land, but who lived to see the results of 
their eflFort. 



2. MY BROTHER'S PAGE 

Picture a fresco consisting of two 
jjanels, one old with the soft dignity and 
beauty of age, and the other bright and 
gaudy in its newness, and you have an 
idea of the old and the new India as 
Dhan Gopal Mukerji depicts them in 
My Brother's Face. Away from the 
Mother of Tradition and Religion for 
thirteen years, which he spent in study 
in the United States, he returns to find 
the India of century-old graciousness and 
meditation rapidly changing to a land of 
industrial revolution, sputtering Fords, 
and a new generation too busy to medi- 
tate on religion or to dream. 

The passing India was a place of many 
religions, but the followers of all gave a 
good part of their lives to God, whoever 
might be His prophet. The people found 
joy and peace in hours of meditation, and 
brought themselves into Oneness with 
God by means of it. The man who was 
too busy to dream was unheard of. Life 
took its leisurely pace from day to day, 
and was sent on its way with a song from 
the lips of the brown children of India ; 
for music was a part of their very being. 
The rug-makers had their songs which 
they sang as they coaxed the patterns 
into their rugs, the men in the field had 
theirs, the Bidri workers made their 
molten metal flow into its place with 
singing — everywhere the song expressed 
the peace and happiness in the Indian 
heart. 

But now India is too busy to sing — or 
too indiflferent, and its religious fervor 



[22] 



which has burned for centuries is losing 
its vigor. The peasants now work long 
hours in noisy factories that drown out 
song and the desire to sing, and there is 
no time to devote to God ; men are too 
tired. And the peasant who still remains 
on his little piece of land has no music 
in his soul, for his heart is heavy. Is 
not his farm mortgaged to the money- 
lender, and will it not soon be taken from 
him, forcing him into the city and in- 
dustry? The crafts are dying from lack 
of patronage. The rug-maker makes no 
more rugs because no one will buy them ; 
people want European designs. The same 
thing is happening to the tapestry, the 
ivory carving, and the Bidri industries. 

Along with the western exploitation 
of India there has developed a group of 
Indians themselves who are becoming 
wealthy by the ruination of the Mother. 
They excuse themselves by saying that 
India will be industrialized sooner or 
later and that the}- may just as well make 



the money as some foreigner. This group 
of newly-rich have cast off all old Indian 
tradition. They wear European clothes, 
they speak English, they adopt western 
customs and dwellings, and they are too 
busy for religion and the gracious little 
ceremonies of other days. 

The education of the upper classes has 
changed. Formerly, during his early 
years, the child was given religious in- 
struction and taught how to live and love 
in the broadest sense of the words. Later, 
he was sent to English or American col- 
leges. Now, the young people are a 
group of pugnacious individuals with 
little religion and much anti-westernism. 

Mukerji does not express very clearly 
whether or not he thinks that Mahatma 
Gandhi is the means of salvation for 
India, but he does reveal the worship of 
Gandhi by all Indians. He also gives the 
impression that the conflict there among 
religions is not nearly as serious a prob- 
lem as it is regarded. 



Lobster Cove 

F. Marshall Smith 
Theme 11, Rhetoric 11, 1933-1934 



J OBSTER COVE hangs apart from 
the Atlantic Ocean as a drop clings 
to the rim of a water-filled basin. Its 
rocky shore is a confused mixture of dull 
terra-cotta, grey, and mauve, blending 
harmoniously into the pale blue-green of 
the sea. A few hardy spruce trees are 
the only signs of vegetation other than 
occasional patches of coarse moss that 
grow in the solid rock which encloses the 
cove. Bleaching shell heaps, sometimes 



many feet deep, are scattered all along 
the shore giving evidence of many a 
hearty feast. The air constantly reeks 
with the mingled odors of salt, fish, and 
evergreen. The water in the cove is 
itself a captivating sight, for, though 
sheltered from the waves, it is kept in 
constant motion by the heavy ocean 
swells which cause tangled masses of sea 
weed to sway slowly, sickeningly, to and 
fro. 



\.2i^ 



My First Love 



Ruth Wheeiler 
Theme 15. Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



|\ yT AYP)E it was the friendly way he 
■^ ' *■ wrinkled up his face when he 
grinned that first attracted me to Alfred, 
or perhaps it was the brilliant sparkle in 
his deep brown eyes. At any rate, I 
loved him with all the love with which a 
little girl of ten can love a little boy of 
eleven. His legs and arms seemed un- 
usually long for his body and hung out 
of his clothes inches farther than they 
should have. He had a mass of curly 
chestnut hair which was in place only for 
a few minutes after it was combed, re- 
sembling, at all other times, a bunch of 
kale. 

Our little romance took place at a 
boarding-school having separate build- 
ings for boys and girls. The large play- 
ground was divided by an imaginary line, 
the crossing of which by either sex was 
punishable. During every recreation 
period, Alfred and I deserted our respec- 
tive playmates to come as close to the 
line as we dared, to enjo}^ little tete-a- 
tetes which, I will admit, lasted longer 
than was necessary. In the class-room 
we exchanged notes and, when neither 
talking nor writing was possible, we con- 
veyed our thoughts to each other by 
means of a sign language. We had been 
advised to cease each and every com- 
munication and, later, we were ordered 
to stop it. 

"They can't do that," he told me 
sullenly during one of our stolen mo- 
ments. "Why, when two people are in 
love, no one can just step in and say, 
'You stop loving each other!' " I agreed. 
We made no effort to stop seeing each 
other. 



One day as we girls were marching 
out of the recreation room, I heard those 
at the head of the ranks giggle and 
laugh. T pushed forward, craning my 
neck to see the cause of all the mirth. 
The sight was a severe blow. They were 
laughing at my Alfred, who stood at the 
end of the long shining corridor. His 
presence there in the girls' building was 
surprising in itself, but what was more 
astounding — he was wearing my clothes ! 

I was stunned. I did not know what 
to think. Slowly the line of giggling girls 
approached him. He stood first on one 
foot, then on the other, smiling faintly 
but looking a bit sheepish. He tried to 
create an air of nonchalance w'hich was 
a hopeless failure in the little dress 
which struck him about six inches above 
the knees and which drew his shoulders 
up by its tightness. A brush of hair 
stood upright, tied with a scarlet ribbon 
matching his face and neck. Slowly the 
tears gathered in my eyes and my throat 
tightened as my heart went out to him. 
I understood it all now. Oh, how cruel 
of them ! Thinking to turn him against 
me, the teachers had put him to shame 
before the girls. I told myself that it 
would not make any difference, as a love 
as strong as ours would not be daunted 
by such a deed. As I passed him, he 
turned away ; he would not look at me. 
The plan had been a success. He was 
through with me. For days after the 
shameful event he avoided me. At first 
I was deeply hurt. Gradually I became 
aware that it really made no difference 
whether I saw him or not. Thus ended 
my first love affair. 



[24] 



Too Close 



Joe Daly 
Theme 15, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



T T was a perfect afternoon, grand fish- 
-■• ing weather, and Mack and I had 
had splendid luck in the morning, each 
having caught four fine bass. Now the 
sun was just touching the top of the east 
wall of Apple River Canyon, which is 
not really a canyon although the natives 
call it that. It was late afternoon, and I 
do not believe I ever saw the fast-run- 
ning water sparkle more, or the rocks of 
the canyon reflect their reds and blues 
more brilliantly. Just above the rapids 
Mack was slowly "whipping" his fly on 
the surface of a quiet, deep pond that 



"Now listen carefully, and again, don't 
move," he warned. "There is a rattle- 
snake about a foot from you, and slowly 
approaching you. You will be perfectly 
safe if you don't move. Perhaps he will 
crawl around you, but he will not strike 
if you do not move. I shall not speak 
again, because it might frighten him.'' 

My muscles tensed; the blood rushed 
to my face ; I wanted to jump and run, 
anything to get out of there. The 
thought flashed through my mind that 
perhaps my companion was joking, but 
almost the minute it entered, I knew that 



was nestled close against the steep rock no one, speaking the way he did, could 



wall. I was tired of fishing; so, in order 
to enjoy the west rays of the sun, I 
clambered up the wall toward a small 
shelf that hung out over the water. 
After carefully laying down my rod, I 
stretched out to rest before we started 
the long walk back to camp. 

I had dozed for a few minutes, when 
that silent sixth sense which all people 
who sleep in the wilderness have, made 
me wake up suddenly, but without mov- 
ing. I lay thus for a very short time ; 
then I heard the voice of Mack, who ap- 
parently was below and to the left of me. 

"Listen, Joe," he cautioned quietly, 
"don't be alarmed at what I am going to 
say, and under no circumstances must 
you move a muscle of your body, or ask 
me why you must not." 



be joking. Lord! what could I do! If I 
could only see the snake, perhaps I could 
kill it, but I dared not move. Thus I 
waited, unable to analyze my feelings, 
almost sure of certain death if I moved. 
I closed my eyes and waited. Suddenly I 
felt something on the biceps of my right 
arm — a queer, light touch, clinging for 
an instant — and then the smooth glide of 
an oily body. I could feel the muscles 
of the snake's body slowly contract, then 
relax as it slid smoothly, oh, how 
smoothly, across my naked arm. Again 
and again that body contracted, and 
again and again it relaxed. At last I saw 
a flat, V-shaped head, with two glisten- 
ing, black, protruding buttons. A thin, 
pointed, sickening-yellow tongue slipped 
out, then in, accompanied by a sound like 



He spoke quietly, reassuringly, but that of escaping steam. Slowly, slowly it 
what he said was as sharp and as cold as advanced, the rounded spots on its back 



ice-water. It was something like being 
told that an executioner's sc|uad you 
were facing had only blank bullets in its 
guns. Obeying this tone in his voice, I 
remained perfectly motionless, and he 
spoke again. 



and sides drawing together and then 
stretching to their length as it moved 
slowly forward. When it was about in 
the middle of my chest, it paused, slowly 
turned its head toward me, and fixed its 
cold, boring eyes in my direction. Now I 



[2S] 



could not have moved had I wished ; I 
was fascinated. So he remained, darting 
his tongue out and in. Finally he slowly, 
very slowly turned his head, and again 
moved forward. Once more I had to see 
and feel the slow contraction, relaxation, 
contraction, relaxation. The body began 
to narrow, the spots grew smaller, the 
cracks on his revolting greenish-white 
stomach grew closer together and more 
minute. At last the slender, whipping 
tail appeared on my chest, and then 
slowly slid along until .... 



My head felt so queer ; up and 
down, up and down it went. Why, my 
face was all wet ! I weakly shoved at the 
bronzed arm that shook me, and asked, 
"What's the matter?" 

"God! and only a couple of minutes!" 
1 heard a voice filter into my brain: 
"Wonderful ! I don't think I could have 
let a rattler crawl across me. Lord ! 
but you're clammy, and look at your 
muscles and veins, all swollen and 
red, while your face looks like a dead 
man's." 




^■[.-laErt: 



Night Cargo 

F. SCHURECHT 
Theme 18. Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



"TpHE trip began at the Chicago ter- 
* minal. Fred Weppner, the driver, 
was painting the big chains on Truck 100 
as I crossed to the end of the long shed. 
Behind us a dozen men toiled in the glare 



of the loading platform. Boxes, barrels, 
crates, bundles were being packed into 
the huge trucks and trailers. Tailboards 
slammed. Motors barked and roared. 
Machines lumbered away into the dark- 



[26] 



ness, heading north, south, east. The 
night fleet of the Chicago Transport 
Express was beginning to roll. 

Fred finished his last-minute job, care- 
fully hung his brush on a hook under the 
truck, stowed his pail of oil, looking like 
black molasses, in a rack on the running 
board, and we both climbed into the cab. 

Our load was ready. The "tickets" 
covering the consignments were handed 
up in an oilcloth pouch. Fifteen tons, in- 
cluding ten thousand nickel cigars, two 
dozen guinea pigs, wallpaper piled like 
cords of stovewood, and a crate of yelp- 
ing collie pups, were riding on the 
eighteen balloon tires of our truck and 
trailer. 

With a load more than a fifth of a 
block long, Fred carefully pulled out of 
the shed, rolled down a dark alley, and 
turned into a glittering main street of 
Chicago. I looked at my watch ; it was 
nine p.m. 

For five minutes we worked our way 
through traffic along residence streets, 
past factories, out to the suburbs. Then 
we settled down to the long grind, the 
roar and clatter of the engine filling the 
cab, 

Fred, who was driving one of his 
father's trucks for the summer, had in- 
vited me to ride on the night-haul to 
watch a motor transport in operation. 
Outside our cab a cold wind rushed past. 
But we were snug and warm, for the 
heat is automatically regulated in these 
large trucks. 

At the toll house of the Cairo bridge, 
we pulled up with a hiss of released air 
from the brakes. Fred fished the three- 
dollar toll from his pocket. Off again, 
we cut around a furniture van with five 
red lights strung across its back, and 
then bowled along for a mile and a quar- 
ter over the white concrete spanning the 
river. 



Beyond Cairo we began to climb out 
of the valley, and now there were hills 
all the way. We labored up one side and 
plunged down the other. The trailer, 
more heavily loaded than the truck, 
butted us as we slowed down and jerked 
back when we speeded up. "When the 
trailer is full and the truck is almost 
empty," Fred said, "you need spurs to 
stay on." 

"Do you know why truck drivers wear 
suspenders?" Fred asked. I made a 
guess, but it was the wrong one. "It's to 
keep their shirt tails in. If you wear a 
belt on a pitching truck, your shirt tails 
keep coming out all the time." 

At this time of night the cities are 
dead. We roar through canyons between 
high buildings, past a huge red-brick fac- 
tory with twin towers, and out into the 
open country again. A cold mist is clos- 
ing in. Telephone wires, white silos, and 
mailboxes are covered with moisture and 
have a silvery sheen in the beams of our 
headlights. 

From our seats, high in the cabs, the 
lights of approaching cars seem to pass 
under us. At Runk's Road Fred throttles 
down and eases over to the curb, across 
from an electric sign suggesting food. 
Inside the restaurant a group of truck 
drivers are being served. Over the coffee 
percolator is the cheerful greeting, "Use 
less sugar and stir like the devil. We 
don't mind the noise." 

When we leave the diner, the fog has 
thickened. Fred snaps out the dash light 
so that he can see better. A pale green- 
ish glow enters the cab windows, coming 
from the high clearance lights running 
along the top of the truck. Fred explains 
that our truck is a good fog machine. Its 
headlights are set low, illuminating the 
concrete. 

A long, gray bus flashes past and dis- 
appears in the mist. Suddenly, high in 



[27] 



the sky ahead of us we see two dim 
close-set hghts dropping steadily toward 
the ground as though in a descending 
balloon. They brighten and out of 
the mist comes a car which has de- 
scended the invisible road down a long 

hill. 

On this forty-five per cent incline the 
truck loses headway rapidly. Fred shifts 
gears five times on the way up. "Now 
watch her lay back her ears and dig in !" 
he says as he shifts the last time. Slowly 
the thundering engine drags the fifteen- 
ton load up the last hundred yards of the 
hill and over "the peak." On the other 
side the fog is even worse. It is billoAv- 
ing up the slope like rolls of cotton. 
Fred knows every inch of the road and 



plunges down the hill for the long 
toboggan to the bottom. 

Cars are thinning out on the roads. 
On the downward grade we meet a slow- 
truck climbing the hill with the head- 
lights of three impatient passenger ma- 
chines peering like eyes from around the 
rear. Then miles go by without a car in 
sight. 

Fred's watch shows five forty-five 
when we reach the outskirts of Memphis. 
We emerge into bare, deserted streets, 
wind through half a dozen blocks be- 
tween dark warehouses and then back to 
the terminal. It is a few minutes after 
six A.M. We have pulled a fifteen-ton 
load approximately four hundred miles 
in nine hours. 



\ 




[28] 



A Great Surgeon 

Dale Lindsay 
Theme 18, Rhetoric II, 1933-1934 



IT was a strange thing that had hap- 
pened, one of those curious cases that 
show the fickleness of a mob's psychol- 
ogy. An unidentified boy had been in- 
jured in an automobile accident and had 
been taken to the County Hospital in the 
city. There had been an operation for 
•the removal of pressure in an apparently 
simple basal skull-fracture. But some- 
thing had gone wrong: certainly it w'as 
no fault of the surgeon. That brain, so 
infinitely sensitive, had not responded 
but had sunk back into darkness. Only 
life remained to the boy now. His arms 
and legs were limp and useless. His eyes 
stared unseeingly into space ; strange 
guttural gibberings had replaced his 
voice. He lived, but that was all. 

A snooping agent of the press ferreted 
the story out, added a suspicion of in- 
competent doctors in the public employ, 
touched up the morbid pathos of the 
affair, and fed the whole to an avid, 
scandal-hungry public. A fat, oily poli- 
tician seized the seed of discontent and 
issued a statement. "So long as I am in 
office, incompetence in the sacred trust of 
public duty shall not exist in our fair 
city. The rights of the people must be 
protected. I promise our voters that the 
perpetrator of this inhuman crime shall 
be speedily hailed before the bar of jus- 
tice." Rumors of impeachment before 
the medical board began to be heard. 
Then there was the hue and cry for a 
jury trial and imprisonment. John Smith 
in the street took up the crusade, and, 
brandishing his evening paper in one 
hand, he howled across the backyard 
fence to his neighbor w^ith apoplectic 



fervor, "See ! Think they can get away 
with it, don't they? Turning our hos- 
pitals into butcher-shops. I'm a taxpayer 
and I've got my rights. We'll fix that 
bird." 

At the hospital a door quietly opened 
and a tall, slim man stepped softly into 
the room where the boy lay. It was night 
and there was only the light from a 
single dim table-lamp. Yet, one could see 
— the boy was dying. His eyes were 
glassy and sunken and his face had a 
peaked, anemic look. He lay motionless ; 
the only sound was the rasping of his 
labored breathing. The surgeon sat 
down beside the bed and settled back in 
his chair with a little sigh of weariness. 
Years of hard work and that keen 
sympathy with suft'ering that one finds 
in great doctors showed plainly on his 
face. Gently he laid his hands on the 
boy's forehead and his fingers groped 
searchingly about, as if he had the will 
to know what was wrong w^ithin that 
little head. He placed a hand on the 
throat that was struggling so hard to 
breathe, and felt the tearing and choking 
beneath his hand. Slowly he raised the 
boy's arm, flexed the fingers one by one, 
and then let the arm drop limply back. 
He sat there for a long time, silently 
watching the boy. Perhaps he thought of 
the long, hard years of work and study 
that lay behind him — college, then the 
medical school, his interneship, the years 
of thankless work in clinics. Maybe he 
thought of how much this boy's life 
meant to his reputation and surgical 
honor. I doubt it. He thought of the 
boy. Finally he got up, and, with the 



[29] 



courage of his surgical predecessors for 
a thousand years back, he went out to 
give the internes his decision. He spoke, 
and his voice vi'as scarcely more than a 
whisper. "Gentlemen, we will operate ; 
yes! immediately." 

Upstairs the great lights of the operat- 
ing-room flashed on, blinding in their 
white intensity. Bandages, gauze, and 
gowns were taken piping hot and steam- 
ing from the sterilizers. The operating 
table with'Hhe still, sheet-draped figure of 
the boy was wheeled to the center of the 
room. The surgical spotlights were 
swung down and focused. The nurses 
and internes, in white gowns and masks, 
stood waiting. The surgeon came at last, 
his hands, wet and dripping with alcohol, 
held out before him. He slipped into a 
gown, snapped on a pair of rubber 
gloves, and walked to the table. He 
spoke only once, "Shall we begin ?" The 
high, piercing whine of an electric drill 
broke the silence. The surgeon hesitated 
a moment, and then bent over swiftly. 
There was the shrill protest of steel 
meeting bone, and then it settled down to 
a steady, nerve-racking chatter as the 
bit burrowed deeper and deeper into the 
skull. The monotonous drone of an elec- 
tric scalpel replaced the whine of the 
drill. A few deft incisions severed the 
overlying flap of bone, and it was care- 
ftilly folded back. Only a thin membrane 
remained in the way ; it vanished like a 
soap bubble at a touch of the knife. 
Twenty years of rigid discipline stood 
back of those fingers on the scalpel. 
Nerves that would have put steel to 
shame slowly lowered probes and forceps 
to the brain tissue. The slight tremble of 
a finger or a tremor of the hand and it 
would have been all over, for, as surely 
as that surgeon was fighting for Life, 
Death stood at his elbow waiting for a 



chance to reach out and claim the boy as 
its own. 

That chance never came. The miracle 
happened ; the probes located two tiny 
bone splinters lodged in the folds of the 
brain itself. Gently and swiftly the 
forceps removed them, and it was 
enough. The boy's fingers twitched ; his 
thigh muscles quivered involuntarily. 
The surgeon worked with almost 
frenzied haste to make good his success. 
The bony flap was folded back, sutures 
were inserted, the job was done. The 
forceps drop])ed from his nerveless 
hands and clattered noisily on the tiled 
floor. He stumbled across the hall to the 
ofifice and slumped down in a chair, limp 
with fatigue. A nurse bent over him 
with some ice water. He attempted a 
smile. "Thanks." he said, "hard work ; 
hard . . . . " His voice trailed oiT and 
his eyes flickered shut. He slept. 

The morning papers carried the news 
of that miraculous achievement. The 
same press that had so morbidly de- 
nounced the surgeon now eagerly 
showered him with praise. "Science has 
triumphed ; all power to this greatest of 
surgeons !" was the new tune they sang. 
It happened that on this same day an 
international clinic of famous doctors 
opened its sessions at the hospital. It 
was only fitting that this new genius of 
surgery should present the opening ad- 
dress. The medical amphitheatre was 
packed. Tier on tier it rose, spreading 
out fan-wise around the small semi- 
circular pit. The press turned out in full 
glory. Laymen lucky enough to gain ad- 
mission were glad for the privilege of 
standing. The medical board which a 
few hours ago had murmured threats of 
impeachment waited there respectfully. 
They were there, all of them, to pay 
tribute to the genius of a great man. A 



[30] 



hush fell over the crowd. The surgeon 
walked to the center of the pit, turned, 
and faced his audience. Slowly he lifted 
his hand, and I think there were tears in 
his eyes. His face was tragic, tragic 
with the pain of being misunderstood. 
"Gentlemen," he said, and his voice was 



low and tired, "we do not seek to work 
miracles. If, in twenty or thirty years — 
yes ! if in a lifetime we can come a little 
closer, be a little surer of the truth, that 
is all we can ask." There was silence, 
dumb and surprised. A great surgeon 
had left the room. 




[31] 



A 



Vol.4 



JANUARY, 1935 



No. 2 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

DOC'S OLDEST KID 1 

Anonymous 

WHY DO PEOPLE COLLECT STAMPS? ... 4 
Hamilton Hall 

VOLUME OF POETRY 6 

Florence P. Newton 

DANCE ORCHESTRA MUSICIANS 6 

Robert Nutting 

HOMECOMING 8 

Howard Klein 

MY LOVE FOR SWITZERLAND 9 

Margaret Kunz 
I LIKE THE FRENCH 11 

Gertrude Stier 

MOONBEAMS ON WATER 12 

Florence P. Newton 

BIG HOUSES, LITTLE HOUSES 13 

Herbert Kastien 

THE CITY DRUG-STORE 14 

Shirley Goodman 

REMINISCING IS 

Marion L. Baker 

THE OKLAHOMA CITY OIL FIELD .... 16 

Phillip Simon 

THE CAMPUS WEEK 17 

Muriel Day 

"EXALTAVIT HUMILES" 18 

Sylvia Stieren 

WINTER IMPRESSION 19 

Florence P. Newton 

I LIKE THE FLYING TRAPEZE 19 

Francis Prerie 
SKIPPY 21 

Dallas Achenbach 

MATILDA AND HEPZIBAH 21 

Florence Butler 
MY AUNT HARRIET 23 

Harriet Coughenour 

RETRIBUTION 24 

Robert W. Gardner 

FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS— 1447 . . 26 
Ernest Tucker 



> 



i 



<l 



\ 



PUBLISHED BY THE RHETORIC STAFF, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA 



The Green Caldron regrets to announce 
that the narrative entitled "Night Cargo" 
in the October issue of the magazine was 
excerpted from "How Nighthawk 
Trucks Move the Nation's Goods" by 
Mr, Edwin Teale in the Popular Science 
Monthly, April, 1934. 



Doc's Oldest Kid 



Anonymous 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



BY WAY of prefacing what is to 
follow, I might make note of the fact 
that, as a rule, I enjoy my own company 
very much, much more than that of 
some of my intimates. Somewhere I 
lost something of the gregarious instinct 
attributed to man. Some people might 
call me an introvert, although the neigh- 
bors rarely stop with such mild terms. 
I prefer to call myself a bibliovert or, 
to employ a mild term in better usage, 
a bibliophile. Since I first learned to 
read, I have sought my conceptions of 
things in books, powdering my nose with 
dried printer's ink and library dust. As 
a result, I see the people and places about 
me as projections upon the screen of a 
page, and their stories as the continuity 
of a book. I 

The scene on my own page is a typical 
little Middle-Western county seat, domi- 
nated and regulated by the omnipotent 
square and county courthouse. About 
this nucleus revolves the life of the 
town-atom. One of the many electrons 
in this structure was my father's office. 
It always held a great fascination for 
me, smelling as it did of adhesive plaster, 
antiseptics, and the thousand and one 
curiosity-provoking concoctions on the 
dispensing shelves. There was nothing 
I liked to do so much as to poke about 
in the examination room, pulling out 
drawers, giving the centrifuge a whirl 
now and then to accompany my investi- 
gations with its high, nerve-wracking 
whine. But the thing that fascinated me 
most was the microscope. I cannot say 
in all truth that I regarded it as an in- 
strument of magic, for, in spite of all my 



imaginativeness, I was always very sus- 
picious of anything smacking of the 
miraculous. I had long doubted the ex- 
istence of ogres, elves, and pixies, es- 
pecially the last ; I always had to finish 
my neglected work, no matter what I 
did to lure the little workers out. Rather 
I classed the microscope with the magic 
looking-glass of my favorite fairy tales. 
One called for something, turned a 
wheel, and saw it ! The analogy was 
made even more apparent by the fact 
t;hat the high wizard waved a magic 
glass rod over the slide and let fall 
thereon a magic drop of some magic 
elixir. I suspected hokum in both phe- 
nomena, but somehow I was unable to 
put my finger on it. 

I have greatly enjoyed being a doctor's 
son. The position was' fraught with 
pleasure and importance. I used to puff 
with pride when some stranger would 
ask my identity. I knew very well that 
some herring-barrel Buddha would re- 
ply, "Him? That thar's Doc's oldest 
kid." Then perhaps that would call into 
my pleasant train of thought bitter re- 
flections concerning the segregation of 
us professional children into favored 
classes. It has long been wormwood in 
my tea that the despised "Preacher's 
kids" should have literary precedence 
over me and my kind. It cannot be that 
they have any superior record for bad 
behavior, for I have often heard the 
Keepers of Velvety Lawns say that 
"Doc's kids are even meaner than the 
Reverend's brats." We certainly make as 
much noise and can hold our own in 
physical encounter. The preference has 



[1] 



always seemed to me to be wholly arbi- 
trary and unfair. The great influence of 
the printed word upon the American 
public has kept us in the background for 
generations. It is our sincere hope that 
science will triumph in the end. 

This vicious and derogatory literary 
favoritism has resulted in total indiffer- 
ence to the intellectual and professional 
equipment of "Young Doc." He must be 
a widely informed young animal, an au- 
thority, even though self-constituted, on 
ever}1:hing, from stomach-ache to cancer. 
The lay brethren and sisterhood offici- 
ating in the public schools are often wont 
to call upon him for any information 
pertaining to the profession. I remem- 
ber one momentous incident of the sort. 
My teacher had called upon me to sup- 
plement the report of our hygiene book 
upon the dire diseases incurred by neg- 
lecting a head cold. I was ignorant even 
of what the text had to offer on the sub- 
ject, but my peroration on it brought 
about a substantial reduction in the rate 
of snifiles and no doubt drummed up 
some custom for the office. One is often 
called upon to diagnose schoolboy aches 
and pains. I established my fame as a 
diagnostician on one case. I have re- 
mained carefully silent since then. My 
bosom pal came to Sunday School one 
morning (back in the days when my 
vagrant soul was forced back on the 
"straight and narrow" once a week) with 
a severe pain located in the region of 
his belt buckle. He disrupted Biblical 
discussion with his heroically suppressed 
groans and his writhings on a squeaky 
chair. At last I consented to poke an 
exploratory finger into his middle and 
advance an opinion upon what caused 
the complications. I stroked my chin and 
pondered in the most approved bed-side 
manner. When I had drained the last 
drop of attention from the situation, I 



rapped out cryptically, "If I were you, 
I wouldn't delay in having that appendix 
out!" and refused to elucidate further. 
Whether my pronouncement had any- 
thing to do with subsequent events, I do 
not know ; but they did an emergency 
appendectomy upon the poor fellow next 
morning at the hospital. 

I always had enough simulated pro- 
fessional aplomb to carry off such scenes 
without loss of face. My hardest task 
was learning to answer the telephone. I 
can't persuade a caller to disclose his 
identity. I sincerely believe that the fad 
for high-pressure salesmanship has 
brought on this reticence about reveal- 
ing one's name. The average person 
"ain't ago'inta commit hisself." If, by 
some means of vocal violence or trickery, 
I am able to extort the name, nine times 
out of ten I am forced to plead ignor- 
ance of the person's system of orthog- 
raphy and to ask him to spell it. Then 
he hangs up, but I must proceed with the 
trying task of reaching each port of call 
in the morning itinerary in the endeavor 
to find my will-o'-the-wisp sire. I solved 
the whole problem one day by telling 
one of his oldest patients that he was 
"missing," that he had disappeared, I 
knew not where. Before he reappeared, 
after a long chess game, my "missing" 
father had been telephonically kidnapped 
and murdered in most of the ap- 
proved bloodier methods. I have ample 
cause to remember the aftermath of the 
furor. 

It is not strange that at such moments 
my brain revolts against the load put 
upon it. Besides its daily routine, the 
grey matter must keep a sort of card- 
index "Who's Who among Papa's 
Patients" for lightning reference. I am 
presumed to remember each and every 
one of them. No doubt I have met all of 
them at one time or another. Perhaps 



[2] 



they clucked and twittered over my 
early period crib or mayhap composed a 
familiar compliment to my indolent eye- 
brow yesterday. "My goo'ness ! Yer 
gittin' t' look more like yer paw every 
day! Ain't he now, Lizzie?" Lizzie dis- 
agrees. She opines that I favor my 
"maw." Providence may here intervene 
by imposing an altercation while the sub- 
ject of the controversy fades gratefully 
into the background. 

Lizzie and her friend are but two 
drops of brandy from the cosmopolitan 
mincemeat which the wheels of the gods 
grind through a country doctor's office. 
His waiting room is the common meet- 
ing place of all — the producers, the mid- 
dlemen, and the consumers ; mortgagor 
and mortgagee ; young and old. It is the 
living proof that "it takes all kinds." 
This kaleidoscopic whirl of dramatic 
characters carry with them a host of 
equally dramatic episodes. Many times 
I have been awakened in the middle of 
the night by the insistent ringing of the 
telephone or the wracking grind of the 
starter on the weather-beaten old Dodge. 
Here was the making of drama — tragedy 
perhaps, suicide, murder, horrible acci- 
dents, sudden death; or a humble bit of 
pageantry to welcome a new individual. 

Besides sating one's taste for the dra- 
matic, life in a doctor's household pre- 
sents other advantages not always ex- 
perienced by the layman's progeny. A 
doctor is often a power in a small town. 
My father was once a member of the 
local school board, and I profited greatly 
during his tenure of office. I was an 
envied figure in my school and gloried 
in my importance. I seem to have been 
endowed with more than my share of 
arrogance and self-importance. Jehu and 
his chariot would have been relegated 
to the ditch had we chanced to pass on 
the way to make a call. No Hindu 



howdah could have been half so inviting 
or so regal as the use-polished front seat 
of the Dodge. We used to rattle along 
at the breath-taking rate of thirty miles 
an hour after I had learned not to fall 
out when we hit a bump. I'll wager that 
no potentate was ever greeted by such a 
variety of salutes as we received when 
we slid to a stop in the barnyard of our 
destination. Squadrons of pigeons 
swooped overhead, and the greyhounds 
of the port coursed about, saluting as 
they circled, while the porcine land bat- 
teries over behind the barn grunted their 
greetings. George, the rooster, assembled 
his clarion-voiced bugle corps and ac- 
companied the march of the geese and 
turkeys who ambled down like lords and 
ladies to give us the latchstring to the 
farm. Our heavy ordnance replied in 
kind, especially when we slowed up to 
make the turn. The Dodge had lost half 
her muffler somewhere along her well- 
run road, and when she throttled down, 
the result was startling, to say the least. 
There is also the advantage of careful 
preservation of health. The only diffi- 
culty therein is that sometimes the care 
becomes burdensomely careful. I was 
but rarely allowed to go barefooted 
when I was at the "barefoot boy" age; 
in fact, my fancies of this sort were in- 
dulged outside the immediate sphere of 
parental influence. I also had to steal 
moments to seek the illicit joys of the 
tempting pop-bottle and the lowly tri- 
china-infested frankfurter. Perhaps it 
was to my -advantage that my voracious 
appetite was restricted to more prosaic 
fare, but what joy there was in the 
golden moments at the county fair pop- 
stand before some weasel-footed rela- 
tive appeared to cry, "Verboten !" People 
would smile as "Young Doc's" frank- 
furter was confiscated as contraband of 
kinship. I was always "Young Doc" to 



[3] 



the older men and "Doc" to my play- 
mates. The name was wished on me 
before I had a chance to establish one 
of individuality. It was the shadow of 
my father thrown upon my nickname 
even as he threw it upon my career, all 
unconsciously, of course. No matter 
what my ideas have been, some people 
have never had a doubt but that I would 
eventually study medicine. 

What chance have I to attain distinc- 
tion in his field if I should choose it? 
There would be no doubt but that I must 
look forward to long years of hard work, 
a keen struggle for recognition, profes- 
sional enmity, and lay ignorance or 
criminal indifference to the achievements 
of medicine for the public weal. It does 
not demand the insight of a crystal- 
gazer to predict a new era in medicine. 



First, however, the layman must break 
away from the absurd fetishes and ta- 
boos which he has set up, and allow the 
practitioner to work as he would for 
their mutual benefit. There will be drama 
in the making. Some will weave the 
romantic web of the marvel of medicine 
as Vesalius, Harvey, Jenner, and Bant- 
ing have done. If I choose to join their 
profession, I cannot follow in my fath- 
er's footsteps, much as I should like to 
try, for the day of the general prac- 
titioner is surely setting against the ris- 
ing dawn of specialization. There is 
something, however, which draws me 
toward the caduceus, as it drew my par- 
ents and their fathers before them. And 
the oracles seem to foretell the existence 
of another who will be just "Doc's oldest 
kid." 



Why Do People Collect Stamps? 



Hamilton Hall 
Theme 8, Rhetoric II, 1924-25 



]\ yr ANY times I have had the question 
■^'^ asked m.e, "Why do people collect 
stamps ?" I have answered it in the same 
way so many times that I am going to 
answer it here for the last time. I am 
going to put my reasons into print and 
have copies sent to all my friends. I 
am going to put a small table by my door 
and a notice to the effect that anyone 
who feels even the slightest urge to ask 
"Why collect stamps?" should take a 
copy and study it, and thereby find the 
answer to his question without bothering 
me. I have reached the limit of my en- 
durance in turning from a study of an 
early American issue that might be 
salmon pink or rose pink or just plain 



pink to spend half an hour in usually 
futile explanation to some well-meaning 
interrupter. This paper, I hope, will 
silence all future questioners. 

To sort through a jumbled stack of old 
postage stamps, some of them bearing 
names of mystic places on their post- 
marks, is to take a flight into the land 
of romance and fiction. Let the imagi- 
nation have free rein as you pick from 
the heap a stamp bearing, in dim, blurred 
marking, the magic name, Singapore. In- 
stantly there flash to your mind innum- 
erable pictures of swaggering seamen 
on leave, carousing, battling for their 
lives with half-caste Malays in a dark, 
dirty, river-front street, of emaciated 



[4] 



English fugitives from society, in a hid- 
den den of opium smokers, enjoying the 
blissful, exhilarating soaring of a few 
hours' dream; of native jungle societies 
meeting in the very center of the city to 
sway the lives of thousands of poor 
peasants through the medium of mysti- 
cism and terror. All this is to be seen 
and more, unless one's imagination has 
become too dull to respond to such a 
call. Pick another stamp from the mass. 
Turn it over and read the postmark. It 
might be from any corner of the earth; 
it might have carried its sealed message 
of business or friendship or love or death 
far across the stormy sea from someone 
in an icy, wind-swept, barren village of 
Labrador; it might have carried news of 
a traveler, halted in a peaceful oasis far 
across the burning, deathly still, white 
sands of the Sahara. If these stamps 
could speak, what tales of intrigue, of 
romance, of sorrow they could tell. 

But there is a practical as well as an 
imaginative appeal in this hobby. Five 
years ago a stamp was sold at auction 
for $48,000. This stamp is the most 
highly valued in the world, a black stamp 
of British Honduras, a trifling ninety 
years old. There are actually thousands 
of stamps in existence that demand many 
hundreds of dollars, and, moreover, are 
sold every day for their price. Age is 
not the only factor in deciding value. 
There are numerous issues containing 
errors that have become highly valuable. 
A sheet of air-mail stamps was errone- 
ously issued by the engraving department 
at Washington last year. The sheet had 
been printed from two plates, one of 
which had been inverted, causing one 
page to have inverted centers. A quick- 
thinking employee noticed it in his regu- 
lar inspection and bought it at face 
value, $8.00. A week later he had sold it 
to a large New York department store 



owner for a thousand dollars. The em- 
ployee lost his job but was a thousand 
dollars richer by losing it. Occasions 
such as this are not uncommon, and to 
find valuable errors in everyday circula- 
tion is far from an impossibility. To find 
a variation in design in a stamp on an 
old letter is a thrill comparable to that 
which the first gold seeker in California 
must have had on discovering his first 
nugget. It may mean anything from a 
few dollars to several hundreds as a re- 
ward, or it may mean only the satisfac- 
tion of adding an oddity to a collection. 
The latter is often the more pleasing 
sensation. 

The money value element is equalled 
as a lure to stamp-collecting by the 
natural desire or instinct, if you will, of 
man to create order, to organize, to 
build. The urge to collect or hoard is 
prominent and is satisfied in various 
ways. The philatelist chooses to collect 
postage receipts. He finds satisfaction in 
efficient and interesting arrangement of 
his collection. He arranges them by 
country, by year, by denomination, by 
design, by color, or by more technical 
details, such as watermark, perforation, 
engraving, or paper. He never tires of 
reorganization, for it is there that some 
of the most interesting sides of philately 
appear. There are endless variations 
that call for expert handling to arrange 
them precisely and artistically so that in 
time to come a stamp that has been filed 
away permanently is not lost. 

Besides this mechanical appeal of 
stamp collecting there is the art interest. 
Art is not lacking in stamps. Some are 
gems of engraving, delicate, fine, per- 
fectly colored, and their beauty alone 
repays the collector. Early British colony 
issues are eagerly sought after, for they 
are delicately executed, and the beautiful 
head of Queen Victoria that appears on 



[S] 



them is a credit to the art of engraving. 
There is a deep, yet elusive, feeling of 
all the hauteur and pride of the British 
Empire expressed in that profile. What 
a far cry this stamp is from some of the 
rough, brilliantly colored, eye-catching 
issues of the smaller modern countries. 
No wonder collectors seek the old and 
pass more lightly over the new. 

Lastly, there is comfort in stamp col- 
lecting. It is a haven for the worried 
mind, and a place to rest. On a howling 
winter evening let the collector sit com- 
fortabl}^ at a table before a crackling fire 



with his stamps spread in books before 
him, and he is lost to the cares and ex- 
acting duties of the day. His mind be- 
comes rested in the soothing romance 
that radiates from the volumes. He can 
tour the world in those pages. Magic 
names flash by: Crete, Iraq, Gold Coast, 
Gibraltar, Tunis, Madagascar, Haiti, 
Honduras, Hejas, and countless others. 
As a hobby, philately offers monetary 
reward, art, the fascination and satis- 
faction which come from planning and 
work, and lastly, romance. What more 
can be asked? 



Volume of Poetry 

Florence P. Newton 

Harvester of dreams made tangible, 
Of smiles in lines. 

And tears in drops of ink; 
Keeper of a night's still, studious hours, 
When men, in lifting pen, 

Made thousands think. 



Dance Orchestra Musicians 

Robert Nutting 
Theme 7, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

THAT group of musicians who make orchestras ; and, finally, the ideal dance 
their living playing popular tunes on man, who "fits" in every way into his 
legitimate instruments are known as position. 



"dance orchestra musicians," or simply 
"dance men." In their degrees of intel- 
lectual attainment and musical ability 
they can be classified in three prevalent 
types ; the "jazz mad" individual, who 
"picks up" the instrument by himself; 
the well-schooled concert man, who is 
forced by circumstances to play in dance 



The appalling musical and moral con- 
ditions in the majority of "small-time" 
dance orchestras in this country prove 
the prevalence of the "jazz mad" type. 
He is usually to be found in some "barn- 
storming" organization or on location at 
some mediocre cafe. He has had little 
or no musical training but holds what 



[6] 



small amount of prestige he possesses by 
the novelty use of his instruments. In his 
own eyes he is a master performer and, 
because of this egotistical complex, usu- 
ally progresses but little, either musically 
or mentally. Like most self -esteemed 
people he is happy and confident in his 
work. Morally he is a mere follower of 
custom, and the ordinary diversions of 
jazz-band people are notoriously without 
ethical limit. He is the gipsy of the 
dance-band world. 

The "converted" concert man differs 
from the "jazzy" type in almost every 
respect. He is highly trained musically 
and, as a result, has had to train himself 
mentally. He is usually found in that 
class of orchestras which play for com- 
mercial radio programs or for the 
making of phonograph records. He has 
been forced into the dance music "game" 
under stress of financial circumstances 



and, because of this and his knowledge 
of finer music, is seldom very happy at 
his work. He grinds out his music with 
mathematical precision but is unable to 
put much of his real self into it. In most 
cases he is a home-loving person who has 
tried all his life to make a business out 
of better music and, because of the per- 
verted public taste, has failed. 

The ideal dance orchestra musician 
is a combination of the "hotcha" musi- 
cian and the musically well-trained man. 
He has become technically superior on 
his instrument without having delved too 
much into high-class music. In other 
words he has not cultivated his taste to 
the extent that he is dissatisfied or dis- 
contented with his work. The glamour of 
showmanship has a permanent appeal to 
him, and, with temperance, he blends into 
the gay and fast-moving life. He "fits" 
his position, and his position "fits" him. 



^ 

y 




[7] 



H. 



fJOMECOMING, like 
* * tic, is something that both students 
and alumni would be quite happy to see 
abolished. I am certain that the students 
would like to have this unspeakably tir- 
ing week-end abolished, because I can 
hear all about me the complaints and 
sorrowful comments of men whose 
towels, shaving equipment, shirts, ties, 
suits, and girl-friends are to be taken 
from them from Friday until Sunday 
afternoon ; I am almost equally sure 
that the alumni would be quite satisfied 
to have Homecoming done away with, 
because from the looks on the visitors' 
faces, both when they alight from their 
automobiles and when they leave for 
Chicago, it is easy to see that there are 
hundreds of places where they would 
rather be. 

Of course, such unpopularity as 
Homecoming enjoys must be deserved. 
It is. Put yourself, for a moment, in the 
place of the boy enrolled in the univer- 
sity. At the time of the semester when 
Homecoming occurs, he is, if he is 
normal and enjoying life at all, behind 
in his school work, short of funds, and 
in the midst of a more or less torrid 
romance. However, with all these Com- 
plications, he is still looking at the world 
through rose-colored glasses ; the sky is 
blue, and the songs of the southbound 
birds are music to his ears. Suddenly 
into this happy atmosphere comes a 
blight, a plague, in the form of sixty or 
seventy whooi)ing, carousing, borrowing 
alumni. The peace of the fraternity, and 
of the campus in general, is broken, and 
it cannot be regained for at least a week 



omecoming 

Howard Klein 
Theme 4, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

Interscholas- after this horde has gone. The scholastic 
assignments drop still further behind, 
the debts mount higher, and the course 
of true love runs less smoothly than ever 
before. Is it any wonder that the hosts 
of Homecoming week-end feel as they 
do about it? 

Now take it from the opposite angle — 
that of the alumni group. Most of them 
are in business, and a number of them 
have taken wives unto themselves. They 
can no longer go out on a binge, and 
recover completely in half a day, and 
they are more conscious of their grow- 
ing inadequacies than the casual observer 
is likely to imagine. All they want is 
time to take care of their business, to get 
sufficient sleep, and to be left alone to 
enjoy their college days merely through 
retrospect and memory. All of a sudden 
they are roused by a blood-curdling letter 
from the social committee of their old 
fraternity — an invitation to come back to 
school for another week-end of gross 
dissipation. They shudder, invariably, 
but are too proud to admit their debility ; 
too ashamed that they have no desire to 
keep in step with the young men. And 
so they come. They come, and for forty- 
eight hours they eat bad food, drink bad 
liquor, feel the burden of imposition that 
they are placing on the younger men, and 
get no sleep at all. Is it any wonder that 
the guests of Homecoming week-end 
feel as they do about it? 

Is there any doubt, in the face of this 
evidence, that anyone who has anything 
to do with Homecoming week-end would 
like to see it abolished ? 



[8] 



My Love for Switzerland 



Margaret Kunz 
Theme 7 , Rhetoric II, 1934-35 
WITZERLAND ! The very word posing forces. 



Switzerland saw its be- 



^ thrilled my whole being with a host 
of vague memories and glorious expec- 
tations. Having spent a year there as a 
small child, I had many scattered impres- 
sions of that country: enormous choco- 
late bars displayed in neat shop win- 
dows ; gloriously rosy-tinted Alps in the 
light of the setting sun; little brown 
Swiss chalets snuggled against each 
other in quiet, little mountain villages ; 
and hordes of aunts and uncles and other 
relatives eyeing me curiously to see if 
I was a worthy descendant. And now 
I Avas to spend another year of my life 
in Switzerland. Great, very great were 
my expectations ! I wondered whether 
I would find that my memory had not 
built up an entirely imaginary Switzer- 
land and whether I would love Switzer- 
land as much as upon my first visit. My 
"wonderings" were soon satisfied. After 
spending my second year in Switzerland, 
I understood its people and its institu- 
tions so much better than upon my first 
visit and had seen so many more of its 
natural wonders that my love was great- 
ly increased ; it became an integral part 
of me. Probably in view of the fact 
that both of my parents grew up in 
Switzerland, this consciousness was to be 
expected ; but I know it never could have 
been without my learning to love the 
Swiss people through actual living with 
them in their own beautiful surround- 
ings. 

While attending school in Zurich for 
a period of five months, I learned some- 
thing of the history of the little nation 
tucked between the more-powerful Euro- 
pean countries like a referee between op- 



ginning in 1291 when Uri, Schwyz, and 
Unterwalden formed a confederation to 
protect themselves against the oppres- 
sions of the representatives of the Holy 
Roman Empire of which they were a 
part. One by one the other twenty-two 
cantons joined the confederation until 
in about 1800 the joining of Tesine, 
Wallis, and Neuenberg produced Switz- 
erland as we see it today. The govern- 
ment is a true democracy, and in all its 
policies and actions expresses the desire 
of the people for neutrality and peace. 
The form of the government is very 
much like ours here in America. There 
are three branches: the legislative, com- 
posed of an upper and a lower house ; the 
judicial body, composed of seven judges; 
and the executive branch, composed of a 
ministerial cabinet, which annually elects 
one of its members to serve as president 
for one year. Parties and the crooked 
methods they use in America play a 
small part in politics ; a man is elected 
for his merits and the principles for 
which he stands. On the whole the 
people feel a more genuine respect for 
their government than we do here in 
America, 

The population of Switzerland is 
about three and a half million. Of this 
number about seventy-five per cent live 
in rural districts and make their living 
from the soil and from such industries 
as silk-weaving, wood-carving, and 
watch-making. The Swiss peasants are 
a hard-working, contented people who 
live calm, steady, patient lives, forcing 
the bare essentials out of the soil by old- 
fashioned devices. Having spent about 



[9] 



two months with my aunt in one of these 
rural villages, I became acquainted with 
their philosophies of life, which are 
strongly colored by religion. They believe 
that the only honest way to live and pro- 
gress is through hard work and a strong 
faith in a Higher Power. The lives 
of these peasants reflect this philosophy 
through a spirit of happy, satisfied, 
routine living which is broken by occa- 
sional festivities such as a wedding or a 
fair. Their modest yet attractive homes, 
brightened by green shutters and color- 
ful window boxes, and their fields of 
potatoes, rye, or wheat speak of a well- 
developed sense of tidiness and thrift. 
Their beautiful home lives, strengthened 
by genuine bonds of affection among the 
members of the families, produce an at- 
mosphere rarely found in America. 

The Swiss cities are beautifully built 
and tell of prosperous, beauty-loving 
citizens who take pride in their homes 
and cities. We spent five months in 
Zurich, one of the finest of Swiss cities, 
which is situated right on Lake Zurich. 
From our hotel, which stood at the top 
of the Zurichberg, we had an impressive 
view down over the city, which is di- 
vided in two by the slow-moving waters 
of the Aare. The hundreds of church 
steeples whose bells set the city into vi- 
brations of glorious silvery music on 
Sunday mornings and the magnificent 
garden-surrounded homes create a color- 
ful scene. Bern, the capital of Switzer- 
land, Geneva, Luzern, and Basle are 
other Swiss cities which express the 
highly developed aesthetic sense of their 
inhabitants. These city people are firm, 
honest, sincere human beings making a 
living through honest trades and busi- 
nesses. Their stores are mostly private- 
ly owned. We found few "chain-stores" 
and big department stores. The down- 
town areas, usually situated in the oldest 



parts of the cities, are crossed by nar- 
row streets occasionally opening into big 
squares decorated with sparkling foun- 
tains or statues of Swiss heroes. 

