4
The University Courier.
LITERARY.
A TALE OF CEN(T)SURE.
By the side of a table a Soph-o-more sat,
Saying "Ante! oh ante! do ante!"
And I stared and I whispered, "Sir, where are you at?
With your 'Ante! oh ante! do ante!'"
A smile of contentment played over his lips,
While his eyes twinkled into a partial eclipse,
"Cent ante! oh ante! do ante!"
On the edge of a table this Soph-o-more leant,
Denying that ante! cent ante!
And the disciplinarians heard his lament
O'er that ante! that ante! cent ante!
But they grimly declined to believe what he said,
And they writ him a writ of dismissal instead,
And he groaned and he groaned as he shook his red
head:
"Sent home to my Auntie! sent t'Auntie!"
A CHARACTER SKETCH.
One afternoon, wearied of study, I threw books aside and resolved to take a walk up the Santa Fé railroad track. It was a typical autumn day. The young willows which skirt the Kaw were putting on a somber hue, and the corn fields along the track had already lost their livery of green. The short grass beside the track was dry and dead. Soon I passed the section hands engaged in burning this grass or cutting it out from between the ties with sharp shovels. After walking several miles farther I determined to rest, so I turned aside to a clump of trees a short distance from the track. As I advanced I noticed some person reclining under these trees. I soon saw that the individual was a tramp, a genuine specimen of the genus ambulator. He was evidently a man of about 40 years of age. His hair was long and black, his shoes heavy and coarse and much worn. His appearance showed the lack of soap. His clothing was the usual heterogeneous assortment which necessity or tramp fashion demands that the genuine tramp should wear.
Surely not a very desirable companion, but I had read of strikes and lock-outs and of thousands of men starving for want of work over the country. Perchance a gold miner from Colorado, or a coal miner from Pittsburg! Curious to learn something of his antecedents I went over and sat down beside him. His face was unusually intelligent for a tramp. His voice was well modulated, his language excellent. At first he was not inclined to talk, but soon his reserve thawed somewhat. We talked of things of general interest, of the towns he had visited, of the dry fall weather, of strikes and lock-outs, and finally of tramps themselves.
"Why." I asked, "do men become tramps? You see them every day. Has the life any particular charm, or are they driven to it?"
"Well," he answered reflectively, "some tramps I have met are devil-may-care sort of fellows and enjoy the life. The great majority of them have been disappointed in life, and take to tramping to bury the past. I have met some who seemed to have the curse of the Wandering Jew upon them. Their only desire seems to be to get to the next town, and when that was reached, the next. The trump instinct was born in them. Others become tramps gradually. They lose self-respect at home. The ties of affection are broken, and they are adrift in the world without any definite purpose."
"You will pardon me," I said, "if I ask you how you became a tramp. You have certainly seen better circumstances than those at present. You have excited my curiosity."
"I do not usually tell my past to everyone who asks me for it," he answered. "The past unless successful is not a pleasant thing to talk about. And mine, as you can see, has not been particularly successful. But since you appear to be more than usually interested I will tell it to you.
"Probably few young men twenty years ago had more brilliant prospects than I had. My father was a wealthy merchant in a town of central Pennsylvania. I was the only child; the pride of my father
and the idol of my mother's heart. I went the usual round of study and was sent to college, where I was a universal favorite. Everything was in my favor; wealth, social position, education and fine address But the last, which I thought to be my best accomplishment, proved my curse and my ruin. I had moderate abilities. Thousands of men with less have won for themselves honorable places. Naturally I felt that with my education and social position I could make a success in life. My personality was greatly in my favor. The first impressions new acquaintances got of me were always most flattering to me.In college I always had great influence, especially with new students and lower class men. My address was winning, my manner magnetic.
"After graduation I decided to study medicine. I went to Philadelphia and spent three years in a medical college. After finishing there I decided to locate in my native city, where my wide acquaintance would greatly aid me to build up a practice.
"My success at first was phenomenal. In a month my practice was greater than that of the oldest physician in the city. All the old chronic cases in the city came to me, and the young, the most impressionable, literally flocked to me. I was happy. I thought my success was assured. But at the end of three months I noticed a change. My patients began to drop off, and at the end of six months my practice was practically gone. I was astonished and dumb-founded. What was the matter? My work as a physician had been fair. I had made no brilliant cures, but I had done good work and had lost few cases.
"I became discouraged and resolved to try something else. Medicine was not my calling, I was convinced. I determined to study law. My father consented. My failure puzzled and pained him as much as it did me. I studied law and in three years was admitted to the bar. My spirits had risen meantime and I was determined now to succeed. I located in a town in Ohio. My experience was the same as before. I had plenty of cases at first, but I couldn't hold my clients. At the end of a year my practice was gone, although I had worked hard and faithfully. While in Ohio my father had failed and his wealth was swept away. The loss of our fortune and mother's anxiety for me destroyed her health and she soon died. In a year my father followed her." Here his voice trembled, but controlling himself he continued; "I left my law office and took to journalism. At first I was successful, but soon lost my position. And now a harder blow than ever befell me. The girl I loved, and the only one I ever loved, rejected me. 'You do not fulfill the high expectations I had formed of you,' she wrote."
"Then for the first time I saw definitely what had caused my failure. My appearance and address prepossessed people too much in my favor. I could not realize their anticipations, and therefore I failed.
"But why continue? Things went on from bad to worse. My personality haunted me like a curse. Whenever success appeared it turned out to be but ashes. I got lower and lower; I finally lost hope and self respect, until at last I became a tramp, the only thing I ever did succeed at for any length of time. But I am due in Lecompton to-night and I must move on."
He got up and shuffled off up the railroad. "Don't let people think you are smarter than you are, young fellow, and then you won't take a tumble," he shouted back to me as I started for home.
P.
AMOR COLLEGENIS.
O illam vade amabam,
Et dedi dona multa,
Et meam nunc putabam,
Quod cepit mea pulchea,— "Anaticulam te!"
Sed illa nunc est dura
Ut fons est in Novembro,
Et flamma, tunc sic pura,
Extincta est in Decembro,—
O ridiculum me!
D. H. R.