The Hair Question Again.

Dear "Spike,"—What have we done to deserve this? Is V.U.C. a University or a Kindergarten? Have the numerous girls' schools of Wellington decided to absorb the University, and have we fallen to the level of a mere extra form in Miss Baber's excellent Diocesan School for the daughters of Pious Gentlefolk, or what? Is this another symptom of the universal unrest consequent on the Great World War? Is it the harbinger of another Bloody Revolution? Or has some fair Debussyite decided to do homage to the master in the semblance of La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin?

Excuse my French, dear "Spike," as our good friend C.Q.P. would say at a moment of heightened emotion like this. What I am referring to is the fact that not one only, but several—how am I to describe them?—women of immature years have positively been seen, observed, and accurately noted to walk the hallowed halls and corridors of V.U.C. with their hair down! Oh," Spike!" blush for human depravity! weep for the brazen effrontery of our little sisters! shudder at the abysm down which., horribile dictu! frail femininity has tottered and incontinently fallen!

What is there to say, O "Spike"? The horrid fact is out. Mayhap by the time these lines appear Decency will have already prevailed; even now Duty," stern daughter of the voice of God" (Wordsworth), may have stepped in; this very night, if heaven so wills, these eyes may gaze upon the semblance, if not the reality, of Women walking under the eye of Mr. J. S. Brook; honour, even now, may be satisfied. Else, what to do but imitate the noble Japanese, and, with due ceremony, having offered prayers and oblations to Minerva and Apollo, austere partner of learning and the arts, and to the nine gracious Muses of Parnassus; having purified the heart and washed the hands, commit hari-kiri in the middle of the hall between the hours of five and eight? So a nation makes tribute to Bushido. Shall a Seat of Learning do less?—I am, etc.,

Sorrowing Graduate.

P.S.—If they don't like to put it up, why not bob it?

Au Revoir (We Hope).

The best and brightest continue to leave us. We drop a tear of blessing on the heads of Miss Hilda G. Heine, M.A., Mr. Gordon Troup, M.A., and Mr. J. G. Myers, M.Sc. We pass no superfluous encomiums, for among friends such are not needed. We gaze with admiration, envy, something of awe, on the departing ones; good students and true, we hope to gaze upon their faces many times again before the night descends. Miss Heine goes, via London, to Berlin, to study economics at the fountain-head. Gordon Troup is on his way to Poitiers with the French Travelling Scholarship for a two years' post-graduate course. He is to represent New Zealand at the biennial meetings of the General Committee of the World's Student Christian Federation at High Leigh in England early in August, and will attend one of the British Student Christian Movement Summer Conferences at Swanwick. Mr. Myers goes to Harvard with the 1851 Exhibition Science Research Scholarship.

Mr. H. L. Richardson, M.Sc, also departs for London in the near future with a scholarship at the Imperial College of Science and Technology.

Marriages.

Marie Priestley to K. M. Griffin, M.Sc.

Marjorie Carr, B.A., to S. A. Wiren, B.A., LL.M.

Engagements.

Margaret Harris to H. McCormick LL.B.

Marion Whitehorn, B.A., to D. O. Williams, M.A.

Roma Fabian to H. A. Heron, M.A.

(Apologies for any omissions)

Good luck to them all!

College Songs.

It has been suggested—and the suggestion is worth serious consideration—that the best of the College songs should be reprinted with the music. The words are now printed in the Old Clay Patch and the C.U. Handbook, but the only copies of the music to which they should be hung seem to have been tattered and torn beyond all possibility of reclamation; this when they have not disappeared altogether. And it is not as simple as it might seem to hand down tunes, as it were, by word of mouth. They would not make a very big book, and the expense should, therefore, not be prohibitive. One thing is certain—the songs are not known as they should be; and this may be the method of getting them known. The matter any how will not be allowed to rest here.

Mr. Brook's Adventure.

We thought for a time it would be necessary to have this number of the "Spike" black-edged. Fortunately, however, things have turned out otherwise, and we are glad to inform our readers that Mr. Brook is recovering as quickly as may be from the brutal attack made on him recently by a burglar in his house. Mr. Brook was a good deal knocked about, but we are proud to think he put up a good fight before his assailant got the upper hand. The sympathy of the "Spike," as well as of the whole College, is with Mr. and Mrs. Brook.

Sir Walter Buchanan.

We can only express the most profound regret also at the sudden death of Sir Walter Buchanan, the latest and not the least of the College's benefactors. He had the interests of education at heart, and his foundation of the Chair of Agriculture and his expressed intention of further providing for work necessary for agricultural teaching was a very practical illustration of his interest. Such men are all too few; their loss, even at the advanced age of Sir Walter Buchanan, is all the more to be deplored. The Executive of the Students' Association at its last meeting passed a motion of regret, and a wreath was sent to the funeral.

Social Service Club.

What has long been lacking among College activities, a club for social service, has recently been started, and is hard at work. The aim of a University, after all, is fundamentally social service; and one of the most pressing of contemporary needs is that of educated men and women having a sympathetic understanding of social problems and broad vision in their consideration. We have had libraries of theories hurled at our heads in the last few years; we attempt now to put one or two of them into practice. The aim is not indiscriminate and ill-directed charity, but constructive work of real value, involving personal contact with fundamental human realities and a solid understanding of the principles involved. The Club is working in with other organisations where possible, and has enlisted the help of such able men as the Rev. T. Feilden Taylor and Mr. P. Fraser, M.P. Prosper the work! Funds are wanted.