Feature
Section
L
flitt n
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Feature
Section
VOL. XXV. No. 42 i ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN, SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1924
EIGHT PAC
STUDENT
LIFE
AT
OXFORD
UNIVERSITY
_____________________44
Rhodes Scholar Discusses the Difference Between American and English Universities from Educational an
Viewpoints An Outline of Activities and Athletics in the English Institution ' The
Relationship Between Student and Instructor
d Social
a
_A_
9I*p
Emp(________
r
A BUMPING RACE (above) shows the method of shell racing at Oxford where the
stream is not wide enough to permit parallel racing.
the two boats change places.
When one boat "bumps" the boat ahead,
"DIGS" (at left) is a typical senior room at Oxford. As standing in the university is
based upon examinations at the end of the senior year, seniors rent rooms like this one away from
the college where they can "dig" their way through.
RUGBY-FOOT BA LL FIFTEEN (at right) shows the players of one team in the
combination of American and English sports. Note the absence of padding and shoulder guards.
By Whitney HI . Shepardson1
A great deal has been written about Oxford dur-
ing the thousand years of its existence. Novels have
been build around it; poets have loved it well; es-
sayists have drawn from its inexhaustible quarry:
and historians have told its story overs and over
again. But American students have discovered it
for themselves only during the present generation,
and, like any other interesting discovery, it deserves
to be passed on to someone else. We know alto-
gether too little about the "Mother of Colleges"-
our alma-grandmater.
When onSce you have been a part of the life at
Oxford, Oxford is part of your own life-one of
these memories that become fresh, and vivid upon
the slightest provocation. All this is dangerous;
for the first memories that come to our minds are
of the most illusive sort-the gardens of the New
College and the well-groomed lawns of Worcester;
Old Tom ringing out its hundred and one strokes
from Christ Church tower through the midnight rain;
old men and young men assembling in their gowns
and bright-colored hoods for the formal functions
of the University. There is a danger, too, of being
diverted into the "curiosities" of Oxford life, its pic-
turesque institutions which seem to link this genera-
tion of undergraduates to those generations which
have gone before; the "Scout" on the staircase who
cares for your room, brings gigantic breakfasts for
the half-dozen guests who are huddled round your
feeble fire on a cold damp morning; students tear-
ing through the streets on bicycles, rushing from
one lecture to another with their short black gowns
bellying out behind like a full jib; the round tin
bath tub-"Your bath, sir!" and a cold ,one at that
-which shivering Oxford men accept defiantly as a
challenge to the progress of science in material
comforts. "Remove not the ancient landmarks which
thy fathers have set."
Close Relationship of Student and Professor
But after a few months, these details lose the
flavor of novelty, and other things begin to emerge
as more important differences between Oxford and
our own colleges. First of all, an intimate relation
between teacher and student is the rule in Oxford
as it is the exception here I have been given help-
ful hints in rowing by a distinguished college head;
I have played doubles on the college tennis team
paired with an authority in Greek philosophy; I've
been swimming in the' Isis after the forbidden
hour of midnight by the grace of an unscrupulous
college chaplain who gave me his key to the back
gate; and I've spent weeks of vacation in North
Devon with a tutor in history, for no other reason
than that we seemed to like each other's company.
There is, in English life, a closer relationship
than we enjoy between older and younger men; but
what makes this valuable intimacy possible in Ox-
*A.( mt - ,o in tome) is the fnct that your final ex-
The Author
Mr. Whitney H. She pardson, who has
written the first article of the
series on
student life in foreign universities gradu-
ated from Colgate in 1910.
As a Rhodes
Scholar he was a member of Balliol
College, Oxford, for three years, 1911 to
1913. He then studied law at Harvard
Law School.
During the war Mr. Shepardson was
a member of the legal sta.' of the Ship-
ping Board and later served in the artil-
lery. After the Armistice he went to
Paris to the Peace Conference during
which he served as Secretary
League of Nations Commission.
of the
study, and constitute the only basis of your ranking.
An uninterrupted week of papers, four hours in the
morning and four hours in the afternoon, with every-
thing at stake on them! Whether this is a better or
a worse system than our own, the pedagogues can
decide. It is certain it is a different one.
Distinction Between University and Colleges
The distinction between Oxford University and
the Colleges which compose it is not easy to grasp
at first. The best analogy I know is that of the
United States itself, and the "states" which go to
make it up. The University, under its own name,
and with all its formality and picturesque ceremony,
greets you when you enter Oxford, and blesses you
when you depart. And perhaps once, in the course
of your residence, an official of the tUniversity
catches you in the act of breaking one of its regu-
lations.I
But apart from these occasions, the undergrad-
uate's life.is spent in his College; one, two, or three
hundred men gathered within its four walls, living
there, taking part in the College sports, taking the
direction of their work from its tutors, belonging to
its clubs, and meeting as a community at least once a
day for dinner in the College Hall.
Each College has its cliques, its gossip, its in-
ternal rows, its particular antipathies among other
Colleges, its traditions, its legends, and its special-
ties-whether they be strawberries-in-season, an-
chovy toast, or a potent brew of ale. And when
you go out from the University into life, you are for-
ever known as a Trinity man, a Magdaen man, a
Balliol man as the case may be.
Individuality Developed
The various Colleges tend, perhaps, to produce
men of a certain type; but far greater scope is given
to the development of individuality in Oxford than
obtains in the United States.
