The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, June 01, 1900, Image 27

The Battalion., June 01, 1900, Image 27

Image provided by: Texas A&M University

About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 1, 1900)

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Newspaper Page TextTHE BATTALION. 23 come to our State from these—yet we hear in the roar of this great advance ment a small, still voice calling for things of old. And one heart is made to feel that we were never so sad in all our lives. Our time is past—the “golden opportunity” to us has gone. We are boys in college no more. We are in brass buttons and stripes no more. We have furloughs to Bryan no more. We walk the lonesome stoops no more. We hear the promotion lists read no more. We stand to entrap or ensnare the fair visitors with the charms of the militarie no more—all the glories and ambitions of A. and M. cadet are ours no more. We are passed beyond and look back to. be moan our fate. Ah! young men, this is no jest! Your heart is larger to-day than it will ever be again. You can love more fair damsels and love them harder than you ever can again. You can think more of her this minute and less the next than you ever can again. You can see more in yourself to-day than you ever will again and more than anyone else does now. The world holds out to you more of her possi bilities to-day than she ever will again. The sun. shines brighter, the flowers are more varied in tint and shade, the birds sing sweeter to the college boy on commencement day than any oth r time in life. But to me, young man, this is an awful sad occasion. I’ve passed fifteen years since these ^entic- ing allurements held themselves out to me, and one by one the glittering, dewy leaves and the waxen flowers have dried and crumbled in my grasp— I’ve found them but encouragements along the pathway to the realities of life—yet they served a good purpose and are gone. This is a sad occasion to me for the absence of familiar faces, scattered many to the four win^s of earth and some laid to their eternal rest beneath the sod. No longer does the quiet, dignified form of a Din- widdie grace the president’s chair or mansion, but he lives in the heart of every co-laborer who survives him, in the heart and life of every student who knew him, in every hand that re ceived his kindly grasp—yea, he lives in the dignity and classic stability he gave to our college. And as long as the A. and M. shall live and her al umni breathe the free air of Texas, the name of H. H. Dinwiddie will live and inspire them to higher and nobler deeds. And when shall the common masses forget the name of our sleeping Sul Ross, whose mighty magic led his Confederate ranks to victory or a will ing death and who brought this school ^ of our first love into the heart’s desire and reach of the common people? A Dinwiddie to establish and dignify the institution—a Ross to uphold and pop ularize it—and a Foster to expand it into the saving hope and glory of the t/ 'Empire State of Texas. And this brings me to the thought cf my paper to-day: Texas needs men of character and brains. When I chose this subject for dis course on this occasion I did so under the impelling thought that within the history of our beloved State or nation there had been no time that so de manded men of character and brains to uphold and carry forward her inter ests as now. I reflected that in this stage of advancement of our people and nation when our resources and ca pabilities are beginning to compare with those of the other nations of the earth, and it seemed that dishonesty and mistrust had seized so many of our public servants and leaders, that men of character and brains were needed everywhere—needed even in Texas. By character I mean that which will prompt and impel a man to seek and to do the right in the face