Although I admire Switzerland both 
for its democratic institutions and 
honest, serious citizens, my greatest ad- 
miration arises out of the almost inde- 
scribable wonders of the natural world 
with its beautiful mountains, lakes, and 
forests. Perhaps I can best describe to 
you the sovereignty of the Swiss Alps 
by relating briefly our trip up to the 
Kleine Scheidegg, a big plateau situated 
high in the Bernese Alps. We left the 
little village of Grindelwald, which is 
tucked way down in the bottom of the 
Rhine Valley, early in the morning and 
followed a path leading up through 
sweet-smelling clover meadows where 
lazy, contented cows stood grazing inno- 
cently in the morning sun. The silvery 
tinkle of their bells added a musical 
quality to the otherwise unbroken early- 
morning silence. As we progressed 
slowly, steadily uphill, we came through 
fragrant pine forests where treading on 
soft beds of pine needles rested our 
weary feet. From time to time we 
passed a few dreary little mountain huts 
with thin columns of blue smoke rising 
from their chimneys to tell us that the 
proprietors had already started the fires 
burning under their big vats of milk 
from which the famous Swiss cheeses 
are made. Now the path led from mead- 
ows richly carpeted with Alpine roses, 
blue gentians, and velvety purple pansies 
through several big beds of snow and 
ice. We knew that we must be approach- 
ing our goal. Suddenly a sharp turn in 
the path brought us face to face with 
that celebrated mountain trio, "Jungfrau, 
Monch, and Eiger." We stopped, almost 
frightened by these glistening, sparkling 
treacherous monarchs gazing down upon 



[10] 



us in all their royal splendor. Their 
jagged glaciers, stinging white snow 
beds, and lofty summits reaching into 
another world presented a forceful sight. 
We felt keenly the presence of a Higher 
Power in these mountains ; and a great 
humility came over us. 

The Jura mountains with their gentle 
grassy slopes and thinly-wooded areas 
tell of a more ancient existence. Spend- 
ing a day with them makes one calm and 
serene and happy. They face one of the 
most beautiful of Swiss lakes, Lake Ge- 
neva, over which peers the distant Mont 
Blanc like a far-away yet mighty sov- 



ereign. The historic sites on Lake Ge- 
neva such as Chateau Chillon and the 
wealthy resort towns like Montreux and 
Vevey attract many beauty-seeking tour- 
ists. Luzern lies on the Vierwaldstadter 
See, which is another of the deep blue 
Swiss lakes surrounded by rugged peaks. 
This combination of mountain and lake 
scenery in Switzerland is unique. 

Yes, I feel that Switzerland is a part 
of me and will always remain a part of 
me. Anyone who has really inhaled the 
atmosphere of beauty and honesty and 
stability found there will, I am sure, feel 
the same way. 




I Like the French 

Gertrude Stier 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



T HAVE often asked myself why I like 
■'• the French, and after a certain amount 
of deliberation I have come to the con- 
clusion that it is because their racial 
characteristics are everything that mine 
are not. Emotionally and mentally they 
are the antithesis of the Germans. 



My unprejudiced opinion is that the 
French are not superior mentally to the 
Germans, but they are much more alert. 
They have the art of clever innuendo 
developed to a fine point, while the Teu- 
ton is blunt and literal ; they are quick 
at repartee, while the German hesitates. 



[11] 



hems, and haws until the spirit of the 
controversy sinks with a leaden thud. 
The Frenchman's intellectual tastes are 
so versatile that one day he is uplifted 
by the inspiration of philosophy, the 
next, he pursues the pagan pleasures of 
the flesh, and the third day perhaps, he 
is enmeshed in the thrall of science. The 
German, on the other hand, is practical 
and generally perfects himself in one line 
of thought or endeavor, but ordinarily 
we do not think of him as versatile in his 
tastes. Can you visualize William I or 
Bismarck, standing with rapt admiration 
before the perfect lines of a Venus de 
Milo? 

My principal reason for liking the 
French, however, rests upon the emo- 
tional difference. From earliest child- 
hood I was fed upon theories of Spar- 
tan-like fortitude. Extremes of emotion 
were frowned upon, and the happy mean, 
which results in a colorless lack of 
ecstasy, was taught as the ideal. Now, 
I look at the Frenchman with his gaiety, 
his vivacity, his joie de vivre, and wish 
that I might be like that, but although 
the heights and depths of emotion may 
exist within my nature, the expression 
of them is impossible. The Frenchman 



makes love as gracefully as he does 
everything else, and, in spite of the fact 
that my masculine contemporaries may 
consider that a questionable accomplish- 
ment, to the feminine heart it is a virtue 
that would improve many a boring 
swain. Then, the Frenchman seems to 
derive pleasure from such trivial things. 
He has an infinite capacity for finding 
something beautiful in his everyday life, 
or at least something which seems beau- 
tiful to him. There is a friendliness in 
his treatment of everyone that is as re- 
freshing as a warm April rain, for it 
seems to draw out each person's latent 
qualities for good. His temper, while 
not as even as that of the German, is 
sweeter in this respect — when he be- 
comes angry, he is at red-hot heat for 
a moment and then cools down and 
forgets, but the smoldering resentment 
of the German race is almost pro- 
verbial. 

It may be that I am unduly influenced 
by the type of Frenchman I have met 
personally, but they were such pleasant 
companions that I give credit to the race 
that can produce an everchanging source 
of interest — a chameleon of tempera- 
ment. 



Moonbeams on Water 

Florence P. Newton 

The tardy moon 
Rose from the sea, 
And careless in 
Her fright. 
Pressed upon 
Each peaked wave 
Footprints 
Of yellow light. 



[12] 



Big Houses, Little Houses 

Herbert Kastien 
Theme 7, Rhetoric I, 1934-25 

J~^VER since I can remember, my ment, currents of electricity shot through 

my hand and arm ; I was so frightened 
by the shock from the switch that I came 



■'— ' family has moved a great deal. 
During my life I have lived in seven 
different homes, which have ranged from 
five-room bungalows to fourteen-room 
houses. I can remember each place dis- 
tinctly, not as a house but as a scene of 
some past action. When I think of a 
house, I think of the incidents that took 
place in it, and I connect it with some 
past pleasure or pain. 

The first home in which I lived was 
a bungalow. It was truly a child's para- 
dise, for it had everything that a small 
boy could desire. Toys and pets of all 
sorts helped me to enjoy myself for 
hours at a time. I owned the world. 
While I was still very small, I experi- 
enced my first change of home ; we 
moved to my grandmother's. But no 
sooner had I become accustomed to my 
new environment than I contracted 
whooping cough. Often I would 
"whoop" for hours at a time; I could 
get relief only when I slept. This made 
it necessary that I stay in bed for six 
months. Although the room in which I 
was confined was pleasant enough, how 
little and dreary it grew to be ! How 
glad I would be when I could play and 
do as I wanted again! As soon as I was 
well, I decided to make a tour of the 
house by myself. Every corner from the 
basement to the attic was within my 
reach. Being naturally inquisitive, I de- 
cided to learn how the attic light switch 



to regard everything in the house with 
fear. I would even hide in my room 
while the vacuum sweeper was being 
used. 

After living in my grandmother's 
dreadful house, I was more than pleased 
to move to an apartment. Life there was 
perfect, for I had a new baby sister to 
help take care of. For hours I would sit 
by the cradle watching her, and when 
she would cry, I was not content until 
the nurse had quieted her. While she 
was learning to walk, we moved again. 
She was not quite so important now, for 
I had started to school and was making 
friends with my schoolmates. 

Then came two new homes in quick 
succession; first, I found myself in the 
country, with a large yard, a stable, and 
ponies. We lived in the country for two 
years, and during that time I learned to 
ride and to enjoy the out-of-doors. 
Whenever the weather was fit, a large 
group of us would go for long rides on 
our ponies, often camping out for the 
night. Never before or since have I so 
thoroughly enjoyed myself. Finally, in 
the third summer, much to my disap- 
pointment, Father decided to move back 
to town, and in town we have lived ever 
since. 

As I grow older, I appreciate more 
and more the importance of the houses I 



worked. After taking it apart, I began have lived in. They have been homes to 
to explore the inside of it with a metal me, and as home they recall pleasant 
tool of some sort. Much to my amaze- memories. 



[13] 



The City Drug-Store 

Shirley Goodman 
Theme 7, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 



npHE old drug-store, once a family 
* institution, is rapidly becoming ex- 
tinct. Not many years ago, a wooden 
sign saying simply "Drugs" proclaimed 
to the world that here was a place where 
one might buy liniment, liver pills, 
stomach tablets, or any concoction desig- 
nated by his physician. In the window, 
on each side, were two great glass globes 
filled with blue, red, or green water 
which held a peculiar fascination for 
the neighborhood children. The window 
display consisted of intricate pyramids 
built of the bottles of somebody's re- 
markable patent medicine, which was 
guaranteed to cure every human ailment 
and grow hair on bald heads. As one 
opened the door, the jolly tinkling of a 
bell announced his arrival. The hardy 
odors of camphor, chloroform, and am- 
monia were prevalent, giving the place 
a therapeutic atmosphere. Looking 
around the room, he might observe 
shelves of important-looking jars and 
bottles covered with a film of dust. A 
door at the back of the room, bearing the 
warning "Private," led to the chamber 
where the mysterious alchemy was per- 
formed. There is one such place left 
near our house — a real drug-store whose 
only business is selling drugs ; but every- 
body in the neighborhood has his pre- 
scriptions filled at Walgreen's. 

The drug-store of to-day is also an 
institution, but a very different one. In 
the window one finds the portrait of a 
moving-picture actress who smokes 
Camels for her nerves, a new mechanical 
toy for children, the current best-sellers 
at popular prices, and Suzette's rejuve- 
nating wrinkle cream. The neon sign 



flashes the name of the proprietor, fol- 
lowed by a motto telling you to meet 
your friends there. This saves the owner 
the embarrassment of classifying his 
store. Plastered on the door and win- 
dows are signs telling of the latest foun- 
tain specialties. Walking inside, one sees 
a sight which vies with the old-world 
market-places. The enormous, white- 
tiled room is subdivided. Across one 
long wall is the sparkling chromium and 
marble fountain where he may order 
drinks, delicious steak dinners, toasted 
sandwiches, or amazing compounds of 
digestion-ruining substances. In one 
corner is a rack containing all the most 
popular movie and detective magazines. 
On the other side is the fragrant cos- 
metic counter, where one may buy all the 
essentials to feminine well-grooming. In 
the middle of the room is a table on 
which toys and games are displayed. 
Here tennis-rackets, golf-clubs, ping- 
pong sets, and all the newest bathing 
togs may be purchased. Near the door 
is the tobacco counter w^here cigars, 
cigarettes, pipes, pipe-tobacco, snuff, and 
chewing-tobacco are sold. Atop this case 
is a chewing-gum vender and a tall dis- 
play of all kinds of candies. One counter 
offers greeting-cards for every occasion, 
and at another the customer may buy 
kitchen utensils. If one looks very care- 
fully, he will discover, tucked away be- 
hind the rental library, the prescription 
counter. 

The staid old city drug-store died 
with the age of sobriety. In its place is 
our new drug-store, bright, shiny, gay — 
emblematic of its era. 



[14] 



Reminiscing 



I 



Marian L. Baker 
Theme 3, Impromptu, Rhetoric I, 1934-25 

HAVE not traveled extensively or way. Sometimes, it seemed as if we 
often, but the few trips I have taken went right through people's yards. Chil- 



have impressed be very much, and I 
cannot forget them. The most vivid 
recollection I have of traveling is of a 
trip taken when I was about six years 
old. I lived then in southern Ohio, 
where I was born, and my mother's par- 
ents lived in Illinois. Every year our 
family went to visit them during the 
summer. My first trip to Illinois was 
taken when I was two months old. After 
that I came to Illinois every summer 
until I was seven, when we moved to this 
state. But this last trip still lingers 



dren would be playing in the yard, and 
the clothes would be hanging on the line. 
Then my eyes would close for a while. 

When I awoke, it was dark outside 
and very lonely looking. The lights in 
the train were on, and I could look out 
the window by pressing my face against 
the pane. We passed through small 
towns while the crossing bells rang and 
cars waited for us to go by. Lights 
flashed here and there — in homes, in 
stores, and on street corners. We passed 
another train — it was noisy, and its lights 



in my mind, a memory which I treasure were so bright. Then, again, we were by 
because it is such a simple, childlike ourselves on the track and nearing our 



fancy. 

My parents, sister, and I traveled on 
the train. I loved to ride and always had 
to sit next the window, from which I 
could hardly turn my eyes, so fascinating 
was the out-of-doors to me. I thought it 
queer how fast the telephone poles 
flashed by, and although I knew it was I 
that was moving, I fancied that it was 
they marching along as soldiers to a 
battle. I loved to hear the whistle of the 
train far ahead as if it were in the 
distance. We traveled over bridges 
spanning rivers and streams. How I 
disliked that! I always held my 
breath for fear that something might 
happen, but it never did — to my great 
relief. From the window I saw the 
broad fields and pastures of Indiana, the 
rolling hills and wooded districts, and 
the forests. How I loved the tall straight 
trees scattered here and there ! There 
were also the homes to see along the 



destination. 

Before I knew it, we were oflf the 
train and bundled into a car, a large 
open car, and were on our way again. 
The wind was furious and blew my hair 
in my face, but it felt good. The car 
made such a noise and the road was so 
uneven that I could not sleep although 
my eyes kept closing. When we stopped 
suddenly, we were before my grand- 
father's house. It was as if we were 
in the country — sweet scents from the 
garden, the crickets and katy-dids wel- 
coming us, and the refreshing qualities 
of the open air. I was hustled to bed 
but, being near the window, had to 
have another look outside. The stars 
were shining with brilliance, glittering 
at me boldly. The trees in front of the 
house seemed to bow down and welcome 
me. There was the continual din of the 
chirping of crickets and, again, the argu- 
ment of katy-did, katy-didn't. Then, as 



[15] 



if from another world came another call Again, it sounded — whoo ! With the 
— whoo! whoo! whoo! An owl! I laid hooting of an owl still ringing in my 
my head on the pillow and listened, ears, I went into a sound sleep. 



The Oklahoma City Oil Field 

Phillip Simon 
Theme 7, Rhetoric I, 1934-25 

THE smell of oil in the air, the sight The field had a marked effect on the 
of sweaty drillers scrambling up and progress of the city. Oklahoma City 
down the side of a rig, and the steady grew in five years from a hundred and 
hum of the cable tool as it plunges into fifty thousand people to a hundred 
the earth have a certain effect upon eighty-five thousand people. One en- 
people that can never be forgotten. It countered on the streets many foreigners 
is the lure of the oil game, the hope of who had traveled miles to investigate 
gold-lined pockets, that brings people of "this new million-dollar liquid called oil." 



all nationalities and creeds, of all de- 
nominations and faiths, and of all mo- 
tives to the newly found oil field. 

Thus it was no surprise, in the year 
1928, to see thousands of people trek 
to the new discovery in the oil world, the 
Oklahoma City Field. The word had 
passed around like wild-fire that the 
Mary Sudick had been struck just out- 
side Oklahoma City. This well was the 
largest in the world, producing fifty 
thousand barrels an hour. With oil sell- 
ing for two dollars and a half a barrel, 
it did not take long for the millions to 
pile up and the largest field in the world 
to start. Many other well discoveries 
immediately followed that of the Mary 
Sudick, and the large oil companies 
bought leases. With the large companies 
interested, the field developed very 
rapidly, and millions of dollars were 
made practically overnight. Men who 
were formerly unemployed were hired as 
tool pushers at twenty-five dollars a day ; 
farmers who once struggled for exist- 
ence found themselves in doubt between 
a Lincoln and a Rolls-Royce. 



The city became an attraction for tour- 
ists who desired to see an oil rig and to 
view at night the wells lighted by a 
hundred and fifty thousand lights. Of 
course the field "boomed" the business 
of the city, and poured thousands of 
dollars into the coffers of the city treas- 
ury as tax money. 

And yet, behind all the glamour of the 
oil field, there lurked a terrible monster 
of crime. The field brought not only 
good to the city but also evil. It was 
only natural that among all the people 
to make the rush to Oklahoma City 
there would be robbers, murderers, and 
criminals of the lowest type. Many of 
the people came with no intention of 
making an honest living, but of being 
parasites on society. This type of people 
caused the city council no end of trouble. 
Then the greedy oil companies, in search 
of more wealth, threatened not only the 
beauty of the city but the health of the 
inhabitants by drilling too close to the 
residential section. This caused another 
problem for the city council. They, of 
course, refused to allow the oil com- 



[16] 



panics to infringe upon the people's 
rights. 

Yes, the oil field has had its good and 
bad effects on Oklahoma City. It caused 
Roger Babson to state, "Without a 
doubt, the city that has weathered the 



storm of depression the best is Okla- 
homa City." It caused Homer Cum- 
mings. Attorney General of the United 
States, to say, "Without the oil field 
Oklahoma City would do away with 
seventy-five per cent of her crime." 



The Campus Week 



T 



Muriel Day 
Theme 6, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

HE Campus Week is unique in its plished intelligent expression which is in- 
tended to fool the instructor. Thursday 
afternoon the "coke n' smokes" are filled 
with the wanton spenders of father's 
hard-earned silver dollars and the latest 
low-down on the big-shot majority. 

The eyes of all Illini are filled with a 
gleam of hope on Friday. They may sit 
through a painful lecture on the mam- 
mals of Kalamazoo without yawning, for 
they are dreaming of the date Saturday 
night with the blond goddess. All races 
on the between-class track have moved 
down to a slow run. 

Saturday and Sunday are the days of 
rest and are different only because the 
student who has classes on Saturday 
morning will sleep Sunday morning in- 
stead. Saturday afternoon and evening 
are spent in pleasurable amusement 
whether the individual may choose to 
cheer the fighting Illini or dance at Brad- 
ley's to the tune of one dollar plus tax 
or the fire-escape. On Sunday afternoon 
the male population waits in line to see 
Mae West while the feminine sex tear 
their hair in useless expectations of a 
Sunday night supper-date. By ten-thirty 
P.M., nine hundred and ninety-nine stu- 
dents have resolved to make A's in all 
classes. Aren't we all here to study and 
receive an education? 



own carefree existence. Unlike the 
N. R. A. employee of definite working 
hours, the student works only when he 
finds time between practicing for foot- 
ball, phoning agriculture clubs for the 
Illini, or attending dance-committee 
meetings, not a definite eight hours a 
day. The Greeks may have had a word 
for the name of each day in the week, 
but the similarity between the hey-day 
of Socrates and the modern campus 
week ends with the word, Monday. 

Monday! the average Illini rises at 
five minutes to eight and eats his banana 
on the way to class while dodging in and 
out between elm-trees and police-dogs. 
The student has not a well-scrubbed 
classroom demeanor, but surveys the 
world from the fog of his own recollec- 
tion of Saturday night's broken milk- 
bottles. By Tuesday he has begun not 
only to recognize the surrounding land- 
marks but to take an active interest 
in Wednesday's Poli Sci hour examina- 
tion. 

Wednesday is the turning-point of the 
whole week; for life in an enveloping 
maze of pen and papers has taken on the 
hurried scramble for which we Ameri- 
cans are so ably reputed. It is on Thurs- 
day that all students have the accom- 



[17] 



"Exaltavit Humiles" 



Sylvia Stieren 
Theme 9, Rhetoric II, 1934-25 



"V T EXT to me in zoolog}^ laboratory sits 
■*■ ^ Emery. For every five drawings 
that the rest of the students make, he 
produces, on the average, three, while 
the instructor vainly urges him on to 
greater productivity. 

I envy Emery, the misfit, the failure, 
the laughing stock of the class. He has 
the scientific spirit of investigation; and 
that seems to be just the reason w^hy it 
may take him double time to pass the 
course. His soul stands serene. No one 
can hurry him ; he heeds not the clock. 
He knows what he wants from the 
course and it perturbs him not one whit 
that his scholastic rating is low. His 
work is its own reward. He doesn't 
need the plaudits of grades. I seldom 
find the time to locate under the miscro- 
scope even the minimum that is required 
of us, because the drawings must be 
made (by some wile or guile) and 
handed in on time if one wants a high 
grade. I work for the grade, and that's 
all I get — the grade. 

It seems to me that civilization is one 
long magnification of the qualities which 
Emery manifests. He tells me that he 
has never made high grades ; I compre- 
hend that to most people he would show 
little indication of brain because of his 
inability to soak up a lot of facts, and 
because of his lack of avidity for book 
lore. He is made of the stuff which peda- 
gogues prefer to scrap. Yet, just from 
sitting beside him in his rapt enthusiasm, 
I have comprehended more of the eternal 
verities of protoplasm than a score of 
lectures have conveyed to me. 

There is no lack of opinion that col- 



lege is no place for a student who makes 
no better grades than Emery. Yet, the 
very fact that such a person is in a 
school of higher education may be preg- 
nant with promise of his patience, steady 
effort, and determination to arrive. I 
recall one's saying that genius consists 
of holding on for just one minute longer. 
My six years of intimate observation of 
people struggling for place out in the 
"hard, cruel world" tends to confirm that. 
I note that the rareripes show an over- 
whelming tendency to rot early, for it is 
seldom their nature to conserve their 
energy. Supersensitiveness of mind is 
common to them so that their well-laid 
plans become "sicklied o'er by the pale 
cast of thought." They arrive less surely 
at comfort, and even celebrity, than the 
patient, industrious plodders. 

Much talent is late in flowering. Hub- 
bard lists somewhere a great number of 
men who were past fifty when their "im- 
mortal children" were brought into the 
world. As for Scott and Byron, the 
heavens gave no sign when those two 
entered the classroom. Ulysses S. Grant 
was past two score years before it w-as 
found he could do an}i:hing but ride a 
horse uncommonly well. Patrick Henry 
was considered stupid enough as a boy to 
drive any teacher to the flowing bowl, 
while Ingersoll was said to be sufficient 
to induce his mentors to opium or strong 
drink. The boy who stood at the foot of 
the class of 1934 graduates from West 
Point was honored because, some twenty- 
odd years before, his father had occupied 
the same lowly position, but had risen to 
eminence in the practical test of the 



[18] 



Skippy 



Dallas Achenbach 
Theme 11, Rhetoric II, 1923-34 



TT ALF of a graham cracker is balanced 
■^ * on the edge of the window sill, likely 
to topple over onto the slanting porch 
roof. On the limb of an adjacent maple, 
with his hind claws pricking the rough 
bark, his grey, plump body and expanded 
tail in rhythm with the soft motion of 
the branches, sits Skippy, sawing 
through a walnut. The inquiring eyes 
lift; they jerk toward the porch roof and 
then to the window sill. The nut bangs 
on the porch roof and thuds to the 
ground. Skippy makes a hurried head- 
first descent to the roof with a four- 
point landing. Here his bravado deserts 



nails over the shingles toward the 
cracker. The white curtain in the win- 
dow flutters, but Skippy does not wait 
to investigate. A blur shoots through the 
air like the swoop of a bat and disap- 
pears on the other side of the maple. A 
sleek, protruding head peers through the 
forks. Temptation overcomes fear. With 
an occasional spasmodic retreat the 
would-be thief slinks toward the win- 
dow sill. Reaching the window, he 
stretches out his neck in an attitude of 
careful watchfulness and stands petri- 
fied. His furry body jerks fitfully, but, 
instead of scurrying away, he bounces 



him. Nostrils quiver and eyes blink in to the window sill. Sharp needle teeth 

indecision. He sits down on his snatch the cracker. Grey bounds across 

haunches, forepaws suspended, and the roof onto the tree ; grey streaks up a 

makes a jerky survey of the roof. Cour- slender limb. Bits of crumbs sprinkle 

age returns with a forward scratch of the ground beneath. 



Matilda and Hepzibah 

Florence Butler 
Theme 13, Rhetoric II, 1933-34 



SOME of my happiest, as well as some 
of my unhappiest, childhood memo- 
ries are centered around the two Blake 
"girls." I can still distinctly remember 



pheasant quill on her velvet toque. 
Always they seemed to frown upon 
Matilda's brilliant red cherries or yield- 
ing black ostrich plume. Fascinated by 



sitting stiffly erect on the excessively this common spectacle, I used to watch 
hard wooden pew always occupied by the black plume nod or the cherries 
our family, and seeing Hepzibah and quiver as Matilda bowed surreptitiously 



Matilda march into church on Sunday 
morning. 

Hepzibah was always a little ahead of 
her sister, and the purple pansies on her 
summer hat were as unyielding as the 



to her neighbors while being towed down 
the aisle by the uncompromising Hepzi- 
bah, who never allowed her glance to 
stray to one side or the other. 

Hepzibah's rustling black taffeta quite 



[21] 



amused me — amused me far more than 
did Hepzibah herself. And it quite 
drowned out the gentler swish of 
Matilda's black alpaca. Both dresses 
were after the manner of the 1890's. 
But as a sort of compensation for my 
love of Hepzibah's dress, I adored Ma- 
tilda's back. It was a nice back, smoothly 
rounded and comfortable looking. Ma- 
tilda's head bobbed around jerkily while 
she vainly endeavored to keep awake to 
listen to the intolerably long and dry 
sermon. I found much consolation in the 
fact that even my da>1;ime idol could not 
stay awake to enjoy or profit by the 
preaching of any one of the long series 
of black-coated clergy that passed 
through our pulpit. 

The Sundays I liked best were those 
when Mother, as an especial favor to me, 
would allow me to sit with Matilda. 
Then I could nestle up close to her, rest- 
ing my head upon her ample bosom while 
I contentedly fell asleep sucking one of 
the round white peppermint lozenges that 
she always managed to dig out of her 
capacious purse. But I would have 
sooner thought of leaning on the North 
Pole — had I known there was a North 
Pole — than of leaning on Hepzibah's 



shoulder. For even her padded bodice 
could not conceal the barrenness of 
her body. Besides, she never for a mo- 
ment took her eyes off the face of the 
minister. 

Hepzibah was always acting the part 
of conscience and guide to Matilda. And 
Matilda had one of those sweet, uncom- 
plaining natures that seem to have been 
created for the sole purpose of giving the 
Hepzibahs someone to dominate. Ma- 
tilda would have been an ideal mother. 
Hepzibah could never have been any- 
thing but the genteel "old maid aunt" 
found in every family. While we took 
our childish woes and joys to Matilda 
and received cookies or scoldings or 
sympathy, depending upon the confi- 
dence, we went out of our way to avoid 
the unsmiling Hepzibah. Instinctively we 
could feel that she considered children 
"necessary evils" to be seen but not 
heard. 

So much a part of the village were 
these two dissimilar sisters that I feel 
that, if I were to return today, I would 
be greeted by a cheerful twinkle in the 
eyes of the dumpy Matilda and a cold, 
steely glance from the uncompromising 
Hepzibah. 




[22] 



My Aunt Harriet 

Harriet Coughenour 
Theme written on Rhetoric II final, May, 1934 



]\ yT Y Aunt Harriet is eighty-two and 
•^ *■ wealthy and walks with a cane. 
She is a bird-like little creature. Why, 
she eats nothing for dinner but vege- 
tables and crackers, and perhaps drinks 
a little hot water. But she lives — that is 
the miraculous thing. And every year we 
heave a sigh and check off another year 
for Aunt Harriet. And every year she 
buys a new hat, huge and high and black, 
with a flower in the back and a bow in 
the front, and every year we think, 
"How silly of her to buy a new hat when 
she is getting so old and feeble." But she 
goes on buying hats just the same and 
growing healthier every day. Every 
summer she gets tired of the city and 
goes to California, and each time we sigh 
and think it is the last time. But 
suddenly in September we get a telegram 
from Aunt Harriet saying she is arriving 
in town at midnight. Father grumbles 
and Mother fusses, but we all pile in the 
car and meet Aunt Harriet at midnight. 
She steps off the train, cane and all, and 
hobbles up to meet us, looking a little 
older and a little more feeble, and we 
stand in line waiting to kiss her and ask 
in quiet voices, "Did you have a nice trip. 
Aunt Harriet?" And she murmurs, 
"Yes, but it's good to be home," and we 
all go slowly back to the car, holding her 
arms and talking quietly. 

Four years ago she broke her leg. It 
was while she was on one of her numer- 
ous trips, and the family was in an up- 
roar. The telegram came at midnight 
(as always) and nothing would do but 
for Mother to leave at once for Colo- 
rado. So we packed her off, and in a few 
days a telegram came saying that Aunt 



Harriet was out of danger and was im- 
proving rapidly. So we sighed again, and 
in three months, much to our surprise, 
Aunt Harriet was home again with 
presents for us all, a little paler but still 
the same. She greeted us with a cheery 
smile and a fond caress, and we all went 
home for dinner. And Aunt Harriet ate 
vegetables and crackers and drank a little 
hot water and talked about Colorado. 
But not once did she mention her acci- 
dent, and we all knew better than to say 
an}4hing about it. 

Every year she spends Christmas with 
us, and every year there are three little 
white envelopes tied on the tree in in- 
conspicuous places. And the envelopes 
are always addressed to my two brothers 
and me from Aunt Harriet. When we 
were younger, the envelopes contained 
subscriptions to beautifully colored chil- 
dren's magazines, but we have outgrown 
them, and now they always hold a fat 
check. 

Every year Aunt Harriet takes a trip 
to the dressmaker's. And every year she 
has a new black lace dress and a new 
gray wool dress. And every summer 
there is a new navy voile, and a black 
sheer with white trimming. Never any- 
thing else. 

So the years go by. . . . And every year 
Aunt Harriet buys a new hat, high and 
huge and black, and goes to California. 
And every fall she sends a telegram at 
midnight and we all traipse down to meet 
her. And every Christmas there are three 
white envelopes on the tree. And on 
Sunday she comes for dinner and eats 
nothing but vegetables and crackers and 
drinks a little hot water. . . . 



[23] 



Retribution 



Robert W. Gardner 
Theme 18, Rhetoric II, 1932-34 



/^NE summer evening a few years ago, 
^-^ a strange wear3^-looking man ap- 
proached me as I sat on the front 
porch. 

"I would Hke to see your father," said 
he, in a somewhat gruff voice, but with a 
friendlv manner. 

"I'll call him for you," I replied, and 
going to the door I told my father that a 
man was there to see him. 

The man removed his hat and took the 
chair I offered him. He was a middle- 
sized man about forty 3^ears old, dressed 
in an old, worn suit, blue shirt, and faded 
necktie. He carried a small grip. His 
black hair, slightly gray at the temples, 
was combed straight back,- disclosing a 
livid scar on his left temple. Although 
he had regular features, with a wide, 
short nose and square chin, his sallow 
face and hollowed eyes gave him a 
peculiarly tired appearance. He softly 
whistled a little tune, but his eyes moved 
restlessly about without fixing on any 
particular object. 

Soon my father appeared at the door, 
and the man, rising, introduced himself 
as Henry Blake. "A man in town," said 
he, "told me that you needed some help 
for the summer. I'll work for whatever 
wages you want to pay." 

My father was not very well pleased 
with his appearance, but he did need 
help, and the last part of the man's offer 
sounded pretty good to him. "Have you 
had any experience?" he asked. 

"Yes," the man replied, "but not for 
several years. I have been working in 
the city for the last few years, but my 
company went broke ; so I have been out 
of work since last January." 



"Well," said my father, "if you think 
you can do the work, I'll give you the job 
for the rest of the summer and fall." 

Henry Rlake proved himself a capable 
farmhand. After he became familiar 
with the routine of his work, he did as 
well as could be desired. He was prompt, 
industrious, and absolutely dependable. 
He was never late and never took time 
off to go away as men usually do. Yet, 
we learned very little about him. He 
would talk a great deal, but never about 
himself. If we questioned him about his 
former work or life, he would answer 
evasively. My mother, who usually was 
able to procure a new man's entire life 
history within a few days, was unable to 
find out any more than the rest of us. 

During the first few weeks of his stay 
with us, Henry Blake changed a great 
deal. He put on weight ; his sallow face 
filled out and became ruddy. His shifty 
eyes and nervous restlessness also be- 
came less noticeable. In short, he be- 
came a rugged, vigorous man. Although 
at intervals he would be gloomy, ap- 
parently brooding over something, he 
was, for the most part, cheerful and 
friendly. 

In the fall when his contracted period 
of work had expired, Henry was re- 
warded for his faithful service by being 
given a steady job. Prior to this time he 
had scarcely been off our premises, but, 
as cold weather approached, he fre- 
quently used to visit the general store in 
town, where the men congregated around 
the stove and smoked and spun yarns. 
As a result of his limitless repertoire and 
fascinating manners of speaking, Henry's 
reputation as a story teller grew rapidly, 



[24] 



and he became quite well known 
throughout the community. 

Henry and I became real friends. His 
willingness to help me with my work 
undoubtedly was a great factor in our 
friendship. I considered myself his spe- 
cial confidant, for he would tell me many 
things about his life that others never 
heard. I listened eagerly to stories of his 
adventurous youthful days when he was 
a wanderer on many parts of the earth. 
He always concluded by advising me to 
remain on the farm where, said he, I 
could find happiness and contentment by 
being independent with a home and 
family of my own. "Look at me," he 
would say, "I was the same sort of a 
farm boy you are at one time, and if I 
hadn't run off to see the world I might 
have a farm, home, and family of my 
own instead of being a worthless old 
bachelor, alone in the world, and lucky to 
be alive, or is it unlucky?" However, he 
was not very successful in convincing me 
that life on a farm was so much to be 
desired. I was much more fascinated by 
the stories of his adventurous career. 

A year had passed since the coming of 
Henry Blake to our farm. At four-thirty 
o'clock in the afternoon on the anni- 
versary of his arrival a large closed 
sedan containing two men drove into our 
yard. The driver remained in the car, 
but the other man stepped out and ap- 
proached me. He was a well-dressed, 
young-looking man about thirty-five 
years old. He wore a dark blue suit and 
a cap to match. In one hand he carried 
a pair of kid gloves, somewhat darkened 
by much wear. A limp cigarette drooped 
from the corner of his mouth and bobbed 
up and down as he spoke. 

"Say, buddy, is there a guy working 
here by the name of Henry Blake?" he 
asked, in the dialect heard on the streets 
of Chicago, 



"Yes," I answered, "but he is down in 
the pasture after the cows right now. If 
you want to see him, I can take you 
down there." 

"Is that your pasture which extends 
along the road about half a mile to the 
west ?" 

"Yes, and Henry is probably up there 
somewhere now." 

"O. K.," said he. "Jake, you drive the 
car to the gate on the north side of the 
pasture by the road. I'll meet you there. 
I'm going to walk with the kid down to 
meet Henry." 

We met him in our old gravel-pit 
where he was rounding up a few cows. 
After we approached quite close, Henry 
looked up, and started perceptibly at 
sight of the stranger. He quickly re- 
gained his composure, and as a hard, 
immovable smile spread across his face 
like a mask, he greeted the stranger with 
"Hello, Al, I had begun to hope I had 
lost you." 

"Oh, it's not so easy as that," the other 
replied. 

"Bob," said Henry to me, "will you 
run over on the other side of that hill, 
and start those cows toward home?" 

"Sure," I answered, starting up over 
the edge of the pit. I looked back just 
before passing from their sight. They 
were still standing there, close together, 
with their eyes upon me. 

A flock of blackbirds in the tree-tops 
at the edge of the woods attracted my 
attention, their harsh, animated singing 
filling the air with noise. Suddenly three 
sharp reports came from the gravel-pit 
below, their echoes reverberating up and 
down the creek valley. The blackbird's 
music ceased ; a few of them fluttered 
hurriedly from branch to branch. The 
only sound to break the silence was the 
gurgle of water from a riffle below. I 
stood perfectly still. In a few seconds 



r251 



the blackbirds again took up their refrain 
as if nothing had happened. A strange 
apprehension came over me. I hurried 
back to the gravel-pit, but the men had 
vanished ; nobody wsls in sight. Wait ! 
What is that blue object lying partly con- 



cealed behind a ridge in the bottom of 
the pit? Running to the edge of the ridge 
to investigate, I beheld the prostrate 
form of Henry Blake, face downward, 
with blood smearing the front part of his 
shirt and overalls — dead. 




From the University of Paris — 1447 



Ernest Tucker 
Theme 6, Rhetoric II, 1924-35 



Foreword 
A T the period of this narrative, France 
■^ *■ was emerging from the darkest time 
in her history. After the terrible, des- 
perate fighting of the Hundred Years' 
War, France was a mere shadow nation. 
Bands of unemployed soldiers — the Free 
Companies — wandered over the country, 
leaving behind them a burnt desolation. 
Charles VH, whom the heroic Jeanne 
d'Arc had crowned, set about rectifying 
things ; but he was never a strong mon- 
arch, and he was seriously handicapped 



by lack of an arm and a complete absence 
of money. 

Slowly, very slowly, the condition of 
the people improved. At the time of 
these letters, a great part of the infamous 
Free Companies had left France in 
search of richer lands to plunder. The 
ruined cities were being rebuilt, the 
barren countryside was gradually regain- 
ing its old fertility. The poor, wounded 
country was forgetting the horror of war 
and its aftermath, and was beginning to 



[26] 



look ahead towards a new destiny. It 

was a real Renaissance for France. 

The Sieur Robert de Alyn to his honored 
Parents, Greeting: 

What a wonderful city Paris is ! The 
greatest in the world — it thrills me to think 
of it. It is continual joy to me to walk 
abroad in the markets and squares, with the 
vast throngs of people and the terrific 
clamor and shouting; and then to go to the 
huge lovely Cathedral of Notre Dame — 
where it is cool and green, and even the 
hucksters still their cries — down by the 
silent Seine, where the noisy city seems far 
away and quieted 

But all that is an old story to you, and I 
am not telling of the University. I am now 
a hejanus^ and entitled to all their priv- 
ileges, which are discouragingly few, and 
their duties, which are quite disproportion- 
ately heavy. The other bejani of the 
French Nation and I sleep in the great hall 
of our building. We must run here and 
there at the bidding of the bachelors,^ and 
obey hurriedly when spoken to by a master. 

Students and masters are divided into 
four Nations, each Nation with its own 
masters and lecture halls, though when a 
great teacher speaks, all Nations come to 
hear him. Our French Nation is the great- 
est; then come the German (which has not 
only Germans but Swedes, Letts, Poles, 
Irish, and a good many of the cursed Eng- 
lish) ; the Picard, and the Norman. All the 
colleges and lecture halls of the Nations are 
in or around the Rue du Fourre; most of 
the French buildings adjoin, on the Rue de 
Garlande. These streets are closed at night 
to the city folk, who would not hesitate to 
play havoc with the buildings, as they dis- 
trust and dislike the students, who, God 
knows, give them enough cause. 

I have made comrades already among the 
bejani, two in particular: Francois de 



^A bejanus was a new student — a freshman. 

*After the examination of determination a 
student became a Bachelor of Arts. He was 
then licensed to teach in a subordinate sort of 
way. The requirements were four years of 
attending lectures and at least twenty years in 
age. A Master was a teacher. At least seven 
years of attending lectures, preparing theses, 
and holding disputations preceded the con- 
ferring of the Master's degree. He usually 
taught in the nation in which he had received 
his degree. 



Montcorbier' and Jehan le Clerc. Jehan is 
as new as I, while Francois gives himself 
airs because he intends to petition for de- 
termination in a few months. He is ex- 
ceptionally bright, but exceptionally lazy; 
a thin dark fellow, who would rather 
scribble doggerel than study the philosophy 
of Seigneur Aristotle, as the bejani must 
do. Jehan is very tall, and quiet and stu- 
dious, although on occasion he can be 
merry. I think he will make a name for 
himself, but I fear Francois will not. 

We sleep in a long, low hall on the Rue 
de Garlande, a building that is used in the 
daytime as a lecture hall. There is straw 
along the walls, on which we spread our 
mantles at night. All of the masters and 
the majority of the bachelors have quarters 
of their own, although there is always an 
older student with the bejani to curb their 
exuberance. 

Today is Sunday, and there are no lec- 
tures; the city is very quiet, even the 
younger students studying or soberly walk- 
ing. It is dusk now, and it becomes difficult 
to write. The flambeaux are lit when it 
becomes dark and are left burning for only 
half an hour; the three fires along the 
center of the hall burn for an hour longer, 
when some bejanus must extinguish them; 
as the winter draws on, they will be left 
burning later. 

All students must arise at daybreak to- 
morrow. The bejani must bring in water 
for breakfast and for those of the bachelors 
who desire to wash themselves. New straw 
is brought in every Saturday, and every 
morning it must be reheaped — by the bejani, 
of course. It is getting too dark to write; 
I will finish this letter tomorrow and give it 
to our faithful servant, Henri, who returns 
home tomorrow afternoon. 



Monday morning, I have just returned 
from a lecture of the great Master Francini 
della Grobio of Florence. It was my first 
lecture, and consequently I am still excited 



^Francois de Montcorbier was the real name 
of Francois Villon. (Cf. Nicolson's Complete 
Works of Francois Villon.) The name was 
dropped after a trial and subsequent pardon 
for murder in 1453. Villon was the name of 
a man who had befriended him. (The other 
names have no significance.) 



[27] 



about it. I shall try to tell you what it was 
like: 

The lecture is at seven, and I walk with 
Francois through the crowded market place 
to a quiet street near the river. It is only 
half after six, and already there is a crowd 
outside the door. All four Nations will be 
present, for Master della Grobio is a great 
rhetorician. He is passing through Paris on 
his way to Flanders, and has consented to 
deliver one lecture. The hall is a long, 
narrow affair, which, says Francois, was 
used as a cavalry stable in the time of the 
fifth Charles. The floor is earthen, with a 
few benches along the sides, which the 
early comers have already appropriated. 
Francois spreads his cloak; we will sit on 
the floor. Some of the more wealthy stu- 
dents have chairs with cushions. But they 
are no snobs, and when a poor crippled boy 
comes in, a richly dressed young man offers 
him his seat. 

It is not yet seven, and the air is chilly. 
A few have small charcoal stoves, but the 
majority disdain such evidence of softness. 
There are mainly French students around 
us; the Germans and English are near the 
front, the Normans around the sides, a 
cluster of Picards near the rear. A silence 
falls on the assembly as the Master enters, 
followed by his attendant bearing two huge 
volumes. Students take out paper or parch- 
ment notebooks and open the inkhorns at 
their belts. I am grateful for my paper 
book when I see some of the poorer ones 
writing with charcoal on a piece of board. 

Master della Grobio begins to talk; his 
subject is "The Great Greek Orators." He 
is very learned, and much of what he says 
goes over my head, although Francois 
seems to follow eagerly, and frequently 
writes in his notebook. I take down things 
that seem to me important, although I fear 
I have not yet learned to listen and under- 
stand. 

The lecture lasts for two hours. I am a 
little tired at the end, but Francois is not, 
and sighs regretfully when the Master 
finishes. A big English youth asks about 
some minor pre-Alexandrian statesman. He 
is answered, and the answer is illustrated 
by quotations. Finally Master Francini can 
stay no longer and leaves, followed by his 
faithful servant. 

Slowly the students leave, arguing, com- 



paring notes, quoting from the lecture. 
Francois is hotly debating with a smiling 
black-haired Irish student. Bad Latin is 
copiously mixed with much better Gaelic 
and French as the two walk leisurely away. 
I have not the faintest idea what the point 
of contention is, but walk beside them try- 
ing to appear wise. 



I see Henri coming, ready for his jour- 
ney, so I will finish the letter. I am to hear 
Master Hugh de Estuteville, nephew of 
William de Estuteville, the Marshal of 
Paris, speak on the "Old Arts of Aristotle" 
this afternoon. I must mix more ink and 
cut a new quill before the lecture. God be 
with you all. 

Writen by Robert, Sieur de Alyn, 
this Third day of October, 
A°. D'.MDCXLVII 



The Second Letter 

The Sieur Robert de Alyn to his honored 
Parents, Greeting: 

Much has transpired since my last letter 
three months ago. I believe I may now 
consider myself a full-fledged student, al- 
though still a bejanus. I am more at home 
in the city now, and no longer stop in the 
street in front of the great Cathedral of 
Notre Dame, but walk by like any Parisian 
born; a great benefit to the passers-by, who 
were wont to stumble over me as I stood 
a-gaping. 

I attend several lectures each morning 
(except of course Sunday) generally in 
company with Francois and Jehan. The 
afternoons are given over to study, for 
which purpose we repair to the hall where 
we sleep, and there read such books as the 
Nation possesses, or write disputations, or 
study our notes taken in lecture. The 
French Nation has four copies of the Holy 
Bible in fine manuscript, as well as a num- 
ber of books done on paper by an impres- 
sion from wood blocks, on which the words 
have been carved in reverse. They are 
called block books, and are cheaper than 
manuscript because a great number of 
copies may be made from the carved 
blocks; they are not nearly as finely done 
as the hand-written, and are not easy to 
read. Jehan says that a German student 
told him that one of his countrymen has in- 



[28] 



vented a system whereby the letters are cut 
separately on blocks of wood, and may 
thereby be changed about for different 
printings. I do not think this is practicable, 
for if it were, surely someone would have 
thought of it long since, it is so simple. 

There is a great quantity of paper^ in 
Paris; it is not nearly as expensive as I 
thought it would be. There is a small shop 
near the University buildings where paper 
is sold and notebooks are bound. All but 
the poorest students may possess several 
sheets of paper. I am going to save up my 
money to buy some, and get a notebook 
bound. It is seldom that a student uses 
parchment except for some very important 
document; it is infinitely more dear than 
paper, although, of course, much better for 
writing. 

Francois has shown me a great many of 
the interesting sights of the city; he was 
born here, and knows it as well as he knows 
the Paternoster. I know now the house 
where Master Pierre Abelard, the founder 
of the University, lived long ago. More 
than three hundred years — think of it ! It 
is a small, very dilapidated house near the 
river, which is now almost hidden by taller 
buildings, though Francois says that in 
Master Abelard's time it was surrounded by 
grass and gardens. So much has the city 
grown. I have seen, too, the dungeon 
where Jeanne d'Arc, the Deliverer of 
France, lay waiting trial twenty years ago; 
how much has happened in even that short 
time. 

An unhappy incident occurred last 
Thursday. The German Nation was having 
one of its numerous holidays, and the Nor- 
mans took it into their heads to break it up. 
The celebration was to end with a grand 
procession through the streets at night, and 
a feast in the main hall of the German 
Nation. The Normans planned to disrupt 
the parade and appropriate the food for 
their own use. They are not as numerous 
as the Germans, and consequently enlisted a 
number of the Picards and some of the 
more abandoned of our Nation. Fran- 
cois, of course, had to go, and he insisted 



*In the fifteenth century paper was becoming 
common. It was sold in large sheets, which 
the student cut himself or had bound. It was, 
of course, thick and rough. 



that Jehan and I accompany him. About 
dusk we went forth, armed with stout clubs. 
The Germans were to march down the Rue 
Picardie, a winding, narrow street. The 
alleys and side streets were swarming with 
Normans, Picards, and a few French, all 
quiet but highly excited. The good citizens 
evidently scented trouble, for they had re- 
tired to the top floors and barricaded all 
entrances. 

Finally the Germans came — ^hundreds of 
them, singing, shouting and capering along, 
their torches making irregular splashes of 
light in the dark street. They were quite 
unsuspecting, and when the signal was 
given and we swarmed out at them, they 
were dumbfounded; but they immediately 
recovered, and set vigorously about defend- 
ing their banquet. The uproar was tre- 
mendous; there must have been fifteen 
hundred students battling ! At first it was 
give and take with fists, but presently a dirk 
was drawn, and then things did get warm. 

The torches were extinguished early, and 
we fought in Hell's own blackness. I found 
myself with my back against a building 
swinging out with my club; I had for- 
gotten entirely about the food, and was 
concerned only with getting out alive. I do 
not know how long we struggled. I re- 
ceived a cut on the arm and a dizzying 
blow on the head, but managed to keep my 
feet. Suddenly over the wild clamor could 
be heard a horn and the swift approach of 
hoofs. The King's Guard ! They came 
swinging down the street at a gallop, the 
brawlers melting away as they approached. 
Their torches were reflected on their 
salades and hauberks and slashing swords; 
truly a magnificent spectacle, but I did not 
sta}^ to admire it. I left — hurriedly. 

It was a sorry business. Two poor boys 
were killed, several fingers and eyes were 
lost, and there were innumerable broken 
heads — and all for nothing ! No wonder the 
students do not have the affection of the 
townsfolk. Francois assures me that such 
affairs are by no means infrequent, al- 
though Thursday's rather surpasses any he 
has seen. In bygone times there were often 
pitched battles betwen the students and citi- 
zens or soldiers in which many were killed. 
I am glad we are living in the civilized 
fifteenth century. 



[29] 



I am coming along wonderfully well in 
my studies. I have learned to listen and 
take notes at lectures, of which I hear one 
or two a week on each of the first three of 
the seven library arts: grammar, rhetoric, 
dialectics, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, 
and music. I am preparing arguments and 
theses in rhetoric and dialectics, and am 
consequently very busy. 

Not all of the masters are equally popu- 
lar. Many of the younger ones, who can- 
not get students by their reputation or 
learning, attempt to enlist hearers by sensa- 
tional methods; but I hear only the well- 
established masters. Some of the things 
the sensation-seekers say are outrageous: 
one maniac even claims that the earth goes 
round the sun ! 

All things taken into consideration, 
though, it is a wonderful life, full of 
growth and energy. I am content now with 
the simple tunic and hose that the bejani 
wear; but I hope to be enabled to don, in 
good time, the bachelor's biretta; and I 
even dare to have hopes of attaining to a 
master's robes. But meanwhile I shall 
work and study, and in the fullness of time 
these things may come to pass. I shall try 
to finish this letter tonight; I must stop 
now. 

Midnight. I cannot sleep; so I will finish 
this letter in the hope that Henri will take 



it when he returns tomorrow morning. The 
great hall is bitterly cold; I have a small 
candle, but it gives no warmth and but 
meagre light. There are a few winking 
coals left of the fires that roared earlier 
tonight; they shift and settle, and grow 
dimmer, moment by moment, and will soon 
die. Francois, Jehan, Hugh de Bemis — all 
are asleep. 

I can hear the snow whispering and 
tapping gently on the window-board. The 
watchman crunches past with clanking 
lantern, beating his arms against the cold. 
He pauses to cry his warning, which rings 
eerily in the still streets; a fretful, ghostly 
echo is carried back from the great black 
form of the cathedral; it murmurs into 
silence, and the watchman resumes his 
lonely round. 

My candle is flickering, and will soon go 
out. I am very tired and cold 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Munro-Sellery, Medieval Civilisation. Cen- 
tury Company, 1907. 

Thatcher and MacNeal, A Source Book for 
Medieval History. Charles Scribner's Sons, 
1907. 

NicoLSON, J. U., Complete Works of Francois 
Villon. Covici-Friede, 1927. 

BoYCE, G. C, The English German Nation in 
the University of Paris During the Middle 
Ages. St. Catherine Press, 1927. 




