Vanderbilt University - Commodore Yearbook (Nashville, TN)

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•' THE COMETH- 19 without any consultation as to our desire or aversion to assuming its cares, set down amid a great multitude of peoples, and left to choose between the good and the bad. There is the first step in the problem, illustrating the mutability of Fate, the immuta- bility of Heaven. We are not the architects of our fortunes— “There’s a divinity that shapes our ends, Hough hew them how we will” We are but the tools of Fate. “ The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together; our virtues would be proud, if our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would despair, if they were not cherished by our virtues.” Our nature is, therefore, dual. We are taken away with the same utter indifference to our wishes. These reflec- tions of a philosophic cast intrude themselves upon me, and claim my attention, this sultry, hot July afternoon, to such a degree that I cannot refrain from penning them, the various little arguments so conducive to inactivity notwithstanding. Suggested, as they are, by the general Alumni meeting, and particularly by the Beuniou of the Class of ’s'J. at the Commencement in June, 1 emerge from the “innocuous desuetude” into which I had fallen, and derive pleasure from these afterthoughts. It is simply phenom- enal to witness what changes thirty years have made. Hip Van Winkle's astonishment could not have been much greater, though he slept twenty years. We have been awake, yet thought it hardly possible that such revolutions could be wrought. The old Campus that was the delight of every student’s heart, the buildings, so massive and so admirably adapted to the purposes for which they were erected, still stand, which fact makes them all the dearer; but the improvement, the additional structures, make it the nourishing University it is. Such liberality of spirit prevails, a thing sadly lacking at the close of the 19th century, and as an immediate consequence, advantages have been taken. 1 was struck with the healthy inter-fraternity spirit manifest on every hand; the same old Creek letters are still there, and though others have from time to time entered, it seems as if something were against them ; they languished and became factors of the dead past. Hach has striven with honest emulation, as in the time when we “of ’80” were there. Beautiful chapter houses have been built, and are really the objects of chief interest to visitors. But the Class of ’80 concerns me most nearly, and 1 shall make a few notes, for my own reference and pleasure, of the several graduates who wended their way into the busy world. The reunion was, hi every seneo of the word, a success, and it did my old heart good to see friends, of some of whom I had not even heard in more than a quarter of a century—almost a life-time.

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18 THE COMET • o GLASS or ’59 ♦ o» OFFICERS L. S. Mekriam...............................President. C. IS. Hurke................................Vice President. O. II. Wilson...............................Secretary and Treasurer. C. M. Luttekloh..............................Historian. W. G. Hunt a.................................Poet. ----JULY, 1920------ TO iiim whose heart beats true to the things which were once a source of inno- cent pleasure, and which are constantly enveloped in the inmost recesses of his soul, a gentle remembrance serves almost to carry him hack to the days them- selves wherein all of which he now but dreams was so real. As Time advances on his rapid journey, bent on a destination the end of which no mortal knows, nor, indeed, can know, striking ruthlessly with his great scythe those of us whose term of mundane existence has expired, we may well bethink us, Whither do we tend ! “Time and tide wait for no man.” Truly has tiiis been exemplified in all the times of life and death. We meet a friend budding into robust manhood, endowed with a priceless legacy, that of good health and a vigorous constitution, at the very threshold of life, upon the stern demands of which he is soon to enter; we accost him, greet him, ask him “ Quo tenetis iter ” bike all other mortals, he cannot divine. He is alloat upon the great sea, tossed hither and thither by the litful waves, at the mercy ot Provi- dence, which alone has knowledge on what shore he shall land, bite is a terrible problem, for the solution of which we are placed here. We are brought into this world

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20 THE COMETS Albcs, who was the dude ol the Class, in so far as that name is applicable to taste an l style, but not attended with any opprobrium, was there, with all tin; old-time char- acteristics. I was glad to hear that he is a successful lawyer, and has made for himself a name at the bar which will live long after the soul is freed from his body. Itonta, with his “meek and lowly'’ look, gave pleasure to tin occasion by his genial countenance and the cordiality with which he greeted his old chums. 1 learn that he became quite an admirer of the fair sex, since he was Historian of the Junior Class and took occasion to record the “mashing” capacity of several boys, lie soon married, settled down as a banker in Harrodsburg, but this bustling life did not suit him much; he therefore retired to the country, where he now resides, surrounded by an intercstinfi family, and fields smiling with peace and plenty. Burke went out from the University buoyant with the air-castles which he had been building, and thought some day he could tell his classes incidents that occurred “ when I was in Leipsie.” Securing a little school, he taught for awhile—just a little while. Somehow, the directors did not like his way of imparting the art of pedagogy, and told him they could dispense' with his services in the future. Always proud, Purke did not like that kind of treatment, and decided to betake him westward, where the star of empire shineth, or words to that effect. So, he did not teach. At Austin, he put up a candy shop, where he might have become princely rich, but Jay Gould saw the oppor t unity, and entered the il sweet” field in opposition. Fate seemed to say, like the Church-street police, “Move on ! ” and he moved, booking ever at the Star of Umpire, lie came upon the beautiful prairies, where his heart’s fondest desire suddenly made itself known ; he is now a dashing cow-boy, as free as the beasts that roam the plains. Davis thought the law was just the thing for him, and prepared himself accordingly. Settling in one of the little towns of West Tennessee, he hung up his shingle, with his name in bright, golden ltd tors. “ lie lisped in numbers, for the numbers came;” that is to say, numbers of bills, etc. He was a man whom the world did not know how to appreciate, and thus the bar lost one of its rough diamonds. Disgusted with spending his life in waiting for clients, he hied him to Oklahoma, where he became quite an influ- ential citizen—after the others had been disposed of by internecine warfare. Paul Jones (not he of naval fame in tin War of 1812, but our own lazy Jones, our sometime poet, that never astonished the world even with spring effusions) came, loyal to his old Alma Mater, to mingle once more with us, some of whom lie had not seen in three decades. He is the same old fellow, a little scarred by the battle of life, but his countenance indicates that his has not been a life of uselessness. Learned left the University ready to survey the world with his engineering know]-