En t ered at the Post Office at University of Richmond, Va , as second-class matter .
V OL. XLVIII FEBRUARY, 1921 No. 5
RICHMOND COLLEGE
E. B . WILLINGHAM, ;2L- '-'"---~-- " ~-
K. E. BURKE, '21 _____________________________________Assistant Editor
W . R. LOVING, '2L ________________________________Business Managef
0. L. HITE, '22_________.___
ASSOCIATE EDITORS
Mu Sigma Rho
P. H. DAVIS
M. L . SKAGGS
B. U. DAVENPORT
Business Managet
Philologian
W. E HATCHER, JR
R. F. EDWARDS
C. W . NEWTON
WESTHAMPTON COLLEGE
K ATHARINE H. SPICER _____________________________Editor-in-Chief
VIRGINIA NEWBILL_ _______________________________Assistant Editor
P EGGY BUTTERFIELD ______ __________Exchange Editor
MARY FUGATE _ _____________Business Manager
LELIA DOAN ____________________________Assistant Business Manager
THE MESSENGER (founded 1878; named for the Southern Literary Messenger) is published on the 15th of each month from October to May, inclusive, by the PHILOLOGIAN and MU SIGMA RHO Literary Societies, in conjunction with the students of Westhampton College. Its aim is to foster literary composition in the college, and contributions are solicited from all students, whether society members or not. A JOINT WRITER'S MEDAL , valued at twenty-five dollars, will be given by the two soci eties to the writer of the best article appearing in THE MESSENGER during the year. All contributions should be handed to the department editors or the Ed itor-in-Chief by the 1st of the month preceding. Business communica tions and subscriptions should be directed to the Business Manager and Assistant Business Manager, respectively.
Address-
THE MESSENGER, University of Richmond , Va.
-!'
JLullabp J.E. w., '23
In my dreams ·
There is a soothing , sighing sea, ·Singing its sweet lullaby to me; Soft as any mother's lullaby, Falling now, yet rising once again With the onrush of a wave.
In my dreams
There are moonbeams on a wave, Glancing through a foaming, dancing wave; Waves are hurling silvery foam at me, . Spraying all my dreams with loveliness, Singing, lulling me to rest.
In my dreams
That great sea beneath the stars, Singing , sighing, sobbing on the shore Is sometimes a roaring, angry sea! Rains beat down upon its mighty waves, Winds come tossing thunderous waves.
In my dreams
Ever present is this sea, Singing its sweet lullaby to me.
Whether tossed to thunderous waves by winds, Or whether wooed by starlight into song, Always it is here for me.
\ In my dreams
With its green waves singing sweet! Out beneath the gentle wind of night, Out beneath the stormy winds of night, Still the pine tre'es sing their wondrous song, Tossing, stirring 'neath the sky.
~rttn J,orns
ROBERT C. AsTROP
The newspaper had lost its interest and my attention. The crowds had thinned in the lobby of the Hotel Madison, where I sat deep in the leather cushions of a chair that invited laziness. I made ready to yawn and then I heard a man ask:
"Where does John D. Rockefeller live?"
I lay aside my paper and looked in the direction whence the voice had come. A man faced the clerk at the desk. He was labelled "Texas" as plainly as Rand and McNally ever put it on the map of the Lone Star State.
The clerk told the stranger the address of Mr. Rockefeller.
"I want to see him," the newcomer continued. "His agent has a fortune belonging to me. I think I'll see Rockefeller and it will be all right."
"Lots of 'em talk that way,'' remarked Martin, the clerk.
The Texan put a hand on each hip and tilted his sombrero back.
"You are young; I like you; do you want to make some money?"
The clerk rubbed the nails of his right hand in his left palm, straightened his tie, smiled at the Texan deprecatingly, and said: "You're on."
The Texan took out a fat wallet jammed with what looked like legal papers and letters after he had dumped them on the register.
"My name is Henry Carter, young fellow," the Texan remarked by way of enlightenment. "I'm just from a ranch not far from San Antonio, but the sheep men and the barbed wire fences don't look good to me and I got lonesome down there.
"My uncle was General Kingston, a big man in England. I haven't seen him for years.
"My fortune is about a million dollars worth of choice real estate in New York. The papers are locked up in a steel vault in a big building downtown. I must get them and as I am a stranger here, I must have help. I want somebody who is on to New York and New York ways to show me around.
"My uncle was a friend of the European agent of John D. Rockefeller and he invested his money through him in New York real property. It is worth a million now."
The clerk laughed.
"Why weren't you told when your uncle died?" he inquired.
"Well, I'll tell you," the Southerner retorted, "I just got hold of an English paper the other day. A British horse-trader who came to my ranch had some odds and ends wrapped up in it. It said that my uncle had just died and that his nephew, William Carter, who had been found in Australia was to inherit the English estate, while I was to inherit the American investments, as I was somewhere in America , but had not been found.
"So I came to New York. Now if we can see Rockefeller maybe he'll know something about it. My papers say the documents are here."
The clerk pulled his collar down and looked at his shoes.
"Well?" he retorted.
"If we can land th at m oney, I'll give you 10 per cent."
The clerk laughed in the man's face.
"Well?"
The word seemed to rasp out freighted with sarcasm. · The clerk arched his eyebrows and his nose went up.
"Now, here's the rub," the man from San Antonio went on, "I'm out of money now. It took about all I had to get here. You put up the coin for a new outfit that'll
make me look like a business man, give me a room and grub---stake me, and I'll split with you when I get my fortune." .
The clerk folded his arms. His eybrows crawled up his forehead until the sleek hair on top his head moved back an inch. He adjusted the chrysanthemum in his lapel. He flicked a microscopic piece of lint from his otherwise immaculate coat sleeve.
"Wake up," he said, "your pipe's out. Say, bo, what do you take me for, huh? You better cheese it before you swindle somebody. Chee, but you're the clever guy."
"Any mail for me?" queried the Texan.
The clerk wafted himself delicately to the mail box. His patent leather shoes were dazzling. He daintily took a letter from a pigeon hole. He delivered it to the :stranger. Then he sauntered debonairly away and turned his back.
"You don't want to take up my proposition then?" questioned Carter.
" Nay, nay, Pauline. Not tonight."
Then I noticed the young lady at the tobacco stand which was hard by the desk. She leaned on the showcase, her chin in her hands, her head moving up and down rythmically as she chewed chewing gum and gazed liquidly at the man from Texas. She had blonde hair, with a couple of hours' work spent on it every morning since she wore socks. A curl was twisted with great care on each roughed cheek. It seemed that she could not take her eyes from the face of the man from the Lone Star State. Then I knew why.
He was good for a New York woman to look at. He was around thirty, six foot, angular, full of muscle, and his face wore a Southern tan. Health and vigor radiated from him. As he had spoken, he had drawled as if he had a month to talk without sleeping.
All at once Henry Carter noticed th~t the girl was staring at him. He shifted his weight from one spurred
boot to another. He fumbled in his pocket and brought out a plug of twisted chewing tobacco. The tan of his face became red . His grey eye beheld the plump, full throat of the girl and the rippling lines of her figure.
The man swallowed once or twice as if he wanted to say something, then he started for the door.
The girl spoke to him.
"Just a minute, kid. Say, I'll stake you to a meal anyhow, if you're hungry."
"M--m--much obliged," blurted Carter sweeping off his sombrero, "don't care if I do, ma'm, if you'll eat with me."
The girl looked at the clock.
" Come on, kid, I'm on."
The pair made off towards the dining room of the hotel.
Next day I went back to the Hotel Madison. Gus Martin, the clerk, was on the job, but the blonde was not at the cigar stand. The clerk looked sour. I asked him about Carter.
"What do you think? ." he said bitterly, "Clara there," with a sweep in the direction of the cigar stand," has taken all her savings out of the bank and turned them over to that crazy guy. A green horn comes up here and swindles a New York girl out of her money like that. Can you imagine it? I liked Clara, too, and I'm holding down her job for her. She's off with that fool Texan and the manager is going to find it out and then, curtains, for her. She'll be out of a job."
A big automobile runabout thundered up to the entrance of the hotel. A man perfect from chin to boottoes by the standards of any Fi£ th A venue tailor got out and helped a woman to the sidewalk. As she entered the door we recognized Clara. Her raiment would have made any prima donna jealous and she walked like the Queen of Sheba.
She swept straight up to the desk and you wondered
where the Ethiopian pages that belonged with her were.
"Just dropped in to tell you good-bye, Gus. We are driving to Texas through the country. Tell the manager I'm gone."