[30] 



^ 



i 



Vol.4 



MARCH, 1935 



No. 3 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

THE STRONGEST INFLUENCE ON MY LIFE . 1 
Charles Dancey 

VIEUX CARRfi 2 

Samuel W. Hays 

WHEN THE FLEET COMES IN 3 

Doris Mason 

JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES S 

Melvina Way 

"THIS WAY, PLEASE" 8 

Laurence Rehm 
THE ONE-NIGHT STAND 10 

Richard Chowen 
THE RIGHT TO AN OPINION 12 

R. M. Ewald 
CHEMISTRY FOR PLEASURE 13 

Herta Breiter 

MY ANCESTORS 16 

Michael Connolly 
GIANT OF THE AGE 17 

Betty Faris 
REACTIONS TO WALPOLE'S JEREMY .... 20 

Anonymous 
THE LOST WORLD 21 

Florence Newton 
THE GLORY THAT WAS MOMENTARY ... 22 

Mary Jane Van Hoesen 
TWO DESCRIPTIONS 22 

Hamilton Hall 
ST. MARTIN'S CHURCH 24 

Earle Bickerton 

MOOD "NUDUS" 25 

Edgar Parkhurst 

JENNIE 26 

Mildred Spitler 
NOTHING ON THE PRINTERS 27 

Ernest Tucker 
"DYNAMITE — SIR!" 28 

James Van Doren 
ENTER MILES 31 

Richard Alan 



/ 



1 



\ 



PUBLISHED BY THE RHETORIC STAFF, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA 



1 



The Strongest Influence on My Life 

Charles Dancey 
Theme written on Rhetoric I final, January, 1935 

long illness was the quiet, something that would not disturb 



|\ yi Y father's long illness was 
■^ " *■ strongest influence on my life. 
When I was just a little boy in grade 
school, I felt the strength of that illness 
on my little-boy personality. Other boys 
were noisy and free, but I could not 
whistle, sing, or play noisy games. In- 
stead, I huddled into a huge chair and 
devoured the books in our tiny study. I 
read history books, wild west stories, 
plays, school books, anything I could 
get my hands on. When my store of 
books had been exhausted, I read them 
over, again and again, until I was sick 
of them. Then I began to make up 
stories of my own. Robin Hood, Robin- 
son Crusoe, Richard the Lion-Hearted, 
Henry of Navarre, and Nick Carter were 
all the same to me. They all lived and 
breathed in my imagination. The new 
characters that I invented seemed just 
as real. Instead of Don Quixote, I wrote 
of Don Quick-shot, and I thought him 
the better of the two. What power I 
possessed ! Upon me and me alone rested 
the decision of whether the red-skins 
should kill Don Quick-shot or not. Of 
course, they never did. He always killed 
thousands of Indians, rescued the beauti- 
ful maiden, and "galloped into the west" 
or "disappeared over the last ridge." 
While I struggled with the future of 
Don Quick-shot and others like him, my 
original longing for freedom and noise 
dwindled to nothing. My imagination 
grew by leaps and bounds. Rough games 
held no interest for me. I absorbed 
history, philosophy, and English litera- 
ture. All of this started simply because 
I had to interest myself in something 



my father. 

As I grew older and drifted farther 
away from home, I learned to get along 
with other boys, but I never enjoyed 
their company as much as the company 
of a new book. However, when girls 
began to interest me, books lost their 
hold. A boy in love must have money, 
but since my father was bed- fast, money 
was quite a scarcity in the family. I 
started to work for it. Odd jobs in the 
neighborhood were my chief source of 
income until my twelfth birthday. That 
year I managed to get a job in a grocery 
store, and I have been working ever 
since. 

When money came into my life, re- 
sponsibility came with it. I had no sooner 
learned to save my earnings than a new 
and greater responsibility came to me. 
It was a moral responsibility. Realiza- 
tion of the suffering of my father, the 
sacrifice of my mother, and the kindness 
of our friends made me determined to 
do the best I could for all of them. I 
was idealistic. My brain was crammed 
with the glorious successes of history, 
and the glory and honor of such men as 
Roland, Leonidas, and the Knights of 
the Round Table. I felt indebted for my 
very soul to all my family and friends. 
Somehow, even now, I cannot shake ofl 
a feeling that I must do my best to be 
worthy of the sacrifices others have 
made. 

In the last few years, just as I began 
to grow into maturity, the illness of my 
father had a new influence on me. I 
learned to appreciate the wisdom and 



[1] 



strength that grows out of long years 
of suffering. I learned at an earlier age 
than most people what pain and death 
really meant. I used to sit by the hour in 
my father's room, looking up into his 
shrunken face, and listening to his kindly 
words. He read constantly and taught 
me many of the lessons he had learned. 
Greatest of all lessons, he taught me 
true strength, true courage, and true love. 
The heroes of fiction with their classical 
features and magnificent bodies were 
crowded out of my mind by the bent and 
shriveled form of a greater hero who 
wore no armor and fought but one 
battle, an unceasing battle with death. 



He was strong. He was brave. He was 
faithful. Illness twisted his body, but it 
could not warp his mind nor confuse his 
ideals. 

Then he taught me the greatest lesson 
of all — death itself. He had shown me 
how to take the bumps of life. At last 
he showed me how to face death, un- 
flinching and unafraid. 

Many have said, "All that I am I owe 
to my mother." Certainly I owe a great 
deal to mine. But at the root of every 
lesson I have learned from life lies the 
thing that life in my home revolved 
around, my father and his illness. 



Vieux Carre 



T 



Samuel W. Hays 
Theme ivrittcn on Rhetoric I final, January, 1935 

HE Vieux Carre, the foreign district who dares to intrude. There is a strange 

foreboding that tells of evil, and one 
glances back to the brightly lighted street 
from whence he came. But the fasci- 
nation of the queer places beckons, and 
as one goes on, the fear is lost in the 
interest he finds in new sights. 

Before long a person forgets the dark- 
ness and its depressing effect, and notices 
the people and their strange houses. 
Families gather on the two or three front 
steps of the doorway of each house. 
They no longer talk in English, but have 
retired into their native French or 
Italian. From the darkness one sees the 
glow of the father's pipe and hears the 
mother chattering incessantly, raising her 
voice now and then to call her brood 
together. The children play and fight 
with the neighbor children while older 



in New Orleans, during the day is 
interesting and colorful ; yet there is the 
familiarity of horns and autos, modern 
dress and English speaking people, and 
the customary bustle of the city. It is 
magically transformed at night. No 
longer does one feel "at home." 

At night the Vieux Carre is a foreign 
city. The dark streets seem narrower. 
The balconies almost shut out a starlit 
sky. Everywhere it is quiet, mysterious, 
and strange. At first there is an element 
of terror attached to a walk along one 
of these crooked little streets hardly 
bigger than an alley. The gloom is in- 
tensified by the proximity of the houses 
which rise up from narrow sidewalks, 
and the walls and the balconies seem to 
lean closer, pressing and stifling him 



[2] 



daughters sit thoughtfully alone. The 
older sons are not seen until one passes 
the corner saloon or billiard hall. It is 
a quiet, peaceful scene, but with the 
strangeness of a foreign city. The houses 
are all dark, shuttered, one-story, wooden 
buildings, bare of ornament except for 
a balcony, and gray from lack of paint. 
Now and then a door is left open a 
crack, and one can look into a long hall 
or see a slice of a room lighted with a 



candle or lamp revealing old furniture 
and curious upholstering. It is odd to 
hear the music of Wayne King filter 
with soft candle light through the aper- 
tures of the shutters. Then suddenly 
at the end of one of the quaint streets one 
finds himself on a busy thoroughfare 
brilliant with lights of advertisements 
and loud with the noise of street cars 
and busy people. The past walk seems 
like a dream. 




When the Fleet Comes In 



QUIET and peaceful is the little fish- 
ing village on the coast of Brittany 
before the fleet comes in. Old fisherwives 
sit on benches outside their doors knit- 
ting and chatting together about each 
other's neighbors. Dogs lie sleepily in 
the sun around the base of the fountain 
in the square. Cats skirt the fountain 
quietly and turn into the nearest alley in 



Doris Mason 
Theme 11, Rhetoric II, 1934-25 

search of scraps of food. A gang of 
youngsters tear up one street and down 
another, making a terrific racket with 
their wooden shoes on the rounded cob- 
ble stones. Some of the housewives, with 
the older girls to help them, are making 
bread at the great ovens of the town. 
Others are doing their washing at the 
foot of the quay in tide pools, and the 



[3] 



beat of their hammers can be heard only 
faintly in the town. The saloons are 
empty; the town is commonplace — but 
this is the day before the fleet comes in. 

When, the next morning, the sun 
shines out from over the hills behind the 
town, the horizon of the ocean to the 
south and west, Avhich has been blue and 
empty for many days, is broken by a 
bright, orange-red sail. Quickly follow- 
ing this come more sails of dark living 
blue, brown, maroon, the color they call 
concarnean red after the name of the 
village. Some of the sails are patched 
with big squares and rectangles of 
another color: blue sails with orange and 
yellow, red sails with yellow, brown or 
green sails with red. 

The town comes to life quickly and 
thoroughly. A bell rings insistently, and 
windows facing the ocean are opened 
with a bang and are filled with faces. 
Some squint at the horizon ; some have 
old spy-glasses. Then the town changes. 
Old men scurry about fixing things. 
Wives and daughters clear and clean the 
storehouses. Boys bring out big, two- 
wheeled carts with high sides and pull 
them to the quays, where they line them 
up in rows the whole length of the quays. 
Other old men and boys clear out the 
harbour, moving all the small boats to a 
remote corner where the water is too 
shallow even at high tide to accommo- 
date the larger boats of the fleet. The 
saloon keepers are no less active, run- 
ning around, lining up rows of bottles, 
filling kegs, unpacking and dusting off 
glasses and mugs. Old women stand in 
the midst of everything and talk. The 
cats and dogs have disappeared tempo- 
rarily. 

At noon the fleet is very near. Most 
of the town is lined up along the quay, 
waiting. Even the cats and dogs appear in 



the background. Then the leader of the 
fleet rounds the first quay, and two long 
ropes are thrown out to the eager hands 
of the waiting villagers. A great shout 
goes up. The Saint Pierre has won the 
great race home. Wives, children, sisters, 
aunts — all the relatives of those aboard 
the Saint Pierre have come up nearest the 
ship. As soon as she is warped up along- 
side the quay and tied, the crew jump 
ashore and are immediately surrounded 
by their families. It is a happy day — the 
day when the fleet comes in — but it is also 
the busiest one. Very little time is lost 
in greetings. The cargo of sardines and 
tuna fish has to be unloaded. 

The men of each boat form a line ex- 
tending from the hold to the two-wheeled 
carts on the quay. With the women help- 
ing, they transfer the cargos of sardines 
in baskets to the carts, which the boys 
draw away to the cold-storage rooms 
where the sardines await shipment to 
the packing plants. The great tuna, 
which have been strung along the decks 
to dry, are stacked along the quays like 
soldiers' muskets, standing on their noses 
with their sharp, pointed tails inter- 
twined. A careful observer will be sur- 
prised to notice, at this point, the great 
number of cats and dogs which are loaf- 
ing around with the manner of interested 
onlookers. After the sardines are taken 
care of, the tuna, also, are carted away. 
After the cargos are all unloaded, the 
day's work is not done by any means. 

The sails have to be hung out to dry 
so that they will not mold. They are 
draped on the decks and quays while the 
beautiful blue sardine nets are strung 
from the tops of the masts to dry. Then, 
after a hard day of fast and strenuous 
w'ork, the last job is left to the wives. 
Each wife seeks out her husband, takes 
him firmly by the arm, or ear, or collar, 
and escorts him home by the most direct 



[4] 



route — unless, of course, the most direct 
route is past a saloon. The wives are the 
principal reason why the married men, 
despite the fact that they have more 
people to support, manage to live as well 



as many of the bachelors, if not better. 
The latter, having no such authoritative 
person to watch over them, patronize the 
saloons and manage to get rid of their 
wages in a comparatively short time. 




Jack- of -All -Trades 



Melvina Way 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 
a young lady, with a she give lectures on hygiene? Can she 
college degree, to teach in a high play any musical instrument? Can she 
school of one hundred pupils." That teach biology if there is a demand for 
seems simple enough for any girl who the subject? They fail to include the im- 
has just completed her college education, portant question, Can she live in the 



'XT RANTED: 



If you were to accompany that young 
lady to a personal interview with the 
board of education of the school in ques- 
tion, however, you would find that the 
advertiser had omitted certain "minor" 
details. The demands made by such a 
board of education are often of astound- 
ing range. Can the applicant teach physi- 
cal education as well as the subject of 
special preparation? Can she direct the 
glee club? Can she direct plays? Can 



community and meet the requirements 
socially of a bickering, fault-finding 
populace ? 

Many difficulties are due to the hetero- 
geneous membership of the board. Each 
member has his idea of the teacher's 
duties, and, although he does not men- 
tion all of them before the teacher is 
hired, he expects her to perform them 
perfectly. But, you say, I am exaggerat- 
ing the demands of the small community 



[5] 



high school upon the teacher. I do not 
feel that one can be a fair judge unless 
he has actually experienced teaching in 
a small town or has studied the problem 
carefully. 

At the close of my high school educa- 
tion I was undecided as to what prepara- 
tion to make for the future. After due 
consideration I decided I would be a 
teacher. I had enjoyed my commercial 
subjects taken during my junior year in 
high school, and because of this I deter- 
mined to prepare, in as short a time 
as possible, to teach typing, shorthand, 
and bookkeeping. Since I was to be a 
teacher, I selected a teachers' college, 
near home, in which to continue my edu- 
cation. I entered a special course for the 
prospective commercial teacher. Practi- 
cally all my subjects consisted of the 
main business courses ; little attention 
was given to the general college courses. 
At the end of two years of study I had 
completed the minimum requirements 
for a commercial teacher. 

At once I began writing letters of ap- 
plication and making interviews. Shortly 
before the usual time when boards of 
education hire teachers, I applied in a 
small town near my home. My father 
and I drove to the town and inquired 
where we might find the president of the 
board. We were directed to his farm, 
which was two miles from town. This 
man was of Italian birth and had very 
little education. He suggested that I in- 
terview the other members of the board 
and told me where I would find them. 
He also requested that I send a written 
application to him. He asked if I met 
the state requirements for the position, 
and when I told him I did, inquired no 
further. The other members of the 
board were a banker, a doctor, a farmer, 
and a farmer's wife. The most unusual 
of these interviews was with the farmer. 



whom we found driving a pig down the 
road. i\Iy father watched the pig while 
I talked with the man. There we stood 
in the middle of a country road, I 
anxious to impress the man with my 
ability, he worried for fear my father 
would prove unequal to the task of tend- 
ing the pig. 

The board of education met shortly, 
and I was employed. My contract merely 
stated that I was to teach commercial 
subjects for nine months and was to be 
paid a specified sum for my services. 
The contract also allowed the board "to 
discharge me if I were guilty of marri- 
age, misdemeanor, incompetency, or any 
action which might cause the board to 
feel that the school would profit by my 
removal from the faculty." No degree 
was required, and I was not questioned 
as to my social ability nor my previous 
experience. I had complete confidence in 
my preparation and in my ability to more 
than please the board. 

The school was in a town whose popu- 
lation was about five hundred. The 
students lived in the town and the 
surrounding country. The school was 
the center of community life; the teacher 
was a part of the school and was ex- 
pected to take an active part in com- 
munity activities. All of the teachers, 
with the exception of the principal, had 
had no teaching experience. The school 
building had been built to accommodate 
fifty students; however, there were a 
hundred students, with five teachers on 
the faculty. 

School opened at the beginning of 
September, and never had I been more 
anxious for September to arrive. The 
first day was spent in registration, which 
was followed by a teachers' meeting. 
There we discussed the registration and 
size of our classes. I learned that besides 
the regular commercial subjects, short- 



[6] 



hand, typing, and bookkeeping, I was 
expected to teach a class in commercial 
law and one in commercial arithmetic. 
I was not prepared to teach these sub- 
jects, but I resolved to keep a few chap- 
ters ahead of the students and thus to 
keep my lack of preparation a secret. 

The first year passed rapidly, and I 
was rehired for the following term. By 
the end of this first year I had taught my 
classes, supervised a study hall, and 
acted as adviser to the junior class. At 
the beginning of the new term, however, 
I found that my duties had increased. 
Not only was I expected to do the things 
I had the previous year, but I was to 
direct the glee club and teach physical 
education. I had not prepared to do 
either, nor were they mentioned in my 
new contract. Luckily I had studied 
voice when in high school and had be- 
longed to the glee club. My physical 
education study had been the required 
courses in the teachers' college. There- 
fore, I secured two books on the sub- 
ject of "Physical Education for Girls" 
and studied them religiously. 

The third year of my teaching found 
me even further involved. I again taught 
the same subjects with the addition of 
commercial geography. The girls or- 
ganized as members of the State Girls' 
Athletic Association. I was leader of the 
group. In addition to the glee club I 
directed a quartette which entered con- 
tests with other schools. Outside inter- 
ests were drawing upon my attention. 
The churches expected help when they 
gave entertainments. The Woman's Club 
wanted students to sing for them. At the 
beginning of my fourth year the board 
of education bought a new mimeograph. 
I was expected to operate it. I was not 
allowed to permit the students to do this, 
for they might harm it in some way. A 
new principal came to the school. Since 



he did not have a secretary I did his 
typing and other office work. This could 
have been done very well by any second- 
year commercial student, but he did not 
wish the students to do it. The entire 
population felt by this time that they 
were well acquainted with me and could 
ask (demand) favors of me. Generally 
these were to sing at some entertainment, 
to type a letter for them, or to mimeo- 
graph programs. Thus it was at the end 
of the fourth year when employing time 
rolled around again. When one of the 
board members asked me if I could di- 
rect the plays for the next year, I 
thought it time to return to school. 

I had prepared to teach commercial 
subjects. When I stopped teaching, I 
had taught the usual ones and commer- 
cial law, commercial arithmetic, and com- 
mercial geography. I had taught physi- 
cal education. I had directed glee clubs, 
quartettes, and helped to direct plays. I 
had been adviser in turn of freshman, 
sophomore, and junior classes. I had 
been sponsor of the Girls' Athletic As- 
sociation. I had made programs, tickets, 
and anything else one could make on a 
mimeograph. I had acted in the capacity 
of secretary to the principal and other 
townspeople. I had been school pianist 
during the entire four years. I had acted 
as chaperon on many and various occa- 
sions. I had given lectures on hygiene 
and manners. Webster defines a jack-of- 
all-trades as a person who can do pass- 
able work at various trades. From the 
above discussion I believe it is easily seen 
that a school teacher in a small town 
must indeed be a jack-of-all-trades. 

My experience is not at all different 
from that of many teachers. Seldom is a 
teacher in the small school employed to 
teach one subject. She is always ex- 
pected to help with extra-curricular ac- 
tivities regardless of her preparation for 



[7] 



this work. The townspeople do not come 
in contact with the teacher in her actual 
teaching of her subjects; they know her 
by her acts of helping the students be- 
come citizens of the town. They judge 
her by her ability to "get along" with 
both students and themselves. Many ex- 
cellent teachers fail because they do not 
have the qualities of leadership outside 
of the schoolroom which are absolutely 
necessary if they are to succeed. Her 
actual classroom teaching, other than 
discipline, is of little interest to the ma- 



jority of the people; some whose chil- 
dren she teaches will be interested. 

Teaching is an excellent experience 
for any person. I enjoyed my time spent 
in teaching in a small high school. There 
is a closer relationship between teacher 
and student than will be found in larger 
schools. The teacher has the opportunity 
to make friends with the students and 
thus to understand them. Many teachers 
in the larger schools began their teaching 
in the smaller schools and to this owe 
their ability, in part, to perform success- 
fully the specific duties assigned them. 



"This Way, Please" 



Laurence Rehm 
Theme 11, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

THE theatre holds a certain fasci- vidual wearing a heavy gold watch chain 

nation for some people, and I am and an admirably dirty shirt. After he 

no exception. Unfortunately, I, also, lack rasps out a list of names, about twenty 

the seemingly huge sum of money that boys will shove their way unconcernedly 

one needs in order to be a successful through the crowd and into the theatre, 

playgoer. Christmas vacation, however, Upon inquiry, you learn that these are 

showed me that I can attend a large per- the "regulars"' — boys and men who come 



centage of Chicago's plays, operas, and 
other stage presentations with an ex- 
pense only for carfare. The system re- 
quires so little effort that I want to pass 
it on to any who may be interested ; the 



for the afternoon and evening per- 
formances every day, week after week, 
regardless of program. They "usher" the 
entire ground floor and the most im- 
portant box seats. After an intermis- 



system is summed up in the one word — sion of forty-five seconds for relighting 



ushering. 

A matinee at the Brown Theater will 
offer as good a start as any. Present 
yourself at the main entrance not later 
than one o'clock. Elbow your way 
through the jam of boys already waiting, 
and proceed to look experienced. After 
an eternity of five minutes, a snorting 
briar pipe will make its appearance, 
closely followed by a bleary-eyed indi- 



the pipe, its operator will begin burrow- 
ing through the mob, and occasionally 
will pick out an evidently familiar face 
with a "Hey, you ! Here !" This pro- 
cedure will admit ten or fifteen more, 
each one receiving a certain floor assign- 
ment. The remainder file in, one by one, 
and are sent on their way with a guttural 
"Third Division," "Cloak Room," or 
"Box." If you are lucky, you may get 



[8] 



the "first division." This is the first 
balcony, which, except for the main floor, 
is the easiest place to "usher." 

About a half -hour later, you will be 
given a flashlight and a stack of pro- 
grams. If the show is making money, a 
box of cough-drops is also donated. Then 
you are assigned an aisle, and you stand 
at the head of the stairs with a very 
gratifying feeling of importance. Soon 
an elderly lady will totter up the short 
flight, and you will strut down the aisle, 
locate the row, fold down the seat, and 
with a cheery smile hand the customer 
her stub and a program. This is repeated 
just a few times; matinees, naturally, 
afford rather lazy work for the usher. 
After the show begins, you may sit down 
in any vacant seat and enjoy the per- 
formance for the remainder of the after- 
noon. 

Evenings are different ; they are more 
exciting. The gallery, or "third division," 
is the most fun. It is often jammed to 
capacity, and alwa3^s with a noisy crowd. 
No one is permitted to go from the gal- 
lery to the second balcony, or fice versa; 



this has been true as long as I can re- 
member. Yet people will try again and 
again to break through the lines of ush- 
ers at the top and bottom of the stairs. 
I am never filled with more self-im- 
portance than when I am able to stand 
there and politely say, "No, you may not 
go down, Madam." If a customer starts 
a loud harangue, I tell him where, as 
far as I am concerned, he can go. We 
do not have to be courteous, as, in reality, 
we are doing the management a favor. 
We receive no pay; therefore we can 
tell these social climbers with their fifty- 
five cent tickets exactly what we think 
of them. I am often amazed at the 
different shades of red the faces of these 
people can exhibit in a short time. 

Many theatres in Chicago use the free 
usher method, the Civic Opera House 
being one of the group. They will never 
turn a boy away — if this is done once, 
he might not come when needed most. 
If too many boys report, those that are 
left are given free seats in the gallery 
with no work at all attached. This, for 
me, is the ideal way of play-going. 




[9] 



The One-Night Stand 

Richard Chowen 
Theme 11, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 



IT is eight o'clock in the morning when 
I drive the truck to the theatre for 
unloading. Mr. Laurant, the magician, 
will arrive later. The town, like most 
small towns at this hour, is just begin- 
ning to awaken, and the sidewalks and 
pavements are still a trifle damp from the 
early morning dew. The sky is clear and 
the air is crisp. It is going to be a perfect 
day for working. The stage hands are 
already on the job when I arrive, and the 
box office, which has been busy for the 
past week, is about to open for the final 
sale. The auditorium of some two 
thousand seats is dark and gloomy. The 
only daylight that ever enters it comes 
through the cracks between the doors 
which open into the lobby. On the stage 
the work lights are on and the "batts" 
are lowered to working distance. 

With the assistance of the stage hands 
the truck is quickly unloaded. The live 
stock, which consists of a rooster, a 
canary, two large ducks, three rabbits, 
and eight doves, are placed, with the ex- 
ception of the canary, which is kept in 
Laurant's dressing room, in a store room 
just off the stage. An interesting bird 
with the show is Ajax, "the only living 
magic rooster." He is an old bird and 
has been from coast to coast. This sum- 
mer he was at the Children's Theatre in 
the "Century of Progress" in Chicago 
for about two months. The canary, 
whose name, by the way, is Mephisto, 
came to a tragic end this summer when 
a bull dog, owned by a manager, found 
its way into the dressing room and killed 
him. 

After the menagerie has been disposed, 
the "drops" are unrolled, attached to the 



"batts," and hoisted into the flies. The 
trunks and crates are now placed in po- 
sition for unpacking. Everything in the 
show has its proper place. It must, for 
the assistants pack the apparatus as fast 
as it comes ofif the stage ; not a motion 
is wasted. In a whole season not so much 
as a silk is lost. There are hundreds of 
minute details to be attended to, one just 
as important as another, regardless of its 
size. There can be no mistakes in a 
magic show. 

At eleven o'clock Mr. Laurant is on 
the job. He is an elderly man, nervous, 
as most magicians are, but very exact 
and systematic. Laurant is a very modest 
sort of person in spite of his success, and 
to meet him one would never suspect 
that he was a great magician of over 
thirty years' experience on the stage. He 
is patient and ever willing to listen to 
what you have to say. He now gives the 
conductor of the orchestra his cues, and 
what work remains to be done in prepa- 
ration for the matinee is concluded. 

The heat of the afternoon is stifling, 
but by two o'clock the theatre is jammed. 
The front rows are filled with a squirm- 
ing, wriggling mass of sticky, hot chil- 
dren, who are eating candy and talking 
at the top of their voices. Already the 
floor around them is covered with torn 
programs and the wrappings of candy 
bars. A fever of excitement comes over 
the audience as the house lights fade out 
and the orchestra swings into a fantastic 
melody. The curtain rises, and Laurant 
makes his entrance amid a great clamor 
of applause. The matinee is never as 
long as the evening show, very few of 
the big illusions being used as a rule, but 



[10] 



the children are soon transported into a 
land of unreality and enchantment under 
the clever and artistic work of the ma- 
gician. They forget that they are hot, 
and momentarily the candy is given a 
rest as their little mouths hang open in 
awe and wonder at the scene before 
them. There is a profusion of colored 
silks, flags, doves, and rabbits, the latter 
of which hardly seem alive at all. Finally 
with the crowing of Ajax the curtain 
falls and the show is at an end. Once 
more the children are carried back into 
the world of reality. For the assistants, 
however, it is more than ever a world 
of reality. The apparatus used in the 
matinee must be cleared from the stage, 
and that which is not to be used in the 
next performance is packed. Immediately 
the work of setting the stage for the 
evening performance begins, and once 
more the show is in readiness. But this 
time it is to be twice as long and will 
consist of two big acts filled with un- 
believable wonders. 

It is a quarter to eight ; almost curtain 
time. The house is filling fast and the 
orchestra is already in the pit. The work 
lights are still on, and we are in our 
costumes making a hurried inspection of 
the set-up. The five-minute call is given. 
Mr. Laurant emerges from his dressing 
room in full evening dress wearing a 
flashy black cape with a bright crimson 
lining. He can tell at a glance that all 
is in order. We are given the word to 
take our places on the stage, and no 
sooner are we in position than the work 
lights are switched out and the orchestra 
is heard as it swings into the overture. 
The massive act curtain rises amid a 
blare of trumpets and the glare of a 
thousand lights. The music swells to 
double forte and the Great Laurant 
swishes onto the stage amid a burst of 
applause. The show is under way and the 



first act well begun. A large butterfly 
completely covered with sparkling span- 
gles is produced, and hundreds of beauti- 
fully colored flowers fall from thin air. 
The audience see the glitter and glamour 
of it all, the tinsel and glory. They little 
realize what a tremendous strain it is ; 
they forget that an actor must entertain, 
regardless of his own feeHngs, regardless 
of anything, for the show business is no 
merry-go-round. 

With a bang the curtain falls on the 
first act, and the audience sit back at 
ease, either to read their programs or to 
enjoy a "smoke." Back stage the as- 
sistants are setting the stage for the 
second act, and Mr. Laurant is resting, 
in his dressing room. In ten minutes 
time the show is again under way. Doves 
come flappirlg out of bowls filled with 
water, the sands of the Sahara are caused 
to part, and once again Ajax, the rooster, 
crows ; but it is not the end of the pro- 
gram yet. There still remains the giant 
drum production. The stage is filled with 
silks and flags, the proscenium arch is 
lined with brightly colored pennants, and 
finally an American flag, almost equal in 
size to the back drop, is produced as the 
orchestra plays The Stars and Stripes 
Forever. The audience is thrilled, and 
the curtain falls to a tremendous ovation. 
There is a curtain call, until finally the 
house lights come on, the applause dies 
out, and Mr. Laurant retires to his dress- 
ing room exhausted. 

The work lights flash on, and the 
"drops" are lowered from the flies. The 
illusions and tables which still remain on 
the stage are quickly broken down and 
packed, the "drops" rolled, and silks 
folded. As fast as the trunks are packed 
they are loaded into the truck. The last 
piece of apparatus to go in is the animal 
cage. By this time the audience has left 
and the orchestra has gone. The audi- 



[11] 



torium is again in darkness, and the 
doors in the lobby are locked. Again the 
stage is empty, this time with only a 
single light left standing in the center. 
The truck drives off from the theatre, 



passes through the deserted streets of the 
town out into the open country, and 
speeds off into the darkness of the night, 
leaving behind it a thousand pleasant 



memories. 




The Right to An Opinion 

R. M. EWALD 
Theme 10, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



I 



N a speech on this campus several 
weeks ago the great scientist and 
thinker Professor Robert A. Millikan re- 
marked that no greater fallacy was ever 
uttered than that every man has a right 
to his opinion. These words struck me as 
being most true, a statement long needed. 
The usual reply to an attempt to correct 
someone of a prejudice or piece of mis- 
information is, "Every man has a right 
to his opinion." This has been and con- 
tinues to be the shield behind which 
people hide their narrow-mindedness and 
refusal to accept facts and proofs logi- 
cally drawn from the facts. This fallacy 
is so convenient to mentally lazy people 
who follo^v the way of least resistance 
and has been used so much that it has 
become a nearly universally accepted 
axiom. 



I am maintaining that no person has a 
right to an opinion that is more than a 
tentative one. If I were more idealistic, 
I would say that no person has a right 
to any opinion that is not the result of 
much study and thought on the subject or 
the result of the study and thought of a 
reliable authority. I realize, however, 
that one cannot delve easily into every 
field and that he must form some 
opinions, especially on philosophical sub- 
jects, merely on the results of his own 
observations. Certain convictions must 
be held and certain assumptions must be 
made in order for one to build up some- 
thing to live by, to have a sound philoso- 
phy of life, without which man is like a 
ship without a rudder. One has a right 
to form an opinion which affects only 
himself (if such an opinion is possible). 



[12] 



One has a right to form an opinion that 
comes from the heart rather than from 
the mind. One has a natural tendency to 
form opinions on every subject on a 
basis of either knowledge or prejudice, 
but the point is that these opinions must 
be subject to change. 

When is a person ethically or morally 
justified in saying that his opinion is 
such and such on a question that is more 
than a personal issue ? In the first place, 
his method of approach must be open 
minded ; he must cast aside all prejudice 
and bias. Then he must study the au- 
thorities and the facts and think these 
over with the dispassionate view of a 
scientist. But when he has arrived at 
the conclusion, that is not the end of the 
study. He must keep in contact with the 
developments and changes that take place 
in the subject. 

Another means of rationalizing one's 
mental laziness is merely to say that one 
man's opinion is as good as another's. 
Such a view might be excusable if the 
issue were on a subject on which the 
authorities greatly differ. For example, 
the philosophies of Dante, Schopenhauer, 
Hegel, James, and Bergson are so much 
in contradiction that they cannot all be 



accepted as a basis on which to build a 
philosophy. Since this is true, one's 
philosophy of life should be built up not 
on the basis of authority but on the basis 
of the individual's personal needs. But 
in more factual subjects which are not 
merely personal matters affecting the 
heart more than the mind, one's opinion 
must be formed from knowledge. Since 
some people are in a better position to 
know, then some people can and do 
form more accurate opinions than do 
others. For example, fancy comparing 
the opinion of the man on the street with 
the opinion of some eminent biologist on 
the evolution of man. It is absurd, 
although very convenient, to say that one 
man's opinion is as good as another's. 

The keeping of one's opinion in a 
static condition cannot be morally or 
ethically justified. When the opinions of 
the people of a nation which is presum- 
ably a democracy built on public opinion 
become static, then progress ceases to 
take place. Thus every person should 
form his ideas and convictions on a basis 
of thought and fact, not only for the 
sake of society but for the sake of keep- 
ing his own personality alive. 



Chemistry for Pleasure 

Herta Breiter 
Theme 18, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 



T AM taking a course in chemistry be- 
■'■ cause I like the stufif. I realize that 
this reason is original and that I run 
the risk of being rushed to Kankakee or 
points north — but risks like that provide 
the proverbial spice for that questionable 
stew which somebody has labeled "life." 
I shall probably change my mind about 
chemistry before the end of the semester, 



but, while the feeling lasts, I may as well 
air my views and hope there is something 
to this business of auto-suggestion. 

My love for chemistry dates back to 
my junior year in high school. I admit 
that I took it then because all proclaimed 
it to be extremely difficult and not a girl's 
course. I was determined to change their 
minds. I doubt whether I would have 



[13] 



found that science half so interesting if 
it had not been for the efforts of my in- 
structor. He tried desperately to make 
the course as interesting as possible, but 
he got very little cooperation from his 
class. He was always greatly concerned 
for our personal welfare — too much so. 
I cannot recall even the tiniest explosion 
in my four years at that school. We 
never handled an^ihing even remotely 
dangerous. Is it surprising that our in- 
terest waned ? 

But I opened my eyes wide when I 
saw here in the University laboratory 
the rows of bottled reagents on the desks 
and the many shelves of chemicals 
around the pillars. Here, surely, was the 
land of the free — (and the home of the 
brave, experience soon taught me.) 
Nobody would fuss about risks here ; I 
would be treated like a responsible indi- 
vidual ; I would get what I wanted here. 
Well, I got it all right — right in the eye. 
It is bad enough to swallow chlorine gas, 
but I abhor red eyes — and I certainly 
got an eyeful of that gas. The natural 
results of swallowing chlorine are identi- 
cal with those of a heavy cold — I looked 
like a dewy last summer's rose for a few 
weeks. But it was a novel experience, 
and I enjoyed it immensely. That is 
just one of the episodes which make 
chemistry laboratory work so enjoyable. 
Then, of course, there is always the 
chance that one's hair may catch fire ; 
but the odor produced by such a confla- 
gration can in no way compare with that 
of hydrogen sulphide. If you have never 
scented this "aromatic" gas, you have 
missed smelling one of nature's most 
respected vapors. It is commonly called 
"rotten egg" gas because it is just that; 
when the yolk of an egg decays, it gives 
off this gas of the unforgettable odor. I 
had to come to college to learn that this 
gas is violently poisonous, but I should 



like to meet the person who could bear 
it long enough to be poisoned by it. Hy- 
drogen chloride is almost as bad, but it 
has not the vile odor of its near relative. 
It makes up for this lack, however, by its 
sharpness. It is almost impossible to 
"sniff it cautiously," as the manual sug- 
gests ; you are sure to get a lung full and 
just as sure to burn the mucous mem- 
brane of your nose. If you are fortunate 
enough not to inhale any of those gases, 
you undoubtedly will burn your fingers 
with the concentrated sulphuric acid 
which will run down the side of the test 
tube while you are admiring the lovely 
color produced by the formation of an 
insoluble sulphate when the acid was 
added. If you run true to form, if you 
are as sloppy as all amateur chemists are, 
you will certainly burn holes in your 
manual and in the clothes which are too 
good for laboratory work — a fact which 
you always forget. 

So far, I have given only the physical 
results, but, strange as it may seem, I 
have a definite mental reaction to report. 
Perhaps it differs with the individual — 
perhaps everybody will not react as I 
did; I hope not, for I am sure my re- 
action was not a rational one. I blame 
it all on my instructor ; he should not 
emphasize important points as he does. 
He said, for instance, "All things are 
composed of elements." He is right, I 
suppose ; but why should his words keep 
running through my head ? And they 
have had their ill effects upon me: water 
is no longer just water — it is two parts 
hydrogen and one part oxygen ; food is 
either carbohydrate or carbohydrate plus 
nitrogen ; man is nothing more than a 
walking mixture of various compounds 
composed of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, 
nitrogen, and sulphur, with a bit of cal- 
cium and phosphorous thrown in as a 
skeleton ; glass is sand in disguise ; and 



[14] 



paper and trees are brothers under the 
skin. Then there are questions — many 
questions which I ask myself because I 
am afraid to display my ignorance to 
anyone else. For instance, if paint con- 
tains iron,, why are not houses coated 
with rust? Is "ferric" or "ferrous" iron 
used in making a truck chassis ? Of what 
are vitamins composed if not of ele- 
ments? Are they crystallized energy? 
Why does smoke keep the form of a 
cloud instead of precipitating soot in- 
stantly on its expulsion from the chim- 
ney? These questions probably have 
answers, but I would never have time 
to look them up ; and, in the meantime, 
I slowly go insane. Then my attention 
was turned from elements into another 
byway. My instructor is also responsible 
for the following bit of wisdom: "Chem- 
istry will become very simple and easy to 
understand as soon as you can visualize 
the atomic theory." This theory states 
that "all elements are composed of mole- 
cules which are constantly in motion and 



traveling in straight lines; as soon as 
they strike anything, they rebound with- 
out losing any of their speed." If the 
"elements" were maddening, there is no 
word to describe the "molecules." I did 
not mind wondering about the air mole- 
cules which were constantly hitting me 
from all sides, nor did I particularly care 
about those I chewed up in candy bars 
or those I fried in the skillet as pork- 
chops, but what bothered me was how 
the molecules formed my instructor's 
nose — whether or not they turned a 
corner sharply — what they hit, if any- 
thing. I almost saw them chasing madly 
down the bridge of his nose. They 
bothered me exceedingly ! 

When the amateur reaches this point, 
he must take a vacation, or he will lose 
his wits entirely. If the malady has not 
progressed too far, he will recover fully 
in a week or two and come back realizing 
that there is considerable pleasure in 
chemistry — if one does not take it too 
seriously. 



i 




[15] 



My Ancestors 



]\ yl Y "living ancestors 

^^ *■ the two sets of grandparents on 
both sides having died before I was born. 
I know very little about them or anyone 
before them, and the little I do know 
has probably been discolored by reason 
of distance and sentiment. 

3fC 3JC -fC 3|C 

At the dinner table I would sing 
"Molly O" for my uncle Tom and receive 
a nickel. (Uncle Tom used to sprinkle 
salt on the table and dip his celery in 
it; he also buttered his apple pie and 
put sugar on his tomatoes ; he went back 
to Ireland about thirteen years ago.) 
The meal finished and the dishes "over," 
the conversation usually developed into 
a Gregorian chant of "do-you-remember- 
the-times." Taking into consideration 
the amount of time out I had in order to 
rush beer, I think I got a pretty good 
picture of my forebears. 

Granny Neville, my mother's grand- 
mother, wore a poke-bonnet and shawl 
and had a face like a withered lemon. 
She defied the landowners once for a 
solid month, during the famine, and had 
to give in only when the potatoes gave 
out. They say she wore the plaid shawl 
and poke-bonnet through it all ; and all 
you can see in the tintype in the album 
is lemon, bonnet, shawl. She was put in 
jail, but so was Robert Emmett. The 
mummers made up a song about her ; I 
forget the words. Her maiden name was 
O'Connell, and she was a first cousin of 
Daniel O'Connell, the Irish statesman. 
She is the only one of my eight great- 
grandparents of whom I know anything; 
the others have no place in the stories. 

Mrs. Sutton of Ramusgrange (that's 



Michael Connolly 
Theme 10, Rhetoric II, 1924-35 

are limited, how it sounded anyway), Sutton's Parish, 
County Wexford, should be alive to- 
day: her favorite nephew is a "big shot" 
politician in Chicago, and all his relatives 
work in the City Hall. She was my 
mother's mother, with a face like an 
angel and a heart of gold .... and 
angina pectoris. Her sons (she had nine, 
and seven daughters) are all alive but 
four. She resembled Queen Victoria, 
although she was not as stout. The 
favorite story about her, told usually be- 
tween set-ups in McGinty's, at 74th and 
Cottage, Chicago, when the "tribe" gets 
together, is the one about 

Punch Ryan's Wake 

The River Suir is a mile wide between 
the towns of Ballyhack and Passage. The 
Atlantic dashes at the foot of the light- 
house, marking the point where a boat 
was blown off its course once and several 
hundred people were lost. The spirits 
of the dead people still haunt the Salty 
Islands, which are just south of Wex- 
ford, in the Irish Sea. They are said to 
be the banshees and leprechauns, but 
these are really the Northern Lights ; 
Dad knew this because he had lived in 
Dublin for a while where the people are 
more sophisticated and hate Joyce's guts. 

They were coming home from Punch 
Ryan's wake in Kilkenny one night, in a 
peat boat — Paddy Whalen, Bridget Mc- 
Conk, Moll the Charger, Patsy Shannon, 
The Dauber, the Mau Doyle, my grand- 
mother, and several others. The men 
were a little under the weather, having 
partaken a little too freely of the liquid 
refreshment for which Irish wakes are 
noted. It was stormy ; the banshees were 
wailing; they had missed the tide. The 



[16] 



next day was Sunday, and the women 
were anxious to get home so as not to 
miss Mass. 

Mrs. Sutton kneels in the wet in the 
beam of the boat, her rosary dripping 
from her fingers. She prays aloud, stop- 
ping in the very midst of her prayer to 
yell, "Damn it to hell. Patsy, sit down 
or the wind will blow you all the way to 
Galway." My dad was leader of the 
mummers one year, and they wrote a 
song about this. 

My mother's father was hit by a red- 
hot spike in a blacksmith shop and killed 
instantly. 

I never learned much of my dad's 
father and mother because my dad set a 



good example by never drinking beer 
when we kids were around. If they 
were like him, however, I would 
have loved them ; he has such swell 
opinions about things — Sean O'Casey, 
for instance, "the dirty bricklayer" — 
that it is a pleasure to argue with him. 
Colum, Yeats, Lady Gregory, Russell, 
James Stephens, even Joyce, he will 
praise, but O'Casey — ! Juno and the 
Paycock is his meat; he has memorized 
parts of it and hurls them at you during 
the course of an argument, asking if 
anyone ever heard an Irishman talk like 
that. I am convinced he would have been 
willing to throw the largest brick the 
night Juno opened at the Abbey. 



Giant of the Age 



SURROUNDING us on every side, 
defying us to free ourselves from its 
reaches, is the giant of our age. Modern 
Advertising — a giant who looms before 
us at every turn — from whom there is 
no escape. The inner sanctuary of our 
homes affords us no protection. Radio, 
newspapers, magazines — all provide ave- 
nues of entrance. When we leave our 
firesides and go forth, we meet the giant 
in other clothing — outdoor costumes. 
Billboards line the highways to the right 
and left; cards hang over our heads on 
trains, street cars, and busses ; electric 
signs flash before our eyes. Even if we 
could defeat this demand for our atten- 
tion by closing our eyes, there would 
still be loud speakers blaring from com- 
mercial herald trucks ; there would be 



Betty Faris 
Theme 16, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

"dodgers" unwelcomingly thrust into our 
hands. 

I am sure we would not resent so 
violently this constant demand for atten- 
tion if the advertising which so intrudes 
upon us were truly a reliable criterion 
for discriminating between advertised 
articles. But many confusing claims are 
made by manufacturers of purchasable 
products. So many of them insult intelli- 
gence that advertising is a hindrance, not 
a help. Each manufacturer declares his 
product better than his competitor's for 
some specific reason which he sets about 
boring into our consciousness until he 
has worn us down and we, unable to re- 
sist the onslaught any longer, accept his 
claims as facts. Having made of us a 
convert, he knows we will henceforth 



[17] 



loyally purchase his product — his ciga- 
rettes (guaranteed throat protection) or 
tomato juice (new kind of vitamin) or 
spark plugs (quicker get-a-way) or 
shampoo (glossier, healthier hair) or 
anything he has set out to sell. 

Now and then an advertiser with 
something bordering on a conscience does 
base his claims on scientific facts — facts 
which he goes great lengths to secure. 
More often the reverse is true, for 
modern advertising is concerned least 
of all with Truth. A recent government 
chemical analysis disclosed the amusing 
fact that a widely advertised soap 
contained no trace of either palm or 
olive oils — the precious ingredients ad- 
vertised as the preserver of youthful 
complexions. 

Several years ago, old Ezekiel Tir- 
mons, then head of the Tirmons mat- 
tress concern, decided he really wanted to 
discover just what sort of mattress was 
most conducive to sleep and then to 
make, advertise, and sell that kind of 
mattress. He wanted to give the public 
the real facts on healthy, vitalizing sleep. 
He hunted up a university professor who 
already had made some investigations on 
the subject of sleep, and, fitting a labora- 
tory for him, commissioned him to spend 
his full time ferreting out the secret of 
restful sleep. Mr. Tirmons cannot be 
credited with absolute altruism in 
financing this project, for two reasons. 
First, Mr. Tirmons expected to capital- 
ize on the discoveries — to sell more mat- 
tresses because of them. Second and 
even more important, Mr. Tirmons suf- 
fered from insomnia. 

The work took six or seven years, cost 
thousands of dollars, and is recorded on 
reel after reel of motion pictures taken 
of people sleeping on various types of 
mattresses. But by the time the proper 
mattress had been scientifically de- 



termined and the data were available for 
advertising purposes, Mr. Tirmons had 
himself found deep and sound sleep — 
for Mr. Tirmons was dead. 

The more modern young men who 
undertook the management of the Tir- 
mons company half-heartedly tried using 
the scientific approach, then abandoned 
the so-called "vitalizing sleep" campaign, 
retreated, and joined the present popular 
school of advertising which, it seems, 
believes anything can be advertised best 
through the medium of the feminine 
figure. So Tirmons mattress advertising 
abruptly changed its appeal from the use 
of reliable scientific data to the picturing 
before the reading public of a charming 
girl sitting, scantily clad, of course, on 
the edge of a bed — the bed presumably 
fitted with a Tirmons mattress. And 
that, sad to relate, is the end of an old 
man's brave attempt to do the right thing 
by the dear public. 

This method of using the feminine 
figure for illustrative purposes is legiti- 
mate enough for the makers of founda- 
tion garments, but the pictures have be- 
come so stereotyped that they are tiring 
— always the X-ray type of picture of a 
lady in a formal gown. The advertis- 
ers' one attempt a few seasons ago to be 
scientific covered our newspaper and 
magazine pages with outline drawings of 
spinal curvatures which they labeled the 
lordosis curve and Ballyhoo renamed, 
aptly enough, the Lord-help-us curve^ 
This advertising campaign was short 
lived, however, for no woman would (by 
purchasing this particular garment) ad- 
mit herself that much out of shape. 

Nothing, it seems, is too remote to 
preclude its being advertised by some 
beautiful girl model. The makers of 
automobile bodies were first to utilize 
this medium. The young lady, in well- 
fitting clothing, illustrates the perfection 



[18] 



of "Body by Fisher." Not more than a 
half dozen people have ever noticed the 
company's old-fashioned trade mark 
which appears always on the same page 
— a medieval coach. After all, there isn't 
an}1:hing romantic about a metal automo- 
bile frame — and it seems that present- 
day advertising must be romantic. "Ads" 
may be untruthful, ambiguous, or just 
plain silly and still get by, but if the 
element of romance is neglected, out goes 
the copy-writer, branded a traitor to the 
present-day conception of first-rate ad- 
vertising. 

Now there are other types of current 
advertising which annoy me. The makers 
of advertising copy seem unified in the 
belief that all life is very dull and com- 
monplace and that they are sent from 
God to glorify for the American public 
every item of daily use. They are slaves 
of the superlative. The product they ad- 
vertise is never merely a good product 
— it is without question the best product 
of its kind. Others have no value at all 
in their estimation. Obviously they can't 
all be "best." But to go back to the 
aforementioned business of glorifying 
anything and everything, these copy- 
writers who are addicted to the exag- 
gerated use of adjectives do irk me. At 
the corner soda fountain, the banana 
sundae which was my childhood love is 
now advertised in giant letters all over 
the glass behind the counter as Royal 
Banana Sundae De Luxe. If the day be 
chilly, the menu invites me to order a cup 
of Superfine Fancy Banquet Tea. Now 
a cup of tea is just a cup of tea to me — 
to anyone, in fact, except an English- 
man. His is "a dish of tea," but it's a 



very common thing at that. Knowledge 
of rudimentary etiquette makes the title 
Superfine Fancy Banquet Tea ridiculous. 
Tea at a banquet! Tea at a banquet! 
How Emily Post would squirm ! 

However objectionable they may be, 
the persons who concoct such overpower- 
ing adjective trimmings are not as ob- 
noxious as the ones who are fostering 
the baby talk trend. This adolescent com- 
plex is manifested by such names as The 
Helpsie Selfsie Grocerie, The Goodie 
Nookie Candie Shoppe, The Waffly 
Goodie Waffle Shoppe. Every little store 
in the land seems overnight to have put 
on airs and emerged into a sort of 
shoppe. One community has an arcade 
of shops whose front windows announce 
them to the passing public as Bettie's 
Beaute Shoppe (a slight French flavor), 
Ye Olde Gifte Shoppe (old English 
flavor), Mummie's Meat Shoppe (plain 
American), and The Nuttie Shoppe 
(plain insanity). 

Another group of "shoppes" are those 
w^hose owners have a genius for mis- 
spelling as well as alliteration — such as 
the Kopper Kettle Koffee Shoppe and 
the Kindly Kupboard Kandy Kitchen. 
The average person hardly suspects there 
are so many words beginning with "K" 
in the entire English language. Spelling 
has become a matter of trivial conse- 
quence. Let the stuffy old lexicographers 
have the jitters, seems to be the preva- 
lent attitude, not shared, however, by 
Alexander Woollcott, who has gone on 
record as pining to give the proprietor of 
the Helpsie Selfsie a good kick in the 
pantsie-wantsie. 



[19] 



Reactions to Walpole's Jeremy 



SOMETIMES, under the influence of 
a book or in the thoughtful medi- 
tation which lonehness inspires, my mind 
turns to memories of childhood. Then 
I re-live in humorous thought many droll 
incidents which, at the time they hap- 
pened, were serious matters to me. I am 
moved, in thinking back, by the same 
misunderstood emotions which so often 
led me to the solace of introspection. I 
cherish these thought- journeys, for I 
believe they will some day enable me to 
be a more understanding father than I 
otherwise would. 

Jeremy, a book written by the versa- 
tile English contemporary, Hugh Wal- 
pole, has brought me for a time one of 
these periods of reflection. Walpole has 
presented incidents and emotions like 
those of my own boyhood, as they af- 
fected the life of an English lad, just 
arrived at the age when he is too big to 
play with his sisters, too young for the 
grown-ups to understand him, and not 
old enough to be accepted as a playmate 
by the older schoolboys. Although this 
little boy lived about forty-five years ago, 
surrounded by a very different type of 
community from any I have ever known, 
I recognize many of his experiences as 
also my own. I will not forget soon the 
first lie that I told, and its consequences ; 
nor will I forget the unasked, un- 
answered questions that filled my mind 
when I discovered one of the grown-ups 
telling a very big lie ; I afterwards found 
that this kind of lie was excusable be- 
cause it was a diplomatic lie. I could, 
therefore, sympathize with Jeremy when 
he was faced with that same perplexing 



Anonymous 
Theme 18, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

problem. I can remember, also, how 
much I enjoyed the first American 
Legion carnival that came to town, 
although I probably would have enjoyed 
it more if my parents had been obliging 
enough to forbid my going, for I certainly 
was no angelic child. In fact, when I 
think of the annoyance I gave my teach- 
ers, I am convinced that I was fully as 
much an imp as Jeremy ever thought of 
being. 

While some of Jeremy's escapades re- 
call memories of my early pranks, the 
emotions felt by his sister, Mary, recall 
even more vividly the many heart-aches 
which were mine during those same years 
of my life. I have been told that I pos- 
sess one feminine quality, because I have 
always had unconcealable affections, 
which were never returned so obviously 
as they were bestowed. Often, when my 
feelings were hurt, I would retire to a 
secluded haymow corner, there to brood 
over my troubles and to lavish self-pity 
upon myself. I believe I can understand 
Mary's jealousy of the little dog that 
supplanted her in Jeremy's affections, 
and I think I can understand her con- 
tempt for the new baby, which came as 
unwanted as a litter of new kittens, yet 
presented the same appeal. 

My reactions to this book, Jeremy, 
however, were not confined to restrospec- 
tion. I could not help noticing the effec- 
tiveness of Walpole's characterizations. 
Each of his personages reminds me of 
someone whom I know. While the me- 
chanics of Walpole's writings do not 
always conform to my ideas of correct- 
ness, the continuity of the book is so 



[20] 



strong and the narrative so interesting 
that I would not wish to find fault with 
Jeremy on account of mechanics. 



I think that I shall read more of Wal- 
pole's books, for he writes of incidents 
with which we are mutually familiar. 



The Lost World 



T SOMETIMES think tnat a 
■'■ world cannot be the same world that 
we see with the eyes of an adult. Re- 
member how bright and freshly washed 
the world once appeared — how green the 
grass, how yery yellow the heart of a 
flower? I feel that our perceptions haye 
been dulled by haste to do the things that 
the adult world yalues as worthwhile. 

Perhaps it is a blunting of apprecia- 
tions. I remember the utter contentment 
of lying in bed of a morning, after hay- 
ing waked gently and not abruptly from 
the terrifying clang of an alarm clock, 
and watching the sun strike a broad band 
of light on the floor, and indolently 
noticing that the leaves on a tree out- 
side my window made an intricate pat- 
tern on the blue sky. It was bliss, un- 
worried bliss ; yet my nerves were sensi- 
tively alive to appreciation. 

Today the alarm clock frightens me 
out of bed. I close my window quickly, 
and am launched on a day spent in being 
boisterously educated — hurrying from 
class to library, meeting countless in- 
different people, people as indifferent to 
me as I am to them. The grass may be 
green and the wind warm, but my mind 
is too crowded for anything save a very 
sketchy appreciation. There are so many 



Florence Newton 
Theme 11, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

that a child's tremendously important and worthwhile 
things to be done. 

And faith — has our childhood faith in 
humanity, as it is and not as the world 
would want it to be, been left behind in 
that seemingly lost childhood world? If 
it has, we adults have lost something 
singularly flowerlike and good. We know 
that children are not critical ; clothes, ap- 
pearance, social standing mean little to 
them. Once I asked a little girl why she 
liked a particularly unprepossessing in- 
dividual, and she replied decisively and 
surely, "She has such kind eyes." The 
child had faith in what she saw. The 
person had kind eyes, and the child did 
not question her feeling of satisfaction. 
I am afraid that we have lost the fresh- 
ness of a child's vision, and that criticism 
has supplanted our childhood's optimistic 
clarity. 

The cruelty of adult life often makes 
me wish to be again in the peaceful 
garden of childhood — a garden protected 
by walls of ignorance. But this is beat- 
ing a retreat; instead of idly wishing, 
why not aspire to embroider on this thick 
unmanageable fabric of the grown-up 
world one simple unobtrusive design in 
white thread to remind us of our child- 
hood appreciation of nature and our 
childhood faith in humanity as it is? 



[21] 



The Glory That Was Momentary 



I 



Mary Jane Van Hoesen 
Theme, Rhetoric I, 1924-35 

F you are the kind of fool who can be bound classic 
even momentarily happy because green 



leaves, massed together on trees, look 
silver on sunny days or gray bricks seem 
green on a windy, cloudy, misty day, 
then you are the kind of fool who is 
above the king's jesters. 

Knowing that growing is a disappoint- 
ing, disillusioning experience for home- 
fed hearts, you can forget the truths 
your eyes have seen and your ears have 
heard and still be happy in the new use 
of your just-awakened senses. You can 
be happy now because you are receptive 
to all that life may offer you. You can 
love the slow glow of a fading sunset, 
exalt in the soaring sounds of a sym- 
phony, thrill at the feel of soft velvet or 
the warm furriness of a kitten, enjoy 
the fragrance of perfume or perfumed 
possessions, and live vitally and fully 
with the complete employment of your 
senses. 

Besides enjoying the quiet use of your 
senses, you, if you are truly receptive, 
can appreciate more mundane matters. 
You can — and do — anticipate well- 
served, highly seasoned meals as much as 
you anticipate the purchase of a finely 



You can enjoy moving 
into a handsome room filled with well- 
dressed, attractive men and women as 
much as you delight in seeing the sky- 
ward flight of a flock of birds. Even 
the fluttering of a lone leaf can give 
you an elusive, fleeting happiness, if you 
are both observant and receptive. 

In the love of the worldly and natural, 
you are a true exponent of receptivity, 
which is, for me, the keen delight in all 
that has been produced by God or man. 

Gradually, unwittingly, I have evolved 
the belief that happiness is the result of 
receptivity. Smoke against the sky; 
flowers in a bowl ; music through an open 
window ; a deserted boulevard on a rainy, 
starless night; an illusory row of street 
lights in a suburban city — to the recep- 
tive mind and heart all these constitute a 
physically elusive, but spiritually lasting, 
happiness. Beautiful women in paintings 
or in person ; handsome men in perfectly 
tailored clothes ; chubby-cheeked chil- 
dren; glossy horses; domestic pets; 
travel pictures — to the receptive mind all 
or any of these are enough for a strange, 
momentary happiness, which is, paradox- 
icall}', the only lasting kind. 



Two Descriptions 



Hamilton Hall 
Themes 14-15, Rhetoric II, 1924-25 

Fog on the River 

TT was one of those nights that river 

■'■ men call thick and landlubbers 

call foggy. It was almost raining but not 

enough to roughen the black surface of 

the river that was sliding silently beneath 



and around us. Instead of falling like 
rain, the water particles floated lazily in 
the air and made a cloud, not quite im- 
penetrable, just thick enough to turn the 
usually bright river lights into dull yel- 



[22] 



low circles that changed into wraithlike 
shapes as I looked at them. There was 
no shore, no sky, no river except beneath 
us, nothing but " curling fog, blurred 
lights, and an occasional hoarse blast of 
a steam whistle. 

Our port and starboard lights made 
red and green blurs just above me. The 
running light threw the rear deck into 
faint relief, and the coiled stern line on 
it made a dark circle. The orange deck 
ahead of me was lighted dimly by the 
refraction from the brilliant finger of 
light from the spotlight mounted over- 
head. The white finger rose and fell with 
the slight rising and falling of the boat, 
which was caused by the low swell run- 
ning before the upstream breeze. A long 
line of evenly spaced circles of white- 
ness took shape in the blackness ahead. 
The lights, like pearls on a string, seemed 
round, perfect, soft. Three darker 
masses began to take shape. They would 
be the bridge piers. My course was to 
the left of the center one. A whistle 
boomed out and seemed to rebound from 
the invisible floor of the high bridge now 
just above us. I answered with two 
blasts, pass to starboard. The thick fog 
curled more rapidly around the wind- 
shield before me and left large trembling 
drops of water that slid endlessly to the 
deck and formed a tiny, uncertain 
stream. Winding fingers of the gray 
cloud found their way in around the 
canvas curtains of the cockpit and 
disappeared in the warmer air of the 
enclosure. 



But for the spokes of the wheel in my 
hand, the solid planking of the deck be- 
neath my feet, and the rumble of the 
engine, I would have felt that I was 
flying through the air, instead of mov- 
ing slowly up the Mississippi. The motor 
was slowed so that we were hardly mov- 
ing against the current, and the deck 
pulsed slowly to its beating. I felt the 
thrill of uncertainty that is ever present 
on such a night when that gray cloud 
shrouds lights, channel marks, and worst 
of all, drifting logs. What is ahead? 
Nothing and everything. Rather like life, 
I thought. We moved on ; more blurred 
lights, more booming whistles, another 
high bridge stretching proudly overhead, 
the damp, cool, pungent river smells, the 
clatter of a bell, and over everything 
the soft fog. 

Rails 

Two slender, shining streaks of steel 
raced from beneath the swaying car and 
ran side by side out into the vague dis- 
tance and then drew closer to each other 
as if pulled by a desire for companion- 
ship like two lonely human beings, alone 
in a mad world. In their straight, appar- 
ently endless course, there seemed to be 
expressed all the eternal striving of man- 
kind, all the futility of man's hopeless 
battle with that prime factor of all life, 
time. Dusk was falling. The sky was 
darkening. The racing rails still reached 
out hopefully but gradually dissolved 
into nothingness, into only a suggestion 
of existence. 



[23] 



St. Martin s Church 



Earle Bickerton 
Theme 12, Rhetoric II, 1924-35 



A TALL, towering steeple against the 
■^*-sky, an equestrian statue high above 
the front door, ancient weathered walls 
of gray stone, narrow deep-set windows, 
old ivy — these are the striking things 
about St. Alartin's. No semi-Gothic uni- 
versity chapel or movie palace s\.y\t of 
architecture is this. Medieval Gothic of 
the purest type, the spire is high and in- 
comparably graceful in slender thrust. 
The coloring of the aged w-alls blends 
into the drab neighborhood. It is the sort 
of church one would expect to come sud- 
denly upon in some ancient walled town 
of the Middle Ages. 

Inside the church, the air is cool and 
moist. The whole church is very dark; 
the flickering red of the vigil light at the 
altar constitutes the sole illumination. 
Little sunlight enters through the stained 
glass of the panes; the sounds of the 



everyday world outside are soft and re- 
mote — almost meaningless. Here and 
there drift wisps of fragrant incense, 
ghosts of benedictions and masses that 
still remain. 

Ever}i;hing inside is of carved wood 
rich with the dark patina of age. Fluted 
shafts rise to the shadowed arches over- 
head. Carved fretworks, panels depicting 
the crucifixion, statues, all were fash- 
ioned from wood cut by some master- 
artisans of years long past. In one of 
the pews a figure kneels, bowed in prayer 
and lost in meditation. Nameless, motion- 
less, utterly without the world, she con- 
tinues her devotion. It seems sacrile- 
gious to disturb her. Thus does St. Mar- 
tin's ofifer refuge, peace, and solace to 
those who would escape from the world 
to think or pray. 




[24] 



Mood "Nudus" 



Edgar Park hurst 
Theme 16, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

T STEP up on the platform with the 

•'• pecuHar feehngs always experienced 
by a person about to make his first speech. 
My heart pounds. My knees shake. My 
breath comes in short gasps. I pick a 
spot in the center of the dais. Here I 
place one foot in advance of the other, 
square my shoulders, place one hand on 
my hip, and turn as though to address 



fear I will disrupt the concentrated at- 
tention of the audience. Through "per- 
sonal contact" I am aware of Mr. Fly 
instituting a systematic search for an 
elusive something. After encircling my 
leg several times he begins a slow ascent 
toward more lofty regions. His moving 
feet produce in the adjacent parts an in- 
tolerable "itchiness." It seems he has 



those of my audience on the right. During decided to prolong my misery by ascend- 
this time, my optical nerves refuse to ing gradually to a more tender spot where 
transmit anything the least bit tangible the torture of my agonized body would 



to my mind. I seem to see only billow- 
ing clouds of a foggy substance con- 
taining ghostly faces peering through 
at me. 

But now the fog is dispersing some- 
what, and more distinctly I can see those 
around me for whom I form the center 
of attention. I focus my eyes on a con- 



be complete. My kingdom for a can of 
Flit! 

The effects of my motionless "attitude" 
are already beginning to take their toll, 
A dull, wracking pain is slowly making 
progress along one arm until it finally 
merges with other such pains originating 
in my feet and neck. The creeping tor- 



venient spot on the wall and try to forget ture of a fly and the tired muscular tor- 

what most speakers try to forget — the ture of prolonged immovability bring me 

audience. close to the limit of my endurance. With 

At this time my feelings are very pe- perspiration on my brow and with a feel- 

culiar, to say the least. I am perspiring, ing of clamminess, I become increasingly 

and yet I know it is actually too cool for aware of my importance; an awareness 

comfort. This latter fact is quite em- which, for obvious reasons I have tried 

phatically proved as now and then a cool to keep from my mind. I now realize to 

current of air wraps my body in its frigid the full extent that my body is clad only 

embrace. I cannot move. I must remain in a trifling "gee-string" and that I have 

immovable as a statue riveted to the floor, been the subject of intense study. 
A fly approaches me and buzzes around These thoughts, of course, bring men- 

my legs seeking a favorable landing field, tal pictures of a critical audience in the 

I very decisively dislike flies, especially depths of despair at my seeming loss of 

on occasions similar to this one tongue. With the final disappearance of 

Just as I feared — the fly makes an irri- my psychological smoke-screen, mental 



tating three point two landing on the 
lower extremity of my left leg. At least 
Mr. Fly was very thoughtful, or should I 
say not very thoughtful, in avoiding other 
more sensitive parts of my body. I do 
not dare to send Mr. Fly on his way for 



reactions are rapidly replaced by physical 
realities. People completely surround me. 
On large sheets of paper fastened in 
front of them, they seem to be "jotting" 
down their impressions of me. A man 
walks among the people giving them 



[25] 



hints on their "notes" and continually 
referring to me. I am very tired by now 
and find myself automatically waiting for 
this particular man to pronounce the sin- 
gle word, "Rest!" The pain in my legs, 
neck, and arms has changed to a prickly 
numbness. Mr. Fly has sought and 
found new fields to conquer on the 
diaphragmatic muscles separating the 
thorax from the abdomen. I try to move 
imperceptibly in order to ease the tired 
muscles, but with the gleam of an in- 



tensely white light focused on me the 
slightest motion would be too easily dis- 
cerned. 

Just when it seems that I have reached 
the limit of human endurance, a voice 
repeating the word, "Rest," reverberates 
in my ears. With the motions of an old 
man crippled with rheumatism, I limp 
from the platform amid no applause 
whatsoever for my "pains." Why should 
I receive applause when I am merely per- 
forming my duties as an artist's model? 



J< 



ennie 

Mildred Spitler 
Theme 17, Rhetoric I, 1924-35 



T LIKE maiden ladies — old maids, if 
■■■ you prefer. I have known only one, 
but my association with her has left many 
pleasant memories. Across the street 
from the place I used to live, twelve 
years ago, there was a brownish white 
house that twisted and turned itself into 
many ells. It was a house of high-ceil- 
inged, spacious rooms, rooms that were 
gay with brightly colored wall-paper 
Here Jennie lived, alone with her mother 
and a small legion of pets: Billy, a 
trilling, throat-puffing canary; Nebu- 
chadnezzar and Hezekiah, the two gold- 
fish ; and Disraeli, the kinky-haired, stub- 
tailed poodle. Jennie was skinny, and 
she wore high-neck collars, but she had 
beautiful hair; it was black and curly, 
and her eyes were as black as her hair. 
I liked Jennie. I never met anyone who 
could play house better than she. I was 
always the mother, and she was every- 
thing from the bad child to a neighbor 
coming to call. Sometimes she would 
take my hand, and together we would 
climb the three flights of stairs to the 
attic. Here in a dusky haze, character- 
istic of all attics, I could see stack after 



stack of boxes, but always we would 
go to a certain corner where a big trunk 
stood. This she would open and from it 
tenderly bring out some remembrance of 
her girlhood. Maybe it would be a doll, 
or a set of tiny spoons, or ma3^be a small 
dish. These she would give me, and, 
drawing me on her lap, would tell me 
stories of how she had used them when 
she was a little girl. There we would sit 
until she would remember that she had 
baked some cookies that morning. 

Then Jennie and I would visit my 
favorite of all her rooms — the pantry! 
It was old-fashioned, much larger than 
one of the step-saving afifairs the modern 
housewife calls a kitchen. Here in this 
storeroom, filled with spicy odors, was a 
shelf just high enough for me to reach 
the five squatty jars on it; each of them 
was filled with a different kind of cookie. 
Jennie was enough of an old maid to 
have certain set ways and opinions. One 
was that cookies must never be mixed — 
hence the five separate jars. Since I 
could not read the labels on the jars 
signifying the type of cookie in each, she 
had painted the lids five different colors. 



[26] 



Green lid signified ginger cookies; blue 
lid, sugar cookies ; red lid, molasses 
cookies ; orange lid, fruit-filled cookies ; 
and yellow lid, oatmeal cookies. It was 
Jennie who with her five jars and her 
delicious cookies taught me my first 
sense of five colors. However, I had 
difficulties when I started to school, for 



I had associated certain colors with cer- 
tain cookies, and since my teacher knew 
nothing of Jennie, she was incapable of 
comprehending the connection which I 
insisted existed between molasses cookies 
and the brilliant red disc she was showing 
me. 



Nothing on the Printers 



D 



Ernest Tucker 
Theme 17, Rhetoric II, 1924-35 

OC Potter sat on the rim of the Twenty years on the copy-desk, 

copy-desk, in the seat that he had Twenty years, since Chuck's mother died, 



occupied for twenty years, and dreamed. 
His eyes hurt, and he shut them. He was 
nearly through with another day's work ; 
half an hour would see him waiting for 
the street-car that would take him back 
to his little hole-in-the-wall apartment on 
the near north side. Things were quiet 



of saving, planning, hoping, dreaming 
for Chuck. He had been afraid, before, 
to let himself be carried away by his 
dreams ; but tonight he let his heart lead 
him. How many times had they talked 
it over together, about the wonderful 
things Chuck was going to do when he 



now, and the "slot man" in charge of graduated; joking about it when each 

the desk had gone downstairs for a cup ^^^^ ^he other was not joking. The list 

of cofifee. Doc was the only one left on ^^ ^^^^^,^ undergraduate achievements 
the rim. He blinked his eyes to ease 



their aching, and looked at the clock. . . . 
Ten more minutes. He would make a 
last check of any possible news stories, 
and go home. 
"Boy!" he called. "Check the printers !" 
The copy boy ambled toward the little 
room where the news teletypes rattle out 
their stories twenty-four hours a day. 
He was in no hurry ; it was late, and the 
news was coming in slowly. Doc Pot- 
ter closed his eyes and resumed his 
dreaming. He had Chuck's last letter in 
his pocket. Chuck, his boy, coming home ! 
It had been nearly a year since Doc had 
seen him ; nearly a year since Chuck had 
proudly sat here at the desk and written 
the headline announcing his own gradu- 
ation from Harvard and his sailing on 
a protracted European cruise. And now 
he was coming home ! 



almost frightened him. That one boy- 
man could do so much! He was bound 
for success ; no, he was fated for success. 
He could not avoid it. And as for Doc, 
he forgot the years on the copy-desk — 
years of writing about people being born, 
marrying, dying, fighting — the same old 
stories year after year, writing the same 
headlifies to fit each one. People are all 
so alike — except Chuck — so wearily 
monotonous, doing the same things in 
the same way as long as he could 
remember. He was through with this, 
through ; now would come happy years 
that they had both looked forward to 
so long, when Chuck would have a good 
job — he could not help getting one — and 
Doc could sit back a bit, and light a 
cigar, and look around at some of the 
things he had missed these twenty years. 



[27] 



He had not seen Chuck for eleven 
months. And now he was coming home ! 



Tommy, the copy-boy, stood watching 
the printers. One story coming in; he 
would wait until that finished, and then 
take it to Doc. The clacking of the tele- 
type stopped. Tommy ripped the paper 
from the machine, and began to read it, 
idly. He caught his breath, and the paper 
trembled in his hand. 

NEW YORK NY JAN 6— (AP) — 
CHARLES POTTER, 23, OF CHI- 
CAGO, WAS KILLED TODAY AS 
HE TRIED TO SAVE A CHILD 
FROAI AN AUTOxMOBILE. 

That was all. Tommy blinked his eyes. 



Damn this cigarette smoke! Just like 

Chuck he'd been a swell kid. And 

poor Doc ! Writing the obit headline on 
his own son ! And then Tommy did 
something he had never done before and 
has never done since. He deliberately 
tore live copy in two and crumpled up 
the pieces. Doc would find out soon 
enough an}^vay. 

He walked down the narrow, paper- 
littered aisle between the desks. Doc was 
putting on his overcoat. "Nothing on 
the printers, Tommy?" 

Tommy bent his head to light a cigar- 
ette. "No, Doc," he said. "Nothing on 
the printers." 



^'Dynamite— Sir ! " 



James Van Doren 
Theme 16, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

npHE battery is standing along the sible. Each man is dressed exactly like 

* west edge of the oval "bull ring" the next, with his perky, olive-drab over- 

which was set down so thoughtfully in seas cap, his straight, black tie, and his 

the middle of a woods and about two khaki shirt and breeches melting down 



blocks from the stables. Each cadet in 
the battery who has never been in sum- 
mer camp before is tightly gripping in 
his right hand the reins that lead up to 
the head of a very, very large horse. 
Those who have been in camp before 
and know all about horseflesh are holding 
the reins nonchalantly. Both the "basics" 
(first-year men) and the veterans, how- 
ever, have one thing in common: they 
are all facing the captain and the daz- 
zling eight o'clock morning sun, and are 
cussing about it. 

If somebody were to attempt to pick 
Private Schultz out of that battery from 
a little distance, he would find it impos- 



into brown leather puttees and shiny 
army shoes. If, however. Private Schultz 
were told to take one step forward, that 
somebody could by careful scrutiny de- 
tect a slight variation in Schultz from the 
other summer camp students. He is of 
medium stature and has brown curly 
hair above his brown square face in 
which are implanted two squinty, black 
eyes ; his pug-nose seems to have waged 
a losing battle to precede his wide, jutting 
chin, and his mouth, wedged in between 
the opposing pressures of his nose and 
chin, appears to want to spread into a 
smile over any little thing. Tell Schultz 
to take one step backward now, and he 



[28] 



will be absorbed into the line of horses 
and men along the edge of the riding 
track — merely another uniformful. 

Captain Stalnaker sits his horse as 
though he were molded to the exact 
measurements to fit it, and from his com- 
fortable position he quickly explains, 
without examples, the execution of the 
commands, "Stand to horse!" "Prepare 
to mount !" After exercising the cadets 
in these commands for a time, the cap- 
tain leaves them mounted and describes 
the position of the mounted soldier. All 
that is left to tell them now is how to 
move the horse out at the command, 
"Forward, Ho !" Captain Stalnaker im- 
parts these last minute instructions, and 
then — 

"Forward, Ho !" sings the captain, 
with just the right inflection. 

The line of mounted men hesitates 
momentarily, then advances jaggedly to- 
ward him. But what is this? He halts 
the riders and advances through the one 
vacancy in that otherwise splendid at- 
tempt at a phalanx. He rides up to the 
man who has been left thirty feet behind 
leaning forward expectantly in his saddle, 
and eyes him impersonally. 

"What's your name?" 

"Cadet Private Schultz, sir." 

"Why didn't you move out, Schultz?" 
But the captain has been looking at 
the horse in the meantime, and, before 
Schultz can answer, he asks another 
question. 

"Isn't that 'Rock of Ages' that you're 
riding?" 

Schultz answers in assent, and is im- 
mediately told to get that old nag back 
to the stables and bring a live one back 
with him. He dismounts and patiently 
leads "Rock of Ages" to the stables. 
Shortly afterwards he appears coming 
from the stables leading a horse which 
is holding his head high and has his 



ears pointed skyward. The stable ser- 
geant has told him that this "Lightning" 
was a horse who would move — Schultz 
would soon be convinced of that. As a 
matter of fact, he no sooner has one foot 
in the stirrup than he realizes that a ser- 
geant wouldn't fool him. "Lightning" 
lights out diagonally across the "bull- 
ring" and rushes madly through the 
woods, wherein Schultz loses his hat, the 
majority of his courage, and, finally, his 
seat. The battery, good-naturedly enough, 
watches his return on foot from his 
ignominious downfall — minus his horse 
and his hat, and whacking the dead 
leaves and dust from his breeches. 

At the captain's bidding, the Prince 
of Wales' imposter trudges somewhat 
painfully back to the dominion of the 
honest stable sergeant for another steed. 
This time when he returns with his new 
horse in tow, the battery is halted and 
the captain trots over to ask if Private 
Schultz has any pertinent questions. 

Schultz turns over the words, "Rock 
of Ages" and "Lightning," in his mind 
as if to see if he can throw any light on 
the subject unaided ; apparently he can- 
not, for he seriously asks Captain Stal- 
naker the much-mooted question of 
"What's in a name?" with special refer- 
ence to horses' names. 

Stalnaker replies, "Nothing, Schultz. 
We just name them with whatever name 
strikes our fancy. Of course any horse 
is apt to act up a little now and then." 
He then rides to the center of the ring, 
giving the command for the battery to 
walk single file around it as he does so. 

Schultz's luck changes and he gets 
half around the track before anything 
happens this time. But half-way around, 
a newspaper blows terrifyingly in front 
of "Catapult," his latest mount, who 
gallantly and quickly lives up to his name, 
with the result that Private Schultz finds 



[29] 



himself suddenly sitting on the hard 
ground, leaning back upon his arms ex- 
tended behind him, and wondering. 

Leading "Catapult" happily, yet hope- 
lessly, back to his stall, Schultz worries 
over his recent decision that horses' ac- 
tions and horses' names are definitely 
connected, despite his captain's denial. 
On the other hand, worry is not the 
word to describe what poor Schultz is 
doing after trading in "Catapult" for his 
fourth animal. Schultz is aghast! His 
knees are jelly-like, his face pale, and 
his brow furrowed, as he returns to the 
now dreaded oval where these fearsome, 
four-legged creatures parade around and 
look so innocent. He glances fearfully 
up at the countenance of the docile thing 
plodding beside him, and trembles all the 
more. He can see through their guileless 
masks now ! But— holy smoke ! What 
a name ! You might expect anything 
from a name like that ! And no doubt 
that devil of a captain will try to force 
him, Schultz, to ride it. Well, here's the 
ring; maybe the captain will let him out 
of it. 

He sees the battery is at stand to 



horse ; so he falls in next to the end man, 
hoping the captain will notice that he 
doesn't care to ride. The captain does 
not notice. 

"Prepare to mount — Mount !" chants 
the captain. 

Thoughts of "Catapult," "Lightning," 
and "Rock of Ages" race vividly through 
Schultz's mind ; then horrible pictures 
of the dire consequences should he mount 
this demoniacally named horse flash 
before him. He is horrorstricken ! He 
can't mount. He shoves his jaw out so 
that it gets half an inch in front of his 
nose, and resolutely stands firm. 

The captain notices him, and orders 
cryptically, "Mount, Schultz!" 

"No, sir!"— from Schultz. 

"What do you — why, what the — umm 
— well, what now?" 

"This horse, sir!" 

"What about that horse — what's his 
name?" 

Schultz explodes all his emotions in 
one word ; his whole being is behind his 
voice: 

"Dynamite — sir !" 




[30] 



Enter Miles 



"POR LOOK!" cried 

•■■ an arch wiggle of her eyebrows. 
"Yonder comes Miles Standish." 

{Enter Miles right, dragging anti- 
quated piece of ordnance, some six feet 
in length. Upon his head rocks a tin 
helmet of questionable period. Hung 
from his shoulders are paired "back- 
and-breast," replicas of what the well- 
dressed man -about -Plymouth wore in 
1621, although the same armor had been 
used by Hector, Caesar, and King Phil- 
ip, and gave every indication in appear- 
ance of having also done duty as a 
Chinese gong. Dragging behind, for all 
the world like the leeboard of a canoe on 
the weather reach, is a huge English 
cavalry saber. Miles' crepe-whiskered 
face takes on a semblance of ferocity as 
he turns toward the cowering women.) 

"Be not afraid," I said reassuringly, 
" 'tis only I, Miles Standish." And, with 
a nonchalant gesture, I hung my helmet 
upon the nearest chair. I had but turn- 
ed around, when I heard a shattering 
metallic clangor behind me. Priscilla 
giggled, and, out of the corner of my 
eye, I saw my recalcitrant headgear clat- 
tering about the cabin floor in the most 
unnerving manner imaginable. My his- 
trionic instinct bade me ignore the inci- 
dent ; so I turned to Priscilla, who was 
still tittering, and glowered with genuine 
dislike. She countered with a charming 
saccharine smile and we spoke at length. 

Upon the word "calumny," young John 
Alden, long, blond, and quite the Puri- 
tan macaroni, entered airily. His high 
Pilgrim's hat was perched jauntily over 
one eye and his hands wandered vaguely 



Richard Alan 
Theme 14, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

Priscilla with up and down the seam of his flimsy trou- 
sers, searching for pockets which some 
crafty costumer had failed to put in. 
Very calmly and with an air of great 
unconcern, he stooped and picked up my 
battered helmet. Time and cue held no 
terrors for young John, for he very care- 
fully hung the thing on a chair amid a 
tense silence. Then he turned and began 
to spout his lines, but his first words 
were marred by a triumphant clatter 
from behind. We flinched as we saw the 
devilish thing roll gleefully about on the 
floor ; even Priscilla was deeply moved, 
for she did not laugh ; she sat, pensively 
chewing her gum, at the old spinning 
wheel, which had not been spun for al- 
most a century. John was visibly shaken, 
but he went on with his lines like the 
seasoned trouper that he was. 

All too suddenly, I found myself try- 
ing to pick up the now truly battle-scarred 
helmet. My unyielding armor squeaked, 
buckled, pinched, and bent, as I leaned 
toward the floor. I was still dazed. I 
didn't remember a single moment of ac- 
tion after the second crash, but I must 
have gone through my lines, for the stage 
manager was well on the way to apo- 
plexy over my hampered efforts to get 
off. At last the armor gave way with an 
audible crack like that of a carelessly 
bowed, starched shirt-front. I set the 
thing on my head as I turned to go off, 
and it settled down over my ears with a 
faint demoniac chortle. For the first time 
I heard the comments of the small chil- 
dren on the first row. I saw John stand- 
ing beside the ancient mahogany spinning 
wheel, absent-mindedly kicking it a foot 



[31] 



to the left and then back again. Priscilla 
stood in the wings with tears in her eyes 
and a handkerchief in her mouth. 

Slowly I walked toward the right exit. 
"Clonk!" rang the helmet on my fore- 



head ; "Clunk !" on the nape of my neck. 
Heavy ordnance and cutlery made a 
barely audible sarcastic rasping noise as 
they followed me along the boards. 
(Exit Miles right.) 




[32] 







Vol.4 



MAY, 1935 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

HAYSKEDS, GRAIN DUST, AND GREASE ... 1 
Frances Sheetz 

A CHINESE PROVERB 3 

Juanita Skelton 

BUSINESS BIKES 5 

William J. Moreland 

PLAY'S THE THING g 

Mary Jane Adsit 

THE WORLD'S BEST PLAYGROUND . . n 

Warren Young 

SIX OF A KIND lA 

Elsie MitcheU ....*■» 

WAR IS NOT A NECESSITY 16 

Lou Ray Spence 

WORDS ALONE 20 

Charlotte Johnston 

THANKS TO VESALIUS! .... 21 

Mary K. Dearth ... * 

OUR NELL 22 

Herta Breiter 

CASTOR AND POLLUX 24 

Joe Crabtree 

YESTERDAY 2S 

William Holly 

ELWOOD 26 

Harvey R. Fraser 

A ROMANTIC BRIDGE 26 

R. H. Colvin ■ * 

MRS. MINCER, EFFICIENCY PERSONIFIED , . 28 
Anonymous 

PORTAGE TO ASHEGAMA 29 

Ernest Tucker 

ICEBERGS OF EMERALD 31 

R. J. Steiskal 



No. 4 




^.u^U\M 



!■ 



PUBLISHED BY THE RHETORIC STAFF, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA 



Hayseeds, Grain Dust, and Grease 



TTAYSEEDS, grain dust, and butcher- 
■*■ * ing grease — the undesirable things, 
yet the spice of farm life. Who would 
consider his life fully lived if he had 
not had the thrill of having one seed 
tucked away in the depths of his hair or 
felt the grain dust piling up one-fourth 
of an inch thick in the cracks of his 
ears, between his fingers, and in the 
corners of his eyes? Who has not longed 
to see the making of sausages from 
beginning to end? All of this you're sure 
to experience if you're on the farm the 
three most important days of the year. 
Two of these days unfortunately occur 
within a few weeks of each other. It 
seems to me that when there are only 
three important days in a year, they 
should be well scattered. 

Haymaking days come first. With the 
beginning of the haymaking season 
comes the tedious and hateful job of 
taking from the shed the machinery 
to be used during the process. The 
needed machines are in the farthest 
corners, with a regiment of other ma- 
chinery in front of them. I don't know 
why systematic arrangement is com- 
pletely forgotten when machinery is put 
away in the fall. During this taking-out 
process, someone is bound to let a heavy 
tongue fall on his toe, or get his finger 
in between the moving object and the 
one standing still. Such incidents may 
cause a little blue smoke to rise. But 
what's a little blue smoke? 

The machinery is finally brought out. 
The first machine, the mower, consists 
of a couple of wheels and a seat, with 



Frances Sheetz 
Theme 3, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

a big scythe (to cut the hay) sticking 
out five or six feet. After the mower 
has gone around the field three or four 
times, the rake follows and puts the hay 
into windrows. Then the hayrack with 
the hayloader attached follows the 
windrows, picking up the hay and run- 
ning it up into the hayrack; that is, 
providing the driver is someone besides 
myself. I never could, and I guess I 
never shall be able to pick up the hay 
in the corner windrows. I can follow the 
straight line perfectly, but I never fail 
to miss a corner completely. To me a 
corner means a miss, and a consequent 
guffaw on the part of the hired men 
at my ignorance. The hay is loaded to 
quite a height. Sometimes the height 
becomes too great, and a tip-over re- 
sults. Tip-overs are not bad, how- 
ever; in fact, they are rather thrilling 
when one remembers the correct way 
to jump — opposite the way the hay is 
falling. 

The hay is put in the barn by three 
people. First, someone in the wagon 
"sticks the fork." When he thinks he 
has a worthwhile fork- full, he calls 
lustily, "All right!" The man in the mow 
repeats the call to the boy sitting below, 
whose purpose it is to give the call to 
the driver on the fork. Upon hearing 
the call, the driver on the fork begins to 
hound his horse. (I say hound because 
the kind of horse that is driven on a 
hayfork has to be hounded in order to 
make him move. He is usually a lazy 
lout that can't be used for anything else, 
and his very slowness is an asset on the 



[1] 



hayfork.) The horse begins to move. The 
big, long rope creeps along in the dust 
like a snake in the grass. When the rope 
has stretched its length, the fork carry- 
ing a huge amount of hay begins to rise 
from the rack. The horse at the end of 
the rope has to pull harder and harder 
as the fork moves up the side of the 
barn toward the cubby-hole through 
which it goes to the haymow. The rope 
quivers and shakes as if it were going 
to break under the strain. But, luckily, it 
never does. It always manages to strug- 
gle through the crisis until the fork is 
in the barn. While the horse on the 
fork is backing up, the man in the mow 
jabs his fork into tlie hay and swings 
it. When he calls "J^^k," the man in the 
rack jerks the rope and the hay falls. 
It takes approximately five forks-full to 
empty a rack. Four loads can be stowed 
away in the barn during the course of an 
afternoon. 

While the hayrack is going back after 
another load, the man in the mow, the 
boy who calls, and the man driving on 
the fork have their in-between siestas 
on the cool, shaded house lawn, or their 
lemonade and cookies — just as their 
hearts desire. 

With haying over, the next big event 
is threshing. This is different from hay- 
ing in that the farmers organize into 
rings and buy a threshing machine, while 
in haying each farmer has his own equip- 
ment and does his own work. While the 
machine is being set up by the manager 
of the ring, the men gather with their 
varied implements. Most of them bring 
teams and racks. Their duty is to carry 
the bundles of grain which have been 
cut and tied by the binder, and which 
have been picked up and put into their 
racks by the "pitchers." The grain 
bundles are pitched into the rattling ma- 



chine. They come out in two parts — the 
grain itself and the straw. The grain is 
caught by a truck, taken to the bin, and 
shoveled in. The straw is blown out of a 
long extended pipe onto the ground, 
where men arrange it in a neat stack. 
The amount of dirt acquired there is 
surprising. One cannot recognize his own 
father when he comes home from a day 
of working in the stack. If nothing goes 
wrong, a big field of grain can be put 
away in a day. 

The women at the house on threshing 
days are just as busy as the men. A huge 
dinner must be prepared to meet the 
equally huge appetites of some thirty 
men. With the table stretched to its full- 
est length, the meal is served four times 
and without any particularly dainty 
manners at any time. Just try serving a 
threshing dinner in good style ! All the 
men want is good food and plenty of it — 
bread, meat, potatoes, cake, pie, and 
coffee. A salad is superfluous. 

Another interesting farm day is 
butchering day — interesting not in the re- 
spect that it is pleasant but that it's 
something different. They tell me sticking 
is the best method of killing hogs. I 
cannot say myself because I always avoid 
this preliminary but very necessary step 
in butchering. So we'll start out with the 
hog already killed. He is then doused 
in a big vat of water heated to 150°F. 
and containing a goodly amount of lye. 
The hog is supposed to be kept moving 
in the water until the hair slips oft' easily. 
Pleasant, isn't it? Then it must be 
scraped. But let's skip that too, shall we? 
Then it's hung up by its hind legs and 
cut into its various parts. All this is 
done away from the house. Then it is 
brought to the house and carried to the 
basement. The hams, spare-ribs, shoul- 
ders, and bacon are separated one from 



[2] 



the other. The pork chops are cut and 
fried, then put into big jars and covered 
with boihng lard. The lard, when cold, 
seals the meat from air and bacteria, and 
the meat will keep for many years. The 
meat for the sausage is ground and 
dumped in a big tube along with so many 
pounds of salt, pepper, and sage. Fifty 
or sixty jars of lard are made on butch- 
ering day. A fire is made beneath a big, 
black kettle of cracklings. These crack- 
lings are boiled or fried (I nevfer could 



figure out which) for many hours. They 
rise to the top of the kettle and the pure 
lard settles to the bottom. The hot lard 
is piped out of the bottom of the kettle, 
and carried to the basement, where it is 
poured into the cans it is to stay in all 
winter long. With the making of the 
lard, butchering day's over. Ah ! but the 
grease still remains. 

You do not think these three impor- 
tant days are interesting? Go out to a 
farm sometime and see for yourself ! 




A Chinese Proverb 



"TF you have two loaves of bread, sell 
^ one and buy a lily," expresses the 
birthright of every Chinese, a love of 
beauty. 

The Chinese today, a plodding, toiling 
race, have not lost their inherent love 
of beauty which four thousand years of 
civilization have developed. Because the 
country in its present state is wretched 
with poverty and oppression, we forget 
that China had its glorious ages of art 
and learning long before even the Euro- 
pean beginnings. Do not think that this 



JUANITA SkeLTON 
Theme 2, Rhetoric II, 1934-25 

nation accepts its immediate fate as a 
matter of course. The people still harbor 
the old spirit that was once high during 
the years that China was a world power. 
Evidence of this was brought out dur- 
ing the uprising against the intruding 
foreigners, in the Boxer Rebellion of 
1900. These people are patient; for 
thousands of years they have multiplied, 
changed rulers, retained old ways, re- 
vered their ancestors, and throughout this 
evolution have held sacred this proverb 
in all that it means. 



[3] 



China has honored her great men. 
There is Confucius of twenty-five cen- 
turies ago, whose beauteous words of 
ethical teaching are law to millions of 
his countrymen. And although a Chinese 
prince, a few hundred years after the 
death of Confucius, burned the latter's 
works, he is to be forgiven for creating 
a thing of beauty as a recompense. I 
speak of the Great Wall as a thing of 
beauty, indeed. The finest Chinese work- 
manship in walls was put into this huge 
fortifying edifice that stretches across 
fifteen hundred miles of the northern 
border. It is twenty to thirty feet high 
and twelve feet in width, faced with 
granite and hard brick, and supplied at 
intervals with towers of defense. This 
ancient structure runs over hill and val- 
ley, sand beds and rivers, cliffs and 
deserts, stretching on seemingly end- 
less. Chinese walls are the finest in the 
world, and although this one was built 
primarily as a protection against the 
Mongolians, it possesses lasting beauty — 
a preservation of the first Manchu 
dynasty. 

The Golden Age of China's history 
was one of art and learning, comparable 
to a degree wuth the Renaissance of the 
western world. It began with the Budd- 
hist religion, and continued for the three 
succeeding centuries of the Ming 
dynasty. Splendid remnants from this 
age are still in existence. It was during 
this period that Marco Polo returned 
from the East with glowing tales of the 
magnificence, the wealth of China. To- 
day, shrines of Buddha, built in the de- 
serted hill country, the mountain dis- 
tricts, and in the populated areas are 
yearly visited by pilgrims. Processions 
of them with their prayer wheels, bells, 
and trains of lamas stand in awe of these 
images of the Saint, cast by skilled Chi- 
nese craftsmen. There are still the great 



stone camels, kneeling and guarding the 
entrance to the Ming tomb. There are 
the temples, the tombs, the porcelain, 
the china, the splendid memorial arches 
all reminiscent of the Golden Age, 

Remnants of the second Manchu 
dynasty, during which a slow retrogres- 
sion began, prevail yet in Peking. The 
city is divided into two parts, the outer 
city bemg purely Chmese, and the place 
where business is conducted ; the Man- 
chu-Tartar section is the inner city con- 
taining all the foreign embassies, and 
embracing the innermost sanctuary, the 
Imperial City, wherein the rulers dwell. 
There are many splendors in the For- 
bidden City; it is one of the few places 
not open to foreigners. There is the 
Temple of Heaven to which the Son of 
Heaven goes once a year to pray for a 
good harvest. The festival is picturesque, 
as are all Chinese festivals. 

These are the beauties of old China. 
I love the China of today with its ancient 
religions, its quaint customs, its pagodas. 
Among these are the Bronze Lion at the 
old Imperial palace, the Great Pagoda at 
Canton, the Lung Hua Pagoda at Shang- 
hai, the Porcelain Tower at the old sum- 
mer palace in the outskirts of Peking, 
and the Hall of Classics of 182 slabs, 
containing all of the Chinese classics, 
also in Peking. 

I like the Festival of Lanterns, the 
beauty in the Festival of the Dragon- 
boat. Even the common tea houses in 
Shanghai and the straggling streets of 
Peking hold an interest of their own. 

The architecture, the silks, the porce- 
lains, the handiwork of the Chinese, 
together with their observance of tra- 
dition, make obvious their love of beauty. 
They love the natural beauties of their 
country, things that have not been the 
results of their work but w^hich have 
lived for these centuries because of the 



[4] 



Chinese sense of appreciation. The upper 
Yangtze river is a sanctuary of flowers, 
larkspur, jasmine, white lily, sunflower. 
The Chinese prove their love of flowers 
as well as of other objects of loveliness 
by the preservation of these. 

They tender a deep regard for even the 
yellow sands blown by strong winds 
down from Mongolia, over all the north- 
ern portion of China. Valleys and hills 



are covered with it. China is a yellow 
land with yellow rivers winding their 
way through soft soil, carrying with 
them thick yellow water down into the 
yellow sea. 

Just as the dust of Peking covers the 
palace as well as the lowliest hovel, 
so does the love of beauty abide, in 
wealth or in poverty, with the Chinese 
people. 




B 



usmess 



Bikes 



William J. 
Theme 5, Rheto 

BICYCLES have taken people to many 
places, but last summer they took me 
on a tour of business experience, for I 
actually earned money with them and en- 
joyed myself while doing so. Unlike most 
people earning money, I was my own 
employer, as I was what is commonly 
called a rent-a-bike dealer. My parents 
and relatives had persuaded me to open 
a rental station in our neighborhood. At 
first I was not in favor of doing so, but 
after I talked to a suburban dealer and 
discovered that the average income from 
a single bicycle was over a dollar a day, 
1 decided to become a business man, 
after a fashion. I rented a very desirable 
location in the city where I live. It was 
directly across from a forest preserve, 
with a baseball field, picnic-grounds, and 
swimming-pool. Then I went to a sign 
painter and had him make several large 
signs for me. After that I had three 



MORELAND 
ric II, 1934-25 

thousand cards printed, as well as five 
thousand contracts. I was truly proud of 
this card, for it represented my first 
business venture, and it bore a slogan 
which I m3'self had thought of. The 
card, looked something like this: 



Phone Your Reservation 
Why Hike? Bill's Rent-A-Bike 

No Deposit Required Wm. J. Moreland, Prop. 



Meanwhile, after inspecting the various 
makes of bicycles, I negotiated with the 
Chicago Cycle Company for the purchase 
of twenty sturdy, balloon-tired bicycles, 
equipped with stainless steel fenders, 
bells, and lights. 

I began to feel like quite a business 
man, but I experienced my first real 



[5] 



thrill on the Fourth of July, when I 
opened my station. The day before, my 
bikes had not yet arrived, and I spent the 
entire evening and part of the early 
morning making frantic telephone calls 
to the factory, trying to insure their de- 
livery in time to open the next morning 
for the holiday. They weren't ready in 
the color I had ordered, and, after argu- 
ing until two o'clock in the morning, I 
finally agreed to take the twenty orange 
and blue bicycles that were in stock 
and could be sent out before six o'clock. 
I went to bed with spokes and wheels 
before my eyes, hoping that they would 
arrive in time. At five-thirty I was awak- 
ened by the factory hands, who had my 
precious cargo waiting outside. Together 
we drove to the place I was to operate 
from, and my bikes were rolled off the 
truck. They were beautiful, gleaming in 
true mini colors, and trimmed with spot- 
less, snow-white tires. I felt nervous, 
anxious, and important all at the same 
time. I was like a little boy who is per- 
mitted to go downtown by himself for 
the first time ; uncertain about the whole 
thing, wondering whether or not he has 
made a mistake, yet anxious to be off ; 
feeling important in accepting responsi- 
bility, yet doubting his ability to succeed. 
After I had arranged the bikes in an im- 
pressive array, it began to rain, and I 
could see my heart sinking in the puddles 
forming at my feet. The skies soon 
cleared, however, and picnic trucks ar- 
rived one after another. My spirits rose, 
and why not, for were not these people 
who were arriving my prospective 
customers? They were, and as the day 
wore on, additional truckloads of holiday 
frolickers arrived. As they did, I found 
it necessary to set out additional benches 
to accommodate the many people who 
were waiting to rent bikes. Some waited 
two and three hours before receiving 



one. My first day was a successful one, 
for I took in over sixty dollars, regard- 
less of the weather — more than three 
dollars per bike, three times the average 
income. 

I was overjoyed at my initial success, 
and at the end of two weeks I was av- 
eraging close to forty dollars per day, 
in spite of the rain and cold. I purchased 
ten more bicycles, hired a man to do 
most of the hard work, and ordered a 
tent that cost over a hundred dollars. 
Yes, I was tasting the fruits of success, 
but things were not quite so easy as 
they may seem. I worked long hours, 
sometimes from ten in the morning to 
long after midnight. There were no 
holidays for me. I was "boss" and I had 
to see that my business w^as carried on 
in the proper manner. I had to look after 
the advertising, supervise the repairing, 
pay the bills, purchase the necessary sup- 
plies, and endeavor to keep competitors 
from opening rental stations in my vi- 
cinity, which I did to a certain extent. 

The management of the station was 
chieflly in my hands, although I had a 
helper. We charged the standard price 
of twenty-five cents per hour, which a 
renter paid before signing a contract 
liberating me from all responsibility. Be- 
fore renting a bike to a person unknown 
to us, we made him identify himself to 
our satisfaction. In order further to in- 
sure against theft, I later bought a fifty- 
picture camera, and whenever we did not 
know a prospective renter, we took his 
picture. We also had poll sheets of the 
voters of the various wards of the city, 
and when a person gave us his address, 
we would look it up in these sheets. If 
his name was not there, then surely his 
neighbor's was. In this way we had an 
almost perfect check on every person 
who rented a bicycle, and it was only 
through carelessness during rush hours, 



[6] 



when we neglected this procedure, that 
we lost a bike. Other tasks, besides the 
renting of the bike itself, included open- 
ing the stand at eight in the morning; 
sta3dng there till noon ; repairing, wash- 
ing, and oiling the bikes, and cleaning 
up the stand in general ; and preparing 
the flashlights for night-riding. We 
worked in three shifts: my helper in the 
morning, I in the afternoon, and both of 
us at night and on Sundays, except for 
one night a week off, on which one of 
us would operate the stand alone. 

During the course of the summer I 
lost a total of three bicycles, and I be- 
lieve that I was fortunate in losing only 
that many. One of these I myself rented 
on a Sunday. There were a great many 
people waiting, and we were renting 
bikes as fast as they returned. We were 
so busy that I decided to trust my judg- 
ment in determining the honesty of cus- 
tomers. My judgment was faulty, and I 
lost not only the twenty-five dollars I 
had paid for the bike, but the use of the 
bike during rush hours. I learned my 
lesson, but my helper did not profit by 
my experience, for he lost two more of 
my two-wheeled money-makers, 

I met many interesting people while 
operating my stand. Often millionaires, 
politicians, and celebrities would drop in 
for recreation or exercise. Their visits 
would break the monotony of renting to 
the ordinary run of people, although 



these were of all nationalities, religions, 
and prejudices. 

About twice a week, on warm clear 
evenings I would sponsor "treasure- 
hunts" to various points of interest. 
Everyone always enjoyed himself on 
these late-hour escapades. We would 
pedal for several hours, stopping here 
and there to hunt for some hidden 
"treasure" until we finally reached a des- 
ignated spot where we would roast 
marshmallows and frankfurters, tell 
stories, and sometimes dance to music 
from an auto radio. It was something 
different, and every time I announced a 
jaunt of this sort, the reservations ex- 
ceeded by far the number of bikes I had 
on hand, which was now about forty, 
counting my racers and tandem. After 
closing time on other days my helper and 
I usually rode several miles to a barbe- 
cue stand in the country for a sandwich, 
just to top off a long, weary evening. 

So it was that I spent my summer last 
year. By working I not only gained ex- 
perience in business and in dealing with 
people, but I profited financially as well, 
for I took in over fourteen hundred 
dollars in two months. Of course, my in- 
vestment was large, but I still have the 
bicycles and the accessories. Next sum- 
mer I intend to operate my rental sta- 
tion again, provided the fad still holds 
sway, and I hope to have many more 
interesting experiences. 




