Students travel in the best of Rigs, and they get them of TOOTHAKER.
VIEWS.
EDITOR VIEWS: Many of the boys are blue over the result of the State contest. For one I don't share that feeling. We merely drew the poorest hand in a lottery having four chances. The judges doubtless decided conscientiously, but that don't prove anything regarding University merit.
Any one who has attended a college for four or five years knows that a contest is only a game of chance. Ability plays about as much part as in shaking dice. The awards in a contest depend upon tastes of judges. As no two sets of referees are likely to have the same taste, the decisions will vary accordingly. The game consists in drawing the right kind of judges.
judges.
As a general rule the audience is disappointed, if not disgusted, with contest awards. The reason is inobvious. The audience crowns the speaker who fires the imagination, appeals to the conviction and holds his hearers spell-bound. The judges give the laurels to the one who gets his words in most grammatical order, the commas and dashes and semicolons in the right place, who hasn't spunk enough to utter an opinion to which any one will object. So generally, the best in the fight fall before the bullets of the referees, while their more cautious brethren in the rear come up with flying colors and victorious shout. Last year we won the day—or rather the second day. This year we suffer defeat. We probably deserved the honor as much one time as the other.
Prize contests are a farce. They are condemned by the best educators. They detract from legitimate work. They create ill feeling. However, they offer one great advantage. Those who are fine speakers and don't need ficticious honors get left, while the poor sticks take the prizes, and are accordingly elated and encouraged. OBSERVER.
EDITOR VIEWS: —As you claim the Courier to be a student's paper, will you allow me space to answer the question asked by “Barb” in last week's issue, viz: “Is it an honor not to belong to a frat?”
I say it is, and that it means liberty to be a non-fraternity man. Permit me in return to ask a question. Where is the honor in belonging to a frat? As I take a birds-eye view of the students of our University, it appears to me a majority of our fraternity men are those who are either seeking a name for themselves, and who dare not rely upon their own ability, or else those who have so little judgment between what is right and wrong, that they are enticed within by some agent of the oily tongued genus.
I wish not to censure those whose principles are no hindrance to such connection. I say if one's principles (poorly formed) bear no opposition, he should by all means show his colors like a man, and be honest about it; for sooner or later "all birds of a feather flock together." But to see those who are so-called professors of religion playing a chance game with principles, character, time and money, for the *pitiable* privilege of associating with those who care more for the plumpness of their pocket book and their talent for dialogueing,
tion in Oread demonstrates the fact that quiet and unanimous elections are not so beneficial as they would at first seem. There are many ways in which a hotly contested election is beneficial. It awakens for a time, at least, a renewed interest in the affairs of the society, and attracts wide attention to its proceedings. It swells the roll of membership as nothing else can; not even diligent and faithful work. It shows a man who are his friends, who are his enemies and how much both are willing to do for or against him. It shows how much dependence can be placed in a man's word, and who can be relied upon as telling the truth and who cannot. And last, but perhaps greatest in importance, it makes a full treasury, and places a society on a sound financial basis. These are some of the ways in which such an election may be beneficial. But as on all questions, there is another side—another fact that has been demonstrated by the recent election in Oread, and in Orophilian too, and that is that in our literary societies merit is no longer the element that decides who shall fill the places of honor. In neither of these two elections did the fact that candidates were good members, poor members, old members or new, faithful or unfaithful, have half the weight that his belonging to this or that combination had. Candidates were supported or opposed because votes were to be gained for friends; enemies were to be defeated and combinations rendered successful. Of course it would be too much to say that no one voted conscientiously, believing that he was supporting the best man for the position, but no one who is not entirely ignorant of the way these two campaigns were conducted will deny that two-thirds of the representatives chosen owe their elections to the combinations that supported them, and are thoroughly aware that without this "for value received" support their election would have been impossible. We mean to cast no reflection on the successful candidates. It is a fact, a deplorable fact, that however deserving a member may be, however faithfully he may have worked for his society, how ever much time he may have spent in attending her meetings and preparing for the duties she may have called upon him to perform, notwithstanding the way he may have stood up for her, talked for her and fought for her, it is to combinations and schemes and to these alone, he must look for advancement. S.
Our Fraternities.