"Wh- -wh--what about the money?" queried Martin. "That was all straight dope only he had the thing all fixed. He wasn't busted at all. He had plenty of money."
"Why did he take yours?"
"He said he wanted to see if I'd do that much for him, and if I did he'd know he had a chance."
"Why did he claim to be broke?"
"He wanted to meet me. He knew you knew me and could give him a knock-down and he was willing to pay for it."
I hadn't noticed what a big mouth the clerk had before.. It looked bigger open than shut.
"Sa-~sa--say, Clara, you are not leaving?"
"Surest thing you know."
She pasted a gob of chewing gum under the edge of the desk with her left hand and stuck out her right to Gus Martin.
He, half-hesitant, took it.
"Say, Clara , what sort of a job have you got with that guy? Secretary?"
She swept towards the door. Just before she went out she flung back over her shoulder the one word, "Wife."
I watched her get into the car. I turned back to the clerk. He was figuring frantically on a scrap of paper. He look nauseated.
Jn Dtftn~t of jiobbtb J,atr
CELIA LEVINSON, '22
Wearing the hair bobbed is a fashion for which busy mothers and little girls, inclined to be fidgety during the process of making straight hair curl, are duly grateful. Indeed, bobbed hair may be called the flag of youth. This condition among children needs no defense. Why should not a woman be just a grown up little girl and retain her short hair? Most of them are now retaining their short skirts. Grandmother's powdered curls are rigid from such a shock. "A young lady with short hair has just been through typhoid fever or---or .'isn't nice,' " she whispers.
The World War has not been fought in vain, even if its only result is freedom of women's hair. Bobbed hair marks the beginning of an era of common sense for women, an era of good sense in two respects---a woman shows good sense by bobbing her hair, and conversely bobbed hair is a sign of good sense, according to the old Hebrew proverb that the amount of good sense varies inversely with the length of the hair. Sister has long hair. She married at seventeen. American women live up to the principle of freedom for which our men fought, wear its standard, bobbed hair.
That "hair is woman's crowning glory" is a story of the past---the days of the Greeks and Romans, those days of flowing hair. But now those golden or raven tresses are protestingly rubbed the wrong way (tangled) and mixed with strange and false hair, cruelly pierced with hair pins, bound and imprisoned from the playful wind by hair nets, and hi dden from the sunshine by a hat. I am surprised that there are not more bald-headed women. If hair is woman's crowning beauty, it is well concealed. lt may be the beauty of a child. But when a child ap-
proaches the time when convention declares that she must enter the Convent "Put-up," let her bob it. I shout from the heights of my bobbed hair wisdom, "Praised be the one who brought it to pass---this regained freedom."
Bobbing the hair demands courage and backbone. Perhaps that is why Jean d'Arc was so brave. This is an excellent method for strengthening the will power. The longer and more beautiful the hair is, the stronger the tonic is. It is a sacrifice, but think of the reward. Of course, there is the risk of "looking like a freak" involved; but economically speaking, the greater the risk, the greater the interest. Even the prince hesitated . before cutting off the . head of the cat he loved, whose plac a beautiful princess was to take. 0 converts to bobbed hair, if you have "screwed your courage to the sticking point," let me give you some advice. There is a time when it is best done. Wait for a holiday so that you can get used to it yourself first, and have time to make up excuses.
Bobbed hair is all advantages. A famous health and beauty doctor advocates cutting it as the first step for health and wealth of hair. By cutting the hair you save it from modern destructives---the human rat, its close friend, the tangles. The sun and wind beautify it and lead it on the road to health. It is an excellent economizer, a good war mea sure to keep up in time of peace. You save your hair pin and hair net allowance for worthier object s .
This condition besides being sensible is romantic. Why , it is my nearest approach to Movieland. Sh---I have been called N azimova. Of course, it is pure flattery and politeness, but sometimes one is susceptible.
"Why did you do it? It's out of style," greeted the first appearance of my bobbed head. But I had all Christmas holidays to think up reasons. It is keeping up with the times. The day of the short-haired woman is bound
to come. But I am glad they are still vain enough to cut it below the ears. Woman suffrage is a big step towards bobbed hair.
"Why did you cut those curls?" all asked. Some were polite enough to cover a now unavoidable state by the comforting words, "You look nice, you are little and can wear it." One girl very sweetly said, "You're a walking temptation for bobbed hair." But to come back to my excuses ---"Mumps," I calmly replied. But it was my little brother who had the mumps. Again, fortunately, I was unfortunate enough to get poison oak on both arms from climbing a persimmon tree. I had no maid. Who was to perform the thankless daily office of combing rather tangled hair? Bobbed hair was becoming a necessity. At any time I might be operated on for appendicitis (I had had several attacks), and nurses were so quarrelsome about combing long hair. I could not rely on the generally accepted excuse of coming-out hair. Do what I could my hair refused to come out. Even my combings were scanty. But sh---I did accomplish a bald spot--thanks to a cruel hairpin.
Ye, who have straight sensible hair which behaves and does what it's told, may safely say, "Bobbed hair is vulgar; only chorus girls have it." But you have not lived in the happy land of bobbed hair. It is a trip to the fountain of youth. Have I di scovered the fountain for which Ponce de Leon searched? It is a good substitute for "green stockings" at the marriage of a young sister. Is that vanity?
West{Jampton~iris
(With Apologies .to Kipling)
W. A. McNEILL, '24
In restricted observations of the maidens of Westham, From the library's quiet cloister to the bridge above the dam;
I have see~ them in assemblies, heard their giggling chorus rise, And at athletic rallies have been deafened by their cries.
I have watched with satisfaction all that variegated line, Girls from Old Virginia, Georgia, Alabam and Caroline; And to make a hit with some of them I've tried with all my might , But whene 1 er it seemed I had a chance a Sophomore came in sight.
I have met the fluffy giddy blondes, who greet you so ecstatic,
And then set out to vamp you in a way that's systematic; Fve met the bashful little girls, like violets, shy and sweet, But then a Sophomore came in sight and I beat a retreat.
For the men in faded rat caps, who have been out here before, Would fain monopolize the girls, and thus I've made them sore;
And so, if when I'm with a lass a Sophomore edges near, I discreetly beg her pardon and prudently disappear.
As it is in other colleges, 1 neath wilder, milder skies, I "observe with apprehension" the lights flashed from maidens' eyes; But with keener apprehension, if I read the times aright;
i see a Sophomore come my way and quickly drop from sight.
You'll have heard of courtly manners, "if you'd win a maiden's favor,
But the Sophomores teach you manners of a somewhat different flavor; Keep your temper, never answer, but get promptly out of sight,
For that's the one and only rule, if you would be polite.
Take an interest in the lassies whom you see across the lake,
And where'er you see them going, quickly follow in their wake;
For in winning their good graces, you may well take a delight,
But, oh ye Freshmen, vanish when a Sophomore comes in sight!
~bt :.flanWbo;Darts
R. T. MA.RSH, '22
Picture in your minds France in the summer of the year 1792. There was great confusion and uproar. The government was unstable and changing from one group to another. The whole country was divided, disordered, without leaders and without soldiers, and in the midst of all this chaos word came that the Prussians and Austrians, old and terrible enemies of France, were rushing toward Paris with a huge army of eighty thousand men. Terror-stricken the Assembly met and wildly sought to devise some means of defense. Danton, one of the most prominent and influential members, cried to the Assembly, "What do we need to win?" And his own answer, which typified the fierce and desperate courage of the Revolution, strengthened and put new life into the heart of France, and caused fourteen Republican armies to spring up as if produced by the waving of a mighty magician's wand. They threw themselves against the powerful foe, which trembled, wavered, then fled in great confusion before the frenzied onslaught of Danton's raw recruits. "To dare, and dare, and dare again," had been his thrilling and inspiring cry.
· All great victories, great discoveries, great inventions have been due to a man or group of men who dared undergo the storm of ridicule of scoffers and skeptics, who dared to set forth on unknown seas in face of many grave dangers, and who were not discouraged by the seemingly insurmountable obstacles which rose up all along their road to final victory.
Over four centuries ago from a tiny port in Spain, Columbus set forth on one of the most important voyages ever made in the history of all ages. His countrymen had no faith in his enterprise; his sailors threatened
mutiny; but this famous pioneer, in spite of opposition, dared to continually keep his face westward, and finally his ideal, his dream, was realized.
