4
7&E IfESPEkiAti
certain kind of vulgarity, and lack of confidence in the imagi
nations of others, that leads a writer to end his book with the
the time worn formula, " l'hey lived happy ever after." No
doubt were "Passe Rose" to be dramatised, the end of the
play would be weak, but Mr. Hardy has not professed to
write a comedy. He is writing of a life as he imagines it to
have been led a thousand years ago, and to have ended his
book by a blare of glory would have been out of keeping
with the pure, sweet simplicity of the life he has portrayed,
"Passe Rose" is a difficult book to describe for it can not
be "boiled down" without losing all its beauty. Mr. Hardy
has made it as compact as possible. All one can say of his
impression of it, is that leaving out details, he remembers
only a mass ol sweet faces, sights and sounds, and that he
has spent a very pleasant afternoon with the story.
SONGS OK A WESTERN PRAIRIE.
A DAY.
Over the prairie, vast and bare,
Day dawns in varied light,
Leaving behind all thought of storms.
That raged and surged by night.
The level lands stretch to the sky.
In every way I turn;
They lie in lifeless quietude,
Motionless unconcern.
The weeds grow sere on heated plains,
Where no cool shadows rest,
No shrub, no tree, no livings tilings
In bight from cast to west.
A prairie dog is slinking south,
And there, up o'er the "swail,"
Far north, in the still empty air,
Slow sweeps a lonely quail.
At last, a change comes to evening,
The clouds turn red and gold,
The gaunt old weeds look beautiful
In light so bright and bold.
Now they arc nodding sleepy heads.
As they're rocked to and fro
By winds which croon unceasingly
Some cradle songs they know.
And night shuts down on the prairie.
So still, and dark, and vast;
The wind dies out when work is done.
The changeless day is past.
A NIGHT.
HEARD HERE AND THERE.
Ahl the midnight is dark and fearful,
There's no light in the tempest, so harsh;
The rain sweeps bleak and wild and tearful,
Through the buffalo grass in the marsh.
There's a sob in the rushing river;
There's wail in the maddening air,
And the stark old sunflowers shiver
'Neath the weight of their cruel despair.
Now a shriek from a bird as it reels,
Downward hurled by the night of the gale:
Now a howl from a wolf, as he feels,
That his courage and strength must soon fail.
But the night long and bitter must close
When 'tis spent witlrits fury and lage,
Even now there arc signs of repose,
In the war which the elements wage.
M. L. R.
Do not (ail to send for catalogue and specimens of nen
manship to the Lincoln Business College and Institute of
l'enmansnip, bliort-liand and typewriting, Lincoln, Neb,
Since the college Y. W. C. A. convention in Lincoln a
missionary society has been organized in connection with the
Y. M. and Y. W. C. A. work in the school. All intciested
in the subject of missionary work arc requested to join.
Some of the students wonder why the armory can be
obtained for dances given by the social clubs of town, when
the students, for whom the armory was built have not always
been granted the privilege of using it for their own . dances.
In the near future the exhibition will be given under the
direction of the Haydon Art Club, ot many American studies
and works of art. The Century Co. and Harper Bros, will
loan many of the original sketches for their illustrations and
and students specially interested in this branch of art will
be given ample opportunity to study from these pictures.
The program given by the Kalpha Alpha Thetas in the
Philodiccan society a short time ago is universally pronounced
to be the best yet given by the respective fraternities. The
music was furnished entirely by the fraternity. The vocal
solo by Miss Sprague, the trio by Misses Loomis, Sprague and
Latta, and the recitatation by Miss Minnie Latta deserve
special mention.
Will someone kindle urge the idle student, who clips arti
cles from our exchanges, to wait until all the students have
had time to read these periodicals? Nothing is more aggra
vating than to find an article cut out out of an interesting
news column. Perhaps this student in his eagerness to
secure the article for his scrapbook, has forgotten that other
students are interested in reading, or at least glancing over
everything in the college exchanges.
THE SENIOR THESES.
The Senior theses of this year are valuable records of
original work. T. A. Williams has prepared a "Preliminary
Descriptive List of Nebraska Lichens." This is almost en
tirely original work. Mr. Williams succeeded in getting
hold of about 135 species of lichens, which is a large number
for a state like Nebraska. These he has examined and
described in his own language, thus making a perfectly
authentic list based upon specimens actually seen by the cat
aloguer. This thesis will consist of from 16,000 to 18,000
words. As the title indicates, the list is preliminary and Mr.
Williams expects to continue his investigations and enlarge
the list as new species are discovered.
H. J. Webber has undertaken and brought to completion
a very laborious task. It is nothing less than a "Preliminary
Catalogue ol the Flora of Nebraska." This consists of
about 20,000 words and is complete so lar as any collected
specimens are in existence. About 950 flowering plants are
listed and nearly an equal number of cryptogams. The list
is founded upon herbariums actually examined, and the
exact localities where each species has been found is cited.
References are made to the specimens on which each
entrance is made. Mr. Webber has been working for sev
eral years on this catalogue, and has himself done a large
share of the collecting and identifying necessary. The
lichen list of Mr. Williams and the "imperfect fungi" list of
Mr. Pound are of course utilized. It may be interesting to
note that fifteen of the plants are new to science, about hall
being discovered by Mr. Pound and half by Mr. Webber.
Miss Helen Aughey treats of the "The Structure of the
Leaf of Populus monilifera." The gross and minute anat
omy of the leaf of the cottonwood was studied with great
care, resulting in a thesis covering about fifty pages of