The Elon College Weekly
VOL. 1. New Series
BURLINGTON, N. C, TUESDAY, APRIL 26, 1910.
NO. ! 1
And Elon College, N. C.
THE MAN WHO COMMITTED
SUICIDE.
A Tragedy of College Life.
He was once a boy back there in a I
little village or country school. He was j
a good boy, too. His work in school
was well done; his evenings were spent
in study; his parents were proud of his !
school record; and his teacher and i
friends prophesied for him a brilliant ca
reer. He led all his classes, won all the
medals and graduated at the head of
his class. Of course he must go to col
lege, even though it was necessary for
his father and mother to scrimp and save
to pay his bills. But what to them was
their discomfort and saving compared
with the bright future of their boy. So
to college he went, equipped with a
sound mind, a healthy body, a father’s
blessings and a mother’s prayers.
His reception at college was all that
he could desire; his teachers were agree
ably impressed by his manly appearance
and honest thorough work. His cheer
ful disposition soon won him friends and
his college life began in a most delight
ful manner. His was a busy whole
some life. With the benediction of a
Christian home still lingering upon him
he readilly entered into the religious or
ganizations of the college and enjoyed
their elevating influences. His letters
home were both frequent and cheerful.
He was surely destined for a successful
carear.
But the Garden of Eden was not
without its temptor and temptations,
neither is college life. Hence it was
only natural that he should encounter
some of these temptations. His was a
nature that responded to friendly treat
ment and easily made friends, and among
his college friends he unfortunately in
cluded several "good fellows" who had
since foreswore earnest persistent work
and were bent on having "a good time."
For them the past was forgotten and the
future yet unborn. The present alone
was theirs to enjoy. In their jovial com
panionship home and mother fade into
the hazy distance for the new boy and
the hopeful future ceases to allure and
sustain and ;oon loses its chance. "A
fellow has but one life to live" say his
careless friends "and he might as well
get some fun out of that one." Of
course his work must suffer, but "work
is a bore anyway and just so a fellow
makes a grade, what difference does it
make?" So when an essay must be
written in English there's plenty of them
in the library that the professor certainly
has never seen, and when a new text in
Latin or Mathematics must be taken up
a few days will suffice to obtain a trans
lative or key and all goes merrily on. At
about this time he discovers, too, that the
professors are not so friendly as they
once were and are not treating him fair
ly ; because when he gets back that
splendid essay which he had been care
ful to copy word for word and to punc
tuate exactly as it was written, he is sur-1
prised and displeased to find it marked!
C. Not a mistake marked in it either;
and there’s Jones, who got his ba^k ht- i
erally cut to pieces and marked " rewrite,"'
and then got B on it. And then when '
he recites his Latin lesson the teacher ^
takes especial delight in tangling him up
with senseless questions about tense and 1
case and mode, etc., while he asks
Smith, who is next to him and doesn’t
read half so glibly, only a few easy ques
tions which he answers without any dif- I
ficulty—as anyone ought to. " It’s no!
use for a fellow to try, he can’t get just- j
ice anyway." The letters home, which |
are diminishing in length and frequency, j
have lost their cheerful tone and are de- j
cidedly pessimistic. Father and mother !
are disturbed and angry that John should
be so mistreated, and wish they had sent
him to another college, where he would
have received justice. They know the
teachers are to blame, because so bright
a boy and so industrious a student as
John would not make such grades as his
reports indicate. But he has begun his
course there and to change would mean
a loss of time and money, so the only
thing to be done is to make the best of
it and let him stay. He will make his
mark yet in spite of those teachers who
are prejudiced against Urn becEiisc th.-y
think he will make a smarter man than
they are. And as for John ; his college
course, which should have been a climb
upward, becomes a slide downward.
His work becomes lighter all the while,
both in his estimation and in quality. The
time must be passed some how, so he
learns how to play caids, takes to smok
ing cigarettes, and burdens his memory
with a collection of stories of doubtful
reputation.
But there comes a time when all this
is of no avail. Tiie work increases, orig
inality is demanded and John fails to
measure up to the demand. He no
longer cares now, and after drifting along
for a while he finally decides to quit
school and go into business. The fact
that he has spent several years in cdllege
enables him to secure a good position,
but his stay is short. His employers are
surprised and disguUed to find him both
careless and incompetent and wonder of
what value his college training has been
to him. But they are not conducting a
training school for incompetents, so John
soon steps down and out. He, of course,
carries with him no recommendation, and
when he tries to secure another position
he fails. And now at last, without con
fidence in himself or the respect of oth
ers, he realizes that so far as his useful
ness to the busy world about him is con
cerned, he is as one dead. He likewise
realizes, but too late, that through his own
acts he has arrived at his present state,
he has killed in himself the man he might
have been, that he has actually committed
suicide. Could he live over his college
days there would de a different story to
be told; but lime past is past forever,
and there is no return He must walk
the path he has chosen, overcast by the
shadows of evil, obscured from the light
of fame, filled with the gloom of regret,
and lost in oblivion and shame.
