KANSAS UNIVERSITY WEEKLY.
5
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Mill Memories.
FROM the plains of quaint old Holland. Daughter of the inconstant sea, Come the echoes of a love song Sung ere our own infancy. Set in the same time and measure As the love songs sung today Thrilling with the same old sweetness As in ages past away.
There within the lowland forest In those days so long ago, Met a pair of Holland lovers In their love's first golden glow. Theirs was but a simple story, He was of but low degree And she was the baron's daughter Flaxen haired and fair to see.
And the tryst trees heard the love tale Which they murmured, heart to heart. And when Fate, with cruel harshness Rent the lovers far apart, And when she, in bitter anguish, Mourned for him, thus left alone, The great trees repeated softly All the love within her moan.
And full well they learned their lesson,
From the maid who, year by year,
Came to bide her tryst beneath them,
Waiting ever there to hear
The swift step of him who hastened
From afar unto her side,
Come from rich and distant countries,
Come at last to claim his bride.
But one day there came an army
Bent on ruin great and sore,
Cutting down the grand old forest
Undisturbed by man before,
Then were borne away the tryst trees
Far away beyond the sea,
Where they heard no more the love tale
Of the maid of high degree.
And from the tryst-trees was fashioned
A great mill of Dutch design,
Memories of sad Dutch sweethearts
Haunt it softly as a shrine.
For beneath its portals linger
Lovers speaking soft and low.
All unthinking of the romance
Breathed into it long ago.
And it ever wonders sadly
If the love of which it knew
Far away beyond the waters,
Still abideth firm and true.
And it wonders if the lover
E'er returned to claim his bride
Or if she, worn out with waiting,
Softly laid her down and died.
And it findeth strange, sad comfort In the sweethearts of today. Dreaming that their lives will never Know that grief of yesterday. Dreaming that the man and maiden Who once dwelt across the seas. Guard all love that ever haunteth Their beloved trysting trees.
Some K. U. Moods at Stanford.
ELEANOR T'MILLEP.
WITH my pink registration card in one hand, and my white study card in another, I stood in the office of the English Department, before my major professor. I was new very new having just registered for the first semester, and it was quite in vain that I recalled to mind my acquaintance with college life and work, made years before at Kansas University. This was Stanford and not K. U., and I was utterly, miserably, frightened. I knew m eyes were beginning to stare in my efforts to appear composed, and I winked them convulsively. A dingy brown suit and a black head were bent over the desk in front of me. I stood limply waiting for the notice of their owner, when the black head was raised, disclosing a frown, two small gray eyes, and a bristling black mustache.
"May I?"
I swallowed bravely, and silently handed him my study card. His pencil ran rapidly down the list of courses I had chosen until it suddenly stopped at 'English 10.' I quickly explained that, although new students were not usually admitted to that course, I thought that, in view of my English work at Kansas University—I spoke those words very distinctly I might be allowed to take it. I paused, but no answer coming from the fierce mustache, I said simply and confidently,
"Well," growled my major professor.
And the answer came quite as simply and confidently.
"No."
In a moment my fear was forgotten. Had Professor Jones guided me through the intricacies of Genung's Rhetoric, had Professor Hopkins ruthlessly red-inked my daily themes, had Professor Dunlap lectured to me on the metaphysics of "Hamlet" only that a man in a brown coat and who bore the unknown name of Anderson, should treat me as if I were a High School girl in short frocks? In tones of impudent coolness, I explained elaborately and with insistence the reasons for my conviction that English 10 was absolutely necessary to my intellectual development. I stopped at a well rounded period, and found myself boldly staring at the awe-compelling mustache, whose bristles were now only half concealing a look of benignant amusement.
"I think," said my major professor, gently, "I think that you will enjoy my Milton class. It meets tomorrow at eleven. Next year we will talk about English 10."
And I found myself gliding nconspicuously out of the door.
In spite of this defeat, Stanford was not so bad. After a while, I learned to tolerate Professor Anderson's mustache and to like Milton, and I loved the fullness of the life and the work, and the satisfactory feeling of being a part of a big and very wonderful thing. But back in a
shadowy corner of my thoughts there were ever memories of other recitation rooms, other friends, and other work.
One day when these memories were crowding full upon me, I happened to be walking from the University to Palo Alto with an affable and loquacious California friend. I roused myself to the knowledge that he was talking, just in time to hear him say:
"It is so dry and barren in Kansas that this must seem like Paradise to you." He waved his hand complacently towards the row of thirsty palms that were extending their stiff, imploring arms to a clear, pitiless sky. The oaks stood strong and patient, while the dry earth crumbed around their roots, and the gray dust covered their leaves. The brown road, the parched grass, the dust covered leaves, made a one toned picture that wearied my eye, and oppres ed my heart. My mind went back to the Kansas hill where the State University looks out over a happy, restful, valley. How plain it all was to me. Below, the town, almost hidden by trees, beyond, prosperous looking fields of yellow grain, cut by zigzag lines of cottonwoods that marked the small streams, to the left lay the river, glimmering in the light of the slant sun; and over everything there was brooding the mysterious autumnal haze which glorifies with a deep significance, all that it touches.
But my silence was becoming rude. "Ye-es," I said doubtful, "but I never cared much about Paradise." Then irrelevantly, "Have you noticed how my eyes are watering? It is the dust."
RUTH E. PLUMB.