Hiram College - Spider Web Yearbook (Hiram, OH)

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orinor Greek roots for several hours. Look! do vou not see your- O O w self at night, meekly lighting the lamps and sitting down, with a darned sock to darn a little more, while the lord of creation picks up his book and says vou will have to keep very quiet as he has an extra hard lesson? Finally your head is in a whirl, tears come to your eyes, and, once asleep, you dream you are a girl again, romp¬ ing, light-hearted and free, through old Bowler Hall. 5c Of course it is better for a student to be married while he or she is pursuing a college course. If it is proper to be married at all, why not begin that coveted state of divine bliss before finishing college work? The members of the faculty are all students—they have to study—and they are married or wish they were. There come to the married students advantages and privileges which the single student is forbidden to enjoy. In class-room they are favored; substitutions are granted to them; and credits are given when no statement of work done is shown. The married students, as a rule, stand at the head of their classes. They are not disturbed, while preparing a lesson, with strange and troublesome thoughts. The married man does not have to pause with reverential awe as he contemplates the prodigious task of asking some lady to permit him—. Nor does the married girl worry about company for the lectures or other entertainments. The pages of their books are not covered with the smiling faces of their dear friends. There is also a financial gain, “for scanty fare for one makes a royal feast for two.” And he needs to make no donations, for his wife carries the purse. “Speech is silver, Silence is golden.” Every enterprising individual is seeking for the best things. If in the course of human events this individual takes unto himself one who solemnly promises to build the fires and write the sermons, 20

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The advantages which a married student has over hi s unmarried brother are legion. When the bell for rising rings long before day¬ light in the morning, the unmarried student does not have to obey its summons instantly or else lose his breakfast. He can have his meals when he wants them, and can eat what he desires, cooked by the best cook in the world, so that he runs no risk of dyspepsia. He is not obliged to make daily pilgrimages to the hall, nor to spend anxious moments at the post-office, and so he can devote more time to his work. He is not continually dreading that he will be jilted for some other fellow, but sleeps soundly at nights,—another thing conducive to study. All fears of leap year, too, have forever fled. He has his own home, where he may always invite his friends; he never lacks the best of company. He has the honor, and that no small one, of being the baby’s papa; and, lastly, he may at some time be admitted to the faculty,—that august body within whose ranks unmarried men are never counted. “When in single blessedness you live ’Tis folly to live double.” It is best also not to venture too near the terrible abyss, which once entered can never be left. If young people would never perch, much of the so-called “matrimonial bliss” would be avoided; girls would go to school as well as boys. There would be no growing apart from each other, as there would be, if the husband had thoughts he could not share with his wife, and no sadness and disappointment in after life as the inevi¬ table result. Better go to school as a girl, growing strong mentally, morally, and physically, and have written on your tombstone, “Here lies Jenny Jones; age, 94; In single blessedness she lived, and in the same did die,” than be a woman worn, tired, and behind the times at twenty-five, all for a man. What fun you miss in the halls, O married woman, during the years that never return! The pillow fights, all the fun and frolic that take away that tired look, after you have been dig- 19

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he violates the great principle of prosperity, for such subjects as ‘‘Woman’s Rights” and “Man’s Neglect,” create much speech,which is of course silver, whereas, if single blessedness had settled on the mind of that individual like dew on a pumpkin, silence would have reigned supreme, and silence is golden. Gold is better than silver, therefore singles are better than doubles, which was to be proved. k k 3|s 5k sjc I pause with reverential awe before undertaking the prodigious task of speaking upon the subject of matrimonial bliss. I pause, pause with reverential awe before undertaking the most blissful subject of all blissful subjects. Many others have paused upon the blissful brink of this chasm, and alas, some have fallen in, and remain there still. Some have retraced their blissful steps and are retrac¬ ing them still. Others have fallen in and have fallen out again, and they remain fallen out still. After the above mentioned pause I seized my pen that I might exhort you with a few well chosen and powerful words concerning the many advantages of married student life. The young man who has been wise enough to take unto himself his better half while in school, will find that, after his graduation day, every door will be opened unto him. It matters not what position he expects to fill, the fact that he has been successful in one attempt in his life will add ten points in his favor. Then too, the young woman who is fortunate enough to be the wife of a student, O that I had the power of pen to picture to you even in a limited degree the one thousand and one advantages which are hers! But time forbids and I cannot mention even one of them. But in my own weak way I would exhort you, brethren, not to enjoy your college life alone. 5k From a long and interesting table of statistics, covering the period from the advent of Adam to the present time, it has been re- centlv discovered that the marriage question has been intensely inter¬ esting to both men and women, in all ages. And as the student 21