登陆注册
15293000000003

第3章 CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH(2)

The faculty lingers in my memory, and I have the same reverence and affection for its members, though sixty-five years out of college, that I had the day I graduated. Our president, Theodore D. Woolsey, was a wonderful scholar and a most inspiring teacher. Yale has always been fortunate in her presidents, and peculiarly so in Professor Woolsey. He had personal distinction, and there was about him an air of authority and reserved power which awed the most radical and rebellious student, and at the same time he had the respect and affection of all. In his historical lectures he had a standard joke on the Chinese, the narration of which amused him the more with each repetition. It was that when a Chinese army was beleaguered and besieged in a fortress their provisions gave out and they decided to escape.

They selected a very dark night, threw open the gates, and as they marched out each soldier carried a lighted lantern.

In the faculty were several professors of remarkable force and originality. The professor of Greek, Mr. Hadley, father of the distinguished ex-president of Yale, was more than his colleagues in the thought and talk of the undergraduates. His learning and pre-eminence in his department were universally admitted. He had a caustic wit and his sayings were the current talk of the campus.

He maintained discipline, which was quite lax in those days, by the exercise of this ability. Some of the boys once drove a calf into the recitation-room. Professor Hadley quietly remarked:

"You will take out that animal. We will get along to-day with our usual number." It is needless to say that no such experiment was ever repeated.

At one time there was brought up in the faculty meeting a report that one of the secret societies was about to bore an artesian well in the cellar of their club house. It was suggested that such an extraordinary expense should be prohibited. Professor Hadley closed the discussion and laughed out the subject by saying from what he knew of the society, if it would hold a few sessions over the place where the artesian well was projected, the boring would be accomplished without cost. The professor was a sympathetic and very wise adviser to the students. If any one was in trouble he would always go to him and give most helpful relief.

Professor Larned inspired among the students a discriminating taste for the best English literature and an ardent love for its classics. Professor Thacher was one of the most robust and vigorous thinkers and teachers of his period. He was a born leader of men, and generation after generation of students who graduated carried into after-life the effects of his teaching and personality. We all loved Professor Olmstead, though we were not vitally interested in his department of physics and biology. He was a purist in his department, and so confident of his principles that he thought it unnecessary to submit them to practical tests.

One of the students, whose room was immediately over that of the professor, took up a plank from the flooring, and by boring a very small hole in the ceiling found that he could read the examination papers on the professor's desk. The information of this reaching the faculty, the professor was asked if he had examined the ceiling. He said that was unnecessary, because he had measured the distance between the ceiling and the surface of his desk and found that the line of vision connected so far above that nothing could be read on the desk.

Timothy Dwight, afterwards president, was then a tutor. Learning, common sense, magnetism, and all-around good-fellowship were wonderfully united in President Dwight. He was the most popular instructor and best loved by the boys. He had a remarkable talent for organization, which made him an ideal president. He possessed the rare faculty of commanding and convincing not only the students but his associates in the faculty and the members of the corporation when discussing and deciding upon business propositions and questions of policy.

The final examinations over, commencement day arrived. The literary exercises and the conferring of degrees took place in the old Center Church. I was one of the speakers and selected for my subject "The Hudson River and Its Traditions." I was saturated from early association and close investigation and reading with the crises of the Revolutionary War, which were successfully decided on the patriots' side on the banks of the Hudson. I lived near Washington Irving, and his works I knew by heart, especially the tales which gave to the Hudson a romance like the Rhine's.

The subject was new for an academic stage, and the speech made a hit. Nevertheless, it was the saddest and most regretful day of my life when I left Yale.

My education, according to the standard of the time, was completed, and my diploma was its evidence. It has been a very interesting question with me how much the academy and the college contributed to that education. Their discipline was necessary and their training essential. Four years of association with the faculty, learned, finely equipped, and sympathetic, was a wonderful help.

The free associations of the secret and debating societies, the campus, and the sports were invaluable, and the friendships formed with congenial spirits added immensely to the pleasures and compensations of a long life.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 空谷道澄禅师语录

    空谷道澄禅师语录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 明月美人花见羞

    明月美人花见羞

    她,本单纯可爱、沉鱼落雁,但乱世美人绝对不简单!后宫的阴险狡诈,君王的不信任,姐妹的背信弃义……叫一单纯女子如何受得了?弃琴师,掌后宫,乱天下,且看花见羞如何掌王朝!“叮——嗙当”她笑了笑,手腕那儿流淌着泉泉鲜血,她终于可以……
  • 无心插柳柳成胤

    无心插柳柳成胤

    车祸后,有个人一言不发坐在那目光直直盯着你,那该是一种什么样的的感受。而苏柳却在这种令人毛骨悚然的注视下答应他的追求。她想,她一定是脑震荡傻了,然而她明明受伤的只有腿啊!爱一个人不奇怪,可到了许成胤这里,却最隐秘的事。所有人都觉得苏柳和他侄子青梅竹马,感情甚笃,是最适合的一对,就连他自己也这么认为。他看着她从儿童长成少女,看着她从无忧无虑到成熟沉敛,一切都在变,然而不变的却是那无法放下的初心。
  • 不朽真圣

    不朽真圣

    “你是谁?”“叶辰天”来自什么地方?”“封神大陆!”“好吧!我要跟你订婚,你要保护我!”“……”。封神大陆蚂蚁般的叶辰天来到地球,角色互换一晃逆天改命,究竟是重蹈覆辙还是成为真圣……
  • 杨文敏集

    杨文敏集

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 白色眷恋

    白色眷恋

    因为不满皇马6比2的比分,中国青年律师沈星怒砸啤酒瓶,结果电光火石间,他穿越成了佛罗伦蒂诺的儿子,且看来自09年的小伙子如何玩转03年的欧洲足坛
  • 帝玺传

    帝玺传

    一场惊心动魄的寻找之旅,却牵出一段尘封多年的秘密。在权利与欲望的纠缠中,那些无法倒退的残破人生是否还有坚持下去的希望。
  • 陌上花开怕君笑

    陌上花开怕君笑

    南有乔木,不可休思。北有青蔓,难以断愁。青春本就是一场放纵的爱情。时间很紧,爱才重要。好好珍惜,好好爱。我从不向这个世界低头,低头只为吻你。我愿倾尽所有,只为博你一笑。
  • 网游之技术流猎人

    网游之技术流猎人

    左酒凝擅长所有的游戏,不论是电子游戏、棋牌、还是赌博。一次车祸,她回到12年前,重新开始人生,开始她第二次的【时空】游戏生涯。注:本文不是一般中国小说那种一条主线下来这种剧情形式,而是多条可能现在还毫不相关的剧情线同时发展,最后这些剧情线一起汇集成主线的剧情形式。所以一开始看着这些不同的现实剧情可能会觉得乱,因为这些不同的剧情线很可能还没开始互相扯上关系。
  • 致命飞船

    致命飞船

    2016年,第五次冰川时期来临,人类面临灭绝。一艘“泰坦尼克”号的巨型宇宙飞船,承载5万移民前往遥远的类地行星,而可怕怪物疯狂突袭,神秘消失的人们又在哪里,他们是否能够抵达目的地“盖亚”星球,而人们渐渐的发现,这一切只是可怕的开始,进化!才刚刚开始。