3 ' r i HESPERIAN STUDENT UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA. Vol. XII. LINCOLN, NEB., JANUARY; :5 188" No. VII. We are inclined to think that the local department of this paper is getting a little too personal for general comfort. "It may be fun for you but it is death to us" said the frogs to the small boy who was pelting them with stones. Personalities are the forlorn hope of the country editor who wants to make his paper spicy, but who has exhausted all other kind of wit. We hope our paper will not be obliged to descend to it. leave puns where they belong, with the slang of the street. When in the course of human events itbecomes nec essary for us and others interested in the success of the Student to buy books, clothing, stoves and coal, let us bear in mind that it is our duty to buy of those who advertise in its columns, and thus contrib ute toward its necessary expense. Some of the busi ness men of Lincoln advertise in the Student, others do not, and it is but justice that those who do, should as far as possible receive our patronage. Again the Regents have met and left the chair ofNatual Sciences vacant. There is no chair of greater importance in our school, and the students in the scientific course, who are regular in their classes have good grounds for grumbling, when neither Faculty nor Regents provide a competant teacher for the branches taught by that chair. How ever, we think it better to let a few suffer now, than to get a poor teacher to satisfy their wants, and hereafter hear a continual complaint, which in a short time will be echoed by the state press. Oliver Wendell Holmes says: "People who make puns are like wanton boys who put coppers on the railroad track. They may amuse themselves and other children, but their little trick may upset a freight train of conversation for the sake of a bat tered witticism." We thought no one used puns but students of the Nebraska State University, but Holmes evidently had the train of his conversation knocked off the track before he made the above sweeping denunciation. No matter how sublime or rediculous the subject of conversation may be, there is always a chance for the inventive punster, and he never fails to fling one at you, and you must laugh though you feel like kicking yourself for it. LetJ us Newspapers are generally supposed to mould pub lic opinion, and it is often amusing to see how each paper takes to itself the credit for the accomplish ment of whatever it may previously have advocated. It is now in order for the Student to claim the hon or of having aroused the regents to a sense of their shortcomings and of having persuaded them to elect for us a chancellor, because ever since the chancel lor's chair became vacant that fact was a fruitful topic for editorial writing, and the regents were time and again informed that the University of Nebraska was without a head. At last we have a chancellor, who comes to us with the highest recomendations, and we hope that all friends of the University will cooperate with him in making it a success. Under the management of Dean Hitchcock the University has had a larger attendance and has been, in every way more prosperous than ever before, with an able corps of teachers, and harmony all around there is no reason why we should not go on from victory unto victory. One of the most pressing needs of our University is a good gymnasium, one that will be a part of the University and under the charge of a professor of gymnastics. It is hardly necessary to enter into any discussion proving the necessity of physical exercise, or that bodily health and strength are not necessarily vulgar. In many colleges attendance upon gymnastic exer cises is required of the members of the college classes, because the studious, who are never seen out side of their rooms, who burn the 12 P. M. oil, and who never kick the foot-ball, are those who especi ally need the gymnasium, but never go near it. In the present financial conditon of the University we do not ask the Regents for a fifty-thousand dollar building, suppliedwith all the necessary apparatus, but we do suggest that the room now used for that purpose be fitted up on a moderate scale. If this is done we venture to say that the Athletic Association will revive, and the room be kept furnished in the future. JMPBteVSMHB Hfiy