The men who dare, the pioneers who are not bound by the iron bands of custom and tradition are very frequently misunderstood, and die with their noble work yet unappreciated. The ignorant Hebrew rabble cried out for the life of Moses, because he led them from an easy state of bondage out into the hard and rugged wilderness of freedom. Men of science and knowledge ridiculed Fulton's idea of steam navigation as "one of the silliest that ever entered human brain." The Wright brothers had to live in a world of continuous scorn before the airplane was finally perfected. And so it is with many of the pioneers. They are living ahead of their age. They see men exalted high in popular favor who have done nothing new but who merely are reflecting the sentiment and common passion of the time. The popular idol, then, is the popular mirror.
What characteristics distinguish the man who dares from the average man? After he has thrown off the meshes of tradition and has hardened himself to the sneers of sceptics, what yet are those qualities he must have in order to forge ahead? First, he must have the courage of his convictions. Suppose Columbus had listened to the gloomy warnings and prophecies of failure and had paid any attention to the solemn headshaking of the old fogies of the fifteenth century, who urged him not to sail where no one else had ventured. Suppose George Washington had peacefully and quietly gone back to Mount Vernon and retired to private life when those meek but well-meaning citizens urged, "Go slow; do not take up arms against the all-wise and powerful king, who is the Lord's anointed." America would have certainly been discovered, and in time the thirteen colonies would have secured freedom from their mother country, but these men, held back by the murmurings and warnings
of the conservatives, would have gone into their graves with their name and memory covered over with the same lifeless dirt which covered their cold bodies.
The next fundamental quality of the man who dares is the "instinct of victory." He must be filled with the belief that he cannot fail. He must be optimistic and must have a will power which will keep him at his task until he reaches the end a winner. By saying that an instinct of victory or self-confidence is necessary is not saying that a man must be egotistical, but it means that he must have full realization of that God-given power which will enable him to overcome obstacles and shape the destinies of himself and others. The man who is like this does not know the meaning of the word "impossible." If the existing circumsta n ces do not suit him he will make his own circumstances and then be master of them. Suppose a man has courage in his convictions and feels within himself that he is going to win, yet as he encounters obstacles which seem to be as immovable as a stone wall, and as he is constantly tossed about by huge waves of discouragement and temporary failure, his courage and confidence in himself begin to weaken. Once he starts to weaken failure is inevitable. But the real man about whom I am speaking does not begin to doubt and give way. He has persistency of efforts and goes back again and again until his goal is finally attained. Mohammed, when he started to pr.each his doctrine of the one God, was surrounded by millions and millions of people who daily offered sacrifices to wooden and stone images. He had only three followers, his wife, his nephew, and his slave. First his friends came to him and warned him not to preach against the gods of his native people. Then they threatened him and insulted him, punished him and persecuted him in many ways. They called him crazy and even planned to take his life. His soul was filled with great thoughts and in his mind's eye he could see great results from the spread of his doc-
trine. He refused to be discouraged or silenced, but said, "If the sun stood at my right hand and the moon at my left, ordering me to hold my peace, I would still declare, 'There is but one God.'" How could a man filled with such devotion and zeal give up and fail? Within a few years after this the religion and empire of Mohammed spread over a huge portion of the idolatrous world, and today two hundred million voices cry with religious faith and devotion, "There is but one God, and MohamJned is the prophet of God." He refused to be discouraged, and by repeated effort overcame circumstances, difficulties, and natural impediments, and is today considered one of the greatest religious reformers in all history.
And now, lastly, I would say that the man who dares is a man of ideals. His mind is not centered on the drab and phlegmatic events of his time, but he looks through the smoke and cloud of the present into a shining, brilliant future. He has hitched his wagon to a star. He does not become old, but remains young and true to the ideals of his youth, holding fast to them with a strong and unwavering grip from the first rising of the sun until it sinks to rest behind the western hills, and the silver stars come out and ornament the heavenly crown of night.
What then is the difference between the outstanding men of today and yesterday and those who live and die unknown and unpraised? It is not a difference in intelligence, but in those characteristics of courage of conviction, confidence in self, persistency and ideals.
The great were young as you, Dreaming the very dreams you hold, Longing, yet fearing to be bold, Doubting that they themselves possessed The strength and skill for every test, Uncertain of the truths they knew, Not sure that they could stand to fate With all the courage of the great.
Then came a day when they Their first bold venture made, Scorning to cry for aid. They dared to stand to fight alone, Took up the gauntlet life had thrown, Charged full-front to the fray, Mastered their fear of self, and then Learned that our great men are but men.
Oh, Youth, go forth and do! You, too, to fame may rise; You can be strong and wise. Stand up to life and play the man--Y ou can if you'll but think you can; The great were once as you. You envy them their proud success! 'Twas won with gifts that you possess.
* Poem by Edgar A. Guest.
B. U. DAVENPORT
You !---with curls and stilted pose, Billboard cheek and silken hose, Penciled brow and daring clothes ;
Do you really think you're pretty?
For if you bait with trash The trout will pass it by; The nibbles that you'll get Will come from smaller fry.
· .Oh! we'll play a while with you, Laugh and dance and bill and coo, Steal and beg a kiss or two, While you "hold us in your hand."
To chase your fickle wish Shows us up as fools; The better way to rule man Is to make him think he rules.
When the little game is done; When we tire of the fun; Then we'll leave you, painted one, And we'll try to find a girl.
For man is wondrous strange; On this I'll place a bet That what he'd rather have Is what he cannot get.
Girl whose cheeks are nature's own, In whose gentle heart has grown Understanding. She alone Will I beg to share with me.
For faces fade when hearts Beat on---that is the key; Long and lasting love Is built on sympathy.
~bt awaltttting
R. E. GARST, '22
The characters : Doc, a college boy who falls in love; Lois, a college girl who finds herself; Dick, Doc's fraternity brother; Helen, Lois' room-mate; Tom, Harry and George, college men and good fellows; a doctor and a nurse.
ACT I-SCENE I
( A college room---poker game in progress with Tom , Dick, Harry and George playing---Doc sitting in corner under shade lamp reading.)
Tom: I guess you'll have to go back to matching pennies, Dick. You can't do anything else. Now that game last night---
Dick: Ye Gods, Tom. If you don't lay off ragging me about that game I'm going to throw you in the lake. Tom: Anybody that would lead a ten spot with the ace out!
Dick: Well how' d . I know the darn thing---
Harry: Oh shut up, you two, and open the pot.
Dick: I can't do it. Never do have any luck. Say, Doc, want to take my hand?
Doc: Nope, but you'd better get out of the game.
Dick: That would bust it up. I'll take another whirl at it. \Nish I had some luck.
George: Listen to the old gloomster. I've got a pair , of openers. How many, Harry?
Harry : Three, old thing. They play and Dick throws down his cards disgustedly.)
Dick: Let's call it off, fellows. My name is mud tonight.
Tom: And every other night. By George, you ought to get a book of rules.
George: Don't take my name in vain, son. Gimme a smoke. .
( They light cigarettes dnd dispose themselves about the room and begin to talk.)
Harry: Say, Dick, want to do something big and clean before you die?
Dick (seriously) : Wish somebody would tell me how.
Harry : Wash an elephant.
Tom: Quit picking on Dick. He's not responsible. I hear he's taking Math III this year. (Groans.)
Dick: Only exposed, really.
Harry: Seriously, fellows, have you all heard the latest?
Dick: You bit this time, Tom.
Harry: No fooling. I hear that Lois has given Jimmy the air---frat pin · back and everything. That makes the third time she's done it to one fellow or another.
George: I never could quite figure her. I guess she's just a butterfly with nothing in her giddy head but a good time.
1
Doc (putting •down his book and lighting a cigarette) : I think you're wrong, George my boy. I admire that girl. I've never met her , but from the way she's acted several times I imagine she has a lot of character. I know how you fellows look at it, but take a look at her side of it.
George: Rave on, Socrates. Proceed with caution.
D oc: W ell, I don 't kn ow mu ch ab ou t th e et ernal feminine, but here's the way I figure it. Every woman is after happiness and men are merely incidents to her until she meets the one who can give it to her. ·
Harry: All very good as far as it goes. But I think she treats them pretty shabby.
Doc: But you'll admit, Harry, that it's foolish for a college girl to tie herself up for life. Nine times out of
ten the feilows haven't any intention of carrying an affair · like that to the extreme and yet they get sore if the girl doesn't stick by them. I know what boys will tell girls without meaning it, but they don't like to have their sweet nothings taken lightly. Anyhow I'd like to meet this girl.
Torn: You'll have your wish granted. I'll introduce you the first chance I get, at the shop tomorrow, maybe. But be careful , old strawberry, or you'll be the next victim.
George: Ho ·hum! I'm sleepy. Let's turn in, you burns, and see if we can keep from sleeping through more than two classes tomorrow.
( They begin to leave.)
