Page:Samuel F. Batchelder - Bits of Harvard History (1924).pdf/377

 Then from his nearest neighbor’s side
 * A knife and fork he drew;

And, reaching out his hand again,
 * He took his teacup too.

A long, long draught,—an outstretched hand,—
 * And crackers, toast, and tea,

They vanished from the stranger’s touch
 * Like dew upon the sea.

But human nature is an eternal paradox: this crabbed misanthrope survives to-day on musty library shelves as the compiler of a book of family prayers, and of a “Selection of Hymns and Psalms,” which ran through several editions! The incongruity did not escape the keen eye of undergraduate cynicism; and the “Med. Fac.,” ever on the watch for absurdities, bestowed upon him the following “degree”: [Steward and Patron], 1829.

About the middle of the last century another class of character began to steal unostentatiously into the col-