IF the Harrisburg Patriot and Phila
delphia Times , in charging Gover
nor Beaver as inconsistent in his sign
ing of the College Appropriation bill
unpruned, were better informed as
to what constitutes relative need, we
think they would express themselves
otherwise. Doubtless they would have
approved of the signature had the bill
at first been $300,000, and then pruned
to $112,000 where it now stands.
THE CHANSONS DE GESTE,
Who linn not hoard of tho famed Chansons do Uoste,
When tho hraln of tho Frenchmen was at Its host 7
For noanolont poom, however well told,
Could vie with those Chansons In beauty so hold. ,
Wandering minstrels in the court of tho king,
Of horolo ancestors were wc nt to sing,
Of Charlemagne so famous and his Twolvo Poors,
And all their worthy and most valiant compeers.
Heroes woro lauded In tho longest of rhymes,
Describing tho stnto of tho earliest times,
And tho battles fought by tho old feudal lords.
Who clashed with wild ardor their glittering swords.
And the knights that fought In tho Holy f'rusido,
Onvo now life to the Chansons, the latest made.
Not a single mind sent forth a Hash of light,
Hut to kindle Into blaze some Chanson bright.
They wero written In their own peculiar style,
And not in rhymes aslinrsh as a grating tile.
Tho oldest known woro all writ in assonance,
Vowels agreeing, but not tho consonants
They flowed Into verso, smooth as a slooping lake,
Yet with words so burning, tlioy enusod one to rjnnko
As llko the tmnnlt of war they rushed along,
Dashing brave knights into sanguineous song.
They dealt not only with tho old feudal laws,
Hut rang their mellow chlincs to another enusu ;
Tho bravo Christian lighting tho rude Musselman
And tho bloody strife with tho Sarnaon elan.
Hut at last a gontlor spirit tho Muso o'ortook,
Rippling his linos with gloo llko a maiden’s look.
As ho dipped his quill In the sweet stream of love,
The warory turned Into tho coo of tho dove.
Placid and serene grew the toolings of all,
As tlin minstrel sang in court and crowded lmll.
A polish and beauty omblnuonod these rhymes,
Whioh thoy.laokod in tho days of more warlike times,
THE FREE LANCE.
A liberal education, stating it broadly, may
be defined as that system which lays the founda
tions for and largely impresses those habits of
body and mind that will enable a man to so com
mand them that they can be concentrated. and
their combined light thrown upon problems to be
solved, or work to be done.
So long as the work of colleges was largely
the preparation of the student for divinity, law
or medicine on the one hand, and the workshop
and apprentice system as a preparation for the
work of the artisan on the other, i. e., so long as
the former were professions and the latter only
trades, Latin, Greek and mathematics may have
been sufficient for a preparatory training, and
even for the backbone of college work. But
these conditions changed; experimenters and
workers in the fields of natural and applied sci
ence and in the workshop have been steadily in
creasing our knowledge of and mastery over the
laws of nature, and their applications.
These Chansons woro longor than any man’s mind,
For bard after bard in oaoli one you will And.
They’re quite ns long as the ages that have passod,
Whoso shades o'er tho in idem student still are cast,
Hut to posterity tho writors aro lost. 1 ,
So anonymous upon tho world they’re tossod I
Though tho flrst and best claims tho name of tho bard,
Who upon Famo’s balder Ims attached his card.
’Tis tho one more beautiful than all the rest,
Of these wild cples of the Chansons do Gesto ;
’Tis tho tale of Holand, that true knight of old,
In tho cloventh century, by Turold told.
Ho tells of treachery waylaying this knight,
Till Death embraood him in n thrill of delight:
Then Inter bards tuned their lyre to this song,
And tuned it to othors more than twice ns long.
So In songs ns sweet as tho breath of the rose,
Tho soul of tho poet in melody flows ;
’Twns thus tho Spirit of llomanee had Its birth,
That, In a mystic halo, still moves on earth.
Kiioda Dbuduo v
LITERARY DEPARTMENT.
PREPARATORY AND TECHNICAL
EDUCATION.
lIY PROF. LOUIS H. HARNARD, C. F„