University of the South - Cap and Gown Yearbook (Sewanee, TN)

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®h£ ©up axxi (iSoum. 21 hungry, and home and the bread and butter that Peter, the house boy, got for us from Aunt Betsy, the cook, touched my heart with peculiar ten- derness. Indeed, there were two things from which I did not recover the whole time that I spent at Sewanee — one was hunger, the other was sleep. Everybody seemed in the same condition, however, and, as there was a plenty to eat, no one seemed to mind. After the two o ' clock dinner I retired with a book and a cigar to a ham- mock in the yard where I slept peacefully until little Brown rushed out saying, Everybody is going — hurry! Base-ball! I cried, and sprang up. I got ready in furious haste, and found the young ladies and Smith and Tompkins waiting for me, also a long blue ribbon, which was pinned to the flap of my coat. The grounds were very level, and I was astonished to see the number of people and vehicles gathered. There was no grand stand, nor anything horrid of that kind, but plenty of logs and stumps and chairs and car- riages and wagons. As we mounted the hill from Tremlett Spring, I thought how bright and cheerful it was, and felt my spirits rise. We turned to the left, circling the ground behind the crowd that occupied the logs and stumps, and I think I never heard so many and such pleasant greetings. Everybody seemed so friendly— everybody seemed so happy. Half way round we found a vacant log and took our places in a row. They have not hauled out your old professors yet, I observed, scan- ning the grounds carefully. Have they not? Then you must be patient. You seem to have a good many clergymen, I said, seeing a number of straight clerical coats. We have a theological department. Are not these men a little advanced for theological students? I in- sisted. For other places, perhaps, but we have such very old professors that we have to cultivate very old students. So. And again I looked very hard at Miss Angelica. Ha! ha! ha! I think it was the heartiest laugh I ever heard, and I turned to see one of the straight-coated gentlemen talking to Miss Jemima at the other end of the log. That is the jolliest looking theologue J have ever seen, I said. Re- ligion has not soured him. Sewanee religion sweetens people, Miss Angelica answered, rising;

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20 ®he (§ap ant OSonm We went first to the Bubbling Spring, and, leaving that, we climbed uj: and down through the woods to the chalybeate spring path that ran along a thickly-wooded ridge. On either side ravines broke away, opening vis- tas through the black stems of the trees ; and the silence was made mu- sical by the whispering of hidden streams and the voice of the wind that crept so softly up the mountain. Steeper grew the path, winding down over rocks and roots, through tangles of vines and wild hydrangeas, along the banks of a tumbling stream that, dashing its mimic waves high among the roots of the gnarled calmias, foamed between the crowding stones, and with a parting laugh slipped away over the shelf of rocks underneath which lay the chalybeate spring. The last few yards of the descent we made in a half run, catching finally by a poplar tree that seemed provi- dentially placed to save us from going headlong into the stream. Under the rocks, behind a veil of falling water, far back where all was moss-cov- ered — where the ferns lived, and grew, and died in green content — where the ground ivy crept with its scarlet berries shining out like little flecks of fire, I saw a wooden trough and the water trickling slowly. There was a break in the veil of water, where a great rock lodged above divided the falling stream, and before I realized it Miss Angelica had gathered up her skirts, and, stepping lightly across the slippery stones, looked like a little ghost against the green background. You should have let me do that, I said when she came back and handed me the cup. There is only room for one, she answered, and strangers usually fall in. Will you have these ? I drank all the water, feeling duty bound, then took from her hand the ideal ferns she had gathered— delicate, exquisite! I have them still. Returning, I marked well the way, that I might come again, for I thought how easy to dream the day to death in such a scene. Miss Angelica pointed out St. Luke ' s Hall and Convocation House, both built of the beautiful pink sandstone, and the latter possessing a tower such as 1 had not seen outside of England. Next was the Walsh Memo- rial, going rapidly toward a beautiful completion. I found very little that was artificial anywhere; every thing was natural, and roughly so in a great many instances, but this only made the whole thing more unique. The gowned and capped students wandering in the primeval wood that is wherever a house is not, made an unusual picture that pleased me. By this time, however, the water or the walk had made me awfully

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22 @The ®ap anif (ffiotxttx. lie is coming here now. Of course I rose too, and, Miss Angelica saying, Mr. Initoo, I felt my hand grasped as if by a long-lost brother. Very glad to see you, the theologue said; Jack Mayo wrote me about you. Jack is an old boy, you know ; we try to keep the run of all our old students. Hope you have come for the summer? Oh, yes! earnestly. He is hunting for the University, Miss Angelica put in. A shadow swept over the theologue ' s bright face ; it seemed a shame that it should be there even for a moment. We have not much to show, he said rather sadly; all our work goes away in the students, you know, and, indeed, Sewanee is rather a feeling than a seeing. But T shall be glad to show you what there is. Thank you; you are very kind, I answered, and please excuse me, but I did not catch your name. I do no not think Miss Angelica men- tioned it. She did not. Miss Angelica is not to be trusted. My name is Gailor. I have asthma, do n ' t you hear ? And am one of the professors who have to be propped up — ha! ha! Amid all the laughter that shook me as well as the rest, a gentleman with a blonde mustache, a blue-ribboned dandy straw hat, and clothed in a Avay that left nothing to be desired, joined the group. ' Mr. Gailor put his hand on his shoulder. Another of the fossils, he said, Modern Languages— ha! ha! Then all Miss Angelica ' s chaff was repeated. And now if Miss Angelica will excuse you, Mr. Gailor went on, I will take you across the grounds to where the rest of the faculty are laid out on logs, and if you will join me in a cigar we will fumigate the old fellows. So we went, he and I and Modern Languages, to where on a log a num- ber of gentlemen were seated. I found Greek with a tender mustache and a cutaway coat. History in tennis flannels. Metaphysics and the Proctor, one a West Pointer and the other from Annapolis, two of the best set up men I had ever seen; and if there were some silver threads in their beards that had come to be a hopeful sign, seeing the rest were so young. I did not see all the faculty that afternoon, but presently General Math- ematics came game galloping upon old George, a thoroughly well known character at Sewanee, followed by two setters, Dick and Ned,