Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1873-10-24
a Lesson to college students.

The telegraph, several days since,
made brief mention Of the death of Nor
timer Leggett, son of the United States
Commissioner of Patents, and student
at Cornell University. From details
recently received it appears that young
Leggett was undergoing the ceremonies
of initiation into college secret society,
the Kappa Alpha Fraternity. The
members of this society gathered on the
banks of creek little outside the viii
lage, and Leggett. the candidate for ini-
tiation, was blindfolded and subjected to
the usual ceremonies, which appear to
have been rough and cruel. While they
were in progress, Leggett and the two
young men who bad him in charge fell
over the brink of the precipice into a
gorge fifty feet below. There they were
found by their companions, Leggett with
his skull fractured, and the other two
seriously and possibly fatally injured.
Leggett lived about hale an hour after
the fall.
This sad tragedy has had the effect to
awaken the attention of the authorities
at Cornell to the outrageous barbarities
which are practiced under the sanction
of student usage Public feeling in Ith-
lea is strongly aroused, and it is proba-
BILE that those who were Immediately
concerned in the affair will be prosecuted
and punished. This is as it should be.
1t is time that the students in our col
leges should be taught that they are not
placed beyond the pale of the laws.
There has been too much ruffianism per-
petrated in colleges which has gone un-
punished simply because the offending
parties were students. In the present
case there are doubts entertained wheth-
er it was not hazing," rather than ini-
tiation, which was intended by young
Legget's prosecutors. However this may
be, it is certain that it was highland
ed outrage. The tragic ending was, Of
course, not contemplated, but the reck-
less cruelty which led to it was.
This very melancholy event should be
accepted by college students as lesson.
There is tendency already manifest in
some of our collegiate institutions to do
away with the cowardly and brutal prac-
tice of "hazing," and to abolish rush.
es and other equally senseless college
customs. We hope this event will
strengthen the reform and make it gen.
eral. If it does not, and if the college
authorities are unwilling or unable to
suppress these practices, the law should
take it in hand. There is no reason why
a Freshman in college should be SUBJ
jected to such indignities and crueties as
are in vogue among student. He is as
much entitled to the protection of the
laws as any other person. Students who
assault their fellows under the cover of
class customs or distinctions should be
handled in just the same way as others
guilty of the same offence-and the PEN
atty should be proportionate to the cow
ardice and brutality of the deed. A
trial before the Police Court, and few
days incarceration, would be excellent
correctives and they would not have to
be repeated many times before hazing
and kindred college customs would die
out.
1t is perhaps hopeless to expect, all at
once, that such qualities as courtesy and
gentle dealing shall become the standard
of college life. AS matters are now,
brute force seems to be mistaken for
manliness and the obligations which
ordinary good breeding imposes on soci-
ETY., are thrown off under the anomalous
conditions of college life. But if no
radical reform can be brought about, the
public can at least require that college
students shall be kept within the bounds
of the law. If it is too much to ask
them to be gentlemen, let US at least in
duce them to act like men.
Another inquiry suggests itself in
connection with young Leggett's death,
and it is whether college secret society
should be allowed to indulge in prac-
tices which are cruel and dangerous as
they are senseless. This would open up
the whole question of the utility of col
lege secret societies, which we do not
care TO enter. But it is certain that
those who believe these fraternities to be
an incubus ON student life, with their
mummeries and secret rites, their grips
and passwords, will find in this occur
renee strong argument in favor of their
view.-Bost0n Journal.
A Detroit business man found a coun-
ferfeit fifty cent scrin annonor HE ourro,,o-