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About The Hesperian / (Lincoln, Neb.) 1885-1899 | View Entire Issue (April 15, 1892)
THE HESPERIAN. establish your oratorical fame forever. The university a term by no means synonomous with the name of your association docs not ask that you win one victory: it has long since ceased to hope for that. It asks merely that you place yourselves where defeat shall not overtake you. He unselfish enough to injure your pride in order to save the university further humil iation! Withdraw from the state association, or else cease to compromise the good name of the university by incorporating it in the title of your association. At Cotncr nine per cent of the students belong to the local association; at the Wesleyan, fifty-nine per cent; at Doanc, one hundred per cent. Your association, however, numbers barely five per cent of the student body. The fact testifies to the good sense of about ninety-five per cent of the students. You have a chance now to revive the flagging interest in your asso ciation by seeking admission to the Northern Oratorical League, whose standard of oratory is essentially the same as yours. By transferring your membership to this league the number of offices to be passed around would be undimin ished. Defeat might still reward your efforts, but you would have sympathy where you now have none. Join the league, or try to join it. If you cannot do that, do the next best thing resign your membership in the state association, stop sawing the air, and go to sawing wood. Six hundred students will then rise up and call you blessed. T. F. A. Williams. LITERARY. WhatWeWunt. All hail the dawn of a new day breaking, When a strong armed nation shall take away The weary burdens from backs that are aching With maximum labor and minimum pay; When no man is honored who hoards his millions; When no man feasts upon another's toil, And God's poor, suffering, starving billions Shall share Ills riches of sun and soil. There is gold for all in the earth's broad bosom, There is food for all in the land's great store, Enough is provided if rightly divided; Let each man take what he needs no mort. Shame on the miser with unused riches Who robs the toiler to swell his hoard, Who beats down the wage of the digger of ditches, And steals the bread from the poor man's board. Shame on the owner of mines whose cruel And selfish measures have brought him wealth, While the ragged wretches who dig his fuel Are robbed of comfort and hope and health. Shame on the ruler who rides in his carriage, Nought with the labor of half-paid men Men who arc shut out of home and marriage And are herded like sheep in a hovel, pen. Let the clarion voice of the nation wake him To broader vision and fairer play, Or let the hand of a just law shake him Till tlic ill-gained dollars shall roll away. Let no man suffer under a mountain of plunder, Let no man suffer with want and colcl: We want right living, not mere alms-giving, We want just dividing of labor and gold. '' Author Unknown. In the year 1848, Whitman set out for a tramp through the mid dle, southern, and western states. In the large cities where he lived, and throughout his travels, he associated with and sympa thized with the lower classes. He felt so keenly for them that none recognized his superiority. It was his desire to right exist ing wrongs that lead to the composition of "Leaves of Grass" his most important work. By some, especially by English authors, his writings are pronounced good. Many censure his works. However, Ralph Waldo Emerson greatly admires Whitman and his writings. There is no conventionality about him, neither docs he, like most poets, allow his imagination to wander from the philo sophical. It is too soon to pass favorable or unfavorable com ments upon his works. It does not seem possible that a work, resulting from such true motives and feeling as .had Whitman, a work so natural and original, should fail to be appreciated. Aside from his writings, none can doubt the good he did those around him. At the last public gathering he attended, he recited this, his best poem, O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done; The ship has weathered every rack the prize we sought is won; Thcjport is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring: But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells; Rise up for you the flag is flung for you the bugle trills; For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths for you the shores arc crowding; For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning; Here, Captain! dear father! This arm beneath your head; It is some dream that on the deck You've fallen cold and dead. Mv Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still: My father does not feel my arms, he has no pulse nor will; The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed done. From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won; Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells! But I, with mournful tread, Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. The Good Gray Poet." One by one the pioneer authors of America are deserting a country which they have done so much to benefit. On March 25, at the age of seventy-three years, Walt Whitman, the good gray poet" peacefully breathed his last. He was a reporter and editor, and died at Camden, N. J., in the service of the Critic He received his education at the public schools in Brooklyn. Later he lived in New York and Brooklyn. For four years after the battle of Fredericksburg, he exposed himself to all kinds of hardships as army nurse. and Burning: Off the North Platte. A very broad and dry subject for an essay, was that old North Pasture in the fall, when it stood knee deep in tawny grass, with here and there bright patches of blue stem, or of purple sabre-grass to give it color. In the "draws" the brown iron weed and the yellow slough-grass lay in matted curls. It had been decided to take advantage of the first quiet evening to "burn off," and at last every thing seemed auspic ious. The grass was dry as tinder. Not a breath of wind was stirring. Even the flossy spider webs hung limp and motionless from the tips of the grass. What a hasty supper it was that evening! The boy that fed the horses that night did not stop to make old Prince whinney for his oats. The pigs, panic-stricken by the sudden clatter of a basket of corn over their heads, broke tor the opposite side of the pen with mighty uproar. Soon four small boys might be seen, trotting up the road in single file through the pasture, their bare feet rustling in the corn husks with which the autumn winds had filled the path. One of this silent group of fireman carries the matches, another a bucket, another an old sack or two, and the little fellow an old rubber boot. Surely a gallant department! The twilight is darkening into night. The hillsides that have glowed all day under the autumn sun, have Uken an