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The Spike: or, Victoria University College Review October 1905

Facetiæ. — (Echoes from School and College Days.)

page 8

Facetiæ.

(Echoes from School and College Days.)

WWhen the present writer was a school-boy some thirty—not forty—years ago, he was frequently called upon by illiterate domestic servants and others to act as amanuensis and literary-coach for them in love and other affairs. On one occasion, when in the ex-sixth standard (and after spending a year at Bryce's First Latin Book) an opportunity of seeing, if not his name, at any rate his "hand," in print, offered. A small farmer in the neighbourhood got fined for "keeping a dog without a license." He, presumably by arrangement with an accommodating pressman, contrived to get a neighbour's name substituted for his own in the press account of the police-court proceedings. This neighbour, though all but illiterate, soon got to hear that his name was figuring in the public prints in connection with the non-payment of his "dog-tax." He called upon the present writer and asked him to personate him to the extent of writing in his name to the editor of the paper (published some twenty miles away) drawing his attention to the mistake. The following paragraph was forwarded and duly appeared:—

"Erratum.—Sir,—I beg to draw your attention to the fact that a nominal error occurred in your last issue. In your report of the court proceedings in connection with the non-payment of dog-tax, the name P—R—should have been P—K—. I am, yours, etc., P—R—."

Truly a little Latin is a dangerous thing.

Some ten years later, when an undergraduate, I was spending my long University vacation in a Highland county. The head master of the public school, near my place of sojourn, was suddenly taken ill from influenza, and I was called upon to act as locum tenens, or "local demon," as some of them would have it. One morning a "new pupil" made his appearance, along with older brothers and sisters, who had been at school for some time. I asked the oldest member of the family to page 9 bring me a note from his father next morning, with the date of the "new pupil's" birth, etc. On the following morning the necessary information was furnished thus:—"Dear Sir,—At your request John was born at 5 o'clock in the morning on the 6th of June, five years ago."

About the same time a teacher in the same county received the following communication from a parent, who had evidently formed a high opinion of his resources as a teacher:—" Dear Sire,—As you ar a man of nolegs I wish to inter my sun in your skull."

On one occasion when I was standing near the door of the large examination hall of my university waiting for an examinee friend, freshmen were filing out from their preliminary examination, and though strangers to one another, were making anxious inquiries among their fellow examinees as to how they "got on." A lad of twenty or thereby, who from his woebegone look, could not have acquitted himself very brilliantly, sidled up to a jovial-looking young man of thirty, whom he took for a fellow-examinee, but who was really the Professor of Mathematics, and addressed him: "How did you get on ? You seem to have done well?" "Oh!" was the reply, "I have got clone with examinations some time ago." "Lucky dog you!" said the examinee, and passed on.

The seats in the college class-rooms were arranged in tiers. A student in one of the back or higher benches in the mathematical class-room was playing the fool. "Mr. B—," said the professor, will you kindly come down to the end of the front bench? I ask you to do so, firstly, because you will be near the board; secondly, because you will be near me; and, thirdly, because you will be near the door."

A student at the end of one of the back benches in the English class-room let his hat fall (on the steps leading up to the benches); it rolled down with a "bobbing" noise until it landed at the Professor's platform. The Professor paused, and looking with a twinkle in his eye at the owner of the hat, remarked: "I am glad, Mr. Blank, to see that something is making progress in this class."

On another occasion—on what was called Essay Day, when students were called upon to read passages from their own essays (previously read and marked by the professor)—a student was called upon to read a marked passage in his essay. The essay was a long one. The professor let the student read for page 10 some ten minutes. The essay was good, and the essayist was frequently applauded by the class. "Thank you, Mr. F.," said the Professor, "that will do. Gentlemen, I will venture no comments. It is rather a delicate matter to criticise a production of my own!" Mr. F., the son of a wealthy ex-New Zealand squatter, had taken his "material" almost verbatim et literatim from an old unsigned magazine article of the Professor's own!