You have more chance of growing in Oxford,-
and you have more chance of disintegrating. In
other words, the system (if an opportunity for edu-
cation may properly be called a system) is admir-
ably suited to the man who knows where he is going
but the man with little purpose and no sense of
responsibility is apt to suffer from being left severely
alone.
Nobody bothers you if you fail to show up at
College meetings; nobody makes you go to lectures;
nobody thinks you are especially queer if you prefer
the writings of some obscure Hungarian poet to
those of Arnold Bennett. "Fools are suffered gladly"
in the belief that they will work out their own sal-
vation in time, and on the chance that the "fool"
may prove, after all, to be right; and that Andreas
Ady may be a greater figure in literature than the
author of "The Pretty Lady." To go to Oxford may
be a dangerous intellectual adventure, but one has
all the freedom of a buccaneer while it lasts.
Inter-College Sports Informal
There are inter-College snorts throughout the
Beginning with this issue
A New Series
articles are included in
the series as
planned, covering universities in nineteen
different countries.
It is the purpose of the series to
acquaint American university students
with the life and activities of students in
will publish from time to time a series of
articles on foreign universities, written by
students in 'those universities. Twenty
other lands.
Originally planned by the
Yale News, the series has been copy-
righted under the syndicate name: "Stu-
dent Life in Foreign Countries."
The Daily
next afternoon, and the rearranged procession be-
gins its second day of rowing. So it continues for
a week until, perhaps, eight or ten years from now,
your own college boat goes "head of the river." On
this occasion,-if I may point out a striking differ-
ence between the practice here and at Oxford-the
president of the college will buy champagne all
around!
Social Elements Applied by the Colleges
The social side of Oxford is a thing by itself.
There is practically no bridge betweei the Colleges
and tha town; and the few stray souls who visit
the elderly ladies of North Oxford at tea-time on
Sunday afternoon, generally do so under the com-
pulsion of duty. There are no fraternities-perhaps
the Colleges provide on a large scale that intimacy
which fraternities and clubs provide in the United
States. But there are innumerable clubs with some
purpose-Liberal, Conservative, Dramatic, Sporting,
Literary, Scientific,-with a membership drawn from
the whole University and with small club rooms of
their own.
And above them all, though, it has no social pre-
tensions, stands the Oxford Union. Generations of
Oxford men have belonged to it, many of the leading
statesmen of the British Empire have fought po-
litical battles, and gained their first parliamentary
experience on its floor. I doubt whether the House
of Commons itself has been a scene of more bitter
skirmishes than have taken place in the Oxford
Union.
Xo "Cramming" Possible
Just because examinations are conducted by such
a neutral body, it is necessary for the student to
have a fairly broad grasp of his subject. He must,
be prepared to answer reasonable questions cover-
ing his whole course of study. If he is taking the
Modern History School, he prepares himself (with
the aid of tutors, lectures, and reading) in political
science, one of the, several subjects that goes to
make up the school.
Ask your tutor for a "textbook" on political sci-
ence and you'll get nothing but.a blank stare! He'll
advise .you generally with regard to a course of
lectures on this subject, or a course ofreading; but,
in the same breath he'll warn you against imagining
that you can "cram" one book or two books and be
sure of passing. Your examination, will be on po-
litical science and not upon Joe Doe's textbook on
political science.
University Stand Based on Final Examination
So you proceed through three years of it-or
four-attending many lectures or few as your tutor
suggests, reading much or little as your taste and
conscience prescribe, taking "tests" from time to
tma which a est by vn u ntn merelyt n disenver
sportsmanship-if love of the game for its own
sake be the criterion. Above all, these College
games give new men' the chance to prove their
mettle, and word quickly reaches the ears of the
varsity officials that "So-and-So is playing well for
Queens." Then one fine day, he is asked to play
for the varsity in a trial match. That day he does
not 'scratch his name off any list. He plays for his
life-for the chance of winning a "blue" is in his
hands.
Rowing a "Serious Sport"
Rowing, throughout, is treated as a "serious
sport." Either you row or you don't row; and
though theoretically you have the same question-
able privilege of striking your name off the list for
practice, the "rowing push"-the rowing officials of
the College-will stand for little or none of this
half-hearted business. You are trained for weeks
in a "tub" or pair-oar, you row for a winter on
fixed seats. Then perhaps in the spring, when the
hearts of coaches grow imperceptibly mellower, you
are given a chance at a sliding seat It's little enough
reward for the long weeks you have rowed through
the winter, with the rain freezing on your hand,
It is so preeminently bound up in the history of
the University and in the long tale of British poli-
tics that all of us who were in Oxford in 1912 were
proud beyond measure that an American was elected
for the first time to be its president. Certainly the
United States never sent a more worthy representa-
tive abroad than Bill Bland of Kenyon and of Lin-
coln College, Oxford. He gave up his life in France
War Wound Still Unhealed
I knew Oxford immediately before thet war, anc
I went back again in 1919. Outwardly little was
changed. The immemorial buildings stood ther
still, the streets gave much the same appearance as
before. Here a new tradesman had come to tak
the place of a favorite tobacco shop; there one migh
see a relic of the days when Oxford made soldiers
instead of scholars. But the lawns were clipped
and green, the river flowed as softly as before, and
the rain was falling as relentlessly as if it had no'
stopped once during the intervening years.
A new generation of men were in residence-
somewhat more serious in their purpose, somewha
more restless against the old traditions, somewha
more revolutionary in their insistence that the cur
riculum should be brought "up to date." The older
men who had been at Oxford in other years wen
again about their work; but as they went the: