7
UNIVERSITY COURIER.
the least support for his back and shoulders. If the human body were without joints, if it were inflexible, if it were petrified, it would rest easily in most any kind of a seat, but having joints and being flexible, it is not only agreeable but necessary that it receive due support. All the students who have become accustomed to the chairs usually take one of three positions, but frequently try all three of them during a single recitation. First, Take from one to three large books and place them between your back and that of the chair; second, sit back as far as possible, lay the fore-arm on the writing shelf, then lean forward until the body forms an acute angle with the seat of the chair; third, slide down to the edge of the chair, then lean back until your shoulders come in contact with its back. The body will thus form an angle of about 145 degrees with the bottom of the chair. The students are in favor of astronomical and chemical buildings, but they are first and vastly more in favor of good drinking water and comfortable chairs. If the regents cannot obtain money enough to provide for these ordinary necessities, and the proposed buildings likewise, we will venture to say that they will receive the gratitude of every student by deferring the buildings until the other wants are supplied.
It is to be hoped, since the town now affords an opera house, that we may have some good troupes here this winter, and not be overrun by third-class theaters and "nigger shows" as formerly. It is, of course, a question in the minds of many intelligent and fair-minded people whether or not any good whatsoever is to be derived from even the best class of operas and like institutions. Such people are, doubtless, extremists. And yet, nearly every one will admit that a very large per cent. of these traveling concerns is open to serious objections, and should, therefore, receive the patronage of no respectable person. It is a matter of general belief that stage actors are, as a rule, a low, degraded class of people. It is hardly probable that this belief would have gained such a firm hold upon the public had it not good foundation. Even the actors themselves testify to the demoralizing influence of stage life. A leading one of his day is credited with the statement that he would not only not allow his children to become actors themselves but would not even allow them to witness the plays presented by others. If such be the character of the stage, ought it to be sustained? Manifestly not. Probably all troupes are not vicious. But what person will say that every man and woman who patronizes those of doubtful respectability is not, by so doing, putting a premium on vice, infidelity, immorality, and thus undermining law, morality, religion? If a man breakes a statute he is fined or sent to prison. And yet how often these institutions which produce moral rottenness, which educate criminals are under the protection of the law. Is it possible to become healthy by feeding on offal? Is it possible for society to become rid of vice in its thousand forms and, at the same time, maintain that which breeds corruption? All operas, all theaters are, probably, not to be censured, but some of them should
be more than censured, they should be suppressed by the laws of the land. Not a few of them are indecent. Will any one deny the assertion? What particular necessity is there in any play, or what benefit is derived that a company of half-made men and women should present themselves before the public, styling themselves actors? And still, what is more common? Are not such spectacles degrading? Is there the least particle of benefit in them? Do they develop the moral nature? As an educator, as a place of amusement, probably the stage can be made one of the best. If the objectionable features could be removed all the people would take more interest in it, and it would thus become an instrument for greater good. As long, however, as so large a class will patronize anything in the shape of an opera or a theater, however low or immoral it may be, there is little possibility of reformation. Let all law-loving citizens withhold their support from everything that is productive of evil, and it will not be many years until society will be healed of some of its worst diseases, and right, truth and virtue will reign without a rival.
LITERARY.
LEIGH HUNT.
Through the portals of a prison cell the "Reinini" comes to render our darkest days brighter and cheerier.
Leigh Hunt was one of the most able of English poets of the eighteenth century. At the early age of fifteen he was a prolific writer of verses. A few years later he and his brother were each fined five hundred dollars and imprisoned for two years on account of a bold statement concerning the prince regent. This shadow seemed not to sadden but to shield him. For beneath its protection he steadily increased his already wide-spread popularity. The imprisonment was endured by him in a manner which converted punishment into pleasure. By his own taste and the attention of his friends, his prison cell was transformed into an elegant apartment, adorned with book cases, busts and flowers, and so deprived of its original appearance that Charles Lamb declared there was no other such room except in a fairy tale.
It was here that he wrote the "Rimini" which established his rank as a poet. This exhibits his sparkling and lively fancy, the affluence of his imagination, and felicity in word painting; and at the same time also those affectations and quaint, far-fetched conceits which characterize all his poetry, and which at the outset subjected him to the ridicule of critics.
The secret of Hunt's success consists less in pre-eminence of genius than of taste. His refined, critical perception had detected the superiority of Chancer's versification over the epigrammatic couplet of Pope, which had superseded it. By the simple return to the old manner he effected for English poetry, in the comparatively restricted domain of metrical art, what Wordsworth had already effected in the realm of nature.
It is said that Hunt's conversation even surpassed his writings. His letters and friendly notes have something of both his conversation and his style of composition. To receive a letter from him was a pleasure that seemed to touch the darkest hour with a golden gleam.