The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-01-13
HOW TO DEAL WITH COLLEGE
KoUGHs.

ing bouts in public and in private.
Recently the grandson of William Lloyd
Garrison joined this society and subse-
auentiy falling sick his father discovered
that his arm had been 50 fearfully burned
with lighted cigar in three different
places during his initiation that the limb
had sweIled TO three times its usual size.
The indignant father at once wrote an
open letter to President Eliot exposing
the outrageous conduct Of the Harvard
students and demanding the suppression
OF such barbarous customs by the univers-
ity authorities. President Eliot replied,
saying in effect that it was none Of his
business; that while he did not approve
Of barbarity, or folly or intoxication, II
was not the business Of the Harvard
college faculty TO interfere.
The Springfield Republican sets forth as
follows the true history Of the evolution of
the Harvard university rough:
This minority is made up largely OF the sons
OF rich men who have bean paEpered and in
dulged 10 q point sufficient TO destroy any
strength OF purpose and beat down any aim in
life above requirement OF the superficial accom-
piiShments AID gmatteTing OF education which
their place in society seems 10 require. They
go 70 Harvard 70 carouse and have high time.
Knowing how much immunity from merited
punishment their money will buy, they become
the most irresponsible and dangerous set Of
young loafers ever tolerated They simply care
nothing for the ordinary rules aud regulations
Of conduct which society outside of the uniEer-
sity in common decency insists upon being
observed, aud their painting Of John Harvard's
statue and the drunken bouts and bsrbaritIes of
Aas1 IaF@ 49,
in point to show what they capable Of
But, worse yet, their example naturally be-
comes contagious 1t 10 time that heavy hand
was laid upon the fast set that is making stu
dent life st Harvard a scandal and reproach.
The Boston Herald, always stout cham
pion of Harvard, confesses that all this is
true and much more might be said. and
rebukes President Eliot for his absurd
position of leaving to selfgovernment a
lot Of rowdies who need stern discipline as
much as convict scamp or an army in
campaign. The truth is that the so-called
college rowdy has no business to be toll
Grated an hour after his character for
public and private indecency and brutality
clog on the neck of the college; scandal
to an institution of learning, and public
nuisance at home or abroad. This perish
ing class of college rowdies acquire moth
ing at college but Incidence, or at best
love of that refined excitement that dudes
confound with culture. They do not go 10
college to master books and digest knowl-
edge; they 60 there to back sporting
events, to spend life in play; to
keep company with seedy actors and soiled
actresses; to eat like Heliogobalus; to
drink like regular army soldier on pay
day, and to- initiate the peculiar animal
vices that alone lift the names of Charles
the ranks of infamous mediocrity to the
level of satanic talent for sin.
These college rakes make the pursuit of
carnal pleasure the purpose of their college
life, so far as they have any purpose. They
have vulgar taste for that most stupid
of all kinds Of so-called wit, rude and I'M
feeling practical jokes; they make life
business and pursuit of play at an institu-
ton that implies labor and study, if not
learning. The brightest and best of these
college rakes have no higher ambition
than to kill care at dull din
ner; TO play brilliant buffoon and
humorist for the stupid Ioungers
and idle tipplers of their set who
grow gregarious in the barroom of the
Parker house. Ten years after college
these bright Mercutios of tie Harvard
| hummer set are become as shallow and
shiftless as court fool who has survived
his sprightliness and become a lean and
slippered pantaloon.
/ OF course, it is not the bright wit. of
Harvard's Bohemia who contrive the bar
barities, indecencies and inanities that
/ have given Harvard college bad name
| with people who distinguish between the
/ harmless. merry pranks of young gentle
/ man and the cowardiy and stupid brutality
I OF a young savage. The oyerseers of Har-
/ ward are now considering how to cure the
/ evil which has grown fat and bloated
/ under the indulgence granted it by
/ President Eliot. The overseers need
/ not go far 10 find a cure
for the disease if they are in earnest. In
! stead of suspending and expelling stu
/ dents who commit gross outrages against
| person or property, let the faculty turn
/ them over to the courts for prosecution
/ and punishment. When the college
authorities teach their students that in
| their little world they can break the
laws of the land without suffering legal
/ punishment; when the college authorities
| screen their students from legal arrest and
| punishment by refusing, as once did Presi-
/ dent McCosh at Princeton, TO give the
names Of the law-breaking students TO the
| officers of the law, then the college author
tiles are the demoEalizing agents Of great
/ trust.
| The brutal hazing, which college author
tiles punish only by suspension or expul-
| sion, is another illustration OF this vicious
| policy Of college government. A college
student who is taught by the faculty that
| he viii be turned over 10 the police court
for trial and punishment if he commits 8
brutal assault, if he destroys or Injuries
| property, or commits any other crime or
| misdemeanor for which he would be sure
TO suffer if he were not a coilegian, has
learned a more valuable lesson than is
contained in the translation and recital of
many pages Of Latin and Greek.
The curse Of all this brutality and sbnor.
NAL aninalism that is yelled under the
name of college athletics is seen in
the enthusiastic interest that college
men take IN the fate and perform
| ances of prize6chters the shame