[7] 



Play's the Thing 



I 



Mary Jane Adsit 
Theme 6, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 
LIKE to think that Wordsworth, when window displays when suddenly he slip- 



he wrote, "The Child is father of the 
Man," meant that in children are devel- 
oped the characteristics and character of 
the men they will become. A cross sec- 
tion of a child's life will show the be- 
ginnings of complexes and beliefs that 
determine the ultimate individual. Since 
the child is glimpsed most naturally at 
play, I believe my own personality can be 
revealed by my youthful recreations. 

I was well equipped for my most im- 
portant childhood occupation, play. The 
latest facilities were mine ; I had a real 
playhouse, a playroom in my own home, 
and toys of every description. These 
were all lost on me. I immediately began 
to show decided inclinations in other 
directions: I could make perfect mud 
pies ; I was an excellent little hole-digger, 
having helped to dig two lovely, large 
ones in the yard of one of my girl 
friends ; and I remember with much 
pleasure the hours I spent in cousins' 
haymows. With the loveliest of real dolls, 
I would invariably turn to the Sunday 
cartoons to cut them out for paper dolls. 
One new friend visited me especially to 
gain entrance through the enchanting 
portals of my playhouse; but I, tired of 
its charm, enthusiastically recommended 
the incredible charms of my latest and 
dearest possessions, cut-outs from a last 
year's Sears-Roebuck catalog. 

Invented recreations seemed always to 
fascinate. I never did play much with 
the jumping shoes that mother purchased 
for me ; but there was no sport that my 
sister and I liked better than that of 
"jumping on the bed." We had a very 
definite story of a man who was walk- 
ing down the street observing all the 



ped on a banana peeling. This point of 
the story halted the walk around the 
bed's edge with a merry tumble and 
gales of laughter. We usually reserved 
this game for mother's club nights. Once, 
inspired to make my aunt's four-poster 
bed a real colonial one, we took one of 
her best quilts to make a canopy. We 
pulled the corners to the poles and tied 
them there. A small tear in the quilt was 
just above us tempting; we took turns 
pulling it. We felt decidedly early Amer- 
ican after our aunt discovered our well- 
meaning efforts. Bouncing on the cush- 
ions of our davenport, holding an um- 
brella covered with a blanket over our 
heads, was suggestive of any real or 
imagined mode of transportation. An 
open umbrella sitting on the floor could 
be furnished with pillows and toys to 
resemble an}1:hing from a general's tent 
to an upper berth in a pullman. We also 
used our front stairs as a train to good 
advantage. The landings were private 
cars while the steps were ordinary day 
coaches. The kitchen was always in the 
little closet beneath the train and was al- 
ways well supplied with soda crackers 
and water, if nothing else. 

At eight I was an established writer 
with a public and was even a best seller 
in the third grade of Lincoln School. My 
chosen career was beyond doubt inspired 
by my reveling in the various and sun- 
dry adventures that Peter Rabbit had in 
library books. I wrote a series of con- 
tinued stories, each about the length of 
a tablet sheet on both sides, on the ad- 
ventures of Bunny Cottontail. These 
were in great demand by my classmates 
and were handed around in their chrono- 



[8] 



logical order. However, my flourishing 
business was shortly ended by a heart- 
less teacher who secured Chapter VI, 
"Bunny Cottontail Makes Candy." My 
next teacher was more sympathetic to 
genius ; for, although I didn't resume 
the continued stories, I remember con- 
fidentially revealing to her my ambition 
and intention to become an authoress. 

Not long after this I began manag- 
ing a show of my own. Our playground 
at school accommodated some one hun- 
dred and fifty girls, ranging from the 
first to the fifth grades. There was no 
organized play; but leaders usually had 
a large group engaged in the intriguing 
game of "Old Witch" or "Bad and 
Good," with occasional epidemics of 
hopscotch, jumping ropes, or jacks. Once 
some group conceived the bright idea of 
having a play. The play was impromptu 
and related to the mischievous adven- 
tures of a certain Sally Goodin. For the 
first few days business was good and 
all the playground attended. Unsatisfied 
with only watching and unsuccessful in 
getting a part in the play, I started a 
rival concern. My show featured "The 
Tattler," also a mischievous young imp. 
Her chief concern in life was the in- 
volving of her sister in various difficul- 
ties. We had good crowds for quite 
awhile ; but, as the plots began to come 
hard to my mind, all the playground be- 
gan producing their own plays. Audi- 
ences were as rare as parts had been 
before. Rarity and oversupply do might- 
ily affect values. 

I must have had an unusually large 
touch of the secret-society mania that 
strikes youngsters and never seems to 
die out entirely in men. The "Ruby 
Seal" society had quite an elaborate 
ritual on which I spent much time and 
great imagination. The idea had grown 
out of a book, as most of my ideas did. 



in which the ruby seal meant lips sealed 
to all secrets. There were two offices, 
princess and queen ; I drew the higher 
office by lot, but singularly enough, the 
other member soon lost interest. Later 
my cousin and I organized the Book- 
worm Club with our playmates. The 
name came from the passion my cousin 
and I had for reading; but it had little 
or nothing to do with the club's activ- 
ities, which consisted, in the main, of 
rummaging in all the garbage cans in 
our back alley. Once we made the ex- 
ceptional find of the stays from an old 
umbrella. We could never figure out, 
with all our ingenuity, any practical use 
for them ; but we had no doubts as to 
our being extremely fortunate in having 
made the lucky find. Our alley was set 
apart from the usual run of alleys by 
the fact that we boasted a greenhouse. 
At the times when the operators were 
changing their flower beds, many home- 
less and numberless homely flowers were 
ruthlessly cast out into the blazing 
"alley" sun. Of course, we tenderly bore 
the bedraggled blossoms home to drop 
their sad petals in our mothers' living 
rooms. While two of us were on an alley 
excursion one day, we came upon half 
a bottle of milk of magnesia which had 
been discarded. Its creamy whiteness 
couldn't be lost to the world in this 
manner. Into a dish we poured it, thick 
from standing, and with a maraschino 
cherry enhanced it. Most graciously we 
then presented it to another playmate 
as some melted ice cream left from din- 
ner. The Bookworms were eventually dis- 
placed by the earthworms that followed. 
Steeped in pirate literature, we soon were 
digging into the earth. We hunted out all 
our old jewelry and discarded old treas- 
ures to be put reverently into a com- 
mon box. A blood-curdling warning 
to any and all trespassers was then 



[9] 



scrawled and signed in red ink — real 
blood from a chicken proved to be too 
unrealistic. Landmarks were carefully 
laid and the treasure, buried. For lack of 
a modern Jim Hawkins or John Silver, 
we had to dig up our own treasures every 
two or three days, thus keeping accurate 
news on the ant's invasion of our preci- 
ous belongings. 

A change of reading material revo- 
lutionized our playing. Now we were 
girls at a boarding school living the excit- 
ing escapades that always occur in girls' 
series books. One night my cousin, 
Eleanor, and I decided to be two such 
girls and, as one of our lesser adven- 
tures, let her brother climb into our 
dormitory window for a spread that 
night. After Eleanor and I had taxed our 
grown-up vocabulary to the limit and still 
Chuck hadn't come, we were beginning 
to feel ourselves deserted. Finally we 
heard him, not outside the door which 
was a "pretend" window, but on a ladder 
outside the window. Into the first floor 
room he climbed with very real provi- 
sions for a spread. Heavy penalty that 
was far from "pretend" went with 
piecing between meals. There was only 
one room in the house where we could 
retreat in perfect sanctity from our par- 
ents and lock the door: into the bathroom 
we went. Here we hastily gulped down 
an indigestible combination of ice cream, 
pop, and penny candy. 

As I began to grow up — in the sev- 
enth grade — we advanced a step in 
recreation. We arrived at the well-known 
stage of "kissing" games. Postoffice, 
wink 'em, and clap-in-and-clap-out were 
immediate favorites. My sister had gone 
through the same state just long enough 
before to be thoroughly convinced of its 
utter foolishness. That this was all much 
nonsense was made unmistakably clear 
to me. Because of this I was quite fa- 



mous as the prude of the party, and was 
left the unenviable job of "doorkeeper." 
The summer evenings from seven until 
nine o'clock were spent, when I could 
get out, in the most vigorous games of 
Run Sheep Run or Dig Out. These were 
group hiding games that covered a whole 
section of town and gave excuse for 
getting in and out of the most unusual — 
and dirty — places that one could imagine. 
Senses were made keener by the fact that 
every one was a "big kid" and all were 
good runners. Signals of "Blue," "Rasp- 
berry," or "Green" rang out clearly. A 
rustle of a twig might give the whole 
group away now, so close was the other 
side. A fence must be jumped and two 
gardens crossed to reach the goal. One 
held one's breath expectantly. An}'thing 
could happen ; something always did. 
There was suspense, excitement, inten- 
sity of feeling. A chill was at my spine, 
a glow in my eyes, and senses were 
sharpened ten- fold. This was being alive ! 
There was also another sharp tingle of 
appreciation as I realized that next sum- 
mer I would be too old to harum-scarum 
over the neighbor's pet flower gardens. 
I must soon leave all this behind. I 
kicked a pebble in disgust and felt very 
much the same way as when I couldn't 
get into my favorite left-over-from-last- 
year's dress. The noise of the pebble was 
all the enemy side needed. Staccato on 
the night air rang, "Break through the 
window light. Run! Sheep! Run!" Pent- 
up emotions broke forth in exclamation. 
The stillness of a moment ago was lost in 
the calls and trampling of the hurrying 
mob. There were excited "You're 
caught's" of the opposite side mingling 
with the triumphant "free's" of our side 
as some reached home safely. Over the 
base line I flew — free. Then someone 
called "Oily Oily Ox in free — o!" And 
I knew that the game was over. 



[10] 



The World's Best Playground 

Warren Young 
Theme 5, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



A T sunset, when a strong wind was 
■^*- beginning to blow, I stood on the 
top of a bluff looking down at the harbor. 
It was a small harbor, fit only for small 
sailboats and medium-sized power boats. 
At this moment I was watching a whole 
fleet of star and Cape Cod boats smooth- 
ly gliding towards their mooring buoys. 
The sight was very impressive. Sails, 
big, white sails, that only an hour ago 
were mere spots upon the blue water, 
came in, one by one. Then, as if by 
magic, they disappeared, leaving barren, 
deserted masts to take their place. 
Yachtsmen and young sailors were 
scurrying back and forth in perform- 
ance of various harbor duties. I watched 
them for nearly an hour. Then I lazily 
shifted my position and gazed at the 
beach. There I saw the residue of the 
day's record-breaking crowd. They were 
busily playing and swimming, as if try- 
ing to utilize the very last rays of the 
sun. As this sight appealed to me, I 
looked up and down the shore line. There 
it was, beautiful Lake Michigan, afford- 
ing enjoyment to hundreds, to thousands 
of people. Playing in the lake — our most 
popular summer sport ! 

The lake is the most fascinating play- 
ground in the world. It offers a very large 
selection of sports: sailing, pleasure- 
yachting, swimming, rowing, speed-boat- 
ing, aqua-planing, fishing, water polo ; in 
fact, almost anything imaginable. Lake 
sports are becoming more thrilling and 
more daring every year. The steeple 
chase and obstacle races have even been 
introduced to attract the public towards 
out-board races. Gar Wood and Sir 
Henry Malcolme are pioneers in high- 



powered speed-boat racing. However, we 
cannot hope to participate in all these 
sports. We must confine ourselves to a 
select group of three or four. Even then, 
the hobby would be very expensive, but 
to the young man who lives near the 
lake shore, it means just a matter of 
time and the ability to contact friends 
in and about the near-by harbor. For the 
most part of my life I have lived on the 
shore of Lake Michigan. About a quarter 
of a mile nortii of my home was the 
Wilmette harbor. When a young boy, I 
determined to make the harbor my 
"hang-out," and now I can thank this 
early determination of mine for making 
possible my fullest enjoyment of the lake 
sports. I have been sailing, speed-boat- 
mg, aqua-planing, and pleasure cruising 
for many years and at a very small cost. 
Now, if you live near the lake shore 
and if you are a true lake sportsman, 
the road to fuller enjoyment will be 
easy and simple. 

But before you decide to engage in 
lake sports, particularly in sailing and 
boating, you must determine whether or 
not you are cut out to be a yachtsman. 
Have you a natural desire and love for 
the lake waters? You must know and 
experience the feeling of secluding your- 
self on a bluff or a sand dune overlook- 
ing the massive lake, to feel the impor- 
tance and romance of it all. You must 
know what it is to camp on the beach, 
to lie on your blanket, which is spread 
on the cool, smooth sand, to watch the 
movements of the sky, and to listen to 
the swishing, ripple-like noise of the 
waves. Many summer nights I used to 
take a few blankets down to the lake 



[11] 



shore and camp there. The next morn- 
ing I would return to my anxious, im- 
patient mother and tell her all I had seen 
at the water's edge. It is this natural love 
for the water that determines whether 
you will enjoy yachting or not. 

When you have found out that you 
are attracted to the water, that you are 
a natural seaman, go out and seek the 
necessary connections. The place to go is 
the local harbor. There you will learn 
to appreciate boats — all kinds of boats — 
from the largest of yachts to the smallest 
of auxiliary dingeys. However, do not 
spend too much of your time at the 
harbor, that is, if you do not want to 
become a common sailor. We must all 
have some recreation and we must all 
have some special interest or hobby, 
but we must not neglect our education. 
Divide your time intelligently. You will 
then only loiter around the harbor dur- 
ing your spare time, making the harbor 
your hobby. Study the types of boats, 
pick up as many of the nautical terms 
and expressions as possible, and, above 
all, show yourself around the harbor. 
Don't sit on the break-water or pier all 
day long and content yourself with be- 
ing just a spectator. Participate in the 
activities of the harbor. Of course, you 
must be careful to avoid annoying any- 
one, for sailors and yachtsmen despise 
"kibitzers." Instead, you must ofifer your 
services with moderation and show the 
aged 3'achtsmen all the courtesies that 
a young apprentice can show his master. 
You will soon become an appreciable 
asset to the harbor. The yachtsmen will 
begin to take notice of you. Then you 
know you have completed the first step ; 
you have made your harbor friends and 
your harbor connections. 

You are a young man of the harbor; 
a yachtsman without a yacht. If you 
have no source of income, the most log- 



ical thing to do is to obtain some kind 
of a job around the harbor. There are 
many good positions, such as chauffeur 
on a power boat, fourth mate to one 
of the larger yachts, or general care- 
taker. I said "job," because you are 
paid for services rendered, but your 
work will be a real pleasure. It is sport 
to drive a high-powered Chris-craft; it 
is sport to be part of the crew on a 
large yacht, especially when the owner 
decides to set sail for an extended two- 
weeks' cruise. You will find that yachts- 
men are the most lenient of employers. 
They grant almost too many liberties 
and privileges to their employees. I know 
of one who encouraged his young 
chauffeur to take his friends for thrill- 
ing speed-boat rides and for a good 
afternoon of aqua-planing. The em- 
ployer is a wealthy man and had hired 
the lad principally to keep his Chris- 
craft in good condition and to take 
him back and forth to work. What did it 
matter to him if his boat was really be- 
ing enjoyed while he wasn't using it? 
You will find many jobs like the one 
I have just described. But be sure to 
hang around the harbor so that the op- 
portunities will come to you one by 
one. 

If you have saved enough money, or if 
you have a steady source of income, pur- 
chase a small boat. I will not try to 
influence you, but since I am a fond 
admirer of sail-boats, I advocate the 
purchase of a small cat-boat, a star- 
boat, or a Cape Cod boat. These are 
all medium-sized sail-boats which I am 
sure you will enjoy much more than any 
noisy, roaring motor-boat. I have always 
preferred the Cape Cod sail-boat, be- 
cause it is large, roomy, seaworthy, and 
reasonably fast. There is room for at 
least eight passengers, and it is easily 
sailed by one man. If you have never 



[12] 



experienced the joy of sailing — of sailing 
at sunset when the reflection of the sun 
upon the sparkling water turns every- 
thing golden, or of sailing at night, 
steering your course in the path of a 
reflected full moon, you have a real 
treat in store. You can do this now, and 
what is more enchanting than to do it 
in your own boat? 

Your boat will make you eligible to 
join the yacht club. Join it ! Yacht-club 
dues on the average are small; very 
small, in fact, when one considers the 
benefits the club offers. You will enter 
races. Your first race will be an experi- 
ence that you will never forget. As a 
member of the club you will make many 
more friends and connections. Possibly 
some member of the club may wish to 
cruise in the Indian Ocean. Nine times 
out of ten he will choose a young mem- 
ber of his own club to accompany him 
as a third mate. No matter how large 
your own boat is, you are now a full- 



fledged yachtsman. You have fellow 
yachtsmen who will invite you to join 
them in other sports. You will go aqua- 
planing, pleasure-yachting, speed-boat- 
ing, and canoeing, and enjoy yourself in 
the best and most healthy way possible. 
You have spent seasons of enjoyment 
on the lake, and now you have purchased 
a boat. It has been a very inexpensive 
experience, and yet, I imagine, you have 
enjoyed your recreation on lake waters 
as much as the wealthiest of yachtsmen. 
With your little boat you can be the host 
of many pleasurable parties. If and when 
you feel the urge to sail — to sail to dis- 
tant lands, convert your Cape Cod boat 
into a comfortable cabin sloop. It is a 
fairly simple task. I have seen quite a 
few Cape Cod boats converted into cab- 
in sloops that no one would be ashamed 
to own. To sail on an extended cruise 
in your own boat and as your own skip- 
per is a joy that cannot be measured. 
Recreation on lake waters has no equal ! 




[13] 



Six of a Kind 

Elsie Mitchell 
Themes 14-15, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

DRAMATISTS are but puppet-deal- at the end is the Nora of the beginning, 
ers who, Hke wise shopkeepers, have They are the same, so far as Nora's 
many varieties to sell. They have in their understanding goes. To the last she re- 
inventories puppets as manifold as the proaches Helmer for refusing to assume 
abductions of Edmund Rostand's Stra- the blame for her crime. It is agonizing 
forel ; they can advertise very plain pup- for her to think of plunging into "the 
pets in very plain settings ; or they can cold, black water" ; yet Nora-like she 
announce a group of very select puppets hopes that the water will not be cold, 
for sale — "$10.00 and up!" — just as It is the same Nora, but a mature Nora 
Straforel could arrange for a simple ab- whose quarrel with her husband puts an 
duction by post chaise or one in a sedan end to her youth. Ibsen's puppet is a 
chair — by all means, a sedan chair — strong woman, not a weak w^oman, for a 
with moonlight at extra cost. Whatever weak woman could never have left her 
the taste of the puppet-loving public, the husband and her children as Nora did. 
dramatist can gratify it. Sir Arthur W. Pinero's puppet is 
Like all dramatists is Henrik Ibsen ■ — almost a replica of the Norwegian 
his A Doll's House is a true puppet author's. Paula is, like Nora, a victim 
show ; his characters, true puppets. The of circumstance. Young, pretty, she has 
puppet dealer needed a young creature — thoughtlessly romped through life. 
a woman to show how hateful is a mar- "Why," asks Paula, "do you trouble 
riage without confidence, and therefore yourself about what servants think? 
no love, for love is confidence. He Why, goosey, they're only machines 
needed one that was full of life but made to wait upon people and to give 
lacking principles in thought, loving but evidence in the Divorce Court." The 
undisciplined, gentle to those nearest her second Mrs. Tanqueray is a woman of 
but not to others, an extravagant young the world, not a toughened individual, 
girl who never had a mother. And, for but an innocent misguided creature who 
such a character, Ibsen pounced upon demanded of life only one thing — fun. 
Nora. He made her the gay little puppet A divorcee several times, the toast of a 
who childishly tells herself stories about devil-may-care London, she settles down 
old gentlemen who will leave her for- to live in Highercoombe near Willomere 
tunes so that she can get out of debt, with Aubrey Tanqueray, in whose social 
who solemnly fibs about the sweetmeats circle she is unaccepted. "What is my 
her husband forbade her to buy, who existence, Sunday to Saturday ?" she asks 
thoughtlessly forges a name to "save her impatiently. "In the morning, a drive 
husband's life." In short, Nora is a down to the village, with the groom, to 
little girl who has been babied by a give my orders to the tradespeople. At 
husband who adores the wax doll in his lunch, you and Ellean. In the afternoon, 
doll's house. But Nora changes rapidly a novel, the newspapers: if fine, another 
— so rapidly that we wonder if the Nora drive — if fine! Tea — you and Ellean. 



[14] 



Then two hours of dusk; then dinner — 
you and Ellean. Then a game of Bezique, 
you and I, while Ellean reads a religious 
book in a dull corner. Then a yawn from 
me, another from you, a sigh from El- 
lean ; three figures suddenly rise — 'Good 
night, good night, good night.' " Paula, 
now belonging neither to her own set nor 
to her husband's, finds that her friends of 
the past only disgust her. Tanqueray's 
friends shun her — and Ellean, selfish, 
heartless Ellean of the Madonna face, 
refuses to accept Paula's genuine love. 
But Ellean, Saint Ellean, can accept the 
love of a shameless man, one with whom 
Paula had lived ! Whatever Paula may 
have been before, Paula in the last scene 
is a true gentlewoman, unselfish and 
sacrificing. Knowing how utterly she is 
ruining her husband's life and Ellean's 
life, how miserable is her own, she 
quietly commits suicide. 

Ibsen and Pinero sold us a Norwegian 
and an English marionette, but what will 
Edna St. Vincent Millay offer? Ah — 
an Anglo-Saxon puppet. "See," says 
Miss Millay, "how pretty Aelfrida is? 
How bright the red hair that lies in waves 
over her shoulders? how dark and wide 
the eyes! how soft but imperiously set 
the mouth ! how dazzling the skin ! Ael- 
frida is my best puppet, but, gentlemen, 
Aelfrida has no heart. Alas, it is all too 
true. Aelfrida's only thought is of her- 
self, her beautiful self. 'But for 
thee,' she mourns to Athelwold, 'I 
had been Lady of England.' That 
Athelwold should have left his be- 
loved king and his all to be with her, 
Aelfrida, does not matter. Was it sick 
she promises to be when King Eadgar 
comes to Devonshire? To dress with 
'locks unkempt, and dusty with hateful 
meal' to save her lover from certain 
death ? Aye — sick and ugly she appears 
— in richest silks and golden bracelets ! 



Her love for Athelwold is so little that 
she would rather see his blood 'splashed 
out in the dust like a bucket of kitchen 
slop' than to appear ugly before the king. 
'Thou hast not tears enow in thy narrow 
heart, Aelfrida,' says Eadgar, 'to weep 
him worthily.' Will you have her, gentle- 
men, or shall I show you another?" 

The French offer us two products — 
genuine Rostand-made — the one named 
Roxanne and the other, Sylvette. They 
are two unimportant ladies who are 
loved by important men. At times we 
would like to shake the lovely and in- 
telligent Roxanne for falling in love with 
the handsome young puppet coached by 
the debonair Cyrano de Bergerac instead 
of with the teacher himself. But, would 
a lovely woman look at Cyrano beyond 
his nose? Roxanne must be forgiven. 
And Sylvette ? Ah, Sylvette is a romantic 
little puppet who loves fruit because it is 
forbidden. Percinet is twice as valuable 
w^hen Pasquinot has branded him as the 
"no-count son of a no-count father." But 
when she finds that this is the plot of two 
wily old fathers for a proper marriage, 
she sighs dismally and says, "Our beauti- 
ful bubble is now a tiny fleck of soap." 
She then waits until Straforel stages 
another abduction before she realizes 
that she can be happy only with Percinet, 
proper marriage or no proper marriage. 

But the Scotch offer us a puppet that 
is unlike all the rest. Maggie Wylie isn't 
even a lady puppet — she is just a good 
Scotch dame, very good and very Scotch. 
"We could describe Maggie at length," 
confesses our puppet dealer, "but what 
is the use? What you really want to 
know is whether she is good-looking." 
No, Sir James Barrie is quite right. 
Maggie is not good-looking. Maggie is 
not even a lady, although Maggie tries 
to be. Maggie learns French, and Maggie 
furnishes her father's home with com- 



[15] 



pany chairs and classics for social 
emergencies. But the sad truth of the 
matter is, Maggie wants to get married 
and no one wants her — not even the 
minister of Galashiels. "It is ill of the 
minister. Many a pound of steak has 
that man had in his house," mourns 
David of Wylie and Sons. Enter into the 
picture, or rather into the Wylie library, 
one John Shand, who needs money for 
an education. Hoot, mon! Three 
hundred pounds, but ye must marry 
Maggie! Maggie, good, generous Mag- 
gie, who knows herself clearly, watches 
her husband climb and climb; she 
watches him fall in love with a pretty 
puppet called Sybil ; and we wonder why 
John Shand begins to slip down when 



Maggie fades out and Sybil flickers in! 
Ah, John, 'tis what every woman knows: 
"Every man who is high up loves to 
think that he has done it all himself, and 
the wife smiles and lets it go at that. It 
is their only joke. Every woman knows 
that." 

There they are, gentlemen, six puppets. 
Which will you have? I, for one, have 
chosen Maggie. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Mill AY, Edna St. Vincent, The King's 

Henchman. 
PiNERO, Arthur W., The Second Mrs. Tan- 

queray. 
Rostand, Edmond, The Romancers, Cyrano 

de Bergerac. 
Barrie, Sir James M., What Every Woman 

Knows. 
Ibsen, Henrik, A Doll's House. 



War is Not a Necessity 



Lou Ray Spence 
Theme 6, Rhetoric H, 1934-35 

"D OOKS upon books and volumes upon out with 
^ volumes have been written about 
war; so what I say in the following 
pages will be of no great irnportance 
other than as the expression of a few 
opinions of a college freshman. To de- 
velop the subject of war adequately, one 
would probably need to write a book. 
However, in this small theme I have 
tried to the best of my ability to present 
the main points concerning the question 
which has puzzled sages and seers of by- 
gone times, and which is still puzzling 
the master minds of today. 

The question of war is as old as his- 
tory itself, having its roots reaching far 
back into ancient times when man wrap- 
ped an animal skin about him and set 



a stone hatchet over his 
shoulder, to kill or be killed. Since that 
time, man has gradually progressed, and 
the story of his progress has been woven 
into the fascinating story of history. One 
thing, however, mars this fascinating 
story; it is war. Progress has eliminated 
custom after custom and institution af- 
ter institution, but war has failed to suc- 
cumb to the steady advance of civiliza- 
tion. Instead of weakening and finally 
dying by the wayside, war has increased, 
become magnified, and developed until 
today it has grown into the defiant armed 
monster which towers above the world, 
ready at any time to wipe out the entire 
civilized human race, or to wreck the 
social structure so completely that it 



[16] 



will never recover. Wherever we go, 
wherever we turn, we see this giant in 
various shapes, forms, and fashions. If 
we pick up the morning newspaper, his 
grim face looms before us in the form 
of a front-page cartoon, or in thick, black 
headlines. If we turn on the radio, we 
hear deep-voiced economists or politi- 
cians discussing the pros and cons of 
our possibilities of having another war. 
When news is at a premium, Lowell 
Thomas and Boake Carter slyly turn to 
the most recent developments in the 
tense, complex European situation or 
to the latest actions of Japan and Rus- 
sia. War news is choice news. Hardly 
a magazine is published which does not 
have between its covers one or more ar- 
ticles relating to some phase of war. And 
people read and seemingly enjoy war 
news, without taking into consideration 
how much war costs them personally, A 
check-up on our national budget shows 
that our government is spending more 
than one-third its annual income upon 
armaments ; and including interest on the 
national debts incurred in former wars 
and totalling nearly thirty billions of 
dollars, about two-thirds of every dollar 
paid every year in taxes goes to pay 
for our past wars and to prepare for 
our next. Not only is this true of our 
own country but of European countries 
as well. In fact, Europe is more militar- 
istic than the United States. 

Europe is in a state of confusion and 
turmoil, waiting and hoping that the 
dark war clouds will "blow over" and 
allow the sun to shine peaceably once 
more upon her land already scarred by 
wars innumerable. Each nation is pitted 
against the rest, and, like incorrigible 
young ruffians, each wants to be "king 
on the mountain top." Germany, though 
humiliated by the Treaty of Versailles, 
is unwilling to remain the underdog and 



is slowly but surely regaining her pres- 
tige. France, the arch enemy of Ger- 
many, not yet recovered from the scare 
of 1915, is secretly digging a great un- 
derground arsenal which in time will 
undermine all France. Italy, not to be 
bluffed by France or Germany, is stead- 
ily increasing her army and navy. Only a 
few days ago II Duce said that he could 
put eight million men on the battlefield. 
Thus we see that the problem of war is 
today a giant to be reckoned with, to be 
analyzed, to be diagnosed, and to be tried 
before the highest tribunal in the world 
— the human mind, there either to be 
acquitted and allowed to terrorize civili- 
zation indefinitely, or to be condemned 
to death everlasting. Therefore, let us 
endeavor to find the causes of war and 
decide for ourselves whether or not 
war is a necessity. If it is a necessity, 
which it seems to be, because it has been 
handed down from generation to gen- 
eration, it should not be condemned. If 
it is merely a menace, it should be elimi- 
nated. But first let us consider its rela- 
tions to the Malthusian theory. 

Malthus said that there must be an 
harmonious relationship between the 
population on the one hand and pro- 
duction of necessities on the other. When 
this relationship does not exist, there are 
certain forces which either decrease the 
population to the food level or increase 
the food level to that of the population. 
Our object, then, is to find, if possible, 
the factors which keep the relationship 
in balance. 

The positive factors, or pe-rhaps I 
should say checks, which tend to elimi- 
nate excess population are of ancient 
origin- — namely, famine, pestilence, and 
war. The preventive checks are of rather 
recent development, and are listed under 
the headings "moral restraint" and "agri- 
cultural improvement." But first let us 



[17] 



discuss the positive checks. The western 
civiHzed world has for years struggled 
with nature to reduce the death rate, 
and to a great degree has succeeded. 
The discoveries of Lister and Pasteur 
have revolutionized medicine; the germ 
theory of disease gave a tremendous 
power of control over contagion and 
infection, and thereby over epidemics 
and pestilence. Preventive medicine has 
done much to eliminate some of the worst 
plagues that were visited upon mankind 
for generations. Pestilence, too, is al- 
most a thing of the past. When an 
emergency arises, a flood, a tornado, or 
a drouth, the Red Cross and Salvation 
Army rush food and clothing to the 
people in distress. Then, too, the state, 
besides the individual societies, is de- 
voting much attention to the condition 
of the needy — those who have little or 
no capital, or those who have but a nar- 
row margin between themselves and a 
mere subsistence. The positive checks, 
we see, have been and are being modified, 
with one rather startling exception. 

While the western nations have been 
alleviating famine and removing pesti- 
lence, at the same time by every con- 
ceivable device of science they have been 
increasing the destructiveness of war. 
Chemists now produce gases which are 
capable of wiping out whole cities in a 
night's time ; munition makers build 
guns which can shoot seventy-five miles 
or more ; army planes can lay smoke 
screens as thick as the heaviest of Lon- 
don fogs. People's minds are filled by 
custom and familiarity with a tacit ac- 
ceptance of war. People have paid taxes 
for armaments all their tax-paying lives. 
They see army units and the fleet. Some 
have attended military schools ; some 
have been in the army, others in the 
navy. Consequently, the individual mind 



finds no shock in considering a resort 
to war as a means of adjustment. 

The preventive checks, as before 
mentioned, are moral restraint and ag- 
ricultural development. Since 1800, the 
force of moral restraint has grown 
amazingly, until its effects in some coun- 
tries have been to annul practically all 
action of the positive checks. A hun- 
dred years ago the preventive checks 
were assigned a much smaller value. In 
harmony with moral restraint is farm- 
ing, which has developed so much in 
recent years that one now hears the 
cry of over-production. I said that farm- 
ing was in harmony with moral re- 
straint. That is because they work to- 
gether in keeping an adjustment between 
population and subsistence. One has 
caused the increase in population to be 
slower; the other has provided for sub- 
sistence for the increase beyond the 
point where the pressure of want would 
otherwise be felt. But let us assume that 
the preventive checks prove insufficient. 
Then the positive checks — famine, pesti- 
lence, and war — have to act. But we have 
seen that famine and pestilence have 
ceased to be checks ; in fact, it is un- 
reasonable to believe that the human 
mind would revert to pestilence or 
famine. Rather would it tolerate the al- 
ternative, the idea which is daily ac- 
cepted. A resort to arms, therefore, 
would be the only positive check left 
to meet and adjust economic pressure 
according to the Malthusian theory. 

Besides the distress caused by lack of 
necessities there may be, and generally 
are, other economic or political causes of 
war. Some of the chief conditions that 
incite war are inherent in our present 
system of industry. The industrial 
regime of the world has been, and is 
now, competitive. Among the various 



[18] 



nations there is a constant competition 
for markets, for trade routes, for op- 
portunities for expansion, or, more ac- 
curately, the trading classes of the world 
are in competition. Naturally, hostile 
feelings are evoked, the government is 
appealed to, international disputes arise, 
and, the situation becoming acute, wars 
are declared. In most cases, wars are 
made by a very small group of men. It 
is amazing to note the ease with which 
these men lead the people by the nose. 
The methods they use are old, but in- 
variably succeed. They begin by invent- 
ing stories of atrocities and injustices 
committed by some foreign power, of 
insults that can be washed out only by 
blood. Common people are persuaded 
that the interest of the nation bids them 
to rush to arms, when the truth is that 
nations are always ruined by wars and 
that wars invariably impoverish the 
masses and enrich only a very small 
number of lucky individuals. 

However, it is hardly necessary for 
the little group of war-promoters to use 
these means. It is enough to beat a drum 
and to wave a flag to rally an enthu- 
siastic mob to rush headlong into de- 
struction and death. The truth is that 
after a few generations without war, the 
people forget the terrible crime of man- 
slaughter and are really glad to go to 
war. Sure pay, a chance to see foreign 
countries and to win glory on the bat- 
tlefield compensate for every danger. 
War gives men the intensest excitement 
they can experience in this world, that 
of killing men. To be sure, there is a 
great risk of being killed, but young men 
never really expect to die in war, and in 
the intoxication of slaughter they for- 
get the danger. War does not call for 
minds of first rank, except in probably 
a few of its leaders; it does not demand 
any brain whatever of the common 



soldier; and any man will make cannon- 
fodder. That is the universal endowment 
of the human race. 

But a greater endowment, one which 
has not yet been used, is that of abolisli- 
ing war. Anyone in his sane senses can- 
not fail to see that war brings nothing 
but evil and destruction, and rarely, if 
ever, settles questions aright. It will con- 
tinue to exist, however, as long as its 
causes exist. Therefore, if we would 
abolish war, we must aim at its causes 
and extirpate them. The causes, we 
have seen, are chiefly economic and 
political. As long as hunger persists, war 
must remain. But hunger and the law 
of decreasing returns might conceiv- 
ably lead, and ought to lead, to coopera- 
tive effort to produce food, rather than 
to produce war. If our government 
would spend as much money on agricul- 
tural research as it does on war, and 
would train our boys to farm as it does 
to fight, it is entirely possible that more 
than enough food could be produced to 
meet the demands of consumption. But 
our government should go further than 
that. It should discourage large families 
among the poor and should sterilize 
those whose offspring would be below 
normal — that is, those who would burden 
the rest and would add nothing to the 
human race. 

Free trade between all nations and 
the development of each country's na- 
tional resources would also lead to a 
higher standard of living. Each coun- 
try could exchange its products for those 
of others and all would profit. This type 
of specialization between countries 
would lead to a higher standard of liv- 
ing in much the same manner as special- 
ization in industry within a country 
does. This would eliminate want but 
would not keep down disputes between 
the politicians and commercialists of the 



[19] 



various countries. Naturally, if the mass 
of the people allowed themselves to be 
dragged into war because of these dis- 
putes between the few, we would be no 
better off than before. Our problem, 
then, must be to produce a type of gov- 
ernment in which the people as a whole 
shall decide whether or not they will go 
to war. And then the people must be 
educated against war. 

Popular education, it must be admitted, 
has not fulfilled our early expectation 
with respect to the promotion of peace. 
Indeed, it has miserably failed ; for the 
results of increased popular intelligence 
and the advancement of science are man- 
ifest in greater destruction and more sav- 
age brutality in war. But the failure is 
not to be charged to education itself; in- 



stead it should be charged to the kind 
of education — the education that pro- 
duces false conceptions of national honor 
and patriotism, and the erroneous idea 
that the best way to prevent war is con- 
stantly to think about and prepare for 
it. 

Now in conclusion, I want to say that 
the possible solutions that I have listed 
must be applied not only in our own 
country but in practically all countries 
before much progress can be made in 
eliminating war. It is highly improbable 
that this can be done; so we must look 
forward to another war, or wars. It is 
only when the people of 'the many gov- 
ernments of the world come to realize 
the various causes of war, and determine 
to expel them, that war will be no more. 



Words Alone 

Charlotte Johnston 
Theme 5, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



A"\ /"HY must we be blind to words? Al- 
^^ though they are our medium of 
communication, they lose half their pow- 
er in our everyday speech. We take them 
for granted, grasping only their barest 
meanings. We do not see them ; we do 
not hear them ; we do not interpret them. 
For instance, when we pass billboard 
signs, do we really read them? No. Our 
eyes automatically scan the glaring let- 
ters, but we let them impress but little 
thought upon our minds. Since we do not 
really read those posters, the advertiser 
uses catch words or slogans again and 
again, that through familiarity with 
them we may retain some phrase about 
the worth of his product. 

If we stop to think of words as indi- 
viduals, then we realize some of their 
connotations. Unfortunately, our lives 



are so rushed and confused that in 
skimming over the waves and froth we 
miss the depths and heights of our vo- 
cabularies, William Blake was an extrem- 
ist in the other direction. To him, words 
indicated not their meanings or defini- 
tions but their connotations or symbolic 
values. Therefore, we find many of his 
poems unintelligible. To most of us, a 
lamb suggests a young animal which 
will grow up to have its wool cut off or 
become a roast on the table. To Blake, a 
lamb signified innocence, weakness, help- 
lessness, a sacrificial victim, and Christ 
as the Lamb of God. Naturally we often 
fail to understand him since he used 
words only for their connotations while 
we use words only for their base diction- 
ary definitions. 

We are also deaf to words. We could 



[20] 



tell the meanings of many words by 
their sound, but we do not listen. We lose 
the onomatopoeia. (The term, alas, is 
enough to discourage anyone from listen- 
ing, much less from spelling.) Words 
like "shriek," "squeal," "bellow," or 
"murmur" we think of as mere utterance. 
"Tap," "clatter," "crunch," "sonorous," 
"hiss," "succulent," "tang," "melody"— 
all fall to earth unheard and, consequent- 
ly, futile. 

Perhaps our most common fault is 
ignoring the settings of words. For ex- 
ample, how few of us think of the back- 
ground of "supercilious" ! "Super" is the 
Latin word for over, "cilium" for eye- 
lid. "Supercilious" indicates a lifting of 
the eyebrow, and, consequently, haugh- 
tiness or arrogance. Another delightful 
word is "halcyon." There is an old legend 
of the love of a young girl. Halcyon, for 
her lover. He was drowned on his way 
to her. Broken-hearted, she begged the 
sea god to help her. He transformed the 



lovers into kingfishers, and promised 
that Halcyon could have the power of 
charming the winds and waves whenever 
her nest of eggs or of new-hatched king- 
fishers was floating on the sea. There- 
fore, we think of halcyon days as pe- 
riods of peace and tranquillity, and of 
the word "halcyon" as meaning "undis- 
turbed" or "happy." How do we think 
of our word "Monday"? To college stu- 
dents, it means a day of sleeping through 
classes to make up for sleep lost on Sat- 
urday night; to the housewife, wash 
day ; to almost everyone, "blue Monday." 
The word itself comes from the Latin 
"dies lunae" or "moon's day." The 
French "lundi" is derived from this same 
source. If we could only think of the 
moon instead of lost sleep, dirty washing, 
or pensive melancholy, we would enjoy 
the word in its true setting. 

Why have we blunted our senses, in- 
sulated our reactions, reined in our 
responses to words? 



Thanks to Vesalius! 

Mary K. Dearth 
Theme 3, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



O ECENTLY, while nibbling on a de- 
■■•^ licious morsel of a roasted chicken's 
breast, I suddenly realized that I was 
not eating mere "meat" but several 
striations of pectoralis major, "the de- 
velopment of which muscle reaches its 
highest peak in Class Aves," and that 
the bone which I was firmly grasping in 
both hands was none other than the 
sternum with its varied xiphoid processes 
and its median prolongated keel. I imme- 
diately lost all interest in the process of 
eating and could hardly wait until every- 
one else had finished eating his dinner 



and I could get my fingers on the rest 
of the skeleton of poor Galliis. After 
much tearing and scrubbing, I finally col- 
lected the bones and spent a most en- 
joyable afternoon assembling the skeleton 
as it had once existed. 

Since that afternoon, the trend I have 
established in making use of my knowl- 
edge of comparative anatomy, knowledge 
gleaned from a practical hygiene course 
and a thorough examination and dissec- 
tion of the physical possessions of a 
shark, has become almost an obsession. 
Before me I no longer see a man but 



[21] 



a great mass of protoplasm, shaped and 
held in place by an intricate system of 
bones, muscles, and tissues (the names 
of which I can spell as well as pro- 
nounce), and with an internal mechanism 
more fascinating and complex than that 
of a delicate watch or perplexing ma- 
chinery. The old-fashioned condition of 
"buck teeth" has become "a hyper-ex- 
tension of the pre-maxilla" ; mere action 
has become a confused series of nervous 
reactions associated with various un- 
pronounceable nerves, and a process in- 
volving almost every part of one's anat- 
omy. I find myself staring at the shape 
of a person's head, or the size of his 
feet or neck, or the color of his com- 



plexion, and I automatically correlate 
my results with a medical terminology 
and raison d'etre. I find myself attribut- 
ing flushed cheeks to various glandular 
disturbances, or a certain bluish pallor to 
a defective circulatory system, and I 
hastilv review in mv mind the "awful" 
names of the components in that vast sys- 
tem in order to decide just where the 
trouble lies. 

It is my ambition, I must confess, to 
be a doctor. But at present, when I am 
trying to enjoy my youth, I find it quite 
annoying and often embarrassing to as- 
sociate continually a person or an animal 
with anatomical and histological textbook 
charts. 



Our Nell 



A LTHOUGH she had merited many 
^*- other names in her time, Nellie 
undoubtedly was a horse. From a dis- 
tance she appeared to be just another 
useful beast of burden; upon closer in- 
spection she proved to be just a beast of 
burden. She was by far the tallest horse 
I have ever seen, and that is saying a 
good deal. Her bones were positively 
huge. Her color was supposed to have 
been white, but I still maintain it to 
have been the gray of old age. Nobody 
seems to know anything of her early 
history save that she had figured in a 
trade between the local teamster and a 
farmer in which the teamster got the 
worst of the bargain — he got Nellie. 
Mike, the teamster, was a clever man — 
and quite an actor, be it added. He 
thought of poor Nellie languishing in the 
barren pastures of her former owner, 



Herta Breiter 
Theme 14, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

still unclaimed by her new master. Even 
more he thought of the jeers and guffaws 
of his neighbors which Nellie certainly 
would inspire. Nevertheless, winter was 
coming, and shelter had to be provided 
for that miserable creature; after all, a 
man had to be humane. 

Whatever prompted Mike to come to 
my father I do not know, but he cer- 
tainly selected the right man. As I ex- 
pected, my father proved to be a most 
sympathetic listener. To me it seemed 
that Mike's tale of woe reeked slightly 
of herring; but, since I had nothing 
to say in the matter, I held my peace. 

"Why don't you take her, Mike?" my 
father asked. 

Mike looked at him seriously — almost 
reproachfully. "Oh, she's a good horse, 
but I haven't any room for her. She's a 
good horse." 



122} 



I didn't like his reiteration ; it seemed 
as if he were reassuring himself. By 
this time IMike was almost in tears, and 
my father's resistance was diminishing 
rapidly. I could bear it no longer and 
went to prepare my mother for the in- 
evitable. 

I shall never forget my first sight 
of Nellie. I don't suppose I shall ever 
again laugh quite as loudly or as long. 
My older brother had been sent to es- 
cort Nellie to her new home. He had 
intended to make the six-mile return 
trip astride Nellie, but something had 
caused him to revise his plan ; instead, 
he was literally pulling our Nell. At the 
time I admired my brother's kindness, 
but I have since learned that it was not 
purely kindness which prompted him to 
spare our Nell. And Nellie really was the 
picture of fatigue — she couldn't even 
keep her eyes open long enough to per- 
mit me to discern their color. Her lower 
lip hung loosely, and ever^-time she 
sighed it wobbled amazingly. I experi- 
enced an urgent and unexplainable de- 
sire to look into the brute's mouth, but 
apparently such things just are not done. 
She was incredibly tall as Mike had pro- 
claimed, but he had neglected to mention 
her huge, dinosaurian frame-work, her 
sagging hide, her "scrubby" ears, her pro- 
jecting joints, all of which my youngest 
brother so aptly summed up in his one 
comment. "Hey, Mom," he roared, "come 
look at the walking hat-rack." Certainly 
she suffered from malnutrition, but that 
was not the worst of her infirmities. At 
some time in her late forties Nellie must 
have sprained her left hind leg, for her 



^ 



manipulation of that appendage was 
most extraordinary. Nellie always lifted 
that leg until it almost touched the un- 
derside of her body in quite the same 
manner as one who comes to the end of 
a stairway in the dark and lifts his foot 
to step on what is not there. I hate to 
think of what might have happened had 
Nellie ever tried to gallop. 

For three long years Nellie lived in 
comparative luxury and privacy. Even 
the cats moved out when she moved in. 
It was then that I discovered a partic- 
ular species of louse which apparently 
preferred an environment of cat fur to 
one of horse hide. Other than serving as 
a local curiosity and a part of the gen- 
eral landscape, Nellie had no practical 
value whatever. For a time I thought she 
might teach me a few things about the 
gentle art of horseback riding. In a way 
I was right. She did convince me that I 
could never become an equestrienne of 
any great renown and still retain my dig- 
nity. But she was an indifferent instruc- 
tor. If m}^ heels prodded her persistently 
enough, she actually increased her speed 
to two miles an hour. But she had her 
regular cruising speed and under normal 
conditions would never alter — not even 
in death. Her death was a drawn-out, 
almost luxurious process which termin- 
ated in her rolling over leisurely, blink- 
ing her almost sightless eyes, and heav- 
ing a deep sigh. My youngest brother 
looked at her corpse thoughtfully for a 
time and then muttered, "The old gray 
mare sure enough isn't what she used 
to be, but she'd make a darn good mu- 
seum specimen just the same." 



[23] 



Castor and Pollux 



Joe Crabtree 
Theme 14, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

AS I opened the door and stepped in- upon my hands 
side the chicken pen, a flutter of 
wings greeted me. Glancing up, I saw a 
young rooster descending upon my head. 
I attempted to ward him off, but it was 
too late. He had alighted already and had 
entrenched himself by firmly grasping 
my hair in his long yellow claws. 

Not thinking it desirable to have a 
chicken upon my head, I pulled him off 
amid flying spurs and feathers and 
tucked him under my arm. After he 
found that he could not escape me, he 
lay still, calmly defiant, taking an occa- 
sional peck at my hand for old times' 
sake and to remind me that he wasn't 
licked yet. All the time I held him he 
uttered not a squawk. 

I had just finished capturing the chick- 
en when I heard another flutter of 
wings over my head and another rooster 
alighted. This was too much. I could 
not handle the second rooster without 
letting go of the first; and if I let go 
of the first, I would have two of them 



I immediately beat a 
hasty retreat for the door ; but before I 
got there, the rooster on top of my head 
flapped his wings twice, crowed long and 
loudly, and then flew off. This was 
my introduction to Castor and Pollux, 
together in war, together in peace, 
and together in the hearts of their 
lady-hens. 

Despite their rough reception and 
treatment of guests, the roosters had 
won a place for themselves in my heart. 
The rest of the day I sat in safety out- 
side the pen watching them boast to their 
harem about defeating the giant feather- 
less chicken. While telling the story, they 
cast sidelong glances at me when they 
thought I wasn't looking. As they fin- 
ished the colorful tale of their conquest, 
they flashed their eyes, puffed up their 
chests, flapped their wings, and crowed 
in unison. Then, finding even my pres- 
ence contemptible, they strutted off to 
another part of the pen, followed by their 
admiring wives. 




[24] 



Yesterday 



William Holly 
Theme 2, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 
npHERE is perhaps no recollection of ground. The high points were th 
^ my boyhood that stands out so vividly 



in my memory as that of the neighbor- 
hood feed and grain store. To the pass- 
erby, it was just a place in which to buy 
grain and feed, and in which orders 
for the winter coal supply were left. 
But to a select group of five boys, of 
whom I was one, it was a veritable 
fairyland. 

The owner's son, big for his age, was 
a fellow-classmate. To be sure we were 
on very good terms, because he was a 
likeable chap, easy-going, and generous. 
His father was a taciturn individual 
whom the boys never did quite under- 
stand, but he must have been a kindly 
soul to tolerate the young scamps that 
we were. 

The store had just one center aisle, on 
one side of which were bins of the vari- 
ous grains that we liked to scoop up and 
run through our fingers. We loved to fill 
the wooden grain measures, not that we 
were asked to, but because the easy flow 
of the grain from the scoop held a cer- 
tain fascination. Then there were the 
sunflower seeds that we shelled and 
munched like so many parrots. However, 
the other side of the store was our chief 
source of delight — pile upon pile and row 
upon row of baled hay. Very ordinary- 
looking hay it was, to be sure, but not 
to us. The very mention of the word 
brings to my mind the pungent and dis- 
tinctive odor of alfalfa. Here the bales 
were piled in disorderly array, the very 
irregularity of which formed our play- 



crow s 
nests" and opposite bays were the 
"forts." Any high, flat surface was an 
imaginary basking area where with 
straws in our mouths we lay face up, 
utterly disregarding time. There were al- 
so rough bales of straw in the climbing 
of which we were afforded all the thrills 
of mountain-scaling. The soles of our 
shoes attained such a high polish that 
they were the cause of many a slip that 
resulted in a bruise, a bump, or even 
torn clothing, the periodic rents becoming 
increasingly difficult to explain to par- 
ental satisfaction. 

A wagon backed into the loading plat- 
form, at the rear end of the store, was 
something additional to clamber upon. 
On the driver's seat we vied with one 
another in cracking the whip, sometimes 
not just the whip but some one's legs, 
and there was a scuffie that was bound to 
end in a tangle of what seemed just 
arms and legs. This loading platform was 
a very effective means for making a 
quick exit — one jump, a run up a short 
ramp, and out into the alley. 

Needless to say, after romping around 
to our heart's content we returned home 
with our day's allotment of energy ex- 
pended, but happy in our fancied accom- 
plishments. Today, I seek to fulfill these 
ambitions on perhaps a more practical 
scale, but with less enthusiasm, with less 
success, and with less satisfaction. It is 
with a touch of melancholia that I realize 
that those carefree days are irretrievably 
gone. 