We receive communications from colleges all over the country asking the true status of affairs as pertaining to fraternities in the K. S. U. We can only answer in a general way, that fraternity rule in K. S. U. is being quite well broken. In a political way they now as per frat vs. barb assist in doing themselves up. We are now blessed with nine fraternities, and generally in political contests it is quite easy to play them against each other when they cannot be defeated in any other way. Boys urged to combat, drawing blood quite freely sometimes, combine forces against the "big boy," and then there is fun, with the greater part of the enjoyment generally on the side of the frats. We experience the usual trouble in uniting a loose element against a bonded union. The barbs will not stick. Honeyed words from some smooth, oily tongued Greek, with promise for future greatness, through his element are too often too seductive to be resisted. As is usual, the Greeks here as a class are the worst schemers, political tricksters, the least troubled by pangs of conscience, to be found in college. So much so that we who cannot get an initiation, lay it to purity and goodness as being the barring clause. With our faculty as regards Greeks we have nothing to complain. Brains with them are the measuring rod. Barbs in faculty appointments generally have high representatives.
EDITOR VIEWS :—
From a social standpoint the wearing of a pin is fast sinking in significance. The "aristocratic" days of Greekdom are evidently gone here. As a general thing, the able class of young men now entering school, after looking the ground over well, show no inclination to join the frats. Barbs look upon the action of a man who has been in school one or two years joining a frat as indicative of a weakening of individuality. The fraternity ladies and gentlemen make no noticeable distinction socially. Social merit is recognized wherever it exists.
We are perhaps as well beridden by fraternities as any college in the country. With an enrollment of 550 students, we have nine fraternities, with about 140 members in all. The real social, fraternal feeling in the greater part of them is not very strong. There is hardly a frat here in which one-half of the membership is really admitted to the "brotherhood."
Political interests heretofore have done more than aught else to cement these bodies. Now losing their power in this line, fraternity influence is fast on the decline.
We would advise Orophilians to come prepared with their pieces, as Oreads may go into secret session.
Prof. Sterling's anabasis class has thoroughly reviewed the first two books, and will enter upon the Hellenica next week.
The old Courier company having given notice of their willingness to settle, it is now in order for the Athletic Association to follow suit.
Prof. Nichols was observing the blood on the sun last Monday, while the Oreads gazed at the gore on the moon.
Everybody ought to wish for fine weather, for the longer winter holds on the more time we have to write spring poetry.
State Oratorical Association.
The Association met at Emporia last Friday afternoon, transacted routine business, appointed a committee to revise the constitution and referred a request of the Presbyterian College at Emporia to enter the Association.
Cap. Shane this week cuts under all the photographers in town in prices. Call and see him. He guarantees work and prices.
Saturday morning the second meeting was held. Several amendments were made to the constitution, the most important of which was the division of the contest judges into two divisions, one lot to mark on composition and thought, the other on delivery.
The Presbyterian College of Emporia was admitted to the Association. The following officers were elected: President, Ellsworth Ingalls, of Washburn; vice president, Mr. Cole, of Ottawa; secretary and treasurer, W. Y. Morgan, of the State University. Solon T. Gilmore, of K. S. U., was elected delegate to the inter-state association, his expenses to be paid, and E. G. Buckland also elected delegate, to pay his own expenses. Topeka was selected as the place to hold the next contest.
A very few members were in attendance at Oread last Friday, but that few in about an hour tore down and rebuilt what it took cliques and combinations four weeks to complete, viz, a "June program." The fact that out of over a hundred active (or rather, inactive) Oreads, only ten took enough interest in the welfare of the society to climb the hill on so beautiful an afternoon, struck that ten with the idea that if they represented the society they had the right to say what it should or what it should not do. So when the minutes of the previous meeting were read, that part of them relative to the "June program" was stricken out. In due time and regular form the following program was elected: Orator, Cyrus Crane; debater, F.W. Barnes; declaimer, Jean Oliver; essayist, Sadie Emery; president of Bayard evening, H.E. Riggs. We cannot guarantee our readers that this will be the final program, as the cliques and factions will doubtless be on hand this afternoon.
SPRING CLOTHING
We have just received
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Which we are selling at
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We are selling off heavy Winter Goods at prices that would pay you to purchase now for next year's use.
REMEMBER THE PLACE,
JACOB HOUSE,
Patronize those who patronize you.
The Old Reliable Clothier.
A GENTLE BRING Is observable when the foot troads on the thawing ground.
A GENTLE SPRING
(BUT
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J. S.CREW & CO,,
Wholesale and Retail Dealers in
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Go there for Tonsorial work.
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At J. M. Wood's Grocery.
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