Kansas University Weekly.
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able to see it, being a long distance away, struggling with the vilest torch that was ever made to hoax an innocent campaigner with, to prevent it from setting fire to himself or any of his neighbors, while he begged the same neighbors to march farther off, not to drop any tar upon him, and to cease smoking him with the smudge which emanated from all the torches. The latter protest was a vain one; in a very few minutes every member of that particular company was black enough in the face to have taken part in a minstrel performance. Those torches had but one virtue; they burnt entirely out before the line of march was traversed, and from that time we were at liberty to turn our attention to other matters, such as keeping in line and file, and observing what was going on elsewhere. However a man in the ranks could not observe very much except the back of the man in front, and an endless line of faces on each side of him; and occasionally it occurred to me to wish that I might change places with our official delegate for a few minutes, just long enough to see what the procession was really like. At last a quarter mile countermarch on Nassau Street gave the men in line a chance to see something of what others were doing. Then we turned into the campus, down McCosh walk, through the quadrangle, turned the left wing of Nassau Hall, and uncovered in front of the reviewing stand where sat a quiet, business-like looking gentleman, apparently the only man present who was not shouting or feeling inclined to do so. But he had no need to shout; if he had done so the sound would have been lost in the uproar of other shouting, the thunder of the captains, and the songs. Once a facetious remark was addressed to the Chief Magistrate himself, and those who were present at the time say that it moved him deeply. It was "Sixteen to one—nit." Your unofficial representative had not yet arrived upon the scene when this particular event took place, but at last he did arrive—the classes marched, after the undergraduates, in order of age, and there were many classes before the class of '88—and as he replaced his hat after passing the stand, there smote upon his ear in
the midst of all the uproar one single but exceedingly vigorous "Rock Chalk." Now a Princeton rocket cheer from some thousands of throats is a wonderful and sonorous thing; but the Kansas cheer has a quality that carries through the other much as a bullet pierces a board. I looked quickly to the right, and found, as I expected, a Kansas University man. This time he wore no gown, but he wore what became him equally well, an air as wildly enthusiastic as that of any Princetonian of them all. It was but a glance as I was swept on, to discover in a moment that the stations reserved in the front campus for the divisions to occupy after the march were largely already occupied, and that I was suddenly adrift in a sea of struggling humanity, each person striving to secure enough space for himself to stand on tiptoe to see the fireworks.
As soon as the parade was over, the multitude began to call for a speech from the President. He might have yielded after a time—college men have a way of getting what they wish everywhere but the management relieved the situation by ordering on the fireworks. During the brief but very brilliant display, the spectators practiced the rocket cheer to the time-keeping of the rockets themselves and endeavored to sing an ancient song in honor of Nassau Hall to the accompaniment of a full band; but no band could be expected to hold together the singing of such a chorus as that in the open air, with so much else going on at the same time.
With the burning of the "Goodnight" piece, the fireworks and the festivities of the second day were at an end. The most important and impressive of all was to come on the morrow. The unofficial representative repaired to the railway station, found standing room only upon the platform of the twelfth car of the first special train for Trenton; and here he rode, cold as to his outer man and hungry as to his inner one, but in deep serenity, knowing that at the end of the journey he would be warmed and possibly fed. And it was so.
(Concluded next week.)