[25] 



Elwood 



A WEAK, pale, languid body scarcely 
able to murmur, "Hello, my boy, 
I'm glad you're here" — such was my last 

view of Elwood. The next time I looked 
upon him, it was not Elwood, but a cold, 
lifeless form resting, I hoped resting, in 
a sombre lead-hued coffin. Elwood was 
dead ; I had lost a real friend. 

Elwood was a strong, husky farmer, 
only in the prime of life when he died. 
Often when the farm work piled up, 
he would rise in the early morning and 
throw his whole heart and soul into 
catching up on overdue tasks. Many are 
the sultry summer days that I have seen 
good men sent to the shade ; but not 
Elwood — he was not to be outdone. Even 
after a hard day's toil he would milk 
twice as fast as any help. And often 



Harvey R, Eraser 

Theme 14, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

he would make ice cream ; I believe I 
have never since tasted such delicious 
ice cream. I can see Elwood now, hold- 
ing a bowl of creamy vanilla in one 
hand and a mammoth soup spoon in the 
other. My, how he did devour that ice 
cream ! He would repeatedly say to me, 
"Have a little more, Harve ; one more 
dish will do you good." After the fifth 
or sixth bowl I had to quit, but Elwood 
kept right on eating until the whole 
six quarts were devoured. Then he would 
laugh and say, "Pretty nice little lunch 
we had, eh boy?" 

Those happy days are gone forever. 
Now there is no ice cream ; there is no 
comradeship during a hard day's toil ; 
for, though his death seems like a fan- 
tastic dream, there is no Elwood. 



A Romantic Bridge 



A 



R. H. COLVIN 
Theme 6, Rhetoric I, 1934-35 

NY resident of Olney, Illinois, will actual span is only about one hundred 
tell you that the overhead bridge and fifty feet in length, the bridge seemed 



on South Elliott Street is just an ordi- 
nary and very dirty viaduct. Perhaps it 
is only that, but to me it is a great deal 
more. Many happy care-free hours of my 
childhood were spent on, beneath, and 
around it, and I therefore look at it with 
partial eyes. 

The bridge was the favorite place to 
play for all the active boys in the neigh- 
borhood. No mother would allow her 
boy to play there, but prohibition made 
it all the more interesting. Although the 



an immense structure to us boys. It is 
made of steel, set in heavy stone ma- 
sonry, with plank flooring and wood 
banisters. The banks on the sides are 
quite steep, large rocks keeping the dirt 
from washing away. Three tracks of the 
Baltimore and Ohio railroad run under 
it, and most of the traffic from the 
southeastern part of town passes over 
it. A small stream runs on each side of 
the tracks. 

It was no effort for the boyish imagi- 



[26] 



nation to make castle turrets out of the 
masonry supporting walls and to turn 
the stream at the foot into a moat. There 
were usually some small boards nearby 
which could be utilized for swords, 
spears, and shields. Many a classic ju- 
venile battle has been fought in this im- 
provised fort. In the soft dirt above this 
stonework we dug a cave. In reality it 
was just large enough to hold four of us 
all curled up together, but in our imag- 
ination it held many bags of pirates' 
loot and many beautiful damsels, whom 
we had rescued and brought there. We 
tried to forget that the cave was the 
work of our own hands, and thought of 
it as an ancient cavern, hollowed out by 
some prehistoric monster. 

The steel cross-beams were excellent 
places on which to lie and watch the 
faces in the windows of the passing 
trains. Sometimes we would gather peb- 
bles from the gravel on the ties and 
carry them to these beams. We would 
hurl these at the vagrants riding atop the 
freight cars, and would be both fright- 
ened and amused at the oaths we re- 
ceived in return. When we climbed down 
from the beams, we would laugh at each 
other's black faces and limbs, and then 



race down to the streams to wash away 
the soot and dirt. If the water was still, 
we could see a few tiny fish and a great 
many crawfish swimming among the 
weeds. Sometimes we would catch some 
of the latter, carry them to the top of 
the bridge in a can full of water, and 
dump the contents on an unsuspecting 
stranger as he walked along the tracks. 

In the winter the bridge acquired addi- 
tional charms. After every snowfall the 
banks would be alive with sleds and boys 
and girls. The banks were so steep that 
it was very thrilling to go shooting over 
the bumps, trying to dodge the rocks. 
Usually a foot-slide, which zigzagged 
from side to side, would be made. If one 
came early, before the main crowd ar- 
rived, he could see a maze of animal 
tracks at the bottom of the hill. There 
were dog tracks of every size, cat tracks 
going in a straight line to some house, 
the curiously bunched tracks of the rab- 
bit, the smaller ones of the squirrel, the 
still tinier ones of the field mouse, and 
the very small ones of the sparrow. All 
of these things helped to endear the 
old bridge to my heart and to make 
pleasant, indelible pictures of it on my 
memory. 




[27] 



Mrs. Mincer, Efficiency Personified 



IN spite of my sadness at Mrs. Min- 
cer's funeral, the odd thought struck 
me that the affair could have been far 
more efficiently arranged had she been 
able to take care of it herself. Although 
I, like everyone else, knew little about 
Mrs, Mincer's private affairs, I don't 
doubt that she had arranged as best she 
could every detail of the funeral. She al- 
ready had a tombstone in a corner of 
the cemetery, upon which was engraved 
in large, neat letters the name "Mincer" 
— just plain "Mincer", nothing more. Un- 
der the next stone lay Mr. Mincer. He 
was already dead when our family moved 
to Mrs. Mincer's town. He died, I guess, 
of super-efficiency and the ever-loving, 
over-indulgent watchfulness of Mrs. 
Mincer. 

But, getting back to the funeral, I am 
sure that it would have made Mrs. 
Mincer grind her teeth. She was a very 
sympathetic person, but she hated fu- 
nerals and their accompaniments of use- 
less sobs and tears, and she confessed 
that the odor of funerals nauseated her, 
although she loved flowers and kept a 
garden. I sent no flowers and wasted no 
tears over Mrs. Mincer, but I have often 
recalled how pleasant it was to know her. 

Mrs. Mincer owned a large house 
which was painted white every other 
spring. She lived alone (except for a 
girl who did housework), although she 
had a host of relatives who used to 
come in swarms to visit her. She was 
an excellent hostess, but she never gave 
any guest a moment's peace, for I recall 
that she buzzed around the house organ- 
izing and promoting parlor games, and 



Anonymous 

Theme 5, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

being perpetually haunted by 'the fear 
that someone might possibly not be hav- 
ing a good time. For one who was so 
efficient and precise, Mrs. Mincer seemed 
to enjoy seeing her immaculate house 
mussed up. 

Mrs. Mincer knew everyone in town. 
She could point out a dozen children 
whose births she had attended. She was 
godmother to many of them, but not 
content with that, she took upon herself 
the privilege of reprimanding them be- 
fore their very mothers, and she did it 
successfully. 

Although I was not one of "her chil- 
dren," I think that I was the most lucky 
child in town in getting on the "good 
side" of Mrs. Mincer. I once tossed a 
ball through one of her large front 
windows, and being a little too proud 
to ask my father to pay for it, I offered 
to work off the debt, with an eye on the 
smooth green lawn which surrounded 
the big white house, and on the giant 
shade trees, eVenly spaced about Mrs. 
Mincer's miniature estate. I worked hard 
one day, under the strict supervision and 
guidance of Mrs. Mincer, and probably 
cut the lawn and trimmed the edges half 
as efficiently as she could have done it. 
When my job was done, Mrs. Mincer 
insisted upon paying me, and would not 
let me go home until I had eaten supper 
with her. From then on, full time during 
the summers, and on Saturdays during 
school, I was gardener-in-chief, super- 
seding Adolf, one of the town's drunks. 

Adolf was often the unwilling recipient 
of impromptu lectures from Mrs. Mincer 
on the evils of drinking, and she finally 



[28] 



gave him a chance to recapture some of 
his wasted Hfe by hiring him as an odd- 
job man. She gave up in disgust, how- 
ever, when one of Adolf's periods of in- 
disposition left the lawn unmowed for a 
whole week. Mrs. Mincer predicted a sad 
end for Adolf, but, ironically, he out- 
lived her by a year. With the exception 
of her own heart, Adolf is the only fail- 



ure of that super-efficient woman. Per- 
haps the strain of always beating the 
doctor to the sick room and staying long 
after he had gone and the strain of the 
hundreds of things that kept her busy, 
was too much for the inefficient heart 
within her agile body, I am glad Mrs. 
Mincer was spared the knowledge that 
her funeral was somewhat bungled. 



Portage to Ashegama 



Ernest Tucker 

Theme g, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

DIP, pull, rest. Dip, pull, rest. On and dling and 
on, mile after mile, hour after hour, 
while the trees on shore swing to the 
rhythm of the paddle. Dip, pull, rest. To- 
day we ought to find the portage that 
will bring us to Lake Ashegama, refuge 
of impossibly gigantic muskies and in- 
credibly game black bass. It is past noon ; 
soon we will draw up to one of the 
small, rocky beaches to cook bacon and 
coffee and wrestle hardtack. Dip, pull, 
rest. There is a snort and crashing on 
shore and a deer goes flinging away 
through the trees. We do not bother to 
look ; deer are common up here .... 
far more so than human beings. We have 
not seen an3^one except each other for 
three days. Last night we saw our first 
moose, a thrilling moment. 

My uncle turns the canoe in toward 
shore: "Lunch time!" he shouts. Dip, 
pull, and then hold the paddles until 
the canoe loses way and scrapes on the 
bottom. We eat quickly, and clean up 
immediately; two weeks in the wilder- 
ness have taught us that. We spread our 
map upon a convenient rock, and esti- 
mate our position. We are nearing the 
upper end of Lake Pipestone. We have 
come, by dint of long and arduous pad- 



5 cxiiva back-breaking portages, 
through Lakes Clearwater, Jackfish, Sa- 
baskong, and Footprint. (What an aura 
of fascinating primitiveness clings to 
those names!) We are on the last lap 
to that fabled Utopia Anglorum, 
Ashegama. It is only about ten miles to 
the head of the lake. There we shall find, 
says the map, a large island ; if we go 
around to the left of it, we shall come 
upon a narrow inlet into a sort of 
sound, on the opposite side of which is 
the final portage and then Ashegama! 
We swing au large, singing: 

"One more portage, 

And then Lake Ash-e-gaaaa-ma . . . ." 
If we had only known ! 

Oh, how that map lied! Lied bare- 
facedly, tauntingly — nay, took pride in 
its lying. It was an old map, an almost 
senile map; that might explain its du- 
plicity. Perhaps, in the hoary time when 
the map was young, Ashegama had been 
where it was shown ; and perhaps some- 
body had moved it. Let us adopt that 
viewpoint. It is only charitable. 

To make a sad story shorter and 
therefore less harrowing: it was twenty 
miles, not ten, to the head of Pipestone ; 
there was no portage, there was no inlet. 



[29] 



there was no sound. I doubt seriously 
whether there was another lake. Islands, 
3'-es, a superfluity of islands, of all shapes 
and sizes and locations ; but not one of 
them had anything behind it in the least 
resembling an inlet. We immediately 
lost ourselves in the labyrinth of islets 
and channels and bays, where every place 
resembled every place else and Daniel 
Boone himself would have given up the 
ghost. I wonder how many unsuspect- 
ing travelers, like ourselves, wandered 
into that place, only to struggle back 
disillusioned and broken, or else remain 
there forever, a pitiful, mute pile of 
whitened bones? We wandered (abso- 
lutely without exaggeration) for three 
days, searching for a way in on the first 
two, and on the last trying desperately to 
get out. The bitterest hour of all was 
when, after paddling all day against an 
obstinate head wind, we found ourselves 
back at our camp site of the previous 
night ! Let the curtain be drawn on our 
sufferings. 

Of course we never did find Ashe- 
gama. We did, though, explore every 
island and inlet and muskeg swamp in 
central Ontario from port to starboard 



and from stem to rudder-post. We were 
perfectly well qualified to draw a map 
of the region from memory. Don't mis- 
understand me: we had a glorious time. 
I shall always remember it as one of 
the most enjoyable months I have ever 
spent. We sighted several moose and in- 
numerable deer, and caught (and ate) a 
quantity of fish; we made an intimate 
study of the wild life of the country — 
the loon and its weird cry, the great 
bald eagle, the friendly "porkies" and 
the far-away wail which was identified 
as Wolf — and we added an inch in 
height and ten pounds in weight. But we 
did not find the portage to Ashegama. 

I am glad that few people number it 
among their burning ambitions to look 
at and fish in Lake Ashegama, and still 
fewer realize that ambition. W^e, for- 
tunately, were of sturdy stuflf, and had 
strong, robust constitutions. But I shud- 
der to think of what would happen if 
the whole vacationing population were to 
try to get to that fantastic mirage of a 
lake, and all were to migrate in a body 
to Central Ontario. The place would be 
a shambles. 




[30] 



Icebergs of Emerald 



A DROP of perspiration trickled from 
one eyebrow and burned in one eye. 
I shut that eye and squinted over the 
dusty grass tops with the other. At the 
base of the long, sun-scorched slope 
down which I peered was, I thought, the 
loveliest stream I had ever seen. Green 
coolness seemed to emanate from it ; and 
even though too far distant, I could none 
the less hear the cool splash of its wa- 
ters washing the shore. Clumps of green 
cotton woods and masses of green reeds 
hugged the banks. Ever}1:hing was green 
—a dozen different shades. I began to 
count them. I saw things that weren't 
there: moss-covered stones slick with 
wetness, dripping willows sipping the 
cool surface water, lazy turtles suspended 
by their necks in green depths. I envied 
them ; it all looked so cool. But it 
wasn't cool enough. I wanted icebergs, 
emerald masses of them. I wanted to 
crawl and grovel in their chilly folds. I 
even envisioned polar ice-fields that 
wouldn't be too cold. 

"Aw' right, keep yer' head down 
there," came a harsh, dream-scattering 
noise. It was the sergeant. 

I pushed my nose into the sunburnt 
prairie grass and inhaled dust. But I was 
used to it by now — had been for the past 
hour. That was all we had been doing — 
burrowing in weeds and dust. We chewed 
weeds and spat dust. A high sun virtually 
burned through our olive-green wool 
shirts and broad-brimmed hats. It was 
like sitting too close to a red-hot stove. 
My pack felt like a five-gallon hot water 
bottle on bare skin. Trickling rivulets of 
sweat burned my eyes, tickled my nose, 



R. J. Steiskal 
Theme 14, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

and mingled with the dust coating my 
hands, to form a muddy paste. The sun 
grew hotter and the dust thicker. We 
were scorched from above and suffo- 
cated from below. Already the blood was 
throbbing in my temples, a dull portent 
of what might befall — and we hadn't 
done more than wriggle about on our 
bellies, "sneakin' and peekin'," But it was 
that insufferable heat and dust ! Why 
even the troops lolling on the maple- 
shaded side-lines, watching our little 



"show," languished. All morning the 
"medics" with their red-cross-on-white 
brassards flashing through the tree trunks 
had been busy with stretchers and pale 
faces. A short hike, too much water (de- 
spite terse orders to the contrary), and 
the "green rookie," suddenly pale as wa- 
ter-thinned milk, crumpled. Soon a 
stretcher with two big leather toes stick- 
ing up at the forward end, would be 
borne away. And now we were out here 
like ground hogs, "sneakin' and peekin'," 
hunting the "enemy." Soon he would ap- 
pear — along that gorgeous stream prob- 
ably — and we would top the crest be- 
hind which we hid, "flop" on the other 
side, and commence firing. I lay quite 
still in hope that the throb in my temples 
would stop, and that the stretcher bear- 
ers would stay away. 

Suddenly, "Aw 'right, up!" It is the 
sergeant cracking out an order. 

"C'mon, move !" yelps a corporal. 

A straggle of olive-green figures 
heaves out of the grass, and dashes 
crouched, over the crest, and "flops" 
down on the slope — me with them. El- 
bows propped, cheek resting on rifle 



[31] 



stock, I peer down the sights at my 
river, which, from the slope, is in clear 
view now — but there is the "enemy" on 
the far shore. The silhouette targets are 
up. The sergeant's order comes, "Range, 
four-fifty, commence firing." I set my 
sights, pick my target, and aim, but the 
sights blur as a globule of perspiration 
fills my eye. I blink and shake my head, 
and squint and try again. I draw a bead, 
hold my breath, and "squeeze" the trig- 
ger in the approved manner, but this time 
each pounding heart-throb rocks my head 
and shoulders, swaying my rifle. I wince, 
draw up my shoulders to ease the dis- 
tress, and try once more, but to no avail. 
So I simply "jerk" the trigger and hope. 
But some one on my ngh\ scrambles 
to a weak-kneed footing and lurches for- 
ward. It's Jimmie — they're building a 
new firing line. "C'mon, young fella, get 
going." I rise, run, flop, and fire loosely. 
The process is repeated again and again ; 
my ears ring to the tune of rifle reports ; 
gray patches hover before me. But there 
goes Jimmie again ; he's always first. But 
no — the rest of the line doesn't move; 
we have no order to advance. "Hey, 
Jimmie, where're you going?" But Jim- 
mie stumbles on until he reaches the 
road across our front; then his knees 
buckle, and slowly he folds up in the 
gravel. "Hey, Jimmie, get out of there ; 
you want to get a slug in yuh ?" He rolls 
into the roadside ditch, lies on his belly 
and shakes his head despairingly. I glance 
down the line to my left. There — that 
big Swede, the squad's "auto-rifleman," 
is "going." His head droops over his 
sights; his rifle twists slowly from inert 
fingers, and he slumps flat, nose and 
mouth in the dust. "Damn, they ought to 
stop this !" I resume firing, but very 
slowly now, so as not to aggravate that 
throbbing pain in my head — I must look 
as if I'm doing something. "They can 
have their sham-battle. Hell with their 



army!" But a whistle shrills over the 
thinning rifle fire. "Cease firing!" rings 
the order, and I release my rifle and lay 
my head carefully on its stock. 

And now, body and mind unoccupied, 
the full force of my outraged body's 
protest wells within me. Rhythmically, 
with each heart-beat I seem to alternate 
from consciousness to gray oblivion and 
back again. I hunch my shoulders for- 
w^ard and press my chin to my chest, 
shrinking from that hovering grayness. 
I concentrate my whole being in the 
effort. Someone shouts, "Ambulance," 
and more insistently, "Ambulance !" I 
sit up. I don't relish the thought of being 
carried away on a stretcher. But the 
grayness closes in and I sink back again. 
The heat almost beats me to the ground ; 
I must get out of it. To the left a clump 
of "silver-leafs" glint. This time, very 
slowly as if treading among sleeping 
rattlers, I manage to rise and totter to 
refuge in the shade. I sit, and in my 
distress have eyes for nothing. I rock 
back and forth slowly, waiting for relief. 
Then I take my canteen from its pouch 
and rub its w^et, chill metal over my face, 
my neck, my ears, my chest ; then I be- 
gin to pour its contents over me, down 
my back, soaking my clothes. Oh — bliss 
ineffable ! Slowly my hot skin cools, my 
heart beats less wildly, and I begin to 
take cognizance of the scene before me. 

Men are lying in a straggle along the 
last line of fire, some very inert ; a few- 
are sitting; fewer are standing. Medics 
in twos and threes are grouped around 
the still ones. Now and then someone 
gives a signal and a stretcher, heavily 
laden, rises and bobs away between its 
bearers. My gaze wanders down the slope 
and there — I espy my little river! 
Straightway icebergs of emerald and 
snow-fields of white begin to hover as 
the turmoil within me recedes. 



[32] 



Lack of space prevents the publishing 
of some excellent themes by the follow- 
ing students: 



Howard Aldrich 
Lois Baxjman 
Earle Bickerton 
John L. Black 
Eleanor Breuer 
Bill Browder 
Elaine Cromwell 
George Curtis 
George C. DeLong 
Virginia Dorman 
Eli Ellis 
Carolyn Green 
Leonard Hendricks 
Francis P. Higgins 
William Hill 
John Hobart 
William C. Imholz 
Frances Janicek 
Jake L. Krider 
Eleanor Krughoff 
Margaret Kunz 
Eugene P. Lundeen 
Richard Marshall 



Bradley Moll 
Helen Motenko 
Frances Mount 
Rita Moxley 
John M. Schofield 
L. V. Simmons 
Edwin H. Sonnecken 
George Sotos 
Mildred Spitler 
Robert Stickler 
Carma G. Storm 
Virginia Stott 
Ralph E. Suddes 
Arlene M. Tarvin 
Jane Tharp 
Norma Tir 
Ralph Tudor 
Margaret Van Horne 
Dorothy Wells 
Virginia Wilson 
Frederick Wright 
J. E. Zakes 
Vernon M. Zwicker 



NOVEMBER, 1935 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

HOW IT FEELS TO ENTER COLLEGE .... 1 
Anonymous 

THE GREATEST NEED OF THE UNITED STATES 2 

Richard Trusdell 
HOW I USE MY LEISURE 3 

Robert L. Sutherland 

THE SLUMS AND CRIME 4 

Francis P. Higgins 

A PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS 7 

Bill Browder 

ON READING AND READERS 8 

Jean Hoskins 

MY METHOD OF MEMORIZING 9 

John D. Mitchell 

PYROTECHNICAL PROPERTIES OF Hj . . . . 10 
Harry Kornberg 

THE SPOTLIGHT ON THE CIRCUS 12 

Virginia Winklepleck 

STUDYING AND A RADIO 16 

David Suter 

RECOLLECTIONS OF THE THEATRE .... 17 

James Morgan 

THE PASSING OF THE "BIG SWAMP" .... 18 
Louis A. terVeen 

THE ITALO-ETHIOPIAN WAR 20 

Pauline Newton 

ONE ALMA MATER? 22 

Barbara Diehl 

THE SOPHISTICATED STUDENT 23 

Eleanor Sweney 

THE SPANIARD 24 

Use Aron 

FROST HINTS 25 

Margaret Holte 

RECORD BREAKING 26 

Jason N. Daykin 

THE HONOR OF THE SIOUX 27 

Nell Gere 
RIGGER SMITH 29 

T. R. Novak 

THE FOG 29 

Bob loder 

SIX MONTHS AT PINE KNOLL 30 

Glenn S. Garvin 



^iM^/%}J\ 



{ 



\ 



PUBLISHED BY THE RHETORIC STAFF, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA 



How It Feels to Enter College 



Anonymous 
Theme 3, Rhetoric I, 1935-36 



T^HE majority of people would be 
*■ considering leaving college at the ripe 
old age of twenty-eight instead of en- 
tering. I am proceeding backwards. 



I remained at the farm from my ninth 
year until I was eleven years old and 
left then only because peritonitis had 
resulted from a ruptured appendix. Still, 



Twenty years ago I sallied forth into my agricultural venture was a profitable 

the industrial world to earn my living, experience to me because it was at the 

My first job was in a weaving mill, farm that I learned to read. I don't re- 

where I began work at seven o'clock in member how I learned — perhaps one of 

the morning and quit at six o'clock in the the hoboes, who were frequent visitors, 

evening, with one hour for lunch — not taught me. At any rate I learned to 

that I needed an hour in which to eat read and discovered the world of books. 



my lunch, for many times I didn't have 
one. I was glad when the noon hour 
came, however ; the looms were shut 
down and the big room was strangely 
still. Noise has always been one of my 
antipathies, and the constant thump- 



I read everything I could find ; Shake- 
speare's plays, the Bible, and yellow- 
backed novels were all one to me. I do 
not remember all the books I have read, 
but I know that much that I found was 
beyond my comprehension. I formed a 



thump of the loom combs, coupled with habit, which persists even today, of read- 
ing the dialogue and omitting the de- 
scription, and I still have a tendency to 



the odd clacking sound of the shuttle 
and the whine of the belts when the 
machines were operating filled the room 
with a deafening sound. 

I think it was my dislike of noise that 
led me next to work on a farm where all 
was quiet. For the magnificent sum of 
three dollars a month I milked cows 
(three of them, Daisy, Dinah, and Nel- 
lie) chopped wood, carried water, washed 
dishes, and swept floors. Clothes were 
seldom washed, but when they were, I 
helped do the washing too. In my spare 
time I cared for the children. I was 
very fond of the children ; they were 
younger than I and couldn't whip me. 
I did my best for them and fed them 
as well as I knew how, and if they are 
all living today, they are proof that the 
importance of a balanced diet has been 
greatly exaggerated. At that time I 
would not have known a vitamin if one 
had sat down beside me. 



"skip the big words." 

My jobs were many and varied. I 
have sorted candy, knitted stockings, and 
worked in a tailor shop. One thing I do 
know: each successive place was less 
noisy than the preceding, until finally, 
after four years of being jack-of-all- 
trades, I entered a hospital as a student 
nurse. I cannot explain how it happened 
that I was admitted. I had absolutely 
no formal education. What little learn- 
ing I had was gained from reading. I 
was taken on probation, however, and I 
must have given satisfactory service 
since I eventually became a registered 
nurse. 

Only someone who has had the same 
experience can appreciate how keenly I 
felt my lack of adequate schooling, and 
understand the discouragement I knew 
many times; but I was young and, like 



[ 1 ] 



all young people, thought it was but a 
matter of time until I would set the 
world afire. In due time I began private 
nursing and as the years went by I grad- 
ually realized I was not going to set 
anything afire; in fact, I was not going 
to cause the tiniest spark. I learned, 
too, that it didn't matter very much. My 
love of books had not lessened, and my 
desire for knowledge was more for my 
own enlightenment than to dazzle my 
friends with a store of information. 
Therefore when it was no longer an 
economic necessity to continue nursing I 
decided to begin at the beginning and 
become "educated." 

Since I wished to enter college as soon 



as possible I gulped down the required 
elementar}^ and high-school work in one 
year, working harder than I had ever 
worked before. My efforts were well 
rewarded, however, when I succeeded in 
gaining admission to the university this 
fall. I am delighted. I love it all. For 
the first time in my life I am attending 
school. I walk on the campus and say 
to myself "Well, I am here at last." And 
although I know I shall never be quite 
one of the student body, I am rejuve- 
nated by associating with the younger 
students. I am rapidly forgetting my 
chronological age. I shall laugh, and 
play, and dance. Life is wonderful. I have 
gone "collegiate." Whoops, my dear ! 



The Greatest Need of the United States 

Richard Trusdell 
Rhetoric I, Proficiency Examination, September, 1935 



A CROSS the water nations eye one 
^^ another suspiciously ; Italy rattles 
the saber and glares at frail Ethiopia, 
Germany watches in the hope of regain- 
ing lost African colonies, France antici- 
pates temporary relief from her tedious 
job of out-guessing Hitler, and Britain 
roars a warning. To the south of us the 
smaller countries play their nasty little 
games of revolution and bloodshed. We 
send notes to nations protesting propa- 
ganda, and simultaneously fill our papers 
full of it. We are nervous, jittery, and 
suspicious. 

Education, long touted as a one-way 
ride to Utopia — a panacea for humanity 
— has been perverted into another means 
of propaganda ; while newspaper editors 
shout about subversive influences and 
communism, professors skirt and fre- 



quently embrace, if not Fascism, at least 
Nationalism. We are a nation of "ism- 
izers," shouting about curing Europe of 
her belly-ache in the delirium of our own 
politico-economic fever. What are we 
doing to improve ourselves — you and I, 
I mean? 

Well, we read the morning paper, and 
feel sorry for Ethiopia and mad (I mean 
mad, not angry) at Mussolini — and turn 
to the sport pages and read "Orphan 
Annie." On the train to the city we 
shove and glare at our fellows (small- 
time Mussolini stuff). We edge away 
from that colored fellow (Hitler's little 
act; different breed). We give a dime 
to a pan-handler and don't think about 
whether it goes for a warm bed or booze. 
(Who said anything about the New 
Deal? Quiet, please.) And we become 



[2] 



more and more complacent as we do all 
this. 

And Italy rattles the saber and Britain 
roars and Russia creaks and America 
sniffles and throws another dollar at 
something. 

Would to God we were less human 
and more humane ! Those old principles 
of Christ and the other great prophets 
should not be allowed to remain rheu- 
matic from neglect. Buddha and his 
"self denial"; Christ and his "love thy 



neighbor" ; Confucious' mild admonition 
to efface ourselves and elevate our betters 
— who cares who formulated these 
precepts? We must care who follows 
them. 

Not education, not charity, nor law- 
making ; not Marx, or Roosevelt, or 
Henry Ford, or John Public; not Com- 
munism, Socialism, Capitalism, or Fa- 
scism; none of these or any other but 
Understanding. 

That is the greatest need. 



How I Use My Leisure 

Robert L. Sutherland 
Rhetoric I, Proficiency Examination, September, 1935 



IT IS SAD but true that my most de- 
termined decisions and efforts to put 
my leisure time to profitable use, with 
personal betterment, physically, mentally, 
and morally, as the result, are all beef- 
steaks cast on the waters — but the waters 
are full of sharks and nothing ever re- 
turns but the bones. 

Many, many times I have looked back 
with regret on a day, or a week, or a 
month, or even a year in which I had in- 



phy, and drama alternately, for versatil- 
ity of knowledge. (Everyone intends to 
read all kinds of the best of literature, 
and is always going to do it next week 
when he has more time. That's when 
I'm going to start — after this registration 
hurry and scurry is over.) And so, on 
and on go the plans for making myself 
the ideal man. 

What's the reason I don't fulfill all of 
these high ideals? What do I do in my 



tended to write that letter, or mend my leisure? It won't take very long to ex- 
tennis racket, or build a pier, or read the plain quite fully and satisfactorily. 



encyclopedia four and three quarters 
minutes every day and put Mr. Einstein 
out of business. 

There are a thousand and one things 
I have lain awake nights thinking about 
and planning to do in those small — but 
large in the aggregate — moments of idle- 
ness during every day. Exercise every 
morning for a moment or so after arising. 
Read through the Bible a verse or two 
at a time. Dig that grass out from the 
cracks in the sidewalk. Repair the fire- 
place grate. Read Plutarch's Lives. Read 
the best of poetry, prose, fiction, biogra- 



Once upon a time I had a few dollars 
saved up. Moreover I intended to keep 
them saved. But alas, past the house 
one day went three boys in — an old 
Model "T" Ford! Instantly, though I 
did not know it, my chances for being a 
genius, a success, and an educated man 
were killed — killed in an "automobile ac- 
cident." For the very next day I bought 
an old Model "T" for myself. Does that 
explain my utilization of leisure time? 
I thought it would. 

I am registering as a mechanical 
engineer. 



[3] 



The Slums and Crime 



Francis P. Higgins 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1924-25 



TWO centuries ago in England there 
were a group of policemen known as 
the Bow Street "runners." These men 
had a reputation for apprehending crim- 
inals and sending them to the gallows. 
The attitude of the "runners" toward 
crime was novel, but a trifle inhuman ; 
they took great pride in the number of 
men they directed to the gallows, so that, 
according to various writers, they would 
turn their heads while a criminal was 
committing a crime, but would stop at 
nothing to apprehend the perpetrator. 
This system was hard on the criminal's 
victim, but it served to swell the "run- 
ner's" list of apprehensions. 

Today we look with horror on the Bow 
Street "runners," though our attitude 
toward crime differs but little from 
theirs. We disregard the old adage of 
an ounce of prevention being worth a 
pound of cure. We wait until a crime 
has been committed before we pounce 
upon the culprit, indignantly crying for 
blood. We close the prison gates behind 
hundreds of criminals every day ; we sup- 
ply the gallows and the "chair" with an 
increasing amount of human fodder ; our 
police bathe the city streets with the 
blood of criminals who get in the path 
of their guns ; but the number of crim- 
inals never diminishes, for each time a 
criminal dies, an adolescent springs for- 
ward to fill the gap in the ranks. 

Crime is like organized baseball, for 
just as the young ball player starts his 
career on the "sandlots" and graduates 
to the minor leagues and thence to the 
major leagues, so the juvenile criminal 



starts with petty crimes and works his 
way up to the "big time." If boys were 
denied the privilege of playing baseball, 
the game would gradually become ex- 
tinct; and if juvenile delinquents were 
furnished with a better environment and 
discouraged from wrong doing, the crime 
rate, too, would fade into comparative 
insignificance. 

To a great extent the slum is the 
"sandlot" of crime; children growing 
side by side with crime and vice cannot 
avoid being contaminated. Perhaps the 
fruit peddler on the corner is the first 
victim of the embryo criminal, who then 
graduates to "stripping" cars, then to 
filling station "stickups," and finally to 
the "big time" offenses. The criminal's 
career invariably terminates amid the 
spasmodic reports of guns, the clang of 
prison gates, or the deathly silence of 
the execution chamber. 

Edward A. Seligman, a prominent so- 
ciologist, states that "there is no doubt 
that rural districts contribute less to 
criminality than do urban districts, and 
it is from the lower social ranks of the 
urban dwellers that most of the appre- 
hended criminals are recruited." Is it 
any wonder that children who are per- 
mitted to imbibe the deep, slimy wisdom 
of the streets as soon as they are able to 
walk wander along the dark avenues of 
crime in later years? They grow up in 
bleak, unwholesome houses, separated 
only by thin partitions from thieves, dope 
addicts, and prostitutes. They cannot 
rub elbows with filth and remain clean. 

Perhaps the child is carefully guarded 



[4] 



by his parents during the early years and 
attends school. Later on he gets a job 
and spends his days working. In the 
evening he goes home into a crowded 
street with its stench and noise. The 
curses of men and women, coarse laugh- 
ter, and drunken shouts mingle with the 
cries of children, blending into a dismal 
symphony. Naturally he wishes to find 
more pleasant surroundings, so that he 
gulps his evening meal and sallies forth 
in quest of gay companionship. Where 
will he find it? The parks are too far 
away, the shows are boring, and concerts 
and books are too far above his poorly 
trained mentality to furnish him enjoy- 
ment. He turns to the pool room or the 
saloon to find laughter and false gaiety. 
The educational system of the pool 
room and saloon is quicker than any 
that college can offer. In a short time 
the young man learns the art of "palm- 
ing" an ace or the safest way of intro- 
ducing a pair of "friendly" dice. His 
companions, with their expensive clothes, 
subtle wit, and generous supplies of 
money, seem to him gods. The daily 
routine of his job looms up dismally be- 
fore him ; he suddenly feels a desire to 
be as free and prosperous as they, to 
break away from monotony and poverty. 
There are always friends to show him 
the means of realizing his ambition. His 
first escapades in crime are eas}^ and 
lucrative ; he advances to bigger crimes ; 
he knows he can "buy" a few policemen 
and a politician or two, and he has noth- 
ing but contempt for the law. Then one 
night he is cornered and has to resort to 
murder. He is caught, and the indignant 
people demand an eye for an eye. They 
convict him and send him to the electric 
chair. He squirms for two seconds and 
dies. His family squirms forever after 
at the thought of him. The state has 
performed its duty. But it has destroyed 



something that only God could create. 
And now it sits back to wait for another. 

The necessity of apprehending and 
punishing criminals is evident, but in 
the face of the rising crime rate the 
futility is also evident. We should stop 
being Bow Street "runners" and seek 
to prevent crime rather than punish it. 
If slums breed criminals, as facts indi- 
cate, then the proper procedure seems to 
be to abolish slums. 

The abolition of slums would be a 
huge task. First a plan would have to 
be devised whereby the men who own 
the property could obtain enough finan- 
cial backing to destroy the old tenements 
and erect modern buildings in their 
places. At present the government is 
loaning huge sums of money for less im- 
portant projects, so that this seems to 
be an ideal time to obtain financial sup- 
port for such a worthy cause. As a 
matter of fact the government should 
be glad to bear a just part of the ex- 
pense involved, for the nation would 
reap the benefit of it through a huge 
saving in the cost of fighting crime. 

After the financial support has been 
obtained and the building got under way, 
there would be the problem of providing 
temporary shelter. The building of tem- 
porary structures to serve as homes for 
the people would be necessary, but as the 
new buildings were completed the people 
could move into them. Then as the 
builders started on another section, the 
people there could move into the tempor- 
ary homes and thence to the new tene- 
ment house. The rentals for the new 
buildings would have to be low enough to 
suit the purses of the people, but low 
rentals could still bring profit to the in- 
vestors as the homes would seldom, if 
ever, lack occupants. 

Upon completion of the buildings and 
the installation of the people in their 



[5] 



new homes, the government should then 
turn to the task of ridding the districts of 
undesirable persons. Shady characters 
such as petty thieves should be appre- 
hended and placed in penal institutions. 
Dope addicts and prostitutes should be 
sent to government-supervised sanatoria 
and turned out into the world again 
only after they have regained a firm grip 
on themselves. 

The next step would be to provide 
parks and playgrounds where the peo- 
ple could obtain healthy and up-lifting 
amusement. The benefits of play- 
grounds have already been proved wher- 
ever they have been built. A New York 
judge, upon being interrogated concern- 
ing the absence of a chronic offender in 
the juvenile courts, replied: "Johnny is 
far too busy stealing bases this summer 
to bother about stealing tires." Boys 
have a natural desire for action, and if 
they have no place to play their games, 
they often resort to the game of thieving 
as an outlet for this desire. 

Often you hear people argue that the 
abolition of slums is impossible be- 
cause the inhabitants are naturally slov- 
enly. True, people are born and raised 
in the filth of the slums, but they cannot 
be condemned for that. No child is born 
slovenly, but merely acquires that quality 
from the example he sees around him. 
The problem of educating the people in 
proper living is but one of the many 
obstacles to hurdle to complete the plan. 

The education of the people would best 
be accomplished by appointing various 
health supervisors to make regular in- 
spections and to give the people the bene- 



fit of their advice and cooperation. 
These jobs should be held not by incom- 
petent politicians but by men trained in 
the problems of sociology. Perhaps this 
system would not show any great re- 
sult if directed exclusively at the older 
people, but a major portion of the educa- 
tion should be directed at the younger 
generation to produce greater results. 
They are young enough to get out of the 
rut and change their mode of living, and 
then upon marrying and raising children 
they can pass their knowledge on to their 
heirs. We cannot expect great results 
immediately, but should look to the fu- 
ture for the reaping of the harvest from 
seed sown in this generation. 

Slum abolition is a problem that 
will have to be tackled sooner or later, 
and there is no advantage in delaying the 
task. We must remember that the peo- 
ple living in slums were created by the 
same God as we ; so we should do all 
we can to lift them out of a detrimental 
environment. Any one of us might have 
been born in such places and been guided 
along the scarlet path of crime, but as 
we were not, we can sympathize with 
and assist those who were. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Mason, Bernard S. and Mitchell, Elmer D., 
Theory of Play, 243-274. New York, A. S. 
Barnes and Company, 1934. 

Seligman, Edward R. A., Encyclopedia of So- 
cial Sciences, Vol. 14, 93-99. New York. 
The Macmillan Company, 1934. 

Sutherland, Edwin H. and Gehlke, C. E., 
"Crime and Punishment," Recent Social 
Trends in the United States, Vol. 2, 1123- 
1139. New York, McGraw Hill Book 
Company, 1933. 



[ 6 ] 



"A Penny for Your Thoughts" 

Bill Browder 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

HERO-WORSHIP is universal shall never forget — we all three stood 

throughout America, from our there and stared at him, with our mouths 

grandsons to our grandfathers. I do not hanging loosely ajar. We almost be- 

know just how many of its stages we pass came the heroes of the school, and we 

through in a lifetime, but by the time we reveled in our glory. 



are eighteen, I believe we have experi- 
enced three general periods. 

President Cleveland's little daughter 
was in the White House yard one day, 
playing with the small girl of the grounds 
policeman. The latter's father strutted 
by with his shiny-buttoned uniform, 
neatly pressed and immaculate. Little 



I had not yet relinquished my claims 
on Grange, when Lindbergh flew the 
Atlantic. Then I (with the rest of 
America) immediately followed the 
name of Colonel Charles A. Lindbergh. 
His personal autograph became my 
prized possession. In this second stage 
of hero-worship, we praised those who 



Ruth Cleveland turned to her playmate had accomplished something spectacular, 



and sighed, 'T wish my father was a 
policeman !" Yes, I am sure that we all, 
at one time, would rather have had a 
brilliant uniform in the family than the 
President of the United States. This 
period, when policemen, soldiers, sailors, 
and doormen were our heroes, was our 
first stage of hero-worship. 

Gradually our conceptions changed. 
We soon began to read and to attend 
moving pictures. It was then that ad- 
venturers received our greatest rever- 
ence. Why, I can remember when I 
would rather have been Robin Hood than 
anyone else in the world. In fact, I did 
spend most of my time in the Sherwood 
Forest of my back yard, robbing the rich 
to help the poor, and "picking off" the 
nobles with my trusty bow and arrow. 

About this same time, great athletes 
began to impress me. I was so complete- 
ly "cuckoo" over Red Grange that I gave 
my uncle no peace until he had promised 
to introduce me to the "galloping ghost." 
Finally he took my brother and me, and 
one of our neighbors (the chiseler!) out 
to see our idol. It was a day which I 



something daring and courageous. 

Although we carry the enthusiasm of 
this type of idolatry with us to our 
graves, we have entered into a third field 
by the time we reach our later teens. 
We begin to pursue saner ideals. We ad- 
mire character and intelligence ; we look 
for men who have had high ideals and 
who have followed them. Right now, I 
respect and laud a truly cultured man 
above almost everyone else. My main 
ambition is intellectual success ! 

There is one hero who outlasts all of 
these, a hero who is constantly in our 
minds and our imagination from child- 
hood to death. He is the one who makes 
the winning touchdown, shoots the final 
basket, and cleans up on all the toughs 
in town. It is he who gains the admira- 
tion of all the girls, and the respect of 
all the boys; who wins all his contests, 
and makes all of the honor societies ! 
How many times have you been asked, 
"A penny for your thoughts," and could 
not answer because you would have been 
embarrassed to admit that you were 
thinking of yourself. 



[ 7 ] 



On Reading and Readers 



Jean 
Theme 4, Rh 

QUE is a friend of my mother's, and 
^ one of my favorite people — gay, 
funny, kindly; but I abhor the way she 
reads and her reasons for reading. She 
can't, by any stretch of the imagination, 
be called a member of the intelligensia ; 
and magazines like Colliers, Liberty, and 
the Saturday Evening Post are suited to 
her mentality. Yet she delights in trilling 
the names of D. H. Lawrence, Henry 
James, Matthew Arnold, Lytton Strach- 
ey, and H. L. Mencken, and professes the 
greatest of interest in Harpers, the At- 
lantic Monthly, and Fortune. The effect 
is marred by the fact that she frankly 
admits that she takes these meaty authors 
and magazines to bed with her and 
peruses them 'til sleep falls on her eye- 
lids. Her conversation is to this effect: 
"George Jean Nathan? Oh, yes, I read 
his book on the drama night before last." 
And upon a little more questioning, "You 
know, I can't ever remember the names 
of the books I read very well. But I 
did read Nathan up to the fourth chapter, 
and then I got just too sleepy. And I 
just hate to finish a book the next morn- 
ing, don't you? What was it about? 
Oh, I don't know — rather psychic and 
nasty. Made fun of the plays whicli I 
went up to Chicago especially to see. 1 
think he is over-rated. He only kept me 
awake through the fourth chapter." 

I dislike to read a really good author 
unless I am mentally on my toes. I 



HOSKINS 
etoric 1, 1935-36 

think it is an insult to the intelligence 
and ability of Joseph Conrad to read him 
until sleep comes. And, besides, he is 
rather too deep to make much sense of 
when the eyelids are flickering. A blood- 
curdling murder story is much more sat- 
isfactory as midnight reading material. 
I don't have to use my brain, and never 
have to re-read a page to get the sense. 
And if drowsiness begins to come before 
the book is read, I have no compunction 
about reading the last three pages and 
getting the whole plot. The morning 
after, I have no desire to read the skipped 
part ; while with a truly good book, I will 
always want to read the center part 
whether or not I have read the end. I 
know whereof I speak. I tried to read 
Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice and 
R. D. Blackmore's Lorna Doone on two 
nights when sleep would not come, and 
these books were so interesting they kept 
me awake until early morning. 

I read constantly, and yet I am ap- 
palled by the number of books which I 
have not read. I am always embarrassed 
to admit that I have never read Swiss 
Family Robinson, and I felt my neglect 
even more keenly after reading Chris- 
topher Morley's parody, Swiss Family 
Manhattan, this summer. Stevenson's 
Kidnapped, Thackeray's Vanity Fair, 
Hugo's Les Miscrables also haunt me. I 
cannot see how anyone ever has the 
opportunity to read enough. 



[ 8 ] 



My Method of Memorizing 

John D. Mitchell 
Theme 4, Rhetoric I, 1935-36 



A SEEMINGLY unimportant inci- 
dent, a chance word or phrase may 
give impetus to an idea that will change 
one's entire attitude toward a person, 
activity, or subject. A sturdy bough falls 
across a sluggish stream ; its branches 
become imbedded in the sand and silt on 
the bottom of the stream. In time by 
the collecting of sticks and leaves about 
these branches, the course of the rivulet 
is changed ; by the narrowing of its chan- 
nel, the stream has gained momentum 
and now rushes to the sea. Thus by a 
chance phrase I was able to overcome an 
obstacle and participate in activities that 
have quickened and enriched my life. 

One day, for want of something else 
to do, I began to read the lives of the 
Barrymores in the American Magazine . 
John Barrymore was discussing his ven- 
ture into acting in Shakespeare's plays ; 
he mentioned casually that in order to 
memorize the role of Hamlet he went 



lines. When I had attempted to master 
a piece of poetry or a speech, I had al- 
ways looked for the softest chair in the 
house in which to complete an arduous 
task; nevertheless my mind would refuse 
to retain perfectly the memory passage, 
even under such auspicious conditions. 

After I had been fortunate enough to 
receive a part in the junior play, I de- 
cided to test my supposition. That eve- 
ning when I was home alone, I proceeded 
to memorize my lines as I strode from 
one room to another. At first I was dis- 
appointed, for I could see no unusual 
results. The next evening I decided to 
test myself on the number of lines I had 
learned ; to my surprise, as I began to 
walk the passages came to my mind with 
little or no effort. In a short time I had 
assimilated the entire role by the simple 
process of "walking" it into my mind. 
This success led me to other experiments. 
I would take a mental photograph of 



out into the woods. That day he learned several pages of speeches, and then dur- 
the entire part as he walked in the cool ing an evening walk I would repeat aloud 
shade; at the close of the day he was these lines. On my way to school I 
able to throw away the book. The ease would stride along, oblivious of the 
with which he memorized such a volum- world, muttering a debate speech, a piece 
inous part astounded me, for memorizing of poetry, or the lines of a play. At times 
had always restrained me from ventur- I would notice people on the street turn- 
ing into dramatics and debate. However, ing and looking at me in a peculiar man- 
being amazed at his mental capacity for ner, but I was too engrossed to think my 
memorizing, I was fascinated by the actions were odd until someone reminded 



idea contained in the word walk. I be- 
gan to think that perhaps the simple 
action of walking was the solution to 
what seemed to me an impossible feat, 
memorizing a role of several thousand 



me that there are places for people who 
persist in talking to themselves in public. 
Another practice that aids in memoriz- 
ing and in retaining the passage intact 
in one's mind is to deliver it just before 



[9] 



going to bed. During the hours of sleep 
the mind seems to digest it thoroughly. 
The results are not only amazing but 
also inexplicable. But this habit of de- 
livering nocturnal addresses is not apt to 
be without amusing consequences. For 
several weeks I had assiduously given 
my debate speech each night before go- 
ing to bed. One morning the lady across 



the hall asked my mother if we would 
please refrain from playing the radio so 
loud, especially when we were listening 
to political speeches. Therefore, al- 
though I recommend these methods of 
memorizing, I admonish the user to ex- 
pect anything from being rushed to the 
hospital to being arrested for disturbing 
the peace. 



Pyrotechnical Properties of H2 

Harry Kornberg 
Theme 18, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

THREE 500 c.c. bottles and a one- for credit in high school chemistry met 

pint milk bottle full of hydrogen there to burn their hands and clothes in 

were left over. John and I had just flames and acids, to cough a little louder 

finished the last part of the experiment and more frequently, and to break some 

on the properties of the gas when we more glassware. Breakage was so f re- 



assured one another that to waste four 
bottles full of it would be a crime. But 
what to do with them? John suggested 
that we pour the hydrogen into smaller 
containers and ignite the gas. I said 



quent that John and I, partners for the 
course, felt fortunate in having three 
500 c.c. bottles between us. 

John was still insisting that we ex- 
plode small quantities of the gas when 



that doing so would not help matters I remembered that hydrogen burned with 

any, for we had already tried that ; be- a very hot flame, and I made a proposal, 

sides, the little laboratory in the base- He caught on at once. We would make 

ment of Lake View Evening School was a blow-torch. A large two-holed stopper 

still resounding with the loud "pops" and a small funnel with a long, thin stem, 

from other experimenters' tests. Mak- called a thistle tube, was hunted up 

ing the racket louder probably would while I bent a piece of glass tubing to 

cause the windows to fall out. But I the shape of an L. We put the thistle 



don't suppose that would have mattered 
much anyhow, for the little square win- 
dows situated near the ceiling were al- 
ways so dirty and smoked with chemicals 
that to blow them out would do no more 
than allow some of the rays of the set- 



tube through one of the holes in the 
stopper and then tried to fit the stopper 
into one of the bottles. The stopper was 
too small ; so while I held my hand over 
the mouth of the bottle, John found a 
larger stopper. By the time it was fitted 



ting sun to enter the dingy place, and into the bottle, some of the hydrogen had 

let some of v the ever-present, stinking been displaced by air. 

fumes go out. Every Monday and Nevertheless, the improvised blowtorch 

Wednesday about twenty people working was ready, and I ceremoniously handed 



[10] 



Recollections of the Theatre 



James Morgan 
Theme 4, Rhetoric I, 1935-36 



'npHE theater is still a wonder to me: 
* it is a strange, hallowed world apart. 
Very few and far between were the 
chances I had of seeing a legitimate 
drama, I recall how jealous I was of 
my parents when they talked of having 
seen such persons as Irving, Barrett, 
Terry, Mary Garden, Sothern and Mar- 
lowe, Fritzi Scheflf, and a host of others 



my voice choked with Cyrano's pain, 
though I never said a word aloud; my 
heart burst with hopeless love for Rox- 
ane ; and at last in the garden I felt a 
fragment of me die with Cyrano. Over- 
romantic I suppose it was; a damned 
fool most people would call me. Per- 
haps a part of my sympathy arose from 
the fact that I myself possess a nose of 



slowly becoming immortal. I despised no mean proportions and have friends 

the fate that forced me to live in the who constantly remind me of the fact, 

theater-less backwoods. When those lines came — "One thing 

My first experience with the theater without stain Mine own! — My 

was going with my brother to see Walter white plume "I felt a cold shiver 

Hampden in Cyrano de Bergerac in Pe- creep up my back and tingle behind my 

oria. I entered the theater proudly ; in ears. My mother afterwards told me she 

my pocket my hand was clutching that remembered distinctl}^ having the same 

little white envelope with the precious sensation a number of times: once when 

green pasteboard inside. I was surprised Maude Adams as Peter Pan stepped 

at the shabbiness of the place, which was close to the footlights and cried to the 

used but several times a season. I was audience, "Do you believe in fairies?"; 

used to gilded movie foyers and dark- once when she saw the aged and frowsy 

ened auditoriums. When I entered the Bernhardt, in the white uniform of the 

hall I was disappointed by its dirtiness; pathetic Aiglon, seize the reins of the 

the curtain was ripped and the paint on horse "to tie him to a star" ; again when 



the walls was flaking. After what 
seemed a long time the house lights were 
lowered and the footlights were turned 
on. 

