CAPPING CAVALCADE

Evening Star, Issue 22033, 20 May 1935, Page 8

CAPPING CAVALCADE

PROFESSORS OFFENDED [Written by W.G.N. for the 1 Evening Star.’] “ The students to-day. Really. . .” This week the Library gossips and the Octagon seat dwellers wall he able to express their annual disapproval, for it will be Capping Week. They are rather tired of holding their post-mor-tem on the council elections. The Jubilee has come and gone. Even the Prime Minister has gone. So what else is there but the students ? But there is nothing new, not even disapproval. Away back in 1889 the professors were so indignant about the students’ too topical and too personal choruses that all except Dr Salmond refused to attend the capping ceremony. They must have spent a very dull if comfortable night. In the bad old days the capping ceremony was open to the public. Now invitations are issued. The Otago University had been established three years when it granted its only degree. In 1874, one student, Mr A. W. Williams, was capped. The students were noL particularly interested, *nd three yei*s went before an entertainment by students was recognised as part of the capping ceremony. The entertainment was at first limited to choruses, fourteen or fifteen of them. Students were expected to amuse a free audience in Garrison Hall for an hour before the actual ceremony commenced. A daring innovation was the production of large cartoons which were hung up in the middle - of the hall. At that time there was no legitimate acting. Then again the students took their courage in their hands, and in 1891 Father Time, complete with hour glass and scythe, held the stage with the speakers, casting withering glances at the too loquacious, nodding approval at brevity. Next year a farce, depicting the Auckland capping ceremony, called for much comment. Perhaps that was the year it was felt that seats would be so desirable in the OctaOAPPING ABOLISHED

Tongues wagged so successfully that, with dramatic suddenness, by a decree of the Senate of the New Zealand University cappings were abolished and degrees posted. _ The ignominy, the horrible commercialism, the rude ejection of tradition, the horror of it all swept Dunedin. More and more fiercely did tongues wag. More and more reserve seats must have been bought. Revolution was in the air. Those who had criticised capping most relentlessly demanded most eloquently the return of past glories. Even the council of thtf-' Otago University backed the students, and a' congratulatory ceremony was arranged. This ceremony, held in the University library, often developed into a battle of flowers, as the lady students had to be given bouquets, while the professors seemed invariably to interrupt the flight of these floral,tributes. The' choruses were maintained during the official ceremony, but when all the speeches had been made and all the bouquets hurled visitors split up into two groups. The conservatives lingered in the library to endure a classical concert. The radicals hurried off to the science lecture room, the real centre of student life before the union buildings had been considered even desirable. Here the ’Varsity wits would express themselves in delightful, waxwork displays carefully arranged on the lecturers’ bench. Then a nervous lull before the enormity of a full-dress farce. And it was all over in half an hour.

So it survived for five years. Then it was decided -to hold the official ceref mony in the afternoon, while the students’ concert should be given the same night in the Agricultural Hall. This move saw, the birth of the capping procession. Previously students had hired a double-decker horse car on capping night, and with cracking of whips, banging of crackers, and yelling of choruses driven through the town. On the night of the first public concert a special cart was hired and decorated with a skeleton and bright students. This cart attracted much attention, and the crowd which followed felt compelled to follow it when it disappeared into the Agricultural Hall. Tho crowd, in fact, did follow it, even though a charge was made.

MATHEMATICAL MAZURKAS

It must pay some people to dig up imaginary sensations out of student balls. What could they have said about the first capping ball in 1884. “ Girls slighted. Euclