Cornell University - Cornellian Yearbook (Ithaca, NY)

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STATUE OF ANDREW D. WHITE Phgto by White

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was his joy in showing these to his pupils. He wished his colleagues to entertain their students, and even urged a subsidy expressly for the purpose. He was interested in all student activities, intellectual and social. For the literary and debating societies he fitted up, from his own purse, a handsome room with statuary and inspiring pictures. He had been himself a student editor, and was always a glad contributor to student publications. Sports he applauded as an overiiow for animal spirits or as they fostered health and character. But, if he himself rushed to the chimes to celebrate our first aquatic victory, he had a hand, too, in bringing it about that there were speedily intercollegiate contests in essay and debate, languages and mathematics, as well as rowing. To football he could never be reconciled. It seemed to him brutal, he could never admire a strength that lacked in grace or self-respect. Especially did he covet for the student world the training that gives breadth of mind. Literature and history he would have had so taught that every student should listen. And yet more did he crave for them the civilizing and enobling influence of art, of architecture, sculpture, painting, and above all music. No chance did he lose to add to Cornell life the touch of beauty andiof melody. Fundamental was his conviction that the university student is a man,.and not a child. It was in deference to his wish, that for years we had no other rule for student conduct than that no student might, on pain of removal, be guilty of aught unbecoming a student and a gentleman. Student disorder he wished dealt with by the civil authorities, like any other, and he welcomed lthaca's growing vigilance and severity. Yet his kindness of heart was unbounded, and he did well to transfer to the faculty from the first, the care of discipline, for, once a student was in his presence, his own companionableness soon made it impossible notto treat him as a man and a brother. The students, and they were many, who had the happy fortune to be his secretaries, librarians, assistants of whatever sort found him making them companions, even confidants, and interrupting often the most serious business for little asides of anecdote or of discussion. It was perhaps this love of companionship, this instinctive democracy, quite as much as his wish to have Cornell known or to bring the world's leaders to bear upon her thought, that made his home throughout the years a meeting place for inter- esting men of every sort from out his vast acquaintance, and students hardly less than faculty, were stirred and broadened by their presence. Since he laid down the presidency, in 1885, the student body has, of course, seen less of him. The public missions which took him abroad or busied him at home, left often small leisure for aught else. But Cornell was never absent from his thoughts., and whenever he has been in Ithaca-as more and more these last years-his interest in student life and welfare has been as fresh as ever. Not even the growing deafness which reduced almost to monologue his conversation, could shut him out from welcoming their visits, and to all who passed him on the Campus, or watched his face at concerts or in chapel, his mere presence has been full of inspiration. Welshall miss him as long as memory remains. 5 16

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