The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-02-05

7 laughed and he said TO the fellow,
Would it be good to milk a SOW
with ?" The clerk looked puzzled for
a moment and with all solemnity re-
plicd. NO, sir. | don't think il would
90 TO milk With.
on the other hand, there have been
things for us to learn. We have found
our that q sitter" Is The sitting room:
and .'bedder.' the bed room; decker, ;"
a lecture: and '.brecker." a breakfast,
and we no longer tremble with doubt
and ignorance il an Englishmen
rushes in and says Come so my room
to q shouter," 10: we now Know that
ii is nothing hut an improvised sing
inG concert. where no harm is done
anybody, who is not musical. We nave
grown accustomed To hearing Jesus
college called .'Jaggers," ana every
body knows that Divers is the name
for the Divinity school. Even The
name Rhodes scholars has been IL
corporated into the unwritten diction-
cry of oxford colloquailsm and hence
forward we snail go down 10 history as
Roger Scoggers. The latest edition
OF a model oxford sentence is thiS:
The Roger Scogser chucked his let
Ter in the wager progger boGger," and
the translation of the awful jun bic
is: '.,Tha Rhodes scholar threw his let
ter in he waste paper basket
fculty. after serious lecturinG from
cur guardian tutors succeeded in drop
ping our MAINS and Sirs,' which at
home we regard as the mark Of polite
respect out here we learn to be that
of seviliiy. \ Rhodes Scholar can
row oralize his lips and say, 'Eoh''
as soft and puFring like as any Eng
.ishman and his Rather" with q long
"a" ana {; rising, accent, on the last
Ill aH IN, Ir,1i, hi Ia
style. In the afternoons, he can brew
as nice q pot of tea and serve it TO
his guests with as much prinneSs as
any precise maid Of fifty years. He
no longer breaks his eggs when he
drops them in The Kettle to boil, and
his coffee is really beginning TO have
some color TO il. IN fact the Rhodes
scholar is learning oxford fast.
These, however. are but the excres-
cences of the life. The Rhodes
scholar may take up with such tricks
for three years, but they never Will
become SO much a. part of his nature
as TO indicate any Kindred character
iStic within the man; for it isn't
American. Nor do we find these pecu-
lialities and oddities, which are so
noticeable in the English TO be the
scholar has found out that the very
fellow who says .tOh, really ana
"Hather,' has conscientiously studict.
Latin and Greek and history fol
twelve years and knows more Greek
in five minutes than he does in five
days-with a lexicon ana translation
thrown in. He has found that these
same EngIishmen can take as hard
lick IN football. can wear OFF as mucn
skin in n four mile boat race and
can Strike as good Il jog in a cross
country run, as he can. We are al
willing To admit that, at first, we mis-
judged the oxford man and 50 far un>
derrated his abilities that ave are just
beginning TO realize his genuine worth.
We are bat beginning To grasp tie
fact that these fellows whom we arc
a associated WITH are to be the poets
orators. statesmen and prime minis
ters OF England, and that it was just
such tea drinkers as these vino be-
came the Gladstoncs. the Cecii
Rhodes; and the RosebcrryS of the
country. we forget that there are bu;
few colleges in England and that il is
English university life that makes
English life in general ana shapes
English policy towards the world.
There must be some great feature IN
an educational system that has Kept
a small island of tWenty-SeVcn million
people as one Of the world powers for
nearly Il thousand years. ana yet the
leaders during that tjme have received
just such training as we are offered
here, now: for oxford never changes.
TO the universities. then belongs the
credit; for their men alone are the
educated. and over here. they are the
ones who rule, for The rest have 40
aspirations of their own and Will take
suggestion as q cat laps milk.
We find that the ordinary OXforii
man is q student OF world politics aud
is thoroughly convehsant upon any
problem of the cay The outward
Geme3nor Of these fellows, which ~
first we thought indicative of childish
ness and effeminacy we now discover
health and even temper To begin
with, every Engiishman is a first class
animal. with a large frame ana
healthy body In addition to that
they consider exercise TO the indispen
sable, and every afternoon, rain or
shine. men. women and children, old
and young alike go TO their game OF
some kind. 1t is not at all unfamiliar
to see an old woman, with gray hair,
scampering across the field after
golf ball.
In athletics, every Englishman is
too good q participant to make q spec
tator at Il match game. and that ac-
counts for the small attendance. For
instance when EXter College Of Ok
ford University plays trinity College
of Cambridge University there are
scarcely hundred spectators TO see
the game. Everybody else has got a
game of his own: he is off somewhere
on the river or at another field play
ing "Rugger' or Soccer or else fol-
lowing the Beagles. At the recent
great match in the city of London,
between oxford and Cambridge uni
versities in which oxford was defeated
II to 10, there were only about six
thousand 10 see the game, and very
little enthusiasm was displayed Oc-
caSionally somebody would yell ont
Cambridge" and that was the extent
of the cheering.
The Rhodes scholars, like all other
freshmen who come here have mis-
Judged the amount of literary work
accomplished and have. for time.
doubted the earnestness of anybOdys
efforts. They thought that because
there were three collegiate terms of
only two months each. which leaves
as much vacation time as term time,
that the result Of a years work would
be naturally small. But again We