DR. VINCENT: All interrogations are in order in the way of criticism,
questions relating to blunders in speech overheard, to infelicities on
the platform, provincialisms, or to any imperfections of speech, which
we desire in the interest of the English language and of a true culture
to correct.
I receive a great many very sensible letters from members of the
Circle. I received one during the summer or spring, to which I call
your attention. I will read it. We have not been able to carry out the
idea here, but at some time I trust will do so:
“DEAR SIR:—At Chautauqua last summer I remember Miss
Washburn referred to some of the practical scientific
work they accomplished at their California Assembly;
and you expressed a wish to bring more of this work
into the Round-Table meeting. I have thought of the
matter often, and several plans presented themselves.
The chapters we had on geology in THE CHAUTAUQUAN
suggested an idea to me that might be carried out with
little trouble. In some of the local circles there are
many who are able to classify and give interesting
particulars of the rocks they may pick up by the
wayside, but many are not so fortunate. I doubt not
those few chapters in geology led more than one to say,
‘I wish I could classify this and this fragment of
rock.’ I do not mean rare and curious specimens, but
that rough and bare rock by the roadside. Many of the
C. L. S. C. members who will be at Chautauqua, must be
familiar with these things, and many will be ignorant.
It seems to me it would be very profitable for those
who are ignorant, and not wholly unprofitable for the
enlightened ones, if we could have some rudimentary
work in reading sermons in stones.”
The letter closes:
“If those who are qualified should be too modest to
volunteer in sufficient numbers, you would undoubtedly
be enabled to select proper ones to supply the
deficiency. Enough specimens, probably, might be picked
up. I was talking to some of the C. L. S. C. friends
who thought they would take a basketful of stones. I
have hesitated about writing, but your note of May 15,
acknowledging the former letter, encourages me that you
will not think this an intrusion.”
It is a very happy, practical letter, and it was in pursuance of the
suggestions made in that letter that Colonel Daniels was invited to
take the class which he organized in geology. I have no doubt that
many of you who attended several sessions of this class in geology
found great benefit, and you have seen how the same kind of work may
be continued on a smaller scale at home. If you have any thoughts in
that direction, I shall be very grateful if you will write them to
me. I hope to do something a little more thorough next year. We have
in the history of Chautauqua had Prof. Winchell, and Prof. Rice, of
Middletown, for very able lectures on geology. We shall do something in
this line in the future. I read the letter because it was practical,
just such as I like to receive.
A VOICE: How would it do for all of us to send on forty to fifty pounds
of geological specimens to the museum from the various localities?
DR. VINCENT: Express prepaid. It might be well to write in advance to
let us know the localities you represent, so that certain portions of
Ohio, where the C. L. S. C. furore prevails, may not send several tons
from the same neighborhood. [Applause.]
A VOICE: A lady here proposes to send specimens from Colorado.
DR. VINCENT: We should be very glad of them. There is no reason why,
with our large organization through the world, we should not have at
Chautauqua one of the best geological museums in the country.
[Footnote I: Seventh Round-Table, held in the Hall of Philosophy, at
Chautauqua, at 5 p. m., August 14, 1882, Dr. J. H. Vincent presiding.]
A correspondent, a lady, writes from Colorado: “I think a knowledge of
hygiene and medicine very essential to house-keepers, but it is one
very little understood in the majority of households. I wish to offer
the suggestion that a course should be founded in connection with the
C. L. S. C. I can not go away from my home and spend time and money to
take the course, but would be glad to take it up in the C. L. S. C., if
offered.”
DR. VINCENT: Why may we not have a department, in which mothers and
house-keepers might be interested; a department which would collect the
various suggestions and devices for promoting house-keeping, that we
may have the “house beautiful” in every home. Wealth is not necessary
to such a result. Some of the most doleful places that I visit are
the richest homes, where they have bare walls, or poor pictures on
them, and carpets selected in the worst taste, and furniture that
cost enough, to be sure, but was not selected wisely. When I go into
a house, though it have very low ceilings, very small windows, and is
very old-fashioned—built years ago, and though the people who built
it did not have very much to build with—when I look at a house like
that, and see on the walls pictures, selected for their real artistic
value, even though inexpensive; when I see flowers and vines growing
about; when I see the _Atlantic_, or _Harper’s_, or the _Century_ on
the table—and a few well-chosen books on the shelves—when I get into a
house of that kind, my heart always warms toward the people who live
there. We might have delightful homes all over the land. Brick and
boards, lath and plaster do not make homes. It is not the large, costly
house, I commend, but the house, little or large, cheap or costly, with
evidences of taste here and there. Do you know that the first movement
of true taste in many a house would not be the putting in of new
pictures so much as the taking out of the old. (Laughter.)
MR. MARTIN: Are the “Hall in the Grove” and the “Outline Study of Man”
absolutely required for ’83?
DR. VINCENT: We put them on the list, but when asked if it were
absolutely necessary to read them I said “No.”
MR. MARTIN: I think that the memoranda will show that at least ninety
per cent. of the class of ’82 have read it.
DR. VINCENT: I am glad to hear it; but you remember when an objection
was made two years ago to the “requiring” of a local, modern book like
the “Hall in the Grove,” I said in a general way we did not require
it, but we preferred it. I will tell you why the “Hall in the Grove”
was written. It is my old story of the _esprit du corps_. The college
provides for this by its surroundings—the old buildings, the old elms,
the old campus, the class songs, the memorial days, the pleasant
memories, the struggles and rivalries in recitation, the sports, the
diploma, the honor, the _prestige_ in the world outside, the relative
standing of “our” college and the other colleges. All these things
create in the student the _esprit du corps_ which makes him glad to
say, “I belong to this or that college.” See the working of this spirit
in a college boat-race. Take these old dignified and pious editors
of religious papers, who have not been in a boat, unless to cross to
Europe, for twenty-five years. Let old Wesleyan row with Cornell, and
Harvard, and Yale, and Brown, you will find the old Baptist editor, or
the old Methodist editor, who opposes all that sort of thing, close
up an editorial on the modern follies in college, “Nevertheless, we
were somewhat glad when we read that Wesleyan stood so well in that
race.” [Laughter.] That is the spirit which characterizes the college
life. There is educating power in it. It is a good thing for a boy to
have it, and for a man to keep it. Now, we of the C. L. S. C can have
nothing of this kind unless we construct it or grow it in our own way.
So we have “Our Hall”—the Hall of Philosophy. Look at it by moon-light,
or in the morning, or with its eager crowds at the vesper hour. The
other evening a lady said, “There is something very fascinating about
this Hall.” Then here are our St. Paul’s Grove; our path-way from the
gate to the steps. Do you remember on Commencement Day the flowers
strewn by those little darlings, who only knew that they were doing a
beautiful thing, and did not see how far down it went into your hearts?
Then there are our Athenian Watch-fires and our songs that excel for
poetry and inspiration all the songs that were ever written for any
educational society on earth (I am proud of our Chautauqua songs and
our Chautauqua poetess, Miss Lathbury),—all these things help to
create the spirit of Chautauqua. Pansy has given in her “Four Girls at
Chautauqua,” and especially in the story of “The Hall in the Grove,” a
true interpretation of Chautauqua and in a delightful way has shown the
effects of the movement on society. All these things tend to give an
_esprit du corps_ to the C. L. S. C., and when you carry your diploma
and remember your march from gate to goal the other day, you say, “I
was present at the graduation of the class of ’82, and I shall go there
as often as I can.” What the vision and the experience do for us who
come here “The Hall in the Grove” will to some extent do for those who
can not come. This enthusiasm will do for our members what the similar
element in four years of college discipline and experience do for
college students. And that is why I said let us have “The Hall in the
Grove” written, so that people who never come to Chautauqua shall feel
that they are one of us, that they really seem to have been there.
Questions concerning pronunciation of words were then taken
up. The words “wiseacre,” “housewife,” “area-r” (a New England
mispronunciation), “septuagint,” “Charlotte Yonge,” “khedive,”
“Chautauqua,” “Celtic,” “truths,” were considered. The differences
of opinion expressed justify our readers in consulting Webster or
Worcester.
DR. VINCENT: I hope the Class of ’83 will be here to-night, according
to the program, at nine o’clock for the Class Vigil. I am very anxious
to see every member of that class. The Class of ’84 will please meet
here when this service closes.
WRITTEN QUESTION: Where is volume four of the “History in Literature?”
DR. VINCENT: That work on English Literature (Chautauqua Library) was
commenced by an accomplished lady who has been ill ever since she wrote
the first volume.
WRITTEN QUESTION: Are we to use the same text-book on Greece as the
first year?
DR. VINCENT: We are.
WRITTEN QUESTION: What is the Bryant Bell? Did Bryant give it?
DR. VINCENT: He did not. We gave that name to the bell we purchased.
We own only one bell. The other bells are furnished by the house of
“Clinton H. Meneely Bell Company,” of Troy, N. Y.
WRITTEN QUESTION: Will reading the White Seal Course for the last two
years give us the white seal?
DR. VINCENT: Yes, sir.
I will now proceed to state the objects of the S. H. G. “The Society
of the Hall in the Grove” has for its object the improvement of the
graduates of the C. L. S. C. in all things that tend to true life,
physical, intellectual, social, and spiritual; the permanence of
the Chautauqua Idea and spirit, the keeping of the place, and the
protection of the articles which have acquired a peculiar sacredness
to all C. L. S. C. Chautauquans. In furtherance of these objects the
Society of the Hall in the Grove shall select an executive committee
of twenty-five members, whose business it shall be to appoint the
working committees for each year. And each year all the members who
are elected in 1882 shall constitute the nucleus or foundation of that
committee. For example, if you elect twenty-five ladies and gentlemen
this year, and next year ten of them are absent, the fifteen who are
present make the nucleus of that executive committee. In that way
we shall keep up a permanent element. It will be your duty to elect
twenty-five members. The “Messenger of the Hall,” appointed by the
Superintendent of Instruction, shall be chairman of that executive
committee. We hope to retain this Messenger for years. The committee
shall be elected in 1882. Then there ought to be several special
committees. We had some annoyance on Saturday. That banner was left
standing in the Amphitheater. It is a banner that no money could buy.
It might be easily mutilated. We need a committee to protect that
banner from one end of the year to the other. We need also a permanent
“Guard of the Gate.” It is only a conceit, and some people may think
it is ridiculous, but we do not mind that. It is a pleasant conceit
that no one pass under that arch who has not a right to pass under it.
It is the business of the Guard to carry out this law. We had the gate
photographed to-day, but the gate was opened, and opened by the Guard.
There should be a committee on correspondence. You see we have quite an
amount of work to do as a “Society of the Hall in the Grove.” I make
these announcements so that you all who are interested may know, and
that we may become a formal “order” and duly elect our committees.