Doc: Good night, fellows. Oh, Dick! I'd like to see you a minute.
(Exeunt all but Dick and Doc)
Dick: What can I do for you, Doc?
Doc: I thought you were going to cut out playing cards.
Dick: I did promise you to, Doc, but a little game now and then doesn't hurt.
Doc : It does hurt you. It's in your blood and you never knew when to stop. If you weren't my fraternity brother you could go to t~e devil and I wouldn't say a word . Now, Dick, I want you to cut it out. Will you?
Dick: I'm trying like the dickens. Stick to me, boy, and I'll make it.
Doc: That's the stuff. Talk it over with me whenever you feel like it. Good night.
SCENE II
(Four months later. Visitor's parlor at Woman's Callege. Enter Lois Webster and her room-mate, Helen.) ,
Helen: Have you a date tonight?
Lois : Yes. With Doc.
Helen: Good gracious! You two are certainly going fast. And lately you've been worried about something. I don't know what it is, but I can guess. Honestly, Lois, how much do you care for Doc? Or is it the same old story?
Lois: No; it isn't the same. Doc isn't like other boys have been, but I don't care for him in the way he wants me to. I honestly don't know whether I love him or not. That's what worries me. I guess I need something to wake me up.
Helen: Don't worry about it. Goodness knows it's easy enough to fall in love and out again if you know how. Well, here comes my man and yours, too.
( Exit Helen; enter Doc)
Doc: Hello, Lois. How's my little girl tonight. Haven't seen you since this afternoon. It's seemed like days.
Lois: Oh, it hasn't seemed very long. Let's go walking so we can talk better.
( They go out and stroll up and down on the quad.)
Doc ( after a long silence) : A penny for them, Lois. What makes you so silent tonight?
Lois: I've got to tell you something and I don't know how to say it.
Doc: I can guess what it's about, so go ahead. If it's worrying you you might as well tell me.
Lois : I do hope you'll understand, Doc. There are reasons and reasons why I ought not to tell you, but it's only fair. I don't care for you as I ought, or as you want me to, or as you say you care for me. Do you think we ought to go on like this if I feel that way?
Doc: It's up to you.
Lois : I do like you more than any boy I've ever known, Doc. But I don't think I can sail under false colors any longer.
Doc: Liking isn't loving, Lois, no matter how strong it is.
• I( '
Lois: ·I know it : ' And I know I've hurt you, but y0u'll get over it ·and fall , in love with someone else in a mon.th.
Doc: That's hardly worthy of you. , But ( rather bitterly) I guess I'll get over it, just like the other fellows. The only trouble is I'm not made -like they are where girls are concerned. If you only---well, I guess I needn't say anything more. I hope you'll never be sorry. Shall we go in?
( They walk silently to the door.)
I suppose this must be good-bye. We'll ·see each other, of course, but it won't ever be quite the same. Good-bye, Lois. '
' (Exit Doc)
Lois: Doc -! Doc! Come back! Oh, what a man he is! I know he'll never come back again.
( Exit crying)
SCENE III
(Doc's room. Dic8 present, alone.)
, l
Dick: I wish Doc would hurry up and come in. Since he 1met Lois Webster ·r-doh't see 'nitich of him and when I do he's thinking about her. Didn't think the old boy could fall so hard for a girl.
' (Enter Doc) '
• 1 Hello, Doc. Just came up tb see you. Why, what's wrong? You lobk like you've lost your last friend. · Doc t Sit down, Dick. I'll talk to you in a minute. I want to think. · ' ' (Sits back 'in a Morri,s chair with his hand over his eyes. Silence for awhile.) ' ' ·
Well, Dickie. •I'm just like all the rest, no better, no worse,-but hit ·a bit harder than they were, I fancy. Lois told me how she felt about it tonight. Don't blame her. She 1s· right, of course, but I can't quite sympathize with her position, in spite of my theories. I had no idea a thing like this could hurt so.
I
Dick ( sitting down on the arm of Doc's chair) : Buck up, old fellow. Lord knows I'm sorry. , Rut I can't help much in a case like this. , No one can. It's up ,to you and you must be man enough to be worthy of your love for her. You are, I know, because you've helped me as no one but a man could. I'll stick by you as you have me.
Doc: Thank you, Dick. I know , you will. I hadn't figured it out quite that way. In fact, I haven't been able to think at all. But you're right. Now about you, want anything special?
Dick: My troubles don't matter now. You have enough of your own. I'll run along and let you turn in. So long. (Exit)
Doc : Good old Dick. There never was a truer friend. And I need him more than he ever needed me. Oh, Lois! Lois! If only you could have cared. ( Drops into a chair and his head falls on his folded arms.)
ACT II---SCENE I
( Group of girls gathered in visitors' parlor. Phone rings. Helen, Lois' room-mate, answers.)
.
Helen : Hello ! Woman's College--This is Helen Abbott--Oh yes, - Dick--Lois ?--Yes, she's here--Yes, I'm listening--What !--Doc--Not expected to live--Oh, poor Lois--Y es, I heard you--Stuart Circle--Oh, Dick, do I have to tell her ?--Oh, I can't! I can't !--Can't you do it? --Very well, then, if I must. (Hangs up.) Oh, Lois! Come here. Close that door and listen to me. Don't interrupt. Doc has been badly hurt---
Lois: Not my Doc! Helen! Say it isn't my Doc!
Helen ( speaking very rapidly) : Stop, Lois, or I can't go on. Yes, it's your Doc. Dick just told me. Automobile accident in West End---Doc saved a little girl from being run over and was hit himself. Dick says it was the bravest thing he ever saw. He's at Stuart Circle Hospital.
Lois: I must go to him. Oh, my poor Doc. Get my things, Helen, and come with me. I'll need you. Hurry! I'll get a machine. (Exeunt)
SCENE II
(Four days later. Private hospital room. Lois and nurse present)
Nurse: Doctor Jordan says he seems to be improving. He should be conscious at almost any minute now. Miss Webster, you should go lie down and get some rest. I'll call you if he becomes conscious. You must go.
Lois: Call me the minute he opens his eyes. You will, won't you?
Nurse: Yes, but it may be some time yet. He's ·still slightly delirious.
Doc ( in delirium) : Lois ! Yes, I'll be there at four--N o, Dick, you'll have to stop. It's in your blood, boy--But she's different, I tell you---This must be good-bye, Lois. I hope you'll never be sorry---Wait a minute, Dick; I'll have to think this out by myself. You're right, I guess---That's hardly worthy of you, Lois, but I guess I'll get over it. Oh, that's a lie. I never shall---Stick to it, Dick, and talk it over with me whenever you want to--Oh, my dear, if you only could have cared---
( Lois goes out quietly, drying her eyes. An hour later Doc's eyes ftutter open for a brief moment and he sighs weakly. The nurse calls Lois. She enters and runs to the bedside.)
Lois ( stroking his forehead) : Doc, dear, open your eyes. Don't you know me? It's Lois.
Doc ( in a whisper) : Lois. Where am I? What are you doing here? I can't seem to remember.
Lois: Don't bother now. Rest and we'll talk as soon as you're able. Go to sleep now.
( She leans over him and kisses his lips.)
SCENE III
(A Week Later at the Hospital.)
Doc: The doctor says I won't be up for a month, Lois. That's just my luck right in the middle of the term.
Lois: Don't worry about it. I want to talk about ourselves if you'll let me, Doc. I never realized what you had come to mean or how much I cared for you until it all happened and you never came to see me anymore. I felt like something had gone that I could never replace. The days were strangely empty when I knew that you wouldn't come. I think it needed this to wake me up, don't you? And, Doc, dear, I never realized how much you cared until I heard you talking in your delirium. How cruelly I must have hurt you. Can you ever forgive me? And, Doc---I---I do love you. Won't you . believe me and forget the bitter part that has passed?
Doc : I can, Lois, and I do. You had almost knocked all the faith in girls out of me, but I do believe you. And love will be all the bigger and better after these hard weeks. Sit down here, dear, where I can see you better. And to think that I almost lost you.
Lois: Don't think of it, please. We belong to each other now and we'll never let each other go.
Doc: Amen to that!
SCENE IV
(Doc's Room)
Dick: I swear, Doc, this is the best thing that's happened in three months. Lord, it's good to see you back again. Are you entirely well?
Doc: Yes. Entirely well and very, very happy, Dick. Haven't you heard?
Dick: About Lois? Oh yes! That's great and you deserved it every bit.
I
Doc : And you, Dick?
Dick: I've quit entirely, Doc, thanks to you.
Doc: Not to me. To yourself. I wasn't here to help you for a couple of months and it took the man in you to pull through. I'm heartily glad, Dick, for your sake and for mine.
