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”:
Jonathan-Peale Dabney, Mr. qui librum Psalmorum Hymnorumque, 1820; ejusdem editionem septimam, 1827; necnon Precum libellum, 1825, emisit. D.M. Med. Fac., Honorarius. Stew. patque [Steward and Patron], 1829.[1]
About the middle of the last century another class of character began to steal unostentatiously into the col-
- ↑ This is the final shape of the degree as it appears in the Med. Fac. Catalogue of 1883. Dabney must have been a figure of fun long before he turned author, for he received a simple “honorarius” in 1820, being in fact one of the first targets of this form of student satire.
For most of the above description I am indebted to Dr. Henry P. Walcott, of the class of 1858.
