Hector Malot - "Ida et Carmelita"

Frank Berkeley Smith - "The Lady of Big Shanty"

Alphonse Daudet - "L'Immortel"

F. Marion Crawford - "In The Palace Of The King"

Books: Book review: 'The Mercy Papers' and 'Downtown Owl'
Moreover Technologies - Premier purveyor of real-time news and RSS feeds from across the Web

Book Review: The Horror, the Horror
Ad - Free Shipping on purchases over $59.95 of products online at Tennis Express.

How to live what Michael Pollan preaches
The Mercy Papers A Memoir of Three Weeks By Robin Romm 213 pages. Scribner. $22. The foundational condition of being human is that we're going to die. Almost as basic a truth is that we seem incapable of believing it. The collision of these inconsonant

A / B / C / D / E / F / G / H / I / J / K / L / M / N / O / P / R / S / T / U / V / W / Y / Z

A Collection of College Words and Customs written by Benjamin Homer Hall

B >> Benjamin Homer Hall >> A Collection of College Words and Customs




"As the appointed hour approaches, long files of black coats may
be seen emerging from the dark halls, and winding their way
through the classic elms towards the Temple, the favorite scene of
students' exhibitions and secret festivals. When they reach the
door, each man must undergo the searching scrutiny of the
door-keeper, usually disguised as an Indian, to avoid being
recognized by a college officer, should one chance to be in the
crowd, and no one is allowed to enter unless he is known.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

"Air,--_Yankee Doodle_.

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

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

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

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

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

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


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

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

See SENIOR WRANGLER.


WRANGLERSHIP. The office of a _Wrangler_.


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


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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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



_Y_.


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


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

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

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


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

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

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


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

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

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


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

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

See BEADLE.


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

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




A LIST OF AMERICAN COLLEGES