Dick: It sure pays to stick to the belief in true manhood, doesn't it, Doc?
Doc: And to your faith in the eternal feminine.
~prap of J,dtotrope
THELMA HILL,
'23
She was bored. For two long, tiresome hours she had stood in the stuffy, dimly-lighted schoolhouse, meeting and chatting with an endless stream of people. At first it had promised to be interesting, for they were different, and there were so many odd types. But two hours can lengthen out interminably! As she sighed onto a weaklegged stool, she felt like the pert polly-parrot at the grocery store who gliby shrieked at every newcomer, "Howdy," and she also felt it would be a · relief to add another of his sayings 1 "Let Polly be; he wants to think." She gazed stupidly at the throng of village folk, swaying and shifting before her tired eyes. Suddenly she spied one lone, little, old man, and oh! how uncomfortable he was. He stood awkwardly, shyly, shifting from one foot to the other, looking out half expectantly with clear, bright, little eyes over the chattering clusters of people. His rusty black suit, with its long frock-coat, was neatly brushed, but the baggy trousers drooped dismally over the heels of his square-toed shoes. With one knotted hand (but how steady it was!) he nervously patted a stray lock and surreptitiously pulled out a huge, oldfashioned gold watch. She wanted to meet him, to know him. She wanted, above all, to make those funny little eyes smile, and were those fine wrinkles at their corners laugh wrinkles ·or squint wrinkles? She hurried over to the minister's wife to beg information. Looking through the window, they saw him climb easily into a low-topped buggy and drive the plump, sleek, dreamy-looking horse slowly out of the school yard.
"Why, that's David Cuttle, child. Haven't you talked to him? He's quite a curiosity in the village. A dreamy,
silent, old ·myster:y. Complex because of his simplicity, probably."
* * * * * *
It was just a day for frisky butterflies; delicious, little, puffy clouds here and there on the bluest of blue skies; inquiring peeps of baby birds; and for big clumsy humans to lounge, talking idly and gazing drowsy-eyed at the village bus, the parrot across the way, or even just wondering how that fly could crawl upside down, what was this and what made that.
The sun shone through the one large window and open door of the tiny shop, touching and, in an instant, changing the rows and rows of watches---big ones, little ones, middle-sized ones---into bright spots of gold and silver. One inquisitive ray sat upon the face of the big dingy clock on the wall, which looked down haughtily upon its lesser brethren. For was not it a well-regulated trusty friend, and did not most of them stare stupidly back with their hands pointing at every conceivable hour and minute, abandoned because they had proved unfaithful? The brightest spot, however, · and the one in which the sunlight seemed to rejoice most, was a shining pale, darkened only in one place by a single lock, clinging heroically to its inhospitable domicile. With a knotted, steady hand, the owner pried into the innermost parts of a large, gun-metal watch. His tiny figure, with its threadbare, red velvet smoking jacket, was bent almost double as he perched upon a high battered old stool. One gray-patched knee was drawn almost up to his chin; the other square-toed shoe methodically tapped a loose plank iri the rough floor, which broke in rudely on the dignified tones of the old clock. Suddenly, with a quick movement of his bald-head, he glanced at a young girl who sat curled up on the doorstep carelessly twirling a piece of heliotrope in her fingers. With one eye screwed up grotesquely in order to hold the oddly shaped magnifying glass in place, he smiled slowly to himself, pushing up delicious,
little, crinkly wrinkles at the corners of his bright, brown eyes. ( She had been so glad that they were laugh wrinkles.) As his gaze rested upon the heliotrope, his smile gradually faded, he half opened his mouth as if to speak, then with a weary sigh returned to the complexities of the internals of the watch, tapping regularly the loose plank in the floor.
"What does heliotrope remind you of, David?"
David Cuttle jumped visibly and shot an inquiring glance in the girl's direction.
"Why now, and what makes you ask me that, Miss Betty?"
" Because there's so very much of it in your garden. A little marigold, some heliotrope; a few bachelor buttons, some heliotrope; a patch of bleeding hearts, more heliotrope. Why even your mint bed is surrounded by heliotrope."
He looked beyond the girl, through the door, and his eyes sought and lingered in the midst of a beautiful rich heliotrope bed. A far-away look crept into the bright old eyes, and with one rough hand, he thoughtfully smoothed the lonely lock The plank was still. The watch, stripped of its vitals, lay unheeded. A bee buzzed noisily in and left as abruptly. The clock ticked slowly and majestically. Unexpectedly the girl turned.
"Why, David Cuttle, I do believe you were dreaming! Y ou---why, I thought you had your dreams only in your garden, when you looked so deeply into the souls of your flowers and listened to their fairy talk"
David looked abashed and reached hurriedly and nervously for the time-piece and his instruments.
"Perhaps and perhaps," he murmured. Again the tapping the loose board.
The girl stared quizzically at his bent head. Finally she exclaimed, "I don't see why you are called a mystery! I've known you for ages now ( why it's been almost six weeks!) and I think you're just a---a---a---well, you're
,.,..:... ) . ' a dear, with a fairy imagination and a heart full of love for folks, all hitched on to wheels and springs and watches and things," she adoed a bit shyly. . David's face beamed at her naive little speech, and the little crinkles romped delightedly, hiding all of his eyes---but th ~ ,sparkles just would peep through. But he denied all connection with a mystery.
"Just because I don't have a visible skeleton, they're trying to make me one, I reckon. Folks are powerful queer---particularly village folk, and it seems as now they've run out of gossip material and are trying to patch up a yarn out of odd scraps of me for a bit of variety," he suggested whimsically.
"No, I do believe you could tell just wonderful things, for what do you whisper to your flowers? They all look so knowing, particularly that tall pink hollyhock peeping in at you now. She looks at me with such a superior air from behind the folds of her frilled bonnet, and I'm not so sure ,but that I dislike her! I'm a weeny bit jealous of your flowers, David," she ventured wistfully.
David Cuttle for years had lived alone. He was known and loved by all the villagers, but, as Tim, the grocer, so often remarked, "Dave Cuttle's a queer cuss. Ef it ain't tinkerin' with watches, it's foolin' with books and l'arning, and the rest of the time, you kin jest bet he's out 'tendin' and whisptrin' to. them goldarned flowers of his'n." Just so, he passed his life in an undisturbed serenity, as a clear tiny stream, n,mning calmly and evenly through the choppy bubbling current of the village life. He had been lonesome, frightfully lonesome, and he had wanted so to talk to somebody. Flowers were charming listeners, but at.times they were sadly unFesponsive. And here was Miss Betty! .She had understood his belief in the wee souls of flowers and his love for them. She had listened eagerly to ·the bits of love he told of the flowers' short delicately ;--scented lives. She had · even had tales to tell in return of the secrets . she had heard the
violets whisper, the funny, funny jokes those giggly little pansies told, the .................. the bleeding hearts sighed and the wonderful poems the lilacs murmured. · So why not?
Climbing down agilely from his high seat, he walked avound and settled himself upon the doorstep by the young girl's side.
"Jealous of my flowers' secrets, Miss Betty?" he queried, resuming the conversation as if it had not been broken off. "TD think that anybody should be interested really ' in anything pertaining to David Cuttle! It's really ---it does a body good, you know, and I'm going to talk to you here among my flowers---just as if you were one of 'em. Youth isn't so very different from flowers, Mis •s Betty, when you come to think of it. It carries its head high and looks toward the sun, smiling and expecting, sometimes, a heap from folks. Flowers and youth always meet you half way if you do 'em a good turn. So young, so fresh and so--so---so hopeful." He paused, pulled a piece of heliotrope which grew close by the step arid held it tenderly, caressingly in the palm of his rough, steady old hand. The big clock ticked monontonously, exaggerating the silence.
·• "I haven't always been just 'old' Dave Cuttle,' " he resumed finally, "there was the time when youth claimed me and I lived and idled and---and--loved."
He stopped, rested his elbows on his knees and gazed into the very heart of the slip of heliotrope.
"And that's my secret. Forty years ago, it was," he continued reminiscently, "and it is all as fresh and dear to me as this bit of flower. She was a tiny siip of a flowerlike giirl, and oh ! how I loved her ! We had grown up together, and I had loved her from the first time I pulled her rag doll out of the creek, and she had lisped shyly that she was glad her doll had fallen in---and did I believe in fairies? I think if I had said no, she would have tmmed her tiny nose yet farther into the air, and I would have been ostracized. But, of course, I did! Hadn't I
seen them in the flowers, in the trees, on the white downy clouds---everywhere? I saw them even then in the curls on her baby head, and one nestled in the corner of her red dimpled mouth. That one proved to be my rival, and 'twas a hard-fought contest!" ·
He hesitated for a moment, a smile suddenly saddening his wrinkled old ·face, and creeping up to his eyes, the sadness lingered there in their depths.
