Haverford College - Record Yearbook (Haverford, PA)

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can speak with greater authority than he. Jay endeavored to scale Parnassus by means of his Obser- vations on an Open Fire,, but found the walking- rather rough. After one or two spasms of literary criticism, he jumped into notoriety as the author of The Cheerful Liar. Some there were who claimed that this was autobiographical, others, that it was the cry of the damned, but the worldly wise shook their heads and said it was both. Lucius ' jibe at Browning was an essay of merit, but it was not alleviated by any too great amount of lightness of style. It was during this time that we made our flying raid into the field of fiction. The burning fires of the gentle passion which had been dammed back since we renounced Poetry now burst into new blossom in a series of love stories. Shoep was the chief offender in this matter, and the emotions which he handed out were vivid enough to have been his own, but perhaps they were only projected. Arnold gave us a droll story on Monkton Ridge, somewhat after the French manner of sparing no details, however shady. In a fit of somnambulism Eben brought forth a storiette on the Detective ' s Umbrella, and followed it with Jepson ' s Jeopardy, which was unexpectedly funny. But our crown of rejoicing in the fiction line is Vic ' s novel, The Illusion of the Moth, which is now wending its serial way through successive numbers of The Haverfordian. How it is going to end, no one knows, not even Vic, but that is a small matter. Compared to it the Decamerone is a collection of nursery tales, and our friend, Elinor Glyn, as innocent as a baldheaded babe. In the matter of editorial wo rk we feel that we have done something worthy of recollection. When Vic seized the helm, The Haverfordian received a remarkable injection of vigor into its some- what senile veins. He took that venerable institution in hand, and by his efforts it became one of the best college magazines in the country. In his Exchange Column he showed that there was one field in which we could excel, and established there a standard to which his successors have found difficult the approach. (Except Jay himself, who wrote this article and is modest as a mushroom.) As to the two other periodicals mentioned, the Middle Barclaij Squirt has long since lapsed into innocuous desuetude, but the Weekly is with us alway, even unto the bitter end. It is a by-product of Dave ' s brain, and is the official organ of his Policies. Its columns furnish us an interesting reminder as to what happened the day before yesterday. When Dave gets into editorial action, sparks, spelling and grammar fly to the winds. Occasionally in its pages he too essays to flght to Parnassus, but he (and the rest of us, too) usually discovers that his winged Pegasus is but a cow in a cage. Speaking of cows reminds us of that gem of purest ray serene which ever an exchange artist 127

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Then Shoep appeared in The Havevfordian with some graceful verses, which, like all inspired poetry, left the intellect of the feeble reader somewhat bemused as to what it was all about. Who was the thee that Vic was going to dwell with, under God ' s blue bell ? Was it his room-mate, Ken- nett Square Reynolds, — or was it not? These were the Great Poets of those Arcadian days of Sophomoredom. Of the smaller fry of poetasters, some mention must be made of Henry ' s Ode to his Orient Brother, Deeply Dipped in Doubt, and of Jack Bradway ' s many and amorous lyrics, which, though coldly rejected by The Haver- fordian, wended their burning way to Bryn Mawr. Cale Winslow ' s Lay of the Last Dime will always be sung by those who remember it, and even such a pessimistic soul as Jay Price is generally reputed to have written some femininely inspired idyls, but even the initiate have never seen more than his Ballad on Driving in the Rain. But these were all in the Golden Age when poetry was a matter of inspiration. With the advent of Junior Year and the Great Unknown, passion gave way to book-keeping as a requisite for poetry. When it came to writing poetry, the Unknown had Lucius put to bed without saying his prayers, he had Vic up a sycamore tree yelling for help. He soon showed us that he was the one and only original, sterilized. Government Inspected, sugar cured, picnic twist Poet that had ever ambled bovinely down the Parnassus Turnpike. The man ' s very presence perspired poetry. It was our overwhelming sense of his superiority which hushed forevermore our humble lays, and the flowery meads where our more gentle Muses were wont to linger were given over to the pasturage of the fatted calf. It seemed sad to leave forever a field in which we had shown such youthful promise, but we were never more to pour out a lover ' s plaint in the graceful, swan-like hexameter. Our next flights to Helicon were on the broad back of the gentle essay. Shoep took a Fling at Bacon, and before he was through he had that Elizabethan worthy backed off the wharf into the bitter waters of Salt River. Arnold turned his toddling feet down that parlous path which Dante trod; in short, he went to Hell and found congenial company there. Why they let him come away, no one knows. Perhaps like another Orpheus, he sang them to sleep; at any rate on his return he penned a defense of that much maligned place of torment. It was witty and convincing enough to appear in the erstwhile orthodox Haverfordian, but it was a trifle too strong for the authorities of Westtown School, so they had all available copies burned by the common hangman of that institution. Encouraged by this unhoped-for mark of approval, he turned his pen towards an exposition of Bootlicking, a subject upon which few 126

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discovered. We venture to quote it, with proper acknowledgments, as a bit of allegorical advice to all sprouting authors whose ambitions have not yet been nipped in the bud. Why, Cow, how canst thou be so satisfied. So well content with all things here below, So unobtrusive and so sleepy-eyed. So meek, so lazy and so awful slow? Dost thou not know that everything is mixed; That nothing ' s as it should be on this earth; That grievously the world needs to be fixed; That nothing we can give has any worth ; That times are hard; that strife is full of care Of sin, of trouble and untowardness; That love is folly, friendship but a snare? Up, Cow! This is no time for laziness. The end thou chewest is not what it seems. Get up and moo! Tear ' round and quit thy dreams. P. S. Are you a cow? [Mount Holyoke.] 128