I no longer saw the flaking walls, and 
the ripped curtain had risen into the 
flies. I saw only the Theatre de Bour- 
gogne in the year 1640. From that 
moment till the final curtain dropped on 
the leaf-covered convent yard I was in 
a new world, a world which for me had 
never before existed. I had not found 
it in movies, and it had not the same en- 
chantment as books. I was part of it — 



Anna Pavlowa as the Swan sank dying 
to the stage. 

I was quiet on the way home — very 
quiet, my brother must have thought. In 
the jolting car on that crisp autumn 
night I relived the whole play. I had a 
taste of something that had created a 
gnawing hunger in me for more. I have 
since by conspiracy and industry been 
fortunate enough to see other plays, even 
operas, and once the glittering ballet. 
But these have yet to give me that 
speechless amazement of my "first night" 
in beer-brewing Peoria. 



[17] 



The Passing of the "Big Swamp" 



Louis A. terVeen 
Theme 6, Rhetoric II, 1934-25 



A SHORT time ago, I had the oppor- 
tunity to make a motor trip through 
Florida. There are many interesting 
places in Florida — the old fort of St. 
Augustine, the orange groves. Palm 
Beach with its ten and fifteen million 
dollar estates, Miami with its colorful 
resort hotels, Coral Gables — but the part 
of Florida which I was most interested 
in seeing, even more than the bathing 
beauties, was the Everglades. The name 
Everglades has held a fascination for me 
ever since I first read it in my geography 
book in about the sixth grade. The 
information contained in our old geog- 
raphy, although quite complete on the 
city of Tampa, was indeed meagre on 
the subject of the Everglades. I can re- 
member vividly how sharply my teacher 
rebuked me — she was a sour old person 
anyway — for "taking up the class's time 
by asking so many questions about such 
an unimportant place." However, since 
that time I have come to the conclusion 
that the reason for my teacher's irrita- 
tion was not that I was taking up the 
class time, but simply that she could not 
answer my questions. There is very 
little information published on the Ever- 
glades, and very few people indeed know 
any more about them than "It's a big 
swamp down in Florida." Although the 
entire area is termed a swamp, there were 
always extensive islands, many of them 
hundreds of acres in size, which were 
never under water. 

Before I traveled through the Ever- 
glades, I did not have even the faintest 
idea that such a wild country still existed 
within the borders of our nation. Some 



sections of the swamp are as untamed 
as the African jungle; but the most 
amazing fact is that these sections are not 
remote, but rather only about an hour's 
drive from the modern city of Miami. 

In some respects it might be said that 
Miami is the most modern city in the 
world. At least it has the most modern 
jail. During the big Florida boom, the 
city and county authorities decided to 
build a skyscraper to serve as a combined 
city hall and court house, and along 
with that they planned to rent out most 
of the upper floors of the building as 
office space, since desirable office space 
was at a premium at that time. But 
along came Old Man Depression and 
away went the office renters. Not hav- 
ing any other use for this large amount 
of space, the authorities decided to use 
the upper floors of the skyscraper for a 
jail. Consequently the prisoners get the 
freshest air, plenty of sunlight, and a 
wonderful view. It must be a delightful 
place to live. 

The Everglades were discovered very 
early in the history of America by the 
Spanish explorers in their search for 
the "Fountain of Youth." The boun- 
daries of the swamp were soon de- 
termined. It was found to extend from 
a narrow strip of high land along the 
east coast westward about forty-five 
miles and northward over one hundred 
miles from the southern tip of the pen- 
insula. But after the boundaries were 
marked out, little else could be discov- 
ered, and until the end of the nineteenth 
century the dense undergrowth success- 
fully resisted the efforts of all explorers 



[18] 



who tried to penetrate more than a few 
miles. Between 1850 and 1900 the 
United States government sent out sev- 
eral exploring expeditions, but all re- 
turned with the same report of failure to 
make any headway. 

While the white men could never man- 
age to penetrate over a few miles, there 
are tribes of Indians who live in and 
have roamed the swamps for centuries. 
About the year 1900 a party of engineers 
succeeded in persuading some Indians 
to guide them and were able to make a 
survey. Out of this survey there has 
grown the greatest drainage project ever 
to be conceived anyAvhere in the world. 

The total area of the Everglades is 
about four and one-half million acres. 
The initial drainage project consisted of 
about 200 miles of canals 60 feet wide 
by 5 feet deep. Crossing the canals and 
draining into them, there was to be a net- 
work of smaller ditches, about 1500 miles 
of them. The project was so vast that 
it was necessary to design and construct 
special machinery, far larger than any 
ever built for this purpose before, in 
order to make the project practical. 
When this first project was finally com- 
pleted in 1916, about one million acres 
of land had been drained. Experiments 
showed that this land was capable of 
raising a wide variety of produce; in 
fact, it was found to be the most fertile 
land in the nation. When it was seen 
that the drainage system was so success- 
ful, it was decided to extend it. At the 
present time about 1,500,000 acres have 
been reclaimed and are permanently dry. 
The total length of the canals in the 
system is over 600 miles, and there are 
almost 5000 miles of ditches. The figure 
"600 miles" looks large on paper, but it 
does not begin to convey a true idea of 
the actual length of the canals. It is 



only after one has driven on a road 
alongside one of them for almost an 
entire day, and sees the sun go down, 
and the canal still stretching on and on, 
that one can appreciate their extent. 

For their entire length the canals are 
flanked by roads. The roads were eas- 
ily constructed, for when the canals were 
built, instead of throwing half the dirt 
on each side of the cut, all of it was 
thrown on one side. After the elevated 
ground which was thus created had set- 
tled, a layer of asphalt was put down, 
and the result was a fine road. Occa- 
sionally the road crosses the canal over 
a bridge and is built along the other side. 
I suppose that the reason that this hap- 
pens is that the steam shovel operator's 
right arm would get tired, so that he 
would use his left, pulling the left lever 
and throwing the dirt on the opposite 
side of the ditch. Ten years later, when 
the road builders came along, they had 
to build a bridge every place the exca- 
vating machine operator had changed 
hands. 

If you are traveling along a road in 
the northern part of the Everglades, 
where the land is well drained, you will 
see, on both sides, orderly and neatly- 
arranged farms with all sorts of flourish- 
ing crops. Occasionally there will be a 
busy little village. Where the road runs 
along a beautiful lake on the northern 
edge of the swamps, there are some 
small towns. Each small town has its 
hotel, strategically located to ensnare the 
tourist. Each hotel is dignified by a 
negro door-man in a general's gold braid, 
full dress uniform. But much of the 
doorman's dignity is lost by reason of 
the fact that, when no one is going in the 
door, it is his business to get out in the 
road and shout and wave and try his 
best to direct the motorist with his call 



[19] 



of "Ho-tel! Right this way! Ho-tel! 

Drive right in ! Ho-tel ! ." 

If you are traveHng along the road 
running west from Miami, you will see 
no sign of human habitation except an 
occasional Seminole Indian village. The 
Indians live in huts made from cane 
poles and roofed with thatch. If the 
natives were a little blacker, and if they 
wore just a few less clothes, the village 
would resemble an African village. Dur- 
ing the rainy season, the land on both 
sides of the road appears to be a great 
field of water, with thousands of islands, 
some small, some very large. But dur- 
ing the dry season much of the water 
dries up, and the islands are joined. The 
extensive territory thus formed, of which 
there is today about three million acres, 
then has the appearance of the African 
veldt. In places the trees and brush 
are so thick that it is a physical impossi- 
bility to force a way through. Great 
areas of this jungle have never even 



been seen by white men. Other parts of 
the area are great plains with only occa- 
sional clumps of trees. These plains are 
the best hunting grounds in the country. 
All sorts of animals are there, from the 
rabbit to the brown bear. There are 
hundreds of deer. A species of panther 
roams the plains, and this panther is 
the largest to be found in America, since 
he has plenty of deer and other game to 
feed upon. 

This picturesque remnant of the Great 
American Wilderness cannot last for 
long. Each year the drainage system 
lowers the level of the water a fraction 
of an inch. As more canals and ditches 
are dug, the jungle-swamp will be slowly 
won from the forces of nature. Peace- 
ful, prosperous farms will replace the 
jungle, domestic livestock will replace the 
deer, and the Indians will live in modern 
houses instead of cane huts. Civilization 
will have scored against the forces of 
nature. 



The Italo-Ethiopian War 

Pauline Newton 
Theme 4, Rhetoric II, 1935-36 



npHE UNITED STATES proudly 
^ points to the fact that it is utterly 
unbiased concerning the Italo-Ethiopian 
war. With pardonable pride, we proclaim 
our neutrality. But are we as disinter- 
ested as we would like to believe.'' Will 
we, the neutral United States, become 
entangled in this war? Is this dispute the 
match that will be the beginning of a 
huge conflagration that might imperil 
civilization itself? 



Today, subtle propaganda is implant- 
ing itself in the American brain. Our 
newspapers tell us graphically of the 
horrible body-mutilating devices that 
Mussolini is employing. We see pictures 
in the tabloids of aggressive Italians pre- 
paring to bomb the helpless little city of 
Addis Ababa. News reels show Selassie 
mobilizing his pathetic and ill-equipped 
little army. We hear of the pitiful 
arrangements of the Ethiopians to scurry 



[20] 



to the hills when an air attack 
impends. 

There is a strange quirk in the Ameri- 
can personality that feels a sympathy for 
the under-dog — and the Lion of Judah 
and his people certainly are under-dogs. 
Mussolini made sure of that before he 
actually went to battle. 

The Ethiopians with their antiquated 
implements of war have little chance 
against Italy, European mistress of the 
air. Their only hope lies in prolonging 
the dispute through guerilla warfare. 
Here, the Ethiopians have a definite ad- 
vantage. They are. fleet-footed children 
of the hills, and can withstand all sorts 
of privations which the European, used 
to the pamperings of civilization, can 
never endure. The Abyssinians are used 
to tramping all day in the terrific heat of 
the desert sun ; they know the meaning 
of hunger and thirst. 

Mussolini's greatest advantage is in 
his great numbers of men. True, many 
of them will die of Ethiopian bullets, 
others won't survive the heat, the lack 
of good food and pure water, but always 
in the background will be more national- 
istic young Italians to take their places. 
Children are taken into the army as soon 
as they are old enough to hold a gun. 
They are taught militarism from the very 
cradle. 

II Duce has the utmost in martial 
equipment. His air fleet is capable of 
unthinkable destruction; the minds of 
his chemists have been productive in de- 
vising weapons that will warp Ethiopian 
lives. Oh, yes, Mussolini will probably 
conquer Ethiopia, but how long will it 
take? 

Italian allies would be of the greatest 
help. But to whom can the aggressive 
Itahan dictator turn? England? No, the 



relations between those two nations are 
already very strained. France? Prob- 
ably not, for French and British points 
of view will undoubtedly coincide. 
Germany? Possibly, but improbably, for 
Hitler too is ambitious. If war were 
profitable enough, he might participate. 
It would, though, be very difficult to 
bring two such positive personalities as 
Hitler and Mussolini to terms. Austria 
might line up with Italy, but her small 
contribution would not be of paramount 
importance. Russia is too isolated to be 
helpful to Italy. 

The United States today is supposedly 
thinking of peace. A war across the 
wide expanse of ocean seems very remote 
and innocent, but, underneath, it is of 
the greatest significance. The great war 
of 1914 started with a seemingly petty 
dispute. At that time, as now, the Ameri- 
can people were strongly anti-war. 

Will the pacifistic urge triumph, or 
will we disregard the warnings of good 
judgment? Stirring martial music, brass 
buttons, heroism, sweethearts waiting at 
home — all these things hold a glamour 
for young men. They don't stop 
long enough in their hysteria to consider 
the horrible aspect of war. They forget 
about the years of living death, men no 
longer what they were, thousands of fine 
young lives sacrificed — and for what? 
So some militaristic dictator can glory 
in his conquests or else grovel in in- 
glorious defeat. They are told — and be- 
lieve — that they are fighting for beautiful 
ideals, and go forth with staunch hearts, 
determined to conquer. But is any vic- 
tory worth the price they pay? 

Will purely emotional and unreason- 
able appeals again carry us into a war 
more horrible than any ever dreamed of? 
God forbid ! 



[21] 



One Alma Mater? 



Barbara Diehl 
Theme 8, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



A NOVEL experiment in American 
education was announced recently 
by the Yale School of Law and the Har- 
vard School of Business Administration. 
This experiment is a four-year college 
course in' which the student spends one 
year in Cambridge, Massachusetts, at 
Harvard and three years at Yale, in New 
Haven, Connecticut. A novel experi- 
ment in American education, I say, for 
in Europe, and in Germany especially, 
the experiment has been tried and proved 
successful. There, students attend sev- 
eral schools, not just one. Many of 
them go to six or eight schools within 
the years of their regular college course. 
This idea of attending not one but sev- 
eral colleges seems to me the most likely 
way of molding a college student into 
a cultured man as Charles Eliot de- 
scribes him, "a man with an open mind, 
broad sympathies and respect for all the 
diverse achievements of the human 
intellect." 

When a student remains in one uni- 
versity for his entire college career there 
is too great a tendency for him to be- 
come narrow-minded and biased. Every 
college has its peculiar atmosphere where 
definite conventionalities of actions and 
ideas are observed. The student who 
is subjected to these same ideas and ac- 
tions day after day for any length of 
time finally absorbs them until they be- 
come a part of him. It is easy to dis- 
tinguish a graduate of Springdale Teach- 
ers College from a Harvard graduate. 
The Springdale graduate knows life only 
as it exists in the small midwestern town, 
and the eastern graduate forgets there is 
any knowledge west of Boston. This 
should not be. 



Students can become mentally and 
spiritually stagnant too if they remain on 
one campus too long. When we en- 
counter customary things our curiosity 
is not aroused and our interest lags, but 
not so with new personalities and ideas. 
Methodist ministers are required to move 
from one community to another every 
few years to prevent the church life from 
becoming stagnant. The congregation 
draws all the spiritual growth it can 
from one man and then it is ready for 
new guidance and stimulation. Since 
the college campus and instructor will 
not rotate for the student, I believe the 
student should rotate himself. 

At present the student cannot rotate 
from one college to another without los- 
ing from several to all of his former 
credits and duplicating a course or two 
under the guise of a different name. 
Perhaps this is one reason so many stu- 
dents in America are content to remain 
in one educational center for four years 
or longer. Colleges cooperate wonder- 
fully well in athletic contests, in musical 
rivalry, and in oratorical competition, but 
not in actual study courses. 

However, I feel that if one has the 
time and money, the loss of credits is 
far less important to the individual than 
the educational losses he would have if 
he remained in one school. Surely some 
time in the near future we shall see stu- 
dents change from one school to another 
with little difficulty just as Rhodes schol- 
ars today go from America to England. 
Then we shall have a S3'Stem of educa- 
tion which is far more capable of giving 
what it now tries to give — a liberal edu- 
cation. 



[22] 



The Sophisticated Student 

Eleanor Svveney 
Theme 4, Rhetoric II, 1935-36 

npHE most satisfactory college student sand Chinese have lost their lives and 

* is not the person who is genuine in homes in a flooding of the Yangtze River 

his interests and enthusiasms, but the one or that seventeen hundred Ethiopians 

who is sophisticated and "smooth." Just have been killed by Italian bombs, but 

what the average collegian means by doesn't see why disasters befalling Chi- 

smoothness and sophistication is hard nese and Ethiopians should concern him. 



to determine. The type picture, however, 
is this: he (or she) is good looking, pref- 
erably in a striking, exotic way, dances 
"divinely," swears like a trooper, drinks 
not too much, but enough to make good 
company, has a ready store of good and 
bad jokes and stories, never studies, has 
a good "line," never profanes conversa- 
tion with a thought-provoking or worth- 
while sentence, and never betrays any 
interest in what goes on around him. 

Indifference is the most important item 
in the make-up of the sophisticated. He 
goes to a football game not because he 
enjoys the game but because the rest 
of the house is going. He hears the 
band play a stirring march and yet he 
does not feel an insane desire to march, 
head high, eyes sparkling. He does not 
feel that today with its blue sky, bright 
sun, and brisk, challenging wind is any 
different from yesterda}^ with its dark, 
oppressing coldness. He goes to a movie 
because he can think of nothing else to 
do, but the movie isn't interesting to him 
—it is like every other movie he has 
ever seen. He is enrolled in the College 
of Commerce not because he is really 
interested in business but because he had 
to enroll in something. If he reads the 
paper at all, he sees that several thou- 



The sophisticated person is rarely 
happy. At first he may have shown a 
spark of interest in his surroundings, but 
he has taught himself so well not to be- 
tray his interest that he has finally per- 
suaded even himself that he is entirely 
indifferent. He misses the vigor of 
spirited arguments and the satisfaction 
of forming definite attitudes. He misses 
the awe of feeling beauty. He misses 
the joy of working toward a goal with 
real determination and enthusiasm. Be- 
cause of his indifference he misses the 
happiness that might be his in all of these 
things. The knowledge that he is hand- 
some and that he dances well appeals 
somewhat to his vanity, but he is not 
happy in it. He derives a certain thrill 
from daring to swear, to drink, and to 
tell off-color stories at first, but now these 
are merely empty gestures that give him 
no satisfaction. He may originally have 
intended to study, but he is afraid he will 
lose his reputation as a "good fellow" if 
he begins to study now. He finds that 
although the world is not unpleasant to 
him as long as he uses a flattering "line," 
he has made no real friends. No, he is 
certainly not a happy individual, but he 
comforts himself that at least he is 
"smooth." 



[23] 



The Spaniard 

Ilse Aron 
Theme 1, Rhetoric II, 1935-36 



IN a drab and respectable living section 
of a drab and respectable manufactur- 
ing town there lived one Juan Ammanos, 
his name long since Americanized to 
John Manos, a white collar worker. In 
the same too-small house there lived 
Rosie, his pretty, trivial, little wife; John, 
his son ; and his old mother, a poor 
deaf crone who spoke only patois Span- 
ish. And it came about that little John 
grew up in that comfortably proletarian 
surrounding, went to school, got into 
fights, and returned home, somewhat bat- 
tered, but nothing worse. When the old 
woman died, John felt only a suspension 
of the childish annoyance she had caused 
him with her deafness and her little 
crotchets. 

Thus John became a t3^ically middle 
class American boy, and in the fashion 
of that type which clings carefully to 
the path of least resistance, he studied 
the Spanish which his dead grandmother 
had made easy for him. Having a fair 
mind, and having acquired a decent 
knowledge of Spanish, he became, ulti- 
mately, an instructor in a small college. 

If you were to ask in that college today 
for John Manos, you would get scant re- 
sponse, but Juan Ammafios, oh ! the vil- 
lagers would swell with pride as they 
give you the address of his "studio." 
There you would find a grand piano 
with a lace shawl draped over it, por- 
traits of enormous-eyed madonnas, crude 
red and yellow pottery, and perhaps Juan 
himself in a black lounging robe with a 
flaming scarlet sash. 

Probably he would be smoking one of 
the long, thin, black cigars which he af- 
fects. Waving airily at the gracefully 



arranged art objects which clutter the 
place, he would say, "You weel pardon, 
senor. Those leetle theengs keep me — 
what is it you say? — contented. Now 
that bowl — eet ees from Madrid, an old 
water jar." If your eye or your atten- 
tion once wanders from the water jar, 
he will remember his unconventional at- 
tire in sudden confusion: "Ah, senor. 
Forgeeve me. I had not dressed for 
company." Then with a laugh of studied 
significance, he murmurs, "But you will 
see, eet ees that I was out late last 
night !" 

He has achieved that exotic English 
pronunciation by some method which 
combines the equally false French accent 
of Maurice Chevalier with a carefully 
consistent use of the lisped Spanish c. 
For one who started with a broad Mid- 
Western foundation, he has made re- 
markable progress. He charms his class- 
es by stopping, distraughtly searching for 
a word: "But what ees eet that you the 
Americans call it?" He enjoys telling 
co-eds stories of a mildly censorable 
nature. Just before he reaches his point 
he stops, waves his hands about, and 
raises his blackened eyebrows very high, 
amidst appreciative giggles and snickers. 

He has never married, though count- 
less panting adolescents have fallen in 
and out of love with him. On windy 
days he can be seen walking, solitary, 
his long black cloak blown against his 
body. But if the weather is so bad as to 
discourage an interested audience to his 
outing, Juan remains in his steam-heated 
"studio" with a crimson robe on his 
shoulders and a long, bitter cigar in his 
lips. 



[24] 



Frost Hints 



Margaret Holte 
Theme 3, Rhetoric /, 1935-36 

ABOUT six o'clock in the morning, or 
in the evening after the sun is gone, 
the frostiness of the air reminds me of 
a place that is now but a name, not very 
well known to many people, and utterly 
unknown to some. 

I will just call it the North, and try 
to tell something of the place from 



moccasins. Sometimes we went on long 
hikes through unbroken "bush," with a 
compass and our sense of direction guid- 
ing our way. We early learned wood- 
lore, not as a hobby, but from necessity. 
Children of the North are taught the 
dangers of leaving glass lying about ex- 
posed to the sun, because during the 



whence, each autumn, come those frosty short summer months the sun's rays are 
messengers bringing to me thoughts of so intensely hot that if they chance to 
home and memories of ice and snow and pass through glass they are likely to ig- 
cold — and grandeur too. Because the nite the dry leaves or grass. Much dam- 
North is grand — a place of vast un- age and loss of life and property have 
touched forests where mighty rivers roar been caused in this way and most "old- 
unheard, and where from late in August timers" have experienced the dreaded 



until late in May the snows lie piled 
high and white, frozen so solidly that 
they resemble granulated sugar and from 
a distance appear oddly blue. At night 
the stars seem to hang so low in the sky 
that one feels that he could reach up 
and touch them with very little effort. 
Perhaps distance does lend enchantment, 
as it has been said, but I've never known 
the nights here to be as beautiful as I 
remember them in the North, when the 
thermometer registered forty degrees be- 
low zero and I would go skimming over 
the gleaming snow, my skiis singing like 



forest fire. 

It is unlikely that I shall ever return 
North: there is no reason why I should. 
I have no ties of friendship to draw me 
back. The towns I knew are built up 
now and are much like any other towns. 
Civilization is rapidly pushing into the 
settlements. Churches, schools, and hos- 
pitals have been established. Roads 
have been built, and automobiles rumble 
over pavements which were once trails 
that knew only the soft, silent rush of 
the dog team. Man's ingenuity has 
conquered many of the forces of nature. 



violins in the frosty air as I sped along The far North is fast becoming popu- 
in the half-daylight of the Land of the lated and consequently is losing much 
Midnight Sun. of its charming wildness. Even know- 
There were so many entertaining ing all this, I still cherish a hope 
things to do in the North: driving dog that some day I shall go back and find 
teams, racing on snowshoes or skiis, or it all as it was when I left, a long time 
dancing in the evening on the ice in our ago. 



[25] 



Record Breaking 

Jason N. Daykin 
Theme 15, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 



THE superintendent came to the front 
of the group of men gathered in the 
shadow of the tipple and said, "Men, 
that record output of coal you set last 
week was broken by the crew at Old 
Ben yesterday. I want to see you get it 
back today." That was all he said. He 
edged his way through the men back 
to his office, and the men stared after 
him. What did he want them to do — 
break their backs? Well, anyhow, they 
would show the Old Ben crew that it 
could not take Number 9"s record that 
easily. 

A shrill whistle screamed through the 
early morning air, the signal to start the 
man trips. The men rushed forward to 
fill the cage, and as soon as it was filled 
the men shot six hundred feet down to 
their work. Cy (my buddy) and I didn't 
make the first load, but we were on the 
second. No sooner did we unload than 
we got on a motor and started for our 
work — northeast section, fourth entry, 
rear room. 

We were soon working feverishly and 
getting a good many cars loaded. But 
Cy wanted a larger output. He raced 
the loading machine. The coal poured 
faster than ever into the cars. We didn't 
seem to be getting any air in our room, 
and the air was so filled with dust that 
my light was useless. I walked over to 
Cy and shouted in his ear, barely able 
to make myself understood above the 
roar of the machine, "Can't we get the 
boss to get us more draft? We can't live 
in this." 

"No," he yelled. "We have to break 
that record." 



"But, Cy, we can't watch the roof, and 
you know that it's bad." 

"Can't help it. If it comes, it gets us — 
that's all." 

"Well, then, how about getting a tim- 
berman in here? We need more props. 
We are in sixty feet now — way past state 
regulations." 

"Can't do it. Record has to fall." 

"Listen, Cy, forget the record. You 
have two children to care for." 

"What's the matter, kid? Going yel- 
low on me?" 

"No ! But I'm not going to get killed 
for a record." 

"Go get a drink. Maybe that will calm 
your nerves." 

I left to go for the water. But I just 
got back as far as the props when I 
heard a noise worse than the roar of ten 
express trains. For a second the din in- 
creased, and then gradually diminished. 
Yes, it was a fall — I could hear the rock 
sliding. Cy was trapped, and I would 
have been too had not luck been with me. 
No use to go back — dust too thick, and 
there might be gas. I ran for the boss 
and found him a short distance from the 
entry. 

"Now," I shouted, "maybe you will 
get some air in there, and some men to 
work." I almost knocked him down, so 
violently did I express myself. 

He grabbed me: "Take it easy, son. 
What's happened?" 

"What's happened?" I shouted. "Why, 
the roof came in." 

"Yes, I heard il. But was Cy in 
there?" 

"Yes." 



[26] 



He left on the run, and I went back 
to see if I could get Cy out, I was help- 
less. Soon I heard the whistle — six 
shrill blasts that made me shiver. 
Everyone knew what that meant — a 
man killed. 

Soon the room was cleared of dust 
and several crews of men started to get 
Cy out. After two hours of steady work 
they lifted him from the machine — a 
lifeless mass of protoplasm. He was 
mangled, bloody, black from the coal; 
and, well as I knew him, I couldn't tell 
that it was Cy. 



Gently they placed him on the stretch- 
ers, covered him with a filthy canvas, and 
carried him to the cage. What a way to 
send a man home ! 

Their records ! Does it pay to set such 
costly records? Most of the time the 
men almost work themselves to death, 
and yet do not break the record. But on 
this day something more valuable than 
a record was broken — one of the happi- 
est homes in town was broken. And the 
only consolation the company could offer 
was that mangled mass of flesh — Cy's 
body. 




The Honor of the Sioux 

Nell Gere 
Theme 9, Rhetoric II, 1924-25 



r\P ALL the experiences of my early 
^-^ childhood, one stands out much 
more clearly than any other. When I 
was young, I had very few little girls to 
play with, and, as a result, I was always 
with my brother and his friends. They 
were all older and larger than I, but I 
played their games, climbed trees, and 
ran almost as well as they did. I couldn't 
be left out of anything because my 



brother had strict orders to take care of 
me, but I wanted to believe that I was in- 
cluded in their fun because they liked 
me. I would do almost anything to prove 
that I could "take it" just as well as they 
could. 

So it happened that one day I was 
chosen to be prisoner of war after one 
of their famous Indian raids, and I was 
proudly preparing to be an unflinching 



[27] 



martyr, never dreaming of the awful 
fate that was in store for me. After a 
few feeble attempts to escape, I allowed 
myself to be bound [Ightly to the stake 
in the middle of the encampment (better 
known as the clothespole) and gave my- 
self up to the delighttul pastime of pic- 
turing myself as a fearless warrior about 
to meet his death in true Indian fashion 
— with courage. My brother and six 
other young hoodlums were dancing 
around me brandishing sticks, and at 
intervals one of them would move in 
closer and give me a poke. The circle 
became smaller and smaller, the dancing 
and fiendish yells became wilder and 
wilder, and the pokes became more and 
more frequent. It was getting just a 
little too realistic, I decided, and I would 
have liked the game to stop right then, 
but far be it from me to spoil the fun 
and be called a sissy and a bum sport by 
my young heroes. So the dance went on. 

Soon the young braves tired of this 
and began to hunt around for more 
original methods of torture. I should 
have realized that something drastic was 
about to happen when I saw them hud- 
dle together around the campfire where 
my fate was bein^ decided. The smoth- 
ered giggles (braves never show emo- 
tion) should have been a further warn- 
ing. But I, innocent child that I was, 
stood tied to my stake, enjoying my 
momentary peace and never dreaming 
that it was the last secure feeling I would 
have for days to come. 

Then, all of a sudden, they came back, 
carefully carrying an old tomato can, and 
still I did not realize my danger. My 
brother reached into the can and pulled 
something out of it. Came the dawn! 



They had yesterday's fishing worms and 
heaven only knew what they meant to 
do with them. I soon found out. They 
all began their dance again, long, squirmy 
angleworms in each hand and faces leer- 
ing at me, for my dislike of worms was 
well known. This was to be the true test 
of my courage ! 

First, they dropped worms down my 
back and in my hair and ears. Inwardly 
I writhed, for the awful things were all 
clammy and they began crawling up and 
down my spine and all over my face. 
But I would not scream. I'd show them 
what stufif we Sioux were made of ! I 
was perfectly disgusted, but I refused to 
let my tormentors have the satisfaction 
of seeing my discomfiture. Then came 
the last straw. Having failed to make 
me cry out even with these drastic 
measures, they went still further. They 
stuffed the nasty, creepy, dirty worms 
in my mouth ! Never in all my life have 
I been so furious. Finally, after tugging 
fiercely at my bonds, I loosened them 
enough for me to slip free, and I ran 
home screaming at the top of my lungs, 
followed by the taunting cries of the 
warriors. I took baths, gargles, washed 
my hair and did ever3'thing possible to 
get rid of the terrible creepy-crawley 
feeling but it was not to be lost so easily. 
I felt wormy for weeks afterward. 

I must admit that I pride myself on 
this one thing — in spite of my rage and 
discomfort, I didn't mention a word of 
this to my family. Thus was the honor 
of the Sioux maintained and a crushing 
defeat turned into an overwhelming vic- 
tory, for the seven cruel braves were so 
grateful that I was allowed to be the 
King of France for the whole next week. 



[28] 



and still gain weight to remain up, ex- 
cept during rest hours. Although I could 
not leave the premises, or even visit (ex- 
cept at certain hours of the day) my 
mother and younger sister, on the floor 
below, I managed to cram enough into 
my hours of activity to keep myself 
occupied most of the time, even to the 
extent that many a rest hour was spent 
in planning the events to follow at its 
conclusion. 

There were a great many things that 
I did while at the institution which still 
stand out clearly in my mind. I can re- 
member how the cook scolded me for 
getting into a patch of raspberries in a 
near-by ravine, which she supposed no 
one knew was there, how I would bribe 
Ker for an extra glass of milk just be- 
fore bedtime each night, how I loved to 
pump "Three o'clock in the Morning" on 
the player piano until all of the patients 
on that floor were driven to distraction, 
how I played the hero before the sani- 
torium school teacher by removing a tiny 
garter snake from her path, and how I 
used to hide in a tree along the front 
walk at the bottom of the hill and toss 
grapes on passers-by. 

There were two other events which 
kept me long satisfied. The first was a 
huge grass fire in a large pasture back of 
the sanitorium. Not long after the fire 
started a fire truck came screeching up 
the hill and stopped in the driveway while 
the firemen ran to beat out the spread- 
ing blaze with their rubber coats. Never 
before had I seen a fire truck except 
from the street while passing a fire 
station. The truck was a large one and 
fully equipped with a big brass bell, a 
silvered siren, ladders, chemical tanks, 
lengths of hose, nozzles, fire axes, hel- 
mets, and coats. After giving the truck 
a hasty inspection, I ran to my room and 
brought back a scratch pad and a pencil 



and sat down on the grass near-by and 
drew a picture of it. Whether or not the 
picture I drew was a good one I have 
no idea, but from the astonishment which 
the nurses and the doctor showed at 
seeing my drawing I feel that it must 
have been fairly accurate for a ten-year 
old. I have forgotten what the drawing 
looked like, but I do remember giving it 
away to a pretty little French nurse who 
asked me for it. 

The other event developed from an 
idea I got one morning while the doctor 
was going over my chest. He told me 
'that his little boy had caught a ground 
squirrel in their yard by putting a string 
noose over the hole and jerking it when 
the squirrel stuck his head out. I lost no 
time in trying the plan out for myself; 
for as soon as I had got back into my 
shirt and trousers, I went to the laundry 
room for a long piece of string, mean- 
while selecting, in my mind, the most 
likely spot to set my snare. After a few 
unreported failures, I finally caught a 
squirrel which bit me before I could kill 
it. I succeeded by the simple process of 
tying a sfip-knot in the end of a long 
string, placing the loop of the knot over 
the squirrel's hole, and laying the re- 
mainder of the string along the grass 
to the nearest bush behind which I could 
hide. When Mr. Squirrel popped his 
head up through the string to see if all 
was well, I yanked the string, and if I 
yanked quicker than the squirrel could 
duck, he was mine. I was working my 
new business quite successfully, having 
caught several, when finally either the 
supply of squirrels gave out, or they 
became too wary for me to catch them 
easily. It was at this time that I de- 
vised a plan that was the last word in 
the trapping of wild animals. I went 
again to the laundry and added more 
string to m}- outfit. Then I went to my 



[31] 



bed on the second floor porch and fast- 
ened one end of the string to my bed and 
payed the other end of it through a hole 
in the screen to the ground. Then I 
went outside, pulled the string along the 
ground to a hole where I know there 
was a squirrel, put my noose over the 
hole, and went to bed for the rest hour. 
The first day it did not work, because 
the old gardener unknowingly cut my 
string in several places \vhile mowing 
the yard. But the following day it did 
work ! 

Needless to say, all of these operations 
had to be kept quiet, especially during 
a rest hour. Whenever a nurse ap- 
proached, I would lie still with my eyes 
closed, but once she was gone, I was 
wide awake and watching the hole. 
Finally, the luckless squirrel popped his 
head up through the string and I yanked 
the noose tight around his neck and kept 
pulling until I had pulled him across the 
yard and up against the side of the build- 
ing. All went well until I had pulled him 
up to the level of the sleeping porch 
below on which some women patients 
were resting. When that squirming and 
wiggling animal went past their screen, 
some silly "goose" let out a scream which 
brought three nurses to the scene and 
which waked every patient in the insti- 
tution who was not deaf. Well, the jig 
was up ; my scheme had been exposed 
with a vengeance. The head nurse came 



directly to my bed with unerring accu- 
racy (we had "tangled" before), and 
yanked the string from my hand, allow- 
ing the squirrel to drop to the ground 
and escape with that long string for a 
necktie. I spent a solid week in bed for 
my brilliance, but was finally "released" 
because my restlessness annoyed the 
other patients. 

To relate such ridiculous incidents 
might cause one to think that a tubercu- 
losis sanitorium is a pleasant place in 
which to be. But I assure you that such 
is not true, even for most small children. 
I was very fortunate in not being very 
ill, having only the small beginnings of 
disease in one of my lungs. Every day 
or so, among the other patients, things 
would happen, especially on visiting days, 
which would pierce my bubble of happi- 
ness and leave tears in my eyes where 
laughter had been only a moment ago. 
The parting of a husband and wife or 
child and parent, especially if the child 
was very small, always upset me. Some- 
times their plaintive cries would cut 
through my heart like a knife, and 
surely they must have left aches in the 
hearts of those from whom they parted. 
No, life for a convalescent tubercular is 
bad at the best. My happiness while I 
was there was based upon the fact that I 
was not very sick and was a small, care- 
free boy. 




C Sow^ 



l32-\ 



l2^rAWi?il^li 



Vol. 5 



MARCH, 1936 



No. 2 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

THE STATE I LIVE IN 1 

Use Aron 

CHURCH LIFE AT HOME AND ON THE CAMPUS 2 

Martha Pile 
PEASE PORRIDGE HOT 3 

Raymond Pollard 

•NORTH TO THE ORIENT"— Anne Lindbergh . . 4 
Margaret McMahon 

WHY NOT TO ASSIGN ETHIOPIA AS A THEME 

SUBJECT 6 

William Percival 
■THE SEA AND THE JUNGLE"— H. M. Tomlinson 7 

Roland McKean 

WHY I RAISE CHICKENS 8 

Joe V. Crabtree 

FARMING IN ROUMANIA 11 

Petru Pana 

MUSSOLINI AND CAESAR 13 

Eleanor Sweney 

MONOTONY 16 

Robert W. Brown 
WORKING FOR PLEASURE 17 

William C. Imholz 

ALLIED AND GERMAN WAR CARTOONS DUR- 
ING THE GREAT CONFLICT 18 

Alfred J. Strohmaier 

FLORIDA SPECIALTIES 21 

Helen Shoemaker 

HOBOES AND "TRANSIENTS" 22 

Eli Ellis 

HOW TO SERVE A TENNIS BALL 24 

Evalyn B. Evans 

ON GETTING ON IN A FRATERNITY . . . . 2S 
Stevens Graves 

THE FASCINATION OF BLACKSMITHING . . 25 
Emil Pietrangeli 

THE PROCESS OF GROWING UP 27 

Harold Kleckner 

CROSSING THE ILLINOIS IN WINTER ... 28 
June Mamer 

SCHICK TESTS 29 

Helen Church 

SATURDAY NIGHT 30 

Mary Jane Adsit 



jMyvik 



i 



\ 



PUBLISHED BY THE RHETORIC STAFF, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA 



1 



The State I Live In 



Ilse Aron 

Final Examination, Rhetoric II, January, 1936 
I say to my European perate" climate, it is a torture. Cold it 



IMAGINE 
* friend, an expanse of land as flat as 
a table, without even a range of old, 
weather-beaten hills. Imagine in the 
south of this land a few hills like 
rumples and creases in the cloth of this 
table, and there you have the aviator's 
view of Illinois topography. Where 
streams amble along (there being no 
slope to hurry them) you can see soft 
patches of green, scraggly little woods 
desolately trying to mirror themselves 
in the sallow water. And my European 
friend groans with sympathy, for he 
loves clear streams and hills and woods. 

But I have not given him a fair pic- 
ture. Topographically, indeed, it is ac- 
curate, but land should have more than 
surface, and it is the richness, the "good 
Mother Earth" quality which makes Il- 
linois as beautiful as she can claim to 
be. Nowhere in Europe can my friend 
see soil like this, black and compact, yet 
springy, kind to the hungry young roots. 
Nowhere can he see such fields of that 
hopeful, shimmering green which be- 
tokens our spring. And our golden au- 
tumns are ours alone, with the blue haze 
over the fields w^here the grain sways, 
ready for harvest. Our land, our soil is 
our wealth, and the proper care of that 
heritage is one of which we are jealous. 
Each year we gain more fruits from the 
earth without making that soil sterile, 
useless to our children. That is the pride 
of the American farmer. 

Our climate, too, is unique. To the 
European, accustomed to a literally "tem- 



is in winter, searing hot in summer, and 
rainy in spring and fall. Indeed, when- 
ever the weather can find no other way 
to be unpleasant, it rains, and very often 
it rains just to fill the cup of discomfort 
during extreme heat or cold. Yet, for the 
crops we grow, the weather is (exclud- 
ing recent drouths) suitable. We grow 
accustomed to it, and think primarily of 
its effect on the crops. Even we in the 
towns manage to say, without too much 
of an "it isn't raining rain to me" effect, 
"This rain will be good for the corn." 
In that attitude lies the dignified un- 
selfishness of the good farmer, not the 
serf or the peasant, but the man who 
owns his land and lives from it. 

"But that farmer," my European 
friend queries, "what culture can he 
have?" In comparison with people of 
your class, my friend, none; in compari- 
son with the peasants and lower classes 
of your country, even with the class level 
in which, in Europe, he would belong, 
his culture is infinite. For America, to- 
gether with the evils of her mass produc- 
tion, has produced certain benefits ; the 
much-advertised advantage of general 
education, the mixed blessing of the 
radio, lately even a kind of native art. 
This culture, such as it is, is a native 
one ; it developed under no rich patron ; 
it is confined to no single class. We have 
made the agricultural profession an 
honorable one. Our rich loam has been 
our wealth in Illinois — financial, mental, 
and spiritual wealth. 



[ 1 ] 



Church Life at Home and on the Campus 

Martha Pile 
Final Examination, Rhetoric I, January, 1926 



111 



"IT /"HAT a difference there is 

' ' churches! All my life I have been 
accustomed to quiet, country-like 
churches. When a child, I attended 
church in small towns where the Sabbath 
was kept holy all da}^ and where the 
congregations, with Puritan decorum, 
went quietly to church twice a day. I 
did not like church very much then. 
Instead of a feeling of awe and peace, a 
feeling of funereal sadness impressed me 
on Sundays. However, when I moved 
to Chicago, I was happy in joining a 
church there. Like the churches I was 
accustomed to, it was peaceful, but much 
more human. Sunday became for me a 
pleasant break in the monotony of the 
week instead of a much-feared day of 
quiet and sternness. 

But I received a distinct and rather 
unpleasant shock the first Sunday I at- 
tended church on the campus. Where 
had all the young people come from? 
Why was the minister so vehement? 
Why did the congregation sing hymns 
so loudly and joyfully? I was greatly 
puzzled, and when asked to become an 
affiliate member, I doubted that I should 
enjoy the campus churches very much. 
After the quiet worship I had known, 
these churches seemed to me somewhat 
like the revivals I had heard described. 
However, after attending a few more 
services, I found that I fitted in a little 
better, and I became an affiliate member. 
Now I prefer my campus church to my 
home church. 

There are great differences in attitude. 
At home, there are rarely more than a 



dozen young people at church. The pews 
are not one-third filled. The minister 
rambles on quietly, usually avoiding un- 
pleasant subjects. Collection is taken up 
by several ancient men in swallow-tail 
coats. After the service, people wander 
out, gossiping quietly. I, among other 
college students, feel strangely out of 
place. In the evening and during the 
week, organizations and clubs hold meet- 
ings in the church house. Our church 
isn't old-fashioned, but it does not like 
to face modern problems. My campus 
church is packed to the doors with young 
people every Sunday. The minister 
preaches energetically and to the point. 
Young ushers buoyantly take up a large 
collection. The whole congregation gives 
its best to the hymns. (When I go home 
now, my sister nudges me, whispering an 
admonition because my voice is not 
lowered sufficiently.) All during the week 
I am besieged by telephone calls and 
letters, asking me to speak at Forum, 
requesting my presence at some club 
meeting, or asking me to teach Sunday 
School. This church faces modern prob- 
lems, is devoted to the student, and pro- 
vides a new experience in religion for 
many young people. 

I still like my home church, because 
it is restful, peaceful, and beautiful. My 
campus church seems to be an outlet for 
all the keyed-up emotions of the week. 
Between these two churches, I shall 
probably adjust my religious feelings cor- 
rectly. I wonder what will happen to 
these feelings when I leave college. 



[2] 



Pease Porridge Hot 

Raymond Pollard 
Thetne 10, Rhetoric I, 1935-36 



/CONVERSATION is keen and flick- 
^^--^ ering like a rapier ; writing, its com- 
panion, is slow and unwieldy as a pike- 
staff. Where conversation nimbly pirou- 
ettes, thrusting and feinting, writing 
plods mechanically, lunging and lurch- 
ing. Because of intimacy of contact, con- 
versation is much more impressive than 
writing. Eloquent speakers often spell- 
bind their audiences so completely that 
they may produce at will tears, scowls, 
or laughter. It is seldom that a printed 
word can induce any such effects as 
this, no matter what depth of feeling 
is intended. A talker can gesture, he 
can laugh, he can snarl, he can shout, 
he can prance; a writer can only wield 
his pen patiently and pray that his words 
may in a small way produce the desired 
effect. 

One summer I drifted down to the 
backwoods of Kentucky. I penetrated 
deep into the hills, into settlements where 
the natives still cling to the superstitions 
and customs of bygone days. I dis- 
covered some marvelous "yarn spinners" 
among the grizzled "granpappies" of the 
hills. It was my greatest delight to cor- 
ral three or four of these old mountain- 
eers and start them to swapping yarns. 
I can see them yet as they lounged in 
their chairs with huge cuds of "long 
green" in their mouths, happily recount- 



ing tales of their youth. How eagerly I 
listened to their bloodthirsty recitals of 
"feuders," "revenoors," and "bushwhack- 
ers." Such a deep and lasting impression 
did these glamorous homespun tales make 
upon me that when the summer was over 
I sped back to Illinois resolved to set 
them in print and weave from them a 
romance of the hills. 

What disappointment awaited me when 
I sat down at the typewriter to begin 
the task ! I hovered over the mute key- 
board with a brain still more mute. 
Where were the words I sought ? Where 
on the keyboard were the letters to por- 
tray that mellow mountain talking? With 
only twenty-six letters in the alphabet, 
how was I to compose words to do 
justice to those slouch hats, long-bar- 
relled rifles, homespun jeans, and to- 
bacco-bulged jowls? How could I put 
the flitting of the red-bird and the 
sweet fragrance of the honey-suckle on 
those cold white pages? Where was I to 
find words powerful enough to express 
love and laughter, hate and death, as 
they had been expressed to me ? Written 
words were too stiff, too dull, too me- 
chanical. The actual conversation had 
been warm and vital, pulsing with life; 
it was sacrilege even to attempt its con- 
version to the unresponsive pages. 




[ 3] 



North to the Orient by Anne Lindbergh 

Margaret McMahon 
Assignment 21, Rhetoric xl, 1935-36 

ANNE MORROW LINDBERGH'S to that settlement once a year stood ice- 
story of the flight which she and her bound hundreds of miles away. So it 



famous husband made to the Orient by 
way of the far northern route is not so 
much the history of a daring scientific 
exploration as a record of people and 
things, impressions and moods. Avia- 
tion, to Mrs. Lindbergh, is not science ; 
it is magic. This impression predomi- 
nates throughout the entire book. The 
orange-winged Sirius was to her not so 
much a craft, designed according to the 
soundest scientific principles of aviation, 
and built to carry them safely over an 
unknown route which promised greater 
accessibility and speed to the Orient, as 
it was a magic carpet on which she 
flew into a land of dreams and upon 
which she depended to carry her out of 
the prison-like wastes of the North which 
held all other human beings bound. She 
relates, vividly and charmingly, the story 
of their flight over the route which had 
been for hundreds of years the dream 
of explorers whose ambition was to 
"saile by the West into the East." 

At Ottawa, their first stop in the 
North, she realized for the first time 
probably just how hazardous the trip was 
to be. Aviation experts there, after at- 
tempting to dissuade her husband from 
pursuing the course he had chosen, even 
to the extent of appealing to him for the 
safety of his wife, resignedly gave him 
what assistance they could and wished 
him luck on his adventure. 

They flew into and away from Baker 



was on all of their stops in the remote 
North where even the sun was not the 
same sun they had known. "Going into 
that strange world of unending day was 
like stepping very quietly across the in- 
visible border of the land of Faery that 
the Irish poets write of, that timeless 
world of Fiann and Saeve, or the World 
of Thomas the Rhymer." It was in this 
mood that Mrs. Lindbergh saw the North 
— Nome, with its proud, strong Eskimo 
tribes ; Karaginski, where, to her sur- 
prise, women spoke both French and 
English in addition to the native Rus- 
sian language ; Point Barrow, where a 
minister must interpret the psalms by 
using Eskimo figures of speech: "We 
have gone astray like the sheep" must 
be translated "Like the reindeer who 
have scattered on the tundras," and 
"Your garners zvill be filled" becomes 
"Your meat cellars will be full of rein- 
deer meat." 

Mrs. Lindbergh paints a colorful, ro- 
mantic picture of Japan, with its singing 
sailors, beautiful islands, toy houses, pa- 
godas, blue umbrellas, and tearooms. She 
makes the reader see and feel the calm 
philosophy of the Japanese. "In every 
Japanese there was an artist." She was 
able to appreciate that artistry and, with 
the touch of an artist herself, to convey 
to others an appreciation of the art that 
is Japan. 

Not all of their adventures in the East, 



Lake with the independence of a bird however, were pleasant. Attempting to 
while the ship which brought supplies land in a heavy fog in Burton Bay, she 



[4 ] 



was convinced they were to die, and her 
description of the experience is dramatic. 
"We were blind — and still going down — 
oh, God ! — we'll hit the mountain. A 
wave of terrific pain swept over me, 
shriveling to blackened ashes the mean- 
ingless words 'courage' — 'pride' — 'con- 
trol' .... Oh, Lord, — here was an- 
other mountain peak ! Was he going to 
try it again? Hadn't he learned any- 
tliingf Did he think I really enjoyed 
this game of tobogganing down vol- 
canoes ?" 

The Yangtze River, when they reached 
China, was in flood, "a huge lake smiling 
catlike, horribly calm and complacent, 
over the destroyed fields and homes of 
millions of people." Here, by the use 
of their airplane, they attempted to bring 
relief to the millions whom the river 
had made destitute. It was this same 
river which finally wrecked the Sirius. 
Colonel and Mrs. Lindbergh were in the 
airplane when the roaring current con- 
quered man-made power. "No one who 
goes under its yellow surface ever comes 
up again," she had been told; yet she 
jumped from the plane; her life pre- 
server did not work; she swam to the 
lifeboat, coughing up Yangtze water and 
amused at the thought that for three 
weeks she had been brushing her teeth in 
boiled water! 

Her humor is quiet, but effective, and 
most often directed at herself. She re- 
signedly prepared for examination for 
radio operator's license, consisting of 
"comprehensive questions on the care and 
operation of vacuum tube apparatus," 
although she had never passed an arith- 
metic examination in her life and "never 
understood a thing about electricity from 



the moment that man started rubbing 
sealing wax and fur." At the beginning 
of the trip, still hazy about the mysteries 
of radio, she attempted to broadcast, 
but with no success. Her husband told 
her to take out the fuses. "I would if I 
knew what a fuse looked like." 

Mrs. Lindbergh has the gift of seeing, 
and her word-pictures are excellent. She 
followed the Mississippi River which 
"carried half a continent of farms mag- 
nificently on its far-reaching banks." The 
Rio Grande rode "like a plumed serpent 
through the sandy wastes of the South- 
west." Night was "being lost and trap- 
ped. It was looking and not seeing — 
that was night." Her diction through- 
out the book is very effective. Every 
smallest detail is described with a con- 
crete, objective illustration, as, "parch- 
ment-colored sails, webbed like a bat's 
wing." 

Her description of people and coun- 
tries has the same acuteness and sin- 
cerity of expression. Of Russia she 
says, "It isn't It ; it's Them, and I like 
them." To her, a Japanese is "the eternal 
gentleman." 

Her book v/ould not appeal to scien- 
tists or to practical-minded people who 
turn to it for the sole purpose of obtain- 
ing mechanical information of the flight 
which blazed a new trail to the Orient. 
The only information of this kind in 
the book is contained in the maps drawn 
by Colonel Lindbergh and in the list of 
supplies and equipment which were car- 
ried in the airplane in anticipation of any 
emergency. However, the book will ap- 
peal to all others, so sincere, dramatic, 
and human is the story. 