"I always like to believe that there's been existence before this one and that we had always loved. Perhaps we had been love-birds, perhaps she had been a lovely lady and I her chamiop; perhaps---"
His voice trailed away, and he sat deep in his own thoughts visualizing the many happy reincarnations. The young girl, serious now, her eyes big and sympathetic, leaned toward him. He smoothed his hair, blinked his bright tittle eyes sharply as if to call himself back to the real world, and again took up the thread of his story.
"We took long woodsy walks. We looked for the first wild .flowers and baby birds. We gloried in the miniature fern-like moss. We laughed at the _sandy toadstools. Particularly did she love the cool shade of the pine woods. She used to say the pine trees were great, tall, quiet Indians, and the sighing and the soughing of the wind, as it murmured through their lofty tops, were the whispers of the Indians, telling stories of mystery and adventure to the fairies and wood eloss lolling on the breezes. One tall majestic pine she called her own, and there we always rested before we turned back. The last time we wandered together through the sweet-smelling stillness of this pine cathedral, she made believe that some day she would be a spray of heliotrope ( she loved it best of any) and I would be a brown pine needle to stay close by her side in the peace and quiet of her pine trees forever and ever."
The village mail man rattled by in a jingling, clinking automobile. The young girl frowned at this interruption,
and David waited. He sighed, pulled his small body more closely together and rested his wrinkled cheek against the hand that held the heliotrope so carefully.
"'Twas a day for the fairy-folk, and I felt, as we walked, that tiny bodies flitted around us and listened and nodded their heads---and I was afraid. And they did heed her wish, for soon they came and bore her away from me, and with her went my youth,-my hope, my very life. There's a little grave in the village cemetery with a modest stone. But underneath the big, protecting pine, her pine, is a tiny spot of heliotrope, nestling close against the friendly, old trunk."
A mist had dimmed his bright eyes, and he turned his head toward his sympathetic little garden and quickly brushed his hand across his face.
"There come days when she calls in the flower-scented breezes, in the carols of the birds, in the blue of the sky, in the soft tints of a fading sunset, or in a baby's smile, and I always, always go, for I know she's waiting for me on the edge of the wood, and she mustn't be disappointed. I wander there in the sweet-scented stillness, listening to her murmurings, and I feel her caresses brushing my faded old cheeks like the gossamer wings of fairy butterflies. And at times," his voice dropped almost to a whisper, "as I leave, I fancy, I hear her sighing plaintively in the zephyrs, 'How-w-w lo-o-ong? How-w-w lo-o-ong ?' And I'll keep her waiting but a bit now, my dear. There'll soon be a big brown pine-needle close by the side of the lonely little heliotrope in the peace and quiet of the big pine woods."
His voice died away in a half-sigh. A big tear dropped and glistened on the bit of heliotrope in the girl's hand. A l;>reeze,laden with the odor of the modest little flower, wafted across their faces.
"Only you and my flower-folk know---only you and my flower-folk. And they dont' tell---no, they don't tell."
The big clock ticked untiringly on, monontously, pon•derously, "I know, I know, I know."
' 1!rbtrt3ls e!:lanof ~tn
HARRY RIDDLE, '23
There is a clan ·of men on the highway of life, And never a· care they own, Just wanderers, the joyous kind, With the wanderlust bred in the bone. They are strong, they are brave, they're true; For praise or a stake they never try. Just wanderers on the great highway, To the land of by and by . .I
They'll be the first to give a hand To a wanderer from the fold,' Yet they'll never pitch their tents In life's great field of gold. They wander on in life's great way; Jubilant, joyous they pass fame by. They wander to a distant goal alone: To a land of by and by.
Yet somehow they are not far wrong, Strong, for the stuff called truth, you see. Lone men, with thoughts of their own, Believers of a Man from · Galilee. You'll find the.m on the foam or /food, Where there is need to do or die, For they are men who wander the clean, hard highway, To the land of by and by.
L. w. BRYCE, '23
It is natural for the mind of man to attempt to explain a fact that cannot be easily understood by the most likely theory based upon what is known. The people of early times were not able to understand certain things that went on about them, and they conjured up explanations to suit their fancy. Even today we find people jumping at conclusions about a great many things they cannot understand. For instance, a farmer goes into his cow barn in the morning just in time to see a snake slip away. His cows are excited and give very little milk. Without any more investigation the farmer concludes that the snake has "milked" his cows, when, as a matter of fact, the small yield of milk is only the result of the excited condition of the cows. The farmer's conclusions were perfectly natural, as were those of the people who saw forms of life around them and could explain their origin only by spontaneous generation.
So far as we know, the idea of spontaneous generation originated among the early Greeks. It might be well to say that by spontaneous generation we mean the spontaneous generation of living matter from lifeless matter. The subject has its serious and its amusing side, serious because it came from the minds of scientific men as their honest conclusions, and amusing because of the absurdity of some of their examples. We must also distinguish between the two forms of spontaneous generation: the first, of the origin of first life on the earth, and the second, of the origin of higher forms.
As to the origin of first life upon the earth we find that the ancients held beliefs very much like our present theories. Analimenes, one of the earliest Greek philos-
ophers, believed that life was first formed from a primadial slime of earth and water acted upon by radiant energy from the sun. This theory is very similar to one advanced by Henry Fairfield Osborn a few years ago in his "Origin and Evolution of Life."
The battle, however, as raged around the second phase together with this aspect will be the theme of this article which is a history of the number of rises and falls of the idea.
Between 495 and 435 B. C. we find Empedocles holding to spontaneous generation. Empedocles believed that plants were first formed and from them, after many trials, animals sprang.
Aristotle ( 384-322 B. C.), the father of natural history, had some interesting ideas about the origin of -certain forms. Looking into his "Natural History of Animals" we find some amusing statements:
"So also some animals are produced from animals of similar form, the origin of others is spontaneous and not from similar forms."
"In the sea is a kind of lice growing on fishes; but these do not originate in the fish, but in the mud."
"There are also other minute animals, some of which occur in woolen goods; as moths, which are produced in the greatest abundance when the wool is dusty, and especially if a spider is enclosed with them, for this creature is thirsty, and dries up any fluid which may be present. This worm also occurs in garments and on the whole they occur in everything, so to say, which from being dry become moist, or being moist becomes dry."
Aristotle did not write these statements as a joke; they were the conclusions of a scientist, the author of the "Perfecting Principle," the first man to conceive of a single chain of evolution, the first man to conceive of life as the function of an organism. We of today cannot afford to ridicule Aristotle's mistakes when we still find people who believe that frogs and eels are generated from mud, and who believe in the hoop snake myth.
Lucretius, a Roman who lived between 99 and 55 B. C., wrote in his "De Renum Natura":
"Plants and trees arise directly out of the earth in the same manner that feathers and hair grow from the bodies of animals. Living beings certainly have not fallen down from Heaven, nor as Analagros supposed, have land animals arisen from the sea. But as even now many animals under the influence of rain, and the heat of the sun, arise from the earth, so under the fresh, . youthful, productive forces of the younger earth, they were spontaneously produced in large numbers. In this manner were first produced birds, from the warmth of spring; then other animals sprang from the womb of the earth, since first mounds grew up from which people sprang forth, for they had been nourished within. In an analagous manner these young earth-children were nourished by springs of milk." This passage besides dealing with spontaneous generation shows the terrestrial idea of the origin of life.
After the decline of the Greek nation their philosophy was kept alive by the early churchmen. We find that St. Augustine held the Greek idea of spontaneous generation. But he took a sort of middle ground between abiogensis and biogensis. Augustine believed that there exist two kinds of germs of livings things : visible, placed by the Creator in plants and animals; and invisible, which become active only under certain conditions and they produce p~ants and animals without the aid of any existmg orgamsm.
