When The Wet Blanket returned to his lodge in the land of Sitting
Bull, he doubtless described Oxford life in his own way to the other
Braves, while the squaws hung upon his words and the papooses played
around. His account would vary, in many ways, from that of
"Whiskered Tomkins from the hail
Of seedy Magdalene."
And he, again, would not see Oxford life steadily, and see it whole,
as a more cultivated and polished undergraduate might. Thus there
are countless pictures of the works and ways of undergraduates at the
University. The scene is ever the same--boat-races and foot-ball
matches, scouts, schools, and proctors, are common to all,--but in
other respects the sketches must always vary, must generally be one-
sided, and must often seem inaccurate.
It appears that a certain romance is attached to the three years that
are passed between the estate of the freshman and that of the
Bachelor of Arts. These years are spent in a kind of fairyland,
neither quite within nor quite outside of the world. College life is
somewhat, as has so often been said, like the old Greek city life.
For three years men are in the possession of what the world does not
enjoy--leisure; and they are supposed to be using that leisure for
the purposes of perfection. They are making themselves and their
characters. We are all doing that, all the days of our lives; but at
the Universities there is, or is expected to be, more deliberate and
conscious effort.
Pages:
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129