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About The Hesperian / (Lincoln, Neb.) 1885-1899 | View Entire Issue (May 1, 1893)
THE HESPERIAN ID mon8 "dos chovoux brim" and nothing oIbo. Turning it over ho found the following in scribod upon it: "SeltWing that there are many fair damsels who, had they the courage, would beg of me a lock of my hirsute ap pendage, (now fast leaving me) I have taken this means of plating -within the reach of some one who wishes it a memento of myself ." ;. ;, ", Tenderly the student replaced the packot between the pages of the venerable volume. 0, fate ! how cruel thou art betimes ! Six years at least has this token been awaiting a claimant. Speed the time when she shall come. WASTE BASKET WAIFS. More than one person this spring has thought that the proprietor of this earth's wind factory should get a patent upon his brand of agitated atmosphere. It seems unnecessary for the pow ers that be to endeavor to blow the poor sorrow ers of earth off without their consent. Dwellers here below often enough object to a longer lease on life when the air is calm as a poet's night. Modern criticism of poetry is externally liable to be sidetracked. The majority of critics seek to appreciate a poem intellectually. Now anyone ought to know that the intellect is but a means to an end in judging poetry. True poetry appeals to the imaginative side of man. True poetry will reach down into the depths of one's nature and stir up his feelings. If it happens to strike an empty void, it will take something along with it and the victim will be made aware of its pres ence by the jangling of its atoms against the walls of his mind. A really excellent poem should act upon the mind like a spark in a barrel of powder. One who is unable to appreciate this fact we are afraid is not destined to be a liter ateur. The student that always carries half a dozen note books is becoming a genciaj nuisance. He or she is an illustration of systematized ignorance. The note book student never knows anything, never remembers anything, never applies any thing. Everything the instructor says is immedi ately referred to the note book,nothing to the head. When it is borne in mind that the man of genius is the man of memory, the folly of such a method of work is apparent. The great musician is the one who has a strange memory for combinations of musical sounds; the great mathematician, the one who has a great memory for formulae and processes of handling them. Any method such as the excessive use of note books which tends to retard or neglect the development of the memory should be steadily disfavored. Hanging on the east wall of the reading room is a motto. The dust of ages has settled upon it. Its careless slant betokens the respect that has been paid it by people of the past ; its dimmed aspect betokens the rigor with which the storms of time have beaten against its uncovered face. Hanging just below it is a cross of hope which seems to bolster up the weightier and more care worn companion. What scenes have these pic tures viewed. How well they have performed their mission, tongue may never relate. They were intended to do a world of good. How much these two have done will never be re vealed. If the "Praise the Lord" of the one, and the lesson ol hope taught by the other have caused one person to go to chapel when he would have remained away had the mottoes remained unseen, who shall be so wicked as to affirm that these two pictures have not done their duty. I wish to speak a word of sympathy for the unfortunate friends of the man who is, or thinks he is literary. It is to these martyrs that the attempts of long haired, melancholy individuals are first submitted, and it often requires infinitely more tact, enthusiasm, and patience to read them than it does to write them. In the first place, it is very embarrassing to read a book before you know whether it is good literature or not, that is, before some publisher has deemed it worthy of photogravures and uncut edges. Secondly, when you are through with it, how are you going to sav whether it is good or not ; for you do not even know how many editions it will run through, or what the Boston Transcript will say of it, Thirdly, to decipher a literary man's handwriting often requires more brain work than a course in mathematics. What a delightful time of it Shakespeare's friends must have had, although he wrote rather clever things sometimes. Just think of it, " Hamlet," "Macbeth," "Richard III," Romeo and Juliet," and Othello," one right after another and all in that beautiful hand which William wrote. He was a sentimental Second Prep, whom we called Teddy. He was addicted to writing poetry, and he was very much in love with a little Prep, girl, whom we will call Miss Beal. Miss Heal was a most charming maiden, who, in those gentle spring days, always wore a little black shawl. One day, as Teddy was prowling about the library, it was in the old days when only a few daring souls ever entered there, he came upon that very dear little shawl, lying upon a chair back in the dark alcove of reference books, where the light of day never penetrates and the foot fall of man is seldom heard. Teddy took up the little black shawl tenderly, and laid it against his cheek and did all those other foolish and delight ful things that young men sometimes do. He fancied that he could even feel in it the scent and warmth of her glorious hair: He heard a step ;