The period between Aristotle and the seventeenth century is filled with amusing incidents connected with the theory of spontaneous generation. The writers of this period were merely compilers and did very little investigating for themselves. It is reported that a great controversy arose over the number of teeth possessed by horses. Each side of the opposing forces attacked the opinions of other writers on the subject, but no one
thought of settling the argument by going out and counting a horse's teeth. Spontaneous generation was in the class with horses' teeth; _most people believed it to be a fact, but no one thought of trying to prove or disprove it. Scientists, as well as the common people, believed that frogs and toads were generated from mud, and that a great many other animals came into being by abiogensis. The upholders of this belief were scornful of those who doubted their opinions and wrote stinging rebukes to the doubter,s. ·
In the seventeenth centur,y Alexander Ross, commenting on Sir Thomas Brown's doubts as to whether mice may be bred by putrefaction, wrote:
"So may we doubt that in cheese and timber worms are generated, or beetles and wasps in cow dung, or butterflies, locusts, shellfish, _snails, eels al)-dsuch life be procreated of putrefied matter, which is to receive the form of that creature to which it is by formative power disposed. To question this is to question reason, sense and ex:perience. If he doubts this let him go to Egypt, and there he will find the fields swarming with mice begot of the mud of the Nylus to the great calamity of the inhabitants."
During thi s period the belief was prevalent that the goose-barnacle, a crustacean, transforms into the barnacle-goose. If you are familiar with the goose-barnacle it is easy. to see how this theory came about. This barn~cle is attached to timbeP by a neck-like structure very much like the neck of a goose. From the tail end of the animal's body is extended tentacles similar in appearance to tail feat h ers. Sylvester Giraldus, in his Relations Concerning Ireland, written in 1187, describes this reputed transformation as follows:
"Chap. U, Of Barnacles which grew from fir timber and their nature.
"There -are likewise here (keland) many birds called. harnacles, which , nature produces in a wonderful manner
out o-f her ordinary course. They -resemble the marsh geese, but are smaller. Being at first gummy excreiscences from pine beams floating on the water, and then enclosed in shells to secure their free growth, they hang by their beaks, like sea-weeds attached to the timber. JBeing in process of time well covered with feathers, they either fall into the water or take their flight into the free air, their nourishment and growth being supplied, while they are bred in this very unaccountable and curious manner, from the juices of the wood in the water. I have often seen with my own eyes more than a thousand minute embryos of birds of this species on the seashore, hanging from one piece of timber , covered with shells, and already formed. No eggs are laid by these birds the hen never sits on eggs in order to hatch them; in no corner of the world are they seen to pair, or build nests. Hence, in Ireland, bishops and men of religion make no scruple of eating these 'birds on fasting days, as not being .flesh, 'because they are not born of flesh, but these men are curiously drawn into error. For, if any one had 'eaten part of the thigh of our first parent, which was really flesh, although not born of flesh, I should not hold him g-uiltless of having eaten flesh. Repent, 0 unhappy Jew."
Later, in 1676, Sir Robert Murry reported his observations on the barnacle question to the Royal Society of England:
"In many shells I opened, I found a perfect Sea-Fowl; the little Bill like that of a Goose; the Eyes marked; the Head, N eek, Breast, Wings, Tail, and Feet, formed; the Feathers everywhere perfectly Shaped, and Blackish Colored; and the Feet like those of other Water Fowl, to the best of my Remembrance. The biggest I found upon the Tree, was but about the size of the Figure ( an inch long) ; nor did I ever see any of the little Birds alive; nor meet with any Body that did; only some credible Persons have assured me that they have seen some as big as their Fist."
As remarkable as this transformation was recognized to be scientific men accepted it for a long time. The first man to attempt to prove or disprove the theory of spontaneous generation was Redi, an Italian. The results of his experiment in 1668 dislodged one stone from the foundation of .abiogensis. Redi simply exposed several pieces of meat to the air; one he covered with parchment, another with fine wire net, and another he left uncovered. The uncovered specimen decayed and maggots developed; the same protected by wire gauze had fly eggs deposited on the wire; and the one covered with parchment decayed, but with no indications of maggots. Therefore, Redi concluded that maggots in decaying meat are hatched from eggs duly laid by adult flies. He was very careful a's to making a generalization from this one experiment, but he suggested that all cases of supposed spontaneous generation were really the . result of the introduction of germs from without Redi's work disproved spontaneous generation and the theory was practically wiped from the minds of scientists. It has been said that the discovery of the microscope set the scientific world back a hundred years. Whether this is true or not the discovery of bacteria and infusoria by Lunwenhoke in 1675 threw biology back to abiogensis. Doubts were entertained as to the origin of these micros~opic forms and opinions were advanced that they were spontaneously generated. It was believed that in these small forms was the beginning of life, the place where inorganic matter was changed to living microscopic organisms. The study of the subject from this time on is chiefly intere sting for the attempts to disprove the theory. In 1748, Needham, a Roman Catholic priest, published the results of his experiments with microscopic forms. His experiments were as simple as those of Rodi. He boiled meat juices and sealed them in bottles by means of mastic. The bottles containing the juices were then boiled to kill any organisms that they might contain and
55 were then set away to cool. In due time these fluids became contaminated by microscopic forms. As Needham believed that he had killed all germs by heating, he concluded that these organisms were spontaneously generated.
Here it might be well to bring in the theories of speculative evolutionists of the eighteenth century. The writings of these men give us some of the comedies of science. Among these writers was Duret, the mayor of a town in France; Kircher, a priest; Didnot, a political writer, and Maillet, a French consul. The only trained scientists of this group being Maupertins, an astronomer, and Orken, a professor of natural history in the University of Zurich.
Maillet ( 1656-1738) advanced the old Greek theory of pre-existing germs. He believed that these germs were pre-determined as to forms to which they should give rise, but the only forms which developed were those to which the changing environment was suitable. This idea, old as it was, shows how persistent was the Greek influence.
Duret in his Historic Admirables des Plantes, published in 1609, tells of a tree, "Not common in France, but frequently observed in Scotland ( so remote that no one was likely to investigate); from this tree the leaves falling and striking the water they become fishes and striking land they become birds."
Father Kircher, another write of fairy tales, describes certain orchids as giving rise to birds, and not being satisfied with this, adds that the same flower sometimes gives rise to small men.
After ·the publication of Neewham's work, spontaneous generation was considered a proven fact, at least so far as bacteria were concerned, and from 1748 to 1777 the subject rested. But in 1777 objections were raised to the methods used by Needham. It was not certain that air could not get into the vials sealed only with mastic. Neither did Needham have any record of temperatures to
which the juices were subjected, nor did we have any record of the duration of the boiling. Spallanzani then set to work to verify or disprove Needham's results. He put meat juices into flasks and hermatically sealed them; boiled them for three-quarters of an hour and set them away to cool. It was then known that organic fluids, when exposed to air, decompose, smell bad, become turbid, and are coated on top with a scum . Spallanzani's fluids remained unchanged and when examined contained no germs. He therefore concluded that these germs are not spontaneously generated.
Needham now raised the question as to whether substances boiled so long would not loose their germinative force. Spallanzani answered that nutrient fluids exposed to the air would become infected no matter how long they had been boiled.
The discovery of oxygen by Priestly in 1774 and the finding of the relation of oxygen to life brought about new doubts. Had not the heating of the-air in the closed flask so changed the oxygen that it had lost its life giving properties? This doubt grew until the subject was once again examined.
It had been shown that air when passed through sulphuric acid remained unchanged. In 1836 Franz Schulze and in 1837 Theodor Schwann carried on experiments; using this fact to test the question. Schulze put organic fluids in flasks closed with perforated corks into which were fitted glass tubes connected to bulbs containing sulphuric acid and other chemicals. The air was sucked into the flasks through the bulbs to remove any germs that might be floating in the air. Schwann's apparatus was similar to that of Schulze, except that the tubes entering the flasks were kept heated as an extra means for killing ,any organism in the air. Neither investigation found any sign of life in their fluids after treatment. These experiments proved that there is something in the air which unless removed would produce life in nu-
trient fluids. Helmholtz in 1843 showed that this something will not pass through a membrane, therefore it is a solid. /
Tyndall, commenting on the woPk of Schulze and 'Schwann, attributed their good results to the fact that the experimenters were working in comparatively pure -air, for he says 'that germs will pass unhurt through sulphuric acid in air bubbles. Tyndall states that in repeating these experiments he failed to get results.
Here -we might examine the beliefs of some of the scientists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Erasmus Darwin, Lamarck, and of the nineteenth century, Chambers.
Erasmus Darwin, in the Temple of Nat u re, published in 1802, displays his belief in spontaneous generation as follows: ,
"Hence without parents, by spontaneous birth, Rise the fi:rst,specks of animated earth."
Dr. Darwin restricted spontaneous generation to the lowest organisms only.
In his earlier works Lemarck rejected spontaneous generation, but later he wrote:
"In the waters of the ancient world, and at the present time, very small masses of mucliaginous matter were col'lected. Under the influence of light, certain elements, caloric and electric, entered these little bodies. These · corpuscles became capable of taking in and exhaling gases; vital movements began, and thus an elemental plant or animal sprang into existence. Possibly higher forms of life, such as infest the intestines, originate in this way. Nature is thus always creating."