I was present on one occasion at a "University Liberal Dinner," given under the auspices of the University Liberal Association. This was before the days of Home Rule and the Liberal schism, which gave birth to Unionism. Several distinguished statesmen were present. The Principal of the University was in the chair, and some fifteen Professors of the University attended. At eleven o'clock, after the authorised programme was exhausted, the Principal and the older members of the company withdrew. One of the younger professors was called to the chair, and a free and easy variety entertainment was carried on into the small hours of the morning. In the course of these horae ambrosianae there were persistent cries for a speech from a young professor, who had spoken rather effectively earlier in the night, but who, it was evident, had thrown off all academic restraint and had left some good things unsaid. He was the rising hope of the University Radicals. He rose in response to frequent "calls." "Suggest a subject," he hiccoughed. "Conservative Principles," shouted a student. Then all took up the cry—"Conservative Principles." "Gentlemen," he began, "Conservative principles are principles be—be—" At this point the chairman intervened with: "Gentlemen, I must call my colleague to order. In fact, I must see him home." Immediately came a chorus of student voices" "Vice versa, vice versa!" Exeunt omnes.

On one occasion a fellow-student and intimate friend had fallen in love with a beautiful Jewess, whose Christian (?) name was Henrietta. He was prompted into verse by her many charms, though it was at this point a case of distance lending enchantment to the "inspiration," for he had not got introduced to her. He had but one objection to her—the fact that her name was so unmanipulable in verse or rhyme. His own name was, we shall say, John A. Want. One evening he was bewailing the unwieldiness of the lady's name to a young but accomplished poet of our mutual acquaintance (whose poetic "remains" have been since edited by Mr. Andrew Lang). "I think I will be able to help you," said our mutual friend, and "rattled off" the following:—

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Group portrait of students

page 11

"Woe is me for John A. Want,
John A. Want and Henrietta;
Hear him rave and hear him rant,
And wish to G—d he'd nev'r met her."

Mr. Want was under considerable physiological handicap in prosecuting love-affairs. When a boy he had his nose, which must have stood out, from the first, in bold relief from the back-ground of his facial anatomy, badly injured by running it against a tree while playing blind-man's buff in Regent's Park. The nose was sent considerably off the plumb, and the doctor who was called in to re-adjust it had bungled matters rather sadly. In fact, it became a leaning tower and positive disfigurement. It made him very sensitive and self-conscious in company, and he winced perceptibly whenever the word "nose" happened to be introduced, inadvertently or otherwise. He had, however, practised (presumably with the help of a large mirror) a good profile pose or posture, which minimised the nasal elevation and deviation. When invited to any function, he was always early, and contrived to secure a seat where he could make the least of his "thwart disnatured torment" and the most of the "profile" already referred to. To me, his intimate friend, he was perpetually harping on his nasal handicap, and the "dead certainty" (as he felt) that it would set things all awry (as much agee as itself) in the matrimonial market! I used to reassure him by saying that it was not so very noticeable. He would silence me, however, with something of this sort: "Oh, nonsense! the other day I heard a caddie boy at a street corner shouting to his chum: 'Tommy, Tommy, come here and see this nose coming round the corner'" On his way to Oxford from Scotland on one occasion, the Jewess (for whom, if she would not jib at his nose, he was prepared to forego his religion, and a good deal more beside) was a passenger by the same express as far as Edinburgh. Here he kept her closely "under eye." She alighted from the train to be received into the arms of a tall, handsome and distinguished-looking young gentleman, in such an effusive fashion that it almost gave Mr. Want locomotor ataxia. He succeeded, however, in making his way to Oxford. After the usual fever-crisis he bethought him of "fresh woods and pastures new," but, before hazarding any further experiments, he determined to visit a London specialist to see if anything could be done to derrick the nose on to its original pedestal. The specialist was confident he could restore the "unruly member" to its quondam site, and remove almost every trace of disfigurement. An operation was submitted to, but unfortunately almost cost my friend his life. All his friends were summoned to London. He recovered, I am page 12 happy to say, but had to spend many weary months in bed in a private hospital in London. The nose, I regret to say, was decidedly the worse for the attempt to lever it into position. He is now a distinguished vicar, and I should not be surprised if his poetry and theology would one day secure him a bishopric. He is still, I understand, in the enjoyment of single blessedness. All I can say of my dear old friend is—

There did go a Christian by,
Would be worth a Jewess' eye.

Now that his Teufelsdiöckhian fever-crisis is over, I doubt very much if even the wholesomely-attempering "speechless messages" of a fair Jewess' eyes could do anything more than prompt him to write a Petrarchan sonnet to her eyebrows.

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