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

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(frjje ( ap anb (Matxtxt. 23 marian, and merely wrote to exemplify the use of ' t v a and ' «-«?. ' ' Burning Sappho, ' ' too, was not burning with poetic fire, she was ' ' inflamed with a desire to show the changes in dialect after Homer. Hesiod — well, confidentially, we never did think Hesiod was much of a poet, only we did not know exactly what to call him. But see the advantages of classical study ! we now know all about him, he was a puzzle maker, not the kind made of iron rings or the 15-14 one, but the kind that comes in the Youths ' Companion. His pages are a hunting ground for Parataxis. We shall never forget our bliss when we caught our first Parataxis. With heart swelling with the pride of a conqueror, we laid him at the professors ' feet, and were told that he was not the right kind. We were crest-fallen, but we shall always believe it was Hesiod ' s fault. If a man pretends to keep a Paxataxis park, he has no right to deceive strangers with a bogus one. Our classical training has given us a proper and due appreciation of the tragic poets. Formerly we never could understand why the Athenians should have given prizes for such grief as they wrote — manifested only in ' ' ee-ou ! ee-ou ! ' ' or ai, ai. But when we understand that they were writing text books, we became filled with the loftiest admiration of their genius. They had dis- covered the great secret how to make a small boy study grammer. With marvelous ingenuity they combined the grammer and the dime novel. By this master stroke the attention of the small boy was fixed and the various syntac- tical points which otherwise would have disgusted him became mere child ' s play. It is only of late years that we have discovered this — that we have learned that the Prometheus is a disquisition on causal clauses with the agony thrown in pour lagniappe, that Euripedes wrote to show that the potential optative could be used without ' av , and Sophocles, only wrote to exemplify certain other linguistic peculiarities. Philip of Macedon was one of the intimate friends of Demosthenes, and when the orator wanted to write something in order to crystalize the attic dia- lect he allowed the book to be dedicated to him . Hence the popular impression that Demosthenes wrote those harsh things against him. Ducian ' s contribu- tion is perhaps the most valuable, he wrote or compiled an encyclopaedia or a Moods and Tenses. The Gospels — The Gospels are of no importance, they are corrupt Greek.

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®he ( ap ani dxvtx. 25 he gtcietxtxfxc £h %. Last year the Cap and Gown stated that the Scientific department was on a boom. The boom time is over now, and the schools have settled down into unrippled prosperity. Probably the best work has been done in the School of Philosophy. Here the students have wrestled with ' ' Mechanism and Personality ' ' until some of them almost understand the preface. In chemistry the school has been seriously handicapped by having the medical department on the floor above it. The students of this department are in the habit of singing ' ' Boom-ta-ra ' ' to keep up their courage during certain of their mystic rites, and the disciples of Remsen down below are distracted thereby. These same embryo doctors are an absent-minded lot, and leave the little souvenirs consisting of muti- lated human remains which they intended to present to their friends in all sorts of unexpected places, as for example the wash bottle of the unsuspect- ing chemist. Notwithstanding these very serious drawbacks the Chemists have done well. So well that a rumor that one of them had passed, or at least thought he could pass, a final examination, was received with credulity by the Mountain. The inclemency of the weather during the spring and summer has pre- vented the class in Astronomy from discovering any new planets. The class in Physics has done beautiful work. Already he knows the difference between acoustics and optics, and the professor seriously hopes that by commence- ment day he will recognize a prism when he sees it. He has already passed mechanics, having locked the professor in one day.