Like Lemarck, Chambers in 1853, believed that spontaneous generation of lower forms is constantly going on.
After the work of Schulze and Schwann the question of spontaneous generation apparently rested. But Pouohet, in 1859, again opened the question. Pouchet's state of mind upon entering his investigation was not
conducive to unbiased conclusions. He set out to prove the truth of spontaneous generation, and prove it he did. He wrote in his H eterogensis: '
"It is evident to me that spontaneous generation was one of the means employed by Nature for the production of living beings, and I applied myself to the discovery of means by which one could place this phenomena in evidence."
Pouchet repeated the experiments of investigators who had preceded him, always with opposite results. He then set to work to devise a method to test the question. His method was as follows : He took a flask of boiling water and carefully sealed it. The neck of the flask was. submerged in a bath of mercury and broken off under the liquid. The bottle was now connected to an oxygen generator and the gas allowed to replace about half of the water. Now a straw, which had been heated for some time in an oven, was introduced by means of sterilized forceps, and floated on the surface of the water. A hay infusion was thus produced and in a few days forms of life appeared.
Pouchet was overjoyed. He pridefully wrote:
"Where does this life come from? It cannot have come from the water, which had been boiled, destroying all living germs that might have existed in it. It cannot have come from the oxygen which was prodm;ed at the heat of incandescence. It cannot have been carried by the hay which had been heated for a long period before introduced into the water."
Pouchet considered that he had proven spontaneous generation. His results set the scientific world afire and such a controversy raged that the Academy of Science appointed a committee to investigate the matter. In 1864 Pasteur demonstrated Pouchet's error before the academy. Pasteur showed, by passing a beam of light through the flask, that the surface of the mercury was covered with dust particles containing germs. And he
explained that, as hay bacteria are very difficult to kill, it was improbable that the heating destroyed all the germs.
Pasteur now set to work to disprove the theory, and using the apparatus, to be described, he settled the question. His apparatus was a flask with the neck sealed, and fitted with a crooked side tube. In this flask he put a nutrient fluid and boiled it. The ·steam condensing settled down, filling the crook so that no air could pass through. He now had a steril nutrient fluid in the flask, and as no germs could pass through the liquid in the bend the fluid remained uncontaminated. Pasteur concluded that bacteria were not spontaneously generated, but were carried through the air on dust particles.
It is interesting to note that Pasteur's Germ Theory of Disease was an outgrowth of his work on abiogensis. He also showed how foods might be preserved by boiling; this is used by housewives today in canning vegetables.
The only attempt to revive the theory of spontaneous generation was by Bastian in 1872. ·
The chief worker on abiogensis after Pasteur was Tyndall, a physicist. Tyndall used in his experiments optically pure air, i. e., air containing no floating particles: Tyndall's results supported the conclusions of Pasteur.
Today we do not believe in spontaneous generation, but we do believe that life at one time was spontaneously generated, but the conditions under which this occurred were vastly different from what they are today. Who knows but that in the future some one will produce protoplasm from its chemical constituents and then see that protoplasm take on life?
Qebttortal
"The old order changeth, giving way to the new." Out of the recent abundant discussion, varied suggestions and even high visions as to the past, present and future The Ne w Order of THE MESSENGER, have come, so far, two main results, consolidation and the Writers' Club. The former you see put into action here and now for the first time; the two separate departments for the two colleges, Richmond and W esthampton, are hereby abolished, and THE MESSENGERbecomes the literary magazine of the University of Richmond. The staff is convinced that this will be found a change for the better. Hereafter, instead of being in two unrelated bunches contributions will be placed with no thought as to their source , but only as to the part they can play in producing a consistent and harmonious whole. We hope that this system will result in a more artistic make-up of the magazine and will also give a certain spirit of unity which has been sadly lacking heretofore.
The second fruit of our labors, the Writers' Club, you have no doubt become acquainted with already through the mysterious signs, the verbal presentations, and the newspaper advertising which have been put forth recently to present the idea to everyone's mind. The results are not yet apparent, for the campaign is yet on and the competition just begun. It is hardly necessary to speak here of the organization, membership, requirements, etc. You can find that elsewhere, but rather of the purpose. To be quite frank with you the original object the staff had in initiating this literary club was purely and solely selfish. It was our aim to relieve in some measure the horrible method , which seemed beyond hope under the existing circumstances, by which THE MESSENGERmaterial was gathered. The editors had to hunt out and run
to earth articles not altogether unworthy to fill the ·allotted space. There was no way to discover when something good' had been written, unless it chanced into the hands of a member of the English department who mentioned it to some one on the staff. Now we are trying to put matters on a competitive basis, so that only the worthwhile work may find publication. Moreover, we feel that w~ have not been entirely selfish and narrow in our planning, but that this club will be of real value, even disregarding its benefit to THE MESSENGER.Here is a chance for all the students in the University who are seriously interested in the making of literature to get together and discuss their efforts and experiments, and help each other by mutual criticism. Then, too, there are successful writers living in town who would be willing to come out and make suggestions from their own experiences. Surely there must be at least ten people on each side of the lake to whom the idea of such an organization means something, is a step at least toward answering a very deeply felt need. It seems that this club should fill a niche which has been quite vacant up to this time; the boys have their literary societies, 'tis true, but they are concerned with verbal expressions; the girls have innumerable clubs, but none of similar interest to this. Here is a beginning, an attempt at progress and development. At least, there are great possibilities. Did you ever come to the end of an evening spent under pleasant social surroundings and feel as the time of departure drew near that you were just beginning to realize what a good time you were having? In There is somewhat of this sensation in the Conclusion experience of the editors of THE MESSENGERfrom Richmond College now, for with this issue of our magazine we lay down our pens ( or to be more modern we place the cover on the typewriter) and
turn the keys of the office over to others. We feel that we are just beginning to appreciate our good times because we are just beginning to see some of our hopes realized. To our Sister Editors across the lake and to those who shall take our places we leave the wish that the plans recently adopted may develop further and prove successful even beyond our expectations.
To those of Westhampton College who have cooperated so completely in the production of THE MESSENGER,to the Business Managers who have worked so constantly and been so ready with their helpful advice, to those who have made possible the magazine by their contributions, and to the members of the Faculty who have advised and encouraged us, we extend . our thanks. We know that there have been mistakes and that we have fallen short of our ideal for this year. Our request is that you will overlook the errors of the past and because of them give our successors the more hearty support as they enter upon their work. Our interest and best wishes accompany the new editorial staff as it enters upon its term of office with the new MESSENGER.
The Isaquenna, of Greenville Woman's College. In the Christmas number the stories are not bad, but show great similarity of subject, all being war stories, which do not seem to be quite appropriate for the season. The articles also show a monontonous sameness. The poetry is very good.
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Th<; Roanoke Collegian contains several works of merit. The poem "The Blues" is well written, but lacks some of the characteristics of a good poem. The poem "Love" gives one a true insight into the nature of God. "The Making of Dick Peyton" comes at the right moment. It will help any college man to read this wellwritten story, for it brings out the best in the Honor System. We get nothing new in "The Three Factors." "His Reward" is a well-developed story, full of pep and action.
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The Lantern, of Bryn Mawr. Here is an astonishing combination of school girlishness and maturity. The poetry seems to be the best feature.
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The Philomathean Monthly, of Bridgewater College. The stories have good plots which could be used to better advantage.
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The Furman Echo. The November issue contains a variety af articles. It has a number of good essays, a
short story, and several well-rounded poems.- The essays are mostly patriotic articles, but they are timely and hit the "Reds" and "Radicals" hard.
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The Lenorian could · well handle a short story and a good poem <Drtwo. The essays, all cut and dry, make the publication uninteresting. This issue shows little variety of material.
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Goucher Kalends. This is one of the best college magazines we have received this year. The stories are remarkably mature and polished. "N oveletto" and "The Real Things" deserve special commendation.
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The Wake Forest Student. The January issue shows a well arranged and splendid group of writings. "His Packard Four" is well written and .quite enjoyable. The "Japanese Question" contains a storehouse of knowledge on this debated subject. The Wake Forest Student is a fine magazine in every respect.
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Wellesley Callege M agazine---Excellent. The stories are clever and exceptionally well written.
• Sweet Briar Magazine. In this publication the cartons and dramatic pictures are unusual features.
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We also acknowledge receipt, among others, of The Wells College Chronicle, The Vassar Missillany Monthly, The William and Mary Magazine, The University Symposium, The Bessie Tift Journal and The Cornell Era.