J. W. Barney.
A True Friend.
There is nothing on this earth that is
nearer and dearer to anyone than a true
friend. Some writer has said, " A
friend in need is a friend indeed." This
quotation is a true one, because we are
always in need of a true friend, someone
to whom we can reveal our secrets and
our desires; and to have a true friend is
of mote value to a person than the
whole world. What would the world
be to anyone without a friend ? Simply
a vast wilderness, having no beauty, no
sublimity, and no affection. True friend
ship is the noblest thing any person can
possess.
Many times have I thought that 1 had
no friends, but 1 found that this was
simply because 1 was not friendly myself
and so I have determined to be on
friendly terms with everyone.
We might compare friendship to a
vast mountain, beautifully clad in robes
of nature, that brings to our minds a
pleasing sensation. Just so are the friend
ly traits in a person. I hey stand out
and leveal to us a spirit of love, which
can never be crushed, except by the
hand of God, and he wili not do it,
because the bible tells us " that God is
Love." Then we see that friends are
valuable, and when we have one, we
should deem it a gift and try always to
remain friends.
Sometimes you think you have friends,
when you really don’t, and so we should
always beware of these false persons.
But this is hard, because it is very diffi
cult to tell just who our friends are.
Don’t accept as a friend that person who
treats you friendly one time, and shuns
you at another, he is not the true friend.
A true friend is a person in whom
you can have confidence, and who will
aid you in the time of need, and be al
ways ready to do the good things for
you and say the good things about you.
Friendship is great, grand, and glorious,
and only those that have friends can
realize it. W. F. W.
Learned It By Ear.
The dear little girl then arose, bowed,
and recited it in this manner:
“Lettuce Denbe up N. Dewing,
Widow Hartfort N. E. Fate;
Still H. E. Ving still per Sue Wing,
Learn to label Aunty Waite."
The Pine.
Pine is the popular name of trees of
genus Pinus, natural order Coniferae. It
is found in almost every part of the world.
We see the pine on every land, and
therefore we consider it a very common
place thing. While the poet has sung
of the oak’s grandeur and the novelist
with his pen and the painter with his
brush have pictured love scenes in the
shadow of the stately palm, the pine
has been rejected as not being worthy
of a song or its shade as a rendevous for
lovers.
Recently I heard a little child exclaim
with rapture as it beheld a stately pine
"Oh ! what a pretty pine tree." I won
dered what the child saw in a pine to
admire, for 1 had never thought of a
pine as being a thing of beauty. I knew
that it furnished products of great ma
terial wealth, such as lumber, turpentine,
naval stores, and whitling material for the
derelicts of humanity that congregate at
the corner grocery and swap yarns, so I
decided to find what the child had
found, the beauty of the pine. I have
been amply rewarded for my pains.
There is an indescribable beauty of
the pine, that can be had only by close
observation. You stroll out among the
pines, behold the stately trunk towering
towards the sky graced with its ever
green foiliage, listen to their sighings . s
the breeze steals softly through the leafy
carpet, and if you came with a feeling of
sadness and melancholy here you will
ffnd an antidote or if you came with a
heart irreverent toward God and nature,
the question will soon be springing from
the heart, "What is man that Thou art
mindful of him?"
Easy Money.
Two Irishmen were in a city bank re
cently, waiting their turn at the cashier’s
window.
" This reminds me of Finnegan," re
marked one.
" What about Finnegan ? " inquired
the other.
" Tis a story that Finnegan died, and
when he greeted St. Peter he said. It's
j a fine job you’ve had here for a long
time."
"Well Finnegan," said St. Peter,
" here we count a million years as a min
ute and a million dollars as a cent."
"Ah ! " said Finnegan, " I’m needing
cash.. Just lend me a cent, will you ? "
" Sure," said St. Peter,
minute."
Notwithstanding.
" And when he proposed did you
tell liim to see me ?" asked her mother.
" Yes, mama, and he said he had
seen you several times, but he wanted
to marry me just the same."
Coffee in England.
It was his first morning in London
" apartments," and his landlady came up
with the breakfast, and as he began the
meal she opened a slight conversation.
" It looks like rain," she said.
' " It does," replied the American, " but
it smells rather like coffee.