[ 5 J 



Why Not to Assign Ethiopia as a 
Theme Subject 

William Percival 
Theme 15, Rhetoric I, 1935-26 

(Written by Mr, Percival after he had read thirty-two themes on Ethiopia. It was 
Mr. Percival who, by a statement in class, occasioned the assignment.) 



T N an unguarded moment I once made 
* the rash and unqualified statement 
that every freshman at the University 
of IlHnois had an opinion about Ethi- 
opia. I now retract that statement com- 
pletely and conclusively. In fact I would 
now hesitate to say that freshmen have 
an opinion on any subject. 

Most of the titles of the themes I 
read were, "Why I Dislike Writing about 
Ethiopia." Such a title is a confession of 
dullness in itself. It is a confession of 
the inability of the student to write an 
essay on the outstanding news events of 
1935. The students that did have an 
opinion usually prefaced it with a state- 
ment something like this: "I have an 
opinion about the Ethiopian situation, 
but it has been drawn from the news- 
papers, and newspapers are so biased 
that it is practically impossible to glean 
any knowledge from them." Again, "I 
hate to put my opinion on paper unless 
I know all the facts." What do these 
students think they are writing — articles 
for Time or Fortune? They were asked 
merely for their opinion, right or wrong, 
accurate or not. After all, our news- 
papers are not so utterly biased as some 
of our students seem to think. They 
may be prejudiced regarding political 
situations, but any statement issued by 
the Associated Press from the war front 
is absolutely accurate. Perhaps it is the 
students who are biased — regarding 
newspapers. The relative inaccuracies of 
the newspapers are unimportant anyway. 
Prejudiced or not, they provide a base 



upon which an opinion could be built. 

The themes were originally intended 
to be, "My Opinion of Any Phase of 
the Ethiopian Situation." The class as 
a whole did not seem to grasp that idea. 
Most of the students seemed to think 
that they must be veritable walking 
encyclopedias before they could write on 
the subject. There were a few classic 
examples of ineptness. One poor girl 
just didn't have the time or energy to 
read the papers, but she was very sure 
that the newspapers were prejudiced. One 
young man had up-to-date information, 
but disliked writing about Ethiopia be- 
cause he didn't think he had enough ma- 
terial. What does this student need be- 
fore he can compile such a tremendously 
important document as a freshman 
theme? Does he need first-hand infor- 
mation from the war zone, and personal 
statements from Haile and II Duce ? Per- 
haps he hesitates to express an opinion 
for fear of being quoted ! Another stu- 
dent had no interest in Ethiopia ; his sole 
reason for this attitude seemed to be that 
inasmuch as the fighting Occurred out- 
side the state of Illinois, it was no con- 
cern of his, and could not possibly inter- 
est or affect him. Another young lady 
seemed rather proud of the fact that she 
had not one whit of information con- 
cerning Ethiopia. Is it possible this girl 
is unaware that Italy and Ethiopia are 
at war? 

There were several excellent, if not 
particularly interesting themes, written 
by students who had a comprehensive 



[6] 



grasp of the Ethiopian situation. A few 
students took a single idea, and with a 
little thought and analysis developed it. 
Certainly the rest of the class could do 
the same. It takes only one thought, one 
idea, one contrast, well developed, to 
make a complete and original theme. But 
the students don't want to write original 
themes — they would rather write inani- 
ties about newspapers. There were two 
students who really knew very little 
about Ethiopia, but who wrote cleverly 
and distinctively. They illustrate what I 



meant when I said before the assignment 
was made, that every freshman at the 
University of Illinois could write about 
the Ethiopian situation if he tried. I 
meant that every freshman could take a 
scrap of information concerning Ethi- 
opia, and, given the liberty of using his 
imagination, could write a really interest- 
ing and original theme. At that time, 
however, I thought the freshmen were 
capable of a little precise and discrimi- 
nating thought. Perhaps I was wrong. 



I 



The, Sea and the Jungle — H. M. Tomlinson 

Roland McKean 
Theme 8 (Impromptu), Rhetoric I, 1935-36 

LIKE Tomlinson's method of writing Tomlinson expresses interesting ideas. 



a travel book. On the way across the 
Atlantic to Brazil, and through the 
jungle, he moves slowly and placidly; 
when the trip is over, he takes a fast 
train to New York from Florida and a 
fast boat back to London. The story is 
developed chronologically, but the in- 
terest is maintained by vivid figures of 
speech and gentle humor. He opens the 
book with a description of a November 
morning in London: "The day was but 
a thin solution of night." Later, in 
describing a character: "The nose sprang 
out of the big face like an ejaculation." 
In fact, the first part is a compendium 
of "Picturesque Speech" such as we read 
in Reader's Digest. Everyone enjoys this 
lolling, quiet, but striking description, 
especially after a month of restless col- 
lege life. The action and fun give the 
impression of vacation days. 

Tomlinson describes some interesting 
characters, too — the Doctor, with his 
humorous little stories, or the Skipper, 
with his mixed tenderness and severity. 
And through some of his characters, 



He shows clearly his amusement at the 
religious practices of Englishmen by 
contrasting them with the practices of the 
South American natives. And by de- 
scribing the kind of men evolved through 
terrible life in the tropics, he shows his 
disapproval of the capitalists who ex- 
ploit people in the jungle. This is done 
well, but I enjoyed more his fresh, 
original descriptions of natural forces 
than his ideas on man-made forces. 

I won't remember much of the infor- 
mation presented in the book ; it isn't 
written that way. Only a few choice 
sketches of the sea or the jungle or of 
London will stay with me. But I do 
want to read more of this man's work. 
I like his habit of inserting short stories 
of dramatic or comic interest. This, and 
his entirely new figurative language set 
Tomlinson apart. His style is a rare 
combination ; it quiets the body and 
stimulates the mind. The reader can 
relax and feel and enjoy — a very 
pleasant experience these days. 



[ 7] 



Why I Raise Chickens 



Joe V. Crabtree 
Theme 6, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

T) EYOND the fact that you prefer it liner stock all the time 



fried, broiled, creamed, or roasted, 
do you know anything about chicken ? 
Do you know that all species of baby 
chicks are covered with a soft yellow 
fuzz so that you can't tell a one-day 
old White Leghorn from a Brown Leg- 
horn nor a Barred Rock from a Plym- 
outh Rock nor an Ancona from a BufT 
Orpington? Do you know that a hen, 
having once "set" (been allowed to sit 
on a nest of eggs and raise a brood of 
chickens), is never again a good layer? 
And that a rooster is one of the most 
chivalric of all creatures? And, by the 
way, can you distinguish a rooster from a 
hen? Can you identify the species of a 
chicken by the size and color of its egg? 
Did you know that purple martins like to 
associate with chickens? And that all 
kinds of bird and animal life will come to 
a place where there are chickens — some 
forms being undesirable, such as rats, 
weasels, and foxes? And that you have 
to keep a close watch for these pests to 
protect your iiock? When I think of 
the great number of people who can 
comprehend only vaguely the association 
between their breakfast omelette and a 
hen, I am inclined to think that they are 
missing a most interesting study and 
work — that of raising chickens. 

When you decide to take up the raising 
of chickens, choosing the type of chicken 
is the first consideration. I think that 
the Tancred strain of White Leghorns 
is the best suited for my purpose. Mr. 
Albert Tancred, for whom the strain is 
named, raised White Leghorns all his 
life, trapnesting them and breeding a 



Some of his 
prize cockerels sell for five hundred dol- 
lars, for one thousand dollars, and for 
even higher sums of money. Three years 
ago he died, and now his wife carries 
on the work. 

I chose Leghorns because I am pri- 
marily interested in raising chickens for 
egg production. Leghorns are excellent 
egg layers, but their small size prohibits 
raising them for meat. I would not ad- 
vise a person to raise Leghorns who is 
not equipped to keep their combs warm 
in the winter. If a Leghorn's comb 
freezes, the chicken ceases to lay. 

In a few days after I have mailed my 
order, the postman delivers a cardboard 
box containing live, cheeping, yellow, 
fuzzy balls of cotton. This is the time 
when the chicken is the most interesting, 
and also the most helpless. The chick's 
chief occupation is sleeping huddled 
around the brooder, which must be kept 
at a temperature of from eighty to 
eighty-four degrees. Sick chicks must 
be removed and given special care con- 
sisting of extra warmth and cod liver oil 
or worm medicine, depending on the 
diagnosis of the trouble. The medicines 
named are just examples — the listing of 
the entire number of medicines would 
require too much space. The baby chick's 
mortality is highest the first few days ; 
however, good, healthy, pedigreed stock 
is not so subject to death as chickens of 
mixed breed. 

I have spent hours watching the chick- 
ens drink. They take a mouthful of 
water, point their beaks skyward, and 
allow the water to run down their 



[ 8] 



throats, repeating the process every few 
seconds until their thirst is quenched. 
Their eating is just as interesting a 
process. The chicks crowd around the 
hopper rapidly pecking at the food, their 
heads flying back and forth intermit- 
tently. Every one of the chickens cheeps 
contentedly to himself ; occasionally one 
emits an angry "chur" because his neigh- 
bor is crowding him too much. He usu- 
ally accompanies this "chur" with a peck 
at his neighbor's head. 

The monotonous cheeping is an index 
to the chicken's health and actions. A 
sick chicken cheeps shrilly ; a well 
chicken contentedly. A chicken going to 
sleep cheeps drowsily until he loses con- 
sciousness. If you thump the floor, pass 
your hand quickly over the pen, or in 
some other manner frighten the baby 
flock, some bold chicken will utter a 
warning "chur" and the entire pen will 
immediately become silent and frozen 
until the danger is passed. A few sec- 
onds later, another bold chick will re- 
sume his cheeping, the entire flock fol- 
lowing suit. 

Like human babies, baby chicks soon 
grow up. First, they lose their fuzz and 
begin to put on feathers. The young 
roosters develop combs and make some 
sickly attempts at crowing. You need 
not hurt their feelings, however, by 
saying what you think of their crowing, 
for they are certain that they have done 
well. Finally, a young pullet hides her 
first tgg in a dark corner of the pen 
under an old box. With me, the first egg 
is always a time of celebrating. I displa}^ 
it to my mother and father with as much 
pride as if I had laid it. Then, I proceed 
to eat it for breakfast, praising its shape 
and flavor although I know that it is 
small and does not taste any differently 
from any other egg I ever ate. 



I have mentioned only a few of the 
pleasures that a flock of growing chick- 
ens provides. You feel pride and satis- 
faction in your flock, for, being of good 
breed, they are healthy, good-looking, 
and profitable. A many-hued, drooping- 
feathered, and moth-eaten mongrel lot 
presents a contrast to my flock of well- 
plumed, shapely, graceful chickens with 
snow-white feathers, yellow-tinted ears, 
bright orange legs, and cherry-red combs. 
These chickens are profitable, for they 
lay more eggs than a mongrel flock. By 
culling, breeding, and trapnesting, I at- 
tempt not only to keep the succeeding 
flocks beautiful and profitable, but also 
to raise their standard. Trapnesting is a 
systematic recording of the number of 
eggs each chicken lays ; under this sys- 
tem each nest is made into a trap which 
locks in the laying hen until released by 
the attendant, who records the legband 
number of the hen locked in the nest. 
In this way may be recorded the number 
of eggs a hen lays in a year. When eggs 
are sent to the hatchery, the eggs sent 
are those laid by the hens which have the 
best laying records. With good stock to 
begin with and good care, I have man- 
aged to keep a flock of chickens whose 
laying records run from two hundred and 
fifty to three hundred eggs a year. This 
is an excellent record even as compared 
with the records of professional chicken 
breeders. 

I also pride myself on the uniformity 
of my eggs. By feeding the chickens 
a balanced ration I am able to maintain 
eggs with uniformly colored yolks. The 
eggs, also, are of the same size, shape, 
and weight — twenty- four ounces to the 
dozen. Since all of my chickens are of 
the same breed, the shells are the same 
color. Uniform eggs bring premium 
prices. 



[ 9 J 



Although chickens have an appeal as 
a business venture, their greatest appeal 
to me is their answer to my desire for 
pets. In the first place, their actions are 
comparable to human actions. Like boys 
and some men, the rooster's chief occu- 
pations are fighting and showing oflF in 
front of the hens. In a fight, the chal- 
lenging rooster approaches the defending 
rooster with great pomp, attracting the 
attention of the hens if possible. Both 
roosters lower their heads, stretch out 
their necks, rufile their neck feathers, 
prance around each other for a bit, and 
then fly to it — beak, claw, and spur. In 
a few minutes the fight is over. The 
victor proudly thrusts out his breast, 
flaps his wings, and crows vigorously. 
Naturally, the hens gather around the 
hero. In the meanwhile, the vanquished 
one goes off to an inconspicuous corner, 
ruffles his feathers, shakes himself, 
cusses a little, and plots revenge. How 
comparable to human nature ! 

Chickens are always pleasant to watch. 
They scratch incessantly at the peat on 
the floor of their pen, now and then 
taking a couple of pecks at something 
they have unearthed by their scratching. 
I have often wondered if they ever 
really find anything. 

The old saying, the early bird gets 
the worm isn't true in the case of chick- 
ens. If a rooster finds a worm, he pro- 



ceeds to call all the hens. The first hen 
there grabs the worm and, instead of 
eating it, begins to run and to squawk. 
The other hens pursue the running one, 
and a mad chase begins around the pen, 
culminating in the cornering of the 
chicken with the worm. The first chicken 
rarely gets more than a nibble for its 
strenuous efforts. 

Have you ever turned a pen of chick- 
ens loose on 3'our lawn ? When you open 
the door of the pen, the rooster rushes 
out calling the hens as he goes. They 
come sailing out the door, sometimes 
running and sometimes flying a few feet 
above the ground. When the flock is 
almost completely outside, the rooster 
leaves his position at the head of the 
flock, rushes to the rear, and hustles 
along the stragglers by running at them, 
calling to them with a curious noise that 
sounds like "Quit, quit, quit . . . ." and 
flapping his wings. Upon safely con- 
ducting his flock to the grass, he crows 
proudly, telling everyone that he is a 
good provider for his wives. You may 
have opened the door to permit the hens 
to get out into the yard, but he, of course, 
discovered the grass and led his flock to 
it ; therefore, he has a right to crow. 
Roosters are not very particular about 
the basis of their right for crowing, 
anyway. 

Yes, I like to raise chickens. 




'^'AU^ 



[10] 



Farming in Roumania 

Petru Pana 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1935-36 



D IG-SCALE farming was practically 
•*-' the only kind found in Roumania 
before the World War. Farms covering 
from ten to fifteen thousand acres were 
numerous. There were also a relatively 
small number of fifty-acre farms owned 
by "mosneni," peasants who, for dis- 
tinguished military service, had received 
land from Alexandru Cuza, a Roumanian 
ruler during the latter part of the nine- 
teenth century. Immediately following 
the World War, in accordance with the 
promise made by King Ferdinand to the 
Roumanian army, all but one thousand 
acres were appropriated by the govern- 
ment from each large land owner and 
divided into ten-acre plots, which were 
given to the peasants who fought for a 
larger Roumania. Two main motives 
led the government to take this action. 
They wished to promote a nationalistic 
spirit in the army during the war, and 
prevent the spread of the communistic 
ideas which caused the Russian revolu- 
tion. The result of this action was the 
formation of a class of small property 
owners, and a general lowering of the 
standard of Roumanian agriculture. The 
government was able to buy the land at a 
"bargain" price from the large owners, 
but it was unable to provide the new 
owners with the capital necessary to 
start farming. Perhaps the government 
was lucky this time in not having suf- 
ficient capital, for if it had invested 
money in the small farms, it would un- 
doubtedly have received poor returns. 
This opinion is based on the fact that the 
new owners, who had never managed a 
farm before, lacked the initiative and 
skill necessary for successful farming. 
Even if they possessed unusual farming 



ability, they were limited by the small 
size of their property. The government 
soon realized the difficulties of this new 
system, and tried to remedy them by 
introducing co-operative farming, by ed- 
ucating farm advisers, and by establish- 
ing agricultural co-operatives and agri- 
cultural syndicates. 

Six main agricultural regions may be 
distinguished in Roumania. The grain 
farming region is the most extensive and 
important ; it includes the western, 
southern, and eastern parts of the 
country, with the exception of a small 
section along the Black Sea in Southern 
Dobrogea. Corn is the most important 
crop in the country. The adaptation of 
this crop to the environment, as well as 
the fact that the peasants eat "ma- 
maliga," a cake made from corn meal, 
with every meal, is a factor which ac- 
counts for the extensive cultivation of 
this grain. Wheat is second in im- 
portance. A reduction in the wheat acre- 
age, however, has occurred since the 
breaking up of the large farms. During 
the last few years there has been also a 
reduction in the acreage of oats. The 
low price offered for it accounts for this 
reduction. Barley and rye follow wheat 
in importance. Alfalfa and red clover 
are probably the most important legumes. 
The foot-hills on the southern and east- 
ern slopes of the Carpatian mountains 
are covered with vine3^ards and orchards. 
Apple and plum orchards are the most 
numerous, for both of these fruits are 
used for making "tuica," the national 
beverage. Most of the grapes are used 
for making wine, which is recognized 
as of superior quality. Just south of the 
foot-hills of the Carpatians in Muntenia, 



[H] 



and north of the grain farms, there is a 
tobacco region. The government controls 
tobacco raising since it has a monopoly 
on it. Attempts are made to raise cotton 
in the southern part of Dobrogea. The 
mild cHmate of this part of the country is 
the explanation for these attempts. 
Transilvania, Maramuresul, and Buco- 
vina (Roumanian provinces) could be 
considered as the livestock and grain 
region. The land in the Carpatians which 
is not covered by forests is used for 
pasture and hay. Large flocks of sheep 
and cattle graze there during the sum- 
mer months. 

Farm power is supplied by horses, 
oxen, and tractors. The small property 
owners use horses and oxen. The own- 
ers of large farms use either oxen and 
horses, or oxen, horses, and tractors. 
Oxen are more numerous than horses on 
the large farms. There are quite a few 
farms which use both animal and trac- 
tor powder, but none that use only trac- 
tor power. Tractors are scarce because 
they are expensive. Not only is the 
initial cost of a tractor about twice as 
high as in this country, but the repair 
parts are also very expensive. Besides 
being costly, repairs are found only in 
cities. Although the country is very rich 
in oil, fuel is expensive because of the 
high taxes. There is a struggle between 
the tradition that farm work should be 
done by animal power, and the new idea 
that it should be done by machinery. The 
low prices of agricultural products 
during the last few years have also pre- 
vented a greater use of machinery on 
Roumanian farms. If co-operative farm- 
ing could be carried out successfully, or 
if there w^ere more large farms, it is 
probable that more machinery would be 
used. The fact that the peasants have 
almost no knowledge of machinery could 
be overcome eventually, if it were not 



for the other difficulties just mentioned. 
Much of the work that is accomplished 
in the United States by machinery is 
done in Roumania by men. Most of the 
small farmers sow wheat and plant corn 
by hand, cultivate the corn with hoes, 
do the harvesting with the scythe, and 
thresh the grain with horses. During the 
threshing season a place is cleared in the 
yard, the ground is sprinkled, and a pole 
is set up. When the grain is brought in 
from the field it is placed around the 
pole. Horses are tied to a rope fastened 
to the pole and driven over the grain 
until the kernels are separated from the 
crop residues either by cleaning ma- 
chinery or by tossing in the air and 
letting the wind carry away these resi- 
dues. Man labor is also used extensively 
on large farms. The supply is gotten 
from the more densely populated hill and 
mountain regions. Along in January the 
large farm owner sends a man into the 
mountain region to make contracts with 
laborers for the coming season. In the 
spring, as soon as the land owner sends 
for them, they drive down to the prairie 
in carriages pulled by oxen. It takes 
several days for them to make the trip. 
They come in time to cultivate the corn 
and stay during the harvesting and 
threshing season. Late in July they re- 
turn to the mountains in the same way 
in w^hich they came down. In August 
they make their own hay, pick the plums 
and apples from their own orchards, and 
make tuica. In September they are again 
notified and come down to the farms for 
corn picking. This time they make the 
trip by train, because in late October, 
when the}' return to the mountains, the 
dirt roads are almost impassable. During 
the summer the men work from three in 
the morning until seven o'clock at night, 
taking two hours ofT for meals. They 
work in large groups under the direction 



[12] 



of a foreman, who is responsible for the 
job that each group is doing. As they 
move from field to field they build huts 
covered with straw, in v/hich they sleep 
during their stay. Each group has a 
kitchen and a cook. A fresh supply of 
food is taken to them from the main 
farmstead every day. A one-room house 
on wheels, which carries the cookin;.; 
utensils and provides a sleeping place 
for the foreman, moves from place to 
place with the group. Eight oxen or a 
tractor is used in pulling it. The camp 
is established around a well near which 
there is usually a pile of straw. The 
laborers are then provided with water, 
fuel for their fires, and material for the 
huts. The wells in the prairie are usually 



so deep that water cannot be pumped 
from them but must be pulled up in a 
large leather sack which holds approxi- 
mately twenty gallons. 

As to the future of Roumanian agri- 
culture, it seems probable that no further 
compulsory splitting of farm land will 
occur. On the contrary, there is apt to be 
more of an increase in the size of 
farms due either to co-operative farming 
or to a decrease in the rural population. 
Most of the farm boys who receive a 
higher education refuse to return to the 
farms, and seek employment by the gov- 
ernment or in industry. Mechanical 
power will finally replace animal power 
on the farms, and as a result of this, bet- 
ter farming can be expected. 



Mussolini and Caesar 

Eleanor Sweney 
Theme 7 , Rhetoric 11, 1935-36 



"HpHE glory that was Rome is the heri- 
^ tage of every Italian of today. Peas- 
ants and noblemen alike treasure in their 
hearts the memory of a Rome that once 
ruled the entire known world with a 
majesty and splendor unequalled in 



hope that some day Rome might return 
to her old position of unequalled power 
and beauty. It is not strange that the 
Italians of today hope that their genera- 
tion may build a new Italy and that 
Benito Mussolini is like Julius Caesar, 



history, of a Rome that merged the another forerunner of a Golden Age in 

beauty of classical Greece and the luxury Roman history. 

of the Orient into a new and glorious Indeed there are a number of ways in 

civilization of her own, of a Rome whose which II Duce might be compared with 

army ruled all land and whose navy ruled Caesar. Conditions in Italy are not so 

all sea, of a Rome whose Vergil, Ovid, different today from the conditions of 

and Horace sang and whose Cicero and Rome in 48 B.C. The early careers of 

Caesar swayed the reason and the emo- the two men have similarities. Both men 

tions of all their listeners, of a Rome centered all of their ambitions and their 

that was highly civilized at a time when aims in one mighty cause, the glory of 

France, England, Germany, and the Rome. Even the methods of the two 

United States were inhabited by savage dictators are comparable, 
tribes. It is no small wonder that a Students of history will remember that 

people so conscious of their historic su- in 48 B.C. Julius Caesar crossed the 

periority should live with the constant Rubicon with his legions and marched 



[13] 



upon Rome to become its dictator. The 
Rome which he volunteered to govern 
was one torn with strife and civil war 
between the patrician followers of Sulla 
and Pompey and the plebeian followers 
of Marius and the Gracchi. Rome was 
rapidly becoming over-populated and 
over-crowded, and there were thousands 
of unemployed, and thousands who de- 
manded a dole from the government. 
Roman rule in the provinces was weak 
and incompetent, and graft and dis- 
honesty were prevalent among the gover- 
nors. The Italian people had lost their 
power to rule themselves wisely and 
sanely, and welcomed a strong, self-con- 
fident ruler who would lead them as they 
should be led. There is a surprisingly 
close parallelism between Rome in 48 
B.C. and Italy in 1922 A.D. when Mus- 
solini and his Fascisti took over the gov- 
ernment. Following the World War 
there was a great depression, and Italy 
was divided by rioting anarchists and 
radicals. Her population, already too 
large to be prosperous, \yas becoming 
larger every year. Her colonies were so 
loosely and inefficiently governed that 
they could not be expected to give in- 
telligent and systematic relief to Italy's 
unemployed. The Italians had lost their 
morale, their strength, and their democ- 
racy, so that once again they needed a 
strong, firm leader to mold them into the 
race they wished to become. 

Although Julius Caesar was by birth a 
patrician, his sypathies were all with the 
common people. He was shrewd enough 
to realize that he had to gain his offices 
through both the common people and 
the politicians ; so for one he gave mag- 
nificent public banquets and for the 
others he gave generous bribes. He 
brought himself before the people first as 
an orator, then as a prosecutor of the 
lawless, and finally as a great soldier and 



general. As the son of a blacksmith, 
Mussolini always felt a peculiar loyalty 
to the working class. He won his promi- 
nence through his ardent and active sup- 
port of first the Socialist and then the 
Fascisti party in his newspapers, Avanti 
and Popolo d'ltalia. Like Caesar, he 
gained favor with the government by 
helping to discipline rioters and anarch- 
ists. Neither Caesar or Mussolini hesi- 
tated to use force to gain his ends. Mus- 
solini followed the footsteps of his prede- 
cessor when in March, 1922, he marched 
upon Rome at the head of his Black 
Shirts and demanded that Victor Im- 
manuel III make him prime-minister 
with all of the powers of dictator. Since 
that time he has maintained his Fascisti 
soldiers to dispense with his enemies, to 
curb any criticism of his policy, and to 
enforce his laws. 

Even the aims and programs of Mus- 
solini and Caesar seem to be almost iden- 
tical. William Morey, in his Outline of 
Roman History, says that "his own 
ambitions and the highest interests of his 
country Caesar believed to be one." 
Gamaliel Bradford, in characterizing 
Mussolini, maintains that he "identifies 
himself with, merges himself in the gran- 
deur and glory of Italy." These men 
both exerted all of their energies, their 
intelligence, their power, and their 
dreams for the development of a more 
perfect and glorious Rome. Each met the 
needs of his time: Caesar united the 
patricians and the plebeians, reformed the 
provincial system, sought to civilize Gaul 
as a colony for the over populated Rome, 
codified the law, reformed the calendar, 
readjusted the grain dole, built a navy, 
and planned the drainage of the Cam- 
pania; Mussolini is trying to rejuvenate 
and harmonize the Italian people, to 
"civilize" Ethiopia possibly for future 
colonization, to make new and better 



[14] 



laws, to develop natural resources, to 
carry out an ambitious public works pro- 
gram in which is included the restoration 
of the Forum, to enlarge his army and 
navy, and to reform the educational, in- 
dustrial, and governmental systems. If 
Caesar's program was great, perhaps 
Mussolini's is even greater in its scope. 
In spite of the fact that there are 
many marked similarities between Mus- 
solini and Caesar an accurate compari- 
son cannot yet be made. A number of 
years, perhaps even centuries, will be 
necessary before the varied and distorted 
ideas of Mussolini will be clarified and 
before it can be seen whether his career 
will stand the test of time. Today we 
are too close to Mussolini to judge him 
sanely and impartially: we are likely to 
go to one of two extremes, either to 
sanction his actions, idealize his accom- 
plishments, and glorify his motives, or 
to condemn his methods, ridicule his 
achievements, and oppose his progress. 
Only after a century or more will the 
world be able to get the perspective from 
which to judge accurately whether his 
reforms in education, in industry, in pub- 
lic works, in statesmanship, and in law 
were of lasting and actual value to his 
people. It may be that Mussolini will 
so antagonize the rest of the world by 
his actions in Ethiopia that instead of 
making Italy greater, he will ruin the 
nation. It is conceivable, too, that in the 
future, ideas will have changed so greatly 
that the selfish nationalism of H Duce will 
be considered contemptible rather than 
laudable. On the other hand, the high- 
handed and undemocratic methods that 
Mussolini is using to attain his ends 
may be seen to be the only ones possible 
under the circumstances and if his ends 
prove to be worthwhile enough, his 
means may be considered wise. Still 
again, perhaps Mussolini, as an imitator 



of Julius Caesar, should not be compared 
with the original. Perhaps, on the other 
hand, we have an altogether too glori- 
fied picture of Julius Caesar and his ac- 
complishments, and we will discover that 
we are not wrong in comparing Musso- 
lini with him. However much Italy in 
48 B.C. and Italy in 1922 A.D. might 
compare, however much Caesar and Mus- 
solini might have been one in their aim to 
make Rome "great, respected, and 
feared," and however similar might have 
been their methods and their rise to 
power, an intelligent and thoughtful 
critic would hesitate to draw the com- 
parison to a conclusion until after the 
full effects of Mussolini's dictatorship 
can be seen. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Books 

Bradford, Gamaliel, The Quick and the Dead, 

Houghton Mifflin and Co., 1931, 187-219. 
MoREY, William E., Outline of Roman 

History, American Book Co., 1901, pp. 

180-201, 311-326. 
Neiv International Encyclopaedia: Rome, Italy, 

Julius Caesar. 
Plutarch's Lives, tr. by Dryden, ed. by Clough, 

A. L. Burt and Co. Vol. IV, pp. 89-155. 

Periodicals 
Current History 
Vol. 28: 
Mussolini, Benito, "Why Italy Rejects 

Democratic Rule," May '28, p. 180. 
Winner, Percy, "Mussolini — A Character 
Study," July '28, pp. 217-527. 
Vol. 30: 
Winner, Percy, "Italian King's Relation- 
ship to Fascist Dictator," July '29, pp. 
625-632. 

Vol. 31: 
Beals, Carleton, "Italy's Seven Years 
Under Mussolini," December '28, p. 
498. 
Vol. 37: 
Martin, William, "Mussolini's Few Years 

of Power," October '32, pp. 2,2,-Z7. 
Salvemini, Garteno, "March on Rome: 
Revised Edition," October '32, pp. 
38-43. 
Vol. 41: 
Woolbert, Robert Gale, "Italy's Colonial 
Empire," February '35, pp. 542-548. 



[15] 



Monotony 



Robert W. Brown 
Theme 12, Rhetoric I, 1935-36 

I DEFY anyone to say that monotony wooden blocks — that the trays of catches 
in life does not exist. I have heard were all filled, 
university students complain of the mo- A bell over one doorway rang at seven 

notony of routine study, but that is not o'clock, the switches were thrown, and 
absolute monotony. One is always learn- the machines started. Slowly at first, 



ing something new, encountering some- 
thing different and unusual. An instruc- 
tor or professor of these studies would 
have more claim to an understanding of 
monotonous routine. But I wonder if 
any of them has ever worked in a 
mouse trap factory. 

A mouse trap factory! People can 
laugh at the idea, and say, "Is there 
really such a thing?" — when they know 



then quickening as my fingers loosened, 
I grabbed a catch from the trap to the 
right of my machine, dropped it into the 
snug-fitting die, and at the same time 
took one of the printed blocks of wood 
from the left, making sure that it was 
in good condition. Then, with the trans- 
ferring of the block to my right hand, 
it was slid in on the carriage above the 
die, and my right foot pressed a pedal 



all the time that mouse traps have to be that caused the punch to descend on the 

made somewhere. Why not a mouse trap wood block and stamp the pointed ends 

factory? All I know is that such a thing oi the metal catch into the wood. It 

exists, and I shall never be able to laugh ^^as really a simple process, and that was 



at the idea. 

I arrived at the factory on the usual 
day at six-fifty. On entering, I took my 
card from the rack, slid it into the clock, 
and punched my time on the space 
marked "in." Then I proceeded to a 
room where several punch presses were 
at that time being used to put catches 
on mouse traps. The job of running one 
of those machines was simple for 



all there was to it ; that was my job. The 
trap, as far as I was concerned, was 
complete. But it had yet to be assembled, 
to have the trigger, spring, and "jaw" 
put on it. My job was merely to put on 
the catch, fling the trap into a basket, and 
repeat the performance, time after time 
— hour after hour — day after day, A 
thousand an hour. But Woolworth 
wanted the traps — and Kresge, and 
hundreds of other stores. My working 



nimble fingers, so although men workers ^^^ terminated only when the final bell 
were preferred in the factory, some of j-ang at four o'clock, and I was able to 
the workers were girls, and wages were py^ch my time on the space marked 
consequently low. But with work as "out." That was monotony— that, and 
scarce as it was I could not object; 1 living in a small town with little oppor- 
was lucky to have something to do. First tunity to break away from routine life, 
of all I tied on an apron that somehow I never cared particularly for study- 
always seemed to be dirty. Then I went ing, but when I think of mouse traps — 
to my machine to see that everything was well, I can agree with the mouse. They 
in order — that I had enough of the little are a menace to pleasurable existence. 



[16] 



Working for Pleasure 



William C. Imholz 
Theme 16, Rhetoric II, 1924-25 

*OR some time the question of "Why glue, hot tin, and steel, all gave their 



1 work?" has been turning over and 
over within my mind. I have been won- 
dering why a man will strain his back 
and blister his palms when it is so much 
easier for him to sit back and view the 
rest of the world as it slides by his 
doorstep. It would undoubtedly be a 
perfect paradise, if he could do anything, 
have anything, see anything, or eat any- 
thing without so much as turning his 
hand. However, it seems that the com- 
forts and luxuries of life are procured 
only by effort — usually distasteful — of 
some kind on the part of the person who 
expects to receive those comforts and 
luxuries. In other words, a man gener- 
ally has to work for his pleasures. 

Last summer a 3^oung man was em- 
ployed in a factory. He had to work. 
He had to blister his hands and to take 
as a matter of course whatever bruises 
and cuts he might receive. There was 
nothing enjoyable about the job. His fel- 
low workers afforded him little or no 
companionship; the greater part of them 
were rather close-lipped and uncom- 
municative. The clattering machinery 
certainly had little respect for his 
troubles ; it shoved at him an endless 
supply of parts, and at the same time 
snatched them from his weary fingers as 
if to reprove him for his slowness of 
movement. The department where he 
worked smelled ; fresh paint, burnt paint. 



odors to the general stink. At times his 
eyes suffered the shock of an intense 
flash from the arc of a nearby electric 
welder. Sparks often spattered down 
over his arms and hands, causing him 
to wince and swear. Many times his 
hands were cut by the sharp edges of 
tin splinters, and, more often than not, 
he had no time to tend to the cuts. 
His was a distasteful job. Nothing made 
him feel better than to be able to turn 
his back upon the doors of that hated 
factory, and to go home to a quiet room 
and bed. However, he continued his 
work. He kept on coming back through 
those doors and punching that uncom- 
promising time clock for a period of 
several months. What was his motive ? 

This young fellow was not thinking of 
the present ; his thoughts were of fu- 
ture happiness to be procured with the 
money from his present job. He had a 
vision of attending school in the fall 
of the year. He knew that he would en- 
joy living ir a college town, making new 
friends, and daily having new and pleas- 
urable experiences. College could bring 
to him the things which he yearned for; 
and so, with this thought in mind, he con- 
tinued his work. He was willing to put 
up with the present for what it might 
bring to him in the future. His was a 
case of "working for pleasure." 



[17] 



Allied and German War Cartoons During 

the Great Conflict 



Alfred J, Strohmaier 
Theme 7, Rhetoric II, 1925-26 



A LL my close friends will agree that I 
^*' have a good sense of humor. I like 
to be happy and gay, to have a good time 
every now and then, and to laugh until 
tears stream from my eyes. Perhaps, in 
your opinion, I have not even grown 
beyond the kindergarten stage yet, if 
you judge me by my thorough enjoyment 
of the weekly "funnies." However, there 
is one type of "humor" which I abhor 
as thoroughly as I enjoy the former. It 
is that everpresent, cruel, lying cartoon. 
Of this scourge, the type dwelling on the 
subject of war, because of its serious 
consequences, has especially drastic ef- 
fects upon my emotions. My dictionary 
defines "cartoon" as "a pictorial sketch 
dealing with a political or social subject." 
It is plain to see, therefore, that the 
aforementioned "funny page" variety 
which jibes this way and that with draw- 
ings of provincial humor is not to be in- 
cluded in this definition. 

At the present time it is, perhaps, hard 
to see just how great a role war car- 
toons actually played in the propagation 
and continuation of the World War. 
"How could a few simple lines by pencil 
or brush," you may ask, "have any great 
effect upon the course of a war?" 

Soldiers will not fight, civilians at 
home will not support their nation's 
army, a war cannot be won, unless every 
citizen is firmly convinced that his 
country is in the right — that he is fight- 
ing for a just cause. The people of every 
nation are peace-loving people. You may 
be surprised when I tell you, from per- 
sonal experience, that the German popu- 
lation hated war as much as you did. 



Like you, they beseeched God to let the 
dawn rise over Europe once again, to let 
the sun shine upon the world, that all 
might enjoy the warm rays of peace arfti 
forget the hallucinations of the night. 
Plausible reasons for hatred and revenge 
had to be given the masses by their re- 
spective governments; their fighting 
spirits had to be thoroughly aroused be- 
fore they would pit themselves against 
each other. Here is where the cartoon 
played its important part. Picture writ- 
ing was our earliest form of recorded 
communication and is still the simplest 
method of inducing thought from one 
mind to another. Language is no bar 
to the pictorial message, nor is much 
time or thought necessary to digest it. 
By employing caricature, symbolism, or 
pure picturization, a cartoon touches the 
heart as well as the mind of every ele- 
ment of society. Thus it is said that a 
cartoonist, even a single cartoon, has 
turned the tide in elections, stirred na- 
tions, or influenced epoch-making move- 
ments. There lies the answer to your 
question. 

To be convinced as to the importance 
of this form of propaganda during the 
war, let us examine how a cartoon can 
become such a monster. Although it can 
be used as an instrument of defense, the 
type most common during the war period 
was the one of attack. It generally ap- 
peared in conjunction with a contem- 
porary news item, thus emphasizing the 
latter and giving the reader a better 
understanding of its content. Such a 
cartoon was the one entitled "The Way 
OF THE Huns: A True Story from 



[18] 



Alsace." It showed a shaggy-looking 
creature stamping away from the scene 
of his crime, gorilla fashion, gun in 
hand. Behind him lay a little boy, life- 
less, a tiny gun lying beside him. Di- 
rectly below the drawing was a story of 
how a German soldier killed a small boy 
who had pointed a toy gun at him.^ If 
the story did not impress the mothers 
of the world, the picturization of it 
certainly must have. 

If you look up this cartoon you will 
notice, perhaps much to your surprise, 
that a war cartoon is not necessarily an 
instrument designed to create humor. 
Far from it ! It has a grim purpose. It 
is primarily designed to create a lasting 
impression in your memory which, in 
turn, will implant in you a fierce hatred 
for the enemy, whether he be actually 
guilty or not. During one of your night- 
mares, the gorilla-like creature with the 
German helmet on its head will grimace 
at you many a time, if not chase you 
with its immense bayoneted gun. The 
title: "The Way of the Huns," will 
always remain with you in conjunction 
with this cartoon and its assertion "True 
Story from Alsace" will be soaked up 
by your brain as by a sponge. Naturally 
you will want to punish those beasts. 
You will hate every German. You, a 
perfectly sane, peace-loving American, or 
French, or English citizen, will suddenly 
be gripped by the lust for revenge and 
blood ; — the cartoon has accomplished 
its purpose. 

To insure this accomplishment, gross 
exaggeration was invariably resorted to. 
If you have your doubts about this, you 
need only turn to the page beyond the 
aforementioned cartoon in Avenarius' 
Das Bild als Narr. There you will see 
another interpretation of the same inci- 



dent, but this time we have, instead of 
one soldier, a whole squad of German 
soldiers under the command of an of- 
ficer, firing upon the same little boy.^ 
The mere turning of another page in the 
same book will bring you face to face 
with an even more startling interpreta- 
tion of the very same incident. In this 
picture the whole German army, under 
the personal command of the emperor,^ 
has its guns trained on a group of little 
children. In these cartoons, as in many 
others, it is easy to see their real purpose. 
The crime of the war cartoonist be- 
comes more apparent when the cartoons 
of the opposing sides are compared with 
each other. Sad to say, this is always 
impossible before or during a war when 
such a procedure would be most useful. 
Perhaps the most prodigious cartoons 
of that time were those depicting atroci- 
ties committed by one nation against 
the helpless people of the other. Our 
aforementioned drawing, "The Way of 
THE Huns," may well be taken as an 
example of Allied tactics in this field. 
Could it be possible that the German 
government used the very same type of 
cartoon to stir the indignation of its 
citizens? Indeed so! Just look at the 
cartoon appearing in the ninth (1916) 
issue of the German magazine Lustige 
Blatter, and entitled "Und ein Levit ging 
voruber . . . ." It shows an immense, 
mocking caricature of an English priest 
unconcernedly reading a Bible while he 
waddles along a shore where, not far 
out in the w^ater, a small group of 
Germans, human beings like you and me, 
are vainly calling for help from their 
sinking airship. Following him are two 
other priests, one carrying an English 
flag and sternly looking across the water 



'Avenarius, Das Bild als Narr, 153 or 
Daily Graphic. 19. IX. 14 



'Avenarius, Das Bild als Narr, 155 
'Avenarius, Das Bild als Narr, 157 



[19] 



while the third walks along with clenched 
fists and a disgustful scowl.* A few 
words of explanation accompany the 
cartoon: "The Anglican Bishop of 
London commended the English seamen 
who had denied our Zeppelin crew their 
assistance." How little of this story may 
have been true did not matter at that 
time, for every German, like us, firmly 
believed whatever was set in print. But 
it was the cartoon, of a nature so 
familiar to us, which actually stirred his 
emotions and fired him with that hatred 
toward us. What could be more in agree- 
ment with the plans of the Kaiser and 
his war lords? 

My conception of liberty becomes very 
much confused when I compare German 
cartoons like the one entitled "Die Wacht 
am Ortler"^ with Allied cartoons like 
"Die Wacht am Rhein.'"^ The former 
shows a German soldier being led on by 
the spirit of Andreas Hofer, the German 
and Austrian symbol for liberty. The 
latter discloses the dark waters of the 
Rhine as being brightly illuminated by a 
torch and symbolizing "Liberty for the 
oppressed," held high in the heavens by 
a doughboy. If the Germans were fight- 
ing against the Allies for liberty, and 
their opponents were sacrificing thou- 
sands of lives for the same purpose, then 
why did they fight against each other? 
I am also puzzled as to who got this 
liberty when the war finally ended. Was 
it the Germans? Or the Allies? The 
dead men? Something seems radically 
wrong in these cartoons ! 

Only now, long after the mischief has 
been performed, are we able to see how 
these pictures have deceived us. How 
much horror and misery they have 
brought into the world ! Have they been 
of any actual benefit to humanity? De- 



*Lustige Blatter, Vol. 4, No. 9 (1916), p. 7 
^Lustige Blatter, Vol. 4, No. 4 (1916), p. 8 
•Hecht, George J., The War in Cartoons, p. 189 



cidedly not ! Through their unforgivable 
sin of mis-representation and exaggera- 
tion they can never be used to improve 
our moral standard, or further our civi- 
lization. Their value as historical docu- 
ments was lost during their very incep- 
tion because of the numerous falsehoods 
which had been painted into them. 
Certainly they could be of no intellectual 
value to us for it takes no intelligence 
to interpret the meaning of a cartoon. 
You will also agree with me that none 
of them, with a few exceptions, perhaps, 
could ever become of value as works of 
art. A look at one or two of them will 
convince even the most sceptical of my 
critics. 

To kill this monster, the war cartoon, 
would be impossible for it has lived 
among us too long. We would not be 
able to pass a law prohibiting war car- 
tooning, much less enforce it. We could, 
however, slowly starve the monster to 
death by donning an impregnable armor 
of education and broadmindedness which 
would enable us to recognize and dis- 
credit this type of "art." Finding no 
more gullible victims with which to ap- 
pease its ferocious appetite, this form 
of public menace would slowly but surely 
dwindle in size until we could finally 
speed it to a just and ignoble end. The 
reins of hatred and revenge would drop 
from our shoulders and our hearts would 
become tender to our fellow men. Slowly 
the night would break, a glimmering of 
hope would rise in its stead — finally a 
zvarmth, as the rays of lasting peace 
envelop this world. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

AvEN.\Rius, Ferdinand, Das Bild als Narr, 
Munchen, Georg D. W. Callwey (1918). 

Hecht, George J., The War in Cartoons, New 
York, E. P. Dutton & Company, (1919). 

Lustige Blatter, 4 Band, Berlin, Dr. Eysler & 
Co. (1916). 



[20] 



Florida Specialties 

Helen Shoemaker 
Theme 14, Rhetoric I, 1935-36 



/^^ORN is the chief product of IlHnois. 
^'^ We eat corn — corn fritters, corn on 
the cob, scalloped corn, corn flakes, and 
hominy — but few in Illinois eat grits or 
even know that grits are a corn product. 
On the other hand, no Florida grocery 
store is without its rows of cylindrical 
boxes containing this corn product. I 
had not been long in Florida before I 
discovered that this was the favorite 
food, as common to the natives and to 
the Georgia "crackers" who had strayed 
south, as potatoes are to us. Even in the 
cafeteria of a certain school which was 
attended by almost as many Northerners 
as Southerners, grits and gravy were 
served at least once a week. In that par- 
ticular school one lunch consisting of a 
beverage, a cake or cookie, and a vege- 
table was served each day. Every child 
ate the same food. On "grits and gravy" 
days I ate only the cookie and the bever- 
age. I could tiot eat that soggy looking 
mess which resembled nothing so much 
as little grains of cooked rice covered 
with beef broth. It was certainly not a 
tempting dish ; yet nearly every girl at 
my table was willing to trade a cookie 
for it, although she had probably had 
grits for breakfast and would un- 
doubtedly have them for supper. 

In Florida we found fruits which we 
had never before seen, growing in our 
own yard. The unbelievably low prices 
of the fruits which we did know and the 
unconcern with which the natives ate 
them astounded us. In Illinois we had 
paid forty cents for a dozen of oranges; 



in Fort Pierce we crossed the street to 
the grove and picked as many as we 
wanted for nothing. At home we had 
bought pineapple — sliced or crushed — in 
cans. In Florida we bought pineapples 
by the bushel and ate them as only the 
natives would ever think of eating them. 
We took a pineapple and chopped oiT 
the stifif prickly leaves until only the 
short cane-like stem remained. Then 
we peeled the thick, bumpy skin off the 
fruit and, holding it by the stem, ate 
the pineapple as children eat all-day 
suckers. No lollypop ever tasted better. 
Northerners sometimes buy kumquats 
at grocery or fruit stores, and guava 
jelly, if not ripe guavas, is sold in the 
North at meat markets, but most 
Northerners think a mango is a vege- 
table ; few know that it is probably the 
Florida native's favorite fruit. People 
tasting it for the first time usually throw 
it away in disgust. It tastes like a mix- 
ture of rotten peach and pawpaw; at 
least, it did to me. The rest of my family 
learned to like mangoes — most people 
do — and swore the fruit was the best 
they had ever eaten. We would go for 
a drive, stop at a roadside stand, and 
buy a sack of this fruit. My mother, 
father, and brother would eat mango 
after mango with obvious relish while I 
sat and regarded them in wonder. How 
could anyone eat those mushy, drippy, 
sloppy thinks with the ugly yellowish- 
orange pulp and think them delicious? 
I longed — oh, how I longed — for a good 
solid red apple with its clean white pulp. 



[21} 



Hoboes and "Transients" 



Eli Ellis 
Theme 10, Rhetoric II, 1934-35 

BUMS, HOBOES, and transients, al- slightly "punch drunk." Taking punish- 
though few of us remember the fact, ment on the head and jaw leads to a 
are men. We read dreary news items 



concerning them and see pictures of them 
in breadlines, but seldom do we realize 
that they may be real, interesting per- 
sonalities — men who would make good 
friends, as I discovered in my contact 
with them in a year of Y.M.C.A. work. 
One of these friends was Dad — a 
grand old piece of wreckage. He was a 
queer, hunched, grey old man of seventy, 
with small, twinkling eyes, heavy bushy 
brows, hooked nose, and pointed chin. 
His arms seemed too big for the rest of 
his body. I remember my surprise the 
first time I saw him ; he was playing re- 
quest numbers on the piano in the "Y" 
lobby for a group of noisy boys and men. 
Once, in the days of the "flicker films," 
he had been a highly paid musician in 
good theaters, but the talkies and old 
age had ruined him. Now he would play 
from memory for hours without a rest — 
everything from "Turkey in the Straw" 
to Gounod's "Dance of the Hours." His 
big hands, with their short, blunt fingers, 
attempted no artistic frills but seemed to 
float above the keyboard and brought 
forth, with scarcely any movement, rip- 
pling melody or sombre chord. Dad's 
playing would sometimes hold the crowd 
for hours, until Billy's hoarse whisper 
spread the news of the fights downstairs. 



condition in which the sense of balance 
is disturbed and even the brain is af- 
fected. Whether, in Billy's case, the re- 
sult came from his own ring career, or 
from his later bouts with the champion, 
I never learned, but he must have taken 
terrific punishment from Dempsey. And 
so, often, just as he was "throwing a 
punch," Billy would freeze. He would 
remain fixed, his eyes opened wide in a 
blank stare. Then, as suddenly, he would 
snap out of it and go on with his demon- 
stration. Although white-haired, Billy 
was still fast on his feet and he had a 
terrific punch. His soft, husky voice 
might tend to mislead one about his 
fighting ability, but one glance at his 
slightly hunched, well-balanced way of 
walking, his frosty blue eyes and bull 
neck, and few would dare crowd him. 
Nevertheless, Billy was a kind-hearted, 
obliging old man, full of advice for the 
younger generation, full of information 
concerning his own generation, and a 
good man to have for a friend. 

In the crowd around the ring one in- 
terested spectator would always be 
Ward, an Indian with a good humored 
face and a beautiful body — a perfect 
wedge tapering from powerful shoulders 
to slim waist and ridiculously small feet. 
The first time I noticed him he was 



Down they would go to the "ring" 

where Billy would be in the limelight standing just outside the ring shouting 

as referee of the evening's fight. His encouragement to a small fellow who 

name is well known to fight fans, for was being badly cut up in a "match" 

several years ago he was a contender for with a heavier man. T liked Ward's 

the middleweight title and later he was sportsmanship then, and I liked his 

Dempsey's sparring partner for five generosity later, when a fellow transient 

years. Like many an old fighter, Billy was "bummed" him for a cigarette. Ward 



[22] 



passed over his precious cigarettes with- 
out a word of protest. 

Ward did not talk to me much until 
I happened to mention an old "Sharp's 
buffalo gun" I had. From then on, he 
came early and talked late. I found that 
he had two great passions, one for guns 
and one for ballads, which he could re- 
peat from memory for hours. Eventu- 
ally, I learned many interesting things 
about his wandering life. Although 
born in Arizona, he had been sent to 
school in New York. His school-days 
ended when he ran away at the age of 
twelve ; he went "down the river" alone 
to New Orleans. That was just the be- 
ginning ; he had been almost everywhere, 
it seemed. He could lie, on occasion, in a 
manner to shame the merchants of Con- 
stantinople, but the tales of his adven- 
tures were, I believe, for the most par