Iowa Heritage Digital Collections
State Library of Iowa

1914 Yearbook

1914 Yearbook

Title

1914 Yearbook

Description

Blue and White Book
Editorials
"ROUND UP."
I found Dave in his room. He
smilingly motioned me to a seat on
his trunk. I smiled to him in return,
and he grinned broadly—I may say
that his features retained this peculiar juxtaposition during our entire
interview. I asked if I might be allowed to remain at his side for a few
hours while he worked. He looked
at me twice in succsesion and and
said, "Please repeat!" I repeated,
and he replied, "Oh, yes, you may
sit at my side while I do a few hours'
work." He then took a seat by the
window, and gazed for fully five minutes at the little birds chasing each
other on the top of the trees. Turning to me, he said, "That is a few
hours work."
I arose and took my departure.
My knock at the next door was
answered by a muffled, "Come, come,
come!" and in I came. I am not sure
that my entrance caused consternation, but it is certain that the five
occupants of the room fell flat on
the floor when I entered. Then, at a
whispered word from one of their
number, who punctuated his language with a peculiar whirring motion of his forefinger in the neighborhood of the temple, they worked.
They seemed so intensely absorbed
that I did not venture to disturb
them, remained quietly standing, a
silent yet close observer of these
strange mortals.
Splendid fellows they were, with
keen eager faces, and they missed
not a move of the small cubes with
which they were working. Their
calculations seemed very rapid to me,
unversed as I am in figures, for they
repeated numbers much as one would
recite that tripping masterpiece, "The
Charge of the Light Brigade." Yet,
quick as my poetical ear caught the
rhyme of the words, "seven" and
"eleven," my soul was fed with merely watching them. " This," I said to
myself, "is a wonderful example of
intensity," and then I left them to
resume my pilgrimage.
In another room I found three
ardent lovers of the great William
Shakespeare rehearsing with lively
realism the Cauldron scene from
Macbeth. They had what they called
a "spirit fire" beneath a minature
cauldron, and in the vessel itself they
stirred a dark brown liquid, which
seemed at last to assume a state of
viscosity, while a rare odor of chocolate filled the room.
On the front door of the next
apartment I found a placard, which
read: "Come in, but don't knock.
Ne meditationem perturbes."
J. HYNES.
"SHALL THERE BE SMOKING ON
THE HILL?"
The law-abiding people of this
quiet community were very much
startled on Tuesday, and the greatest indignation prevailed hereabouts,
owing to an editorial article in the
"Phil," denouncing the practice of
smoking on the hill. The article
went on to say that the placing of
certain courts on the hill led to
smoking in the most insane manner
possible.
The Blue & White Book does not
care to enter politics, but when a
great constitutional question, like the

Date

1914

Identifier

http://cdm16810.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16810coll2/id/3335