San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-12-05
CHAPTER /.

Commencement day is, so to speak,
resurrection day in the good old college
town of Singleton, set among the red
clay hills and the sweet smelling pines
that belong to one of the oldest coun-
ties in the state of Mississippi.
On commencement day there is a
general uprising of the population,
sparse and scattered as it is, to see that
Singleton does credit to itself and hon
or to the college.
Poor and rich, humble and naughty,
from the bakers baby burdened wife up
to the presidents childless lady ev-
cry one makes common cause of the an
nual and stirring climax to year Of
somewhat languid intellectual exertion.
Local pride and feminine ingenuity
are evoked confidently and exercised
without stint. 1t is only once year
that Singleton challenges public atteD-
ton, and it strenuously endeavors to
pose respectfully on that one important
date, putting out of sight, as far as pos
sible, every indication of its ordinary
out at heelness
Singleton frankly admits that its
everyday methods may be open to crit
icism and is mildly convinced that in a
hand to hand contest for municipal Ian
rels with any one of the half dozen
plebeian little towns that have sprung
up since it reached its majority it
would very likely come off second if
not third best.
But the staid old college town does
not mediate any such unseemly contest
with the villages whose mushroom ac-
tivities are an offense in its nostrils
Singleton stands upon its dignity in
an attitude of perpetual aloofness from
its neighbors
Marks of age and of pinching poverty
pit its venerable face deeply. Its paint,
less fences, its crumbling brick houses
its weather stained frame buildings, its
patched and peeling stucco facades, are
drearily suggestive of badly peck
marked old face
If it were not for the college, Shingle
ton might have dropped out of tbs
memory of every one but the mapmal5
ers long ago. But the college is, ha
been and will be a thing of today, yes
terday and tomorrow, linking Shingle
toms pathetic present with splendid
past and problematical future.
Local pride clusters with considerable
confidence about the two solemn eye
dingy red brick houses that are Sc
squarely in the middle of vast acres o
untitled and untillable ground in tn,
suburbs of the town. These houses ar,
brick and mortar twins The same mum
Der of broad, squat windows in each
duplicate front doors, clumsy and pom,
derous, gloomy suggestions of Jail facil.
tiles. The same number of blunt top,
ped chimneys, whose growth might have
been arrested by cyclones, or whose
stunted proportions might have been
the opponents of the mason's groveling
spirit. The same description of low cell
ed, white finished, rectangular apart
ments in each.
One of these time defying creations
is the college proper, the other shelters
the professors families and the board
ing students. No ornamental vine or
oficious fig tree filings superhuous pro-
lection over the stern fronts of the two
college houses. They rise superior to
all such effete requirements, and all
day long the squat, square window
panes, with their heavy green blinds
plastered against the brick walls, stare
unblinking at the sun.
Equidistant between these two self
sufficient structures is a small oval in
closure known as "the garden" The
gate to it is always locked and the
whereabouts of the key always an in
scrutable mystery The designer of this
solitary decorative touch evidently had
leanings toward the enduring.
Some unperishing box trees, a few
long lived arbor vites, large laurse
mundi or two, tangle of pink and
white azaleas, long since grown to the
dimensions of trees, all clustered ir-
regularly about the stem of a century
plant whose blossom tide had occurred
but once within the memory of Shin
gleton, but furnished then sort of flo
raj calendar back to which any event of
local Importance might be referred as
having happened before or after the col,
lege century plant had blossomed.
Occasionally gardeners who have been
hired to nip any desultory tendencies on
the part of the rigid shrubs and bushe:
within this rigid Enclosure have brought
TO light specimens of petrified wood,
which seem, curiously enough, to bt
the most natural product of the petrified
garden.
These specimens, duly classified anC
labeled, have been honored with con
spicuous places in the rather meage
geological collection which finds ampl
accommodation in a small showcase
purchased at milliner' bankrupt sale
This collection of minerals in the show
case is called the college museum and i
IN object of respectful awe to the vii
Iage urchins
Nothing but a barbed wire fence is be
tween this arid nursery of learning an,
nature in her sweetest, widest, mos
T-iotous mood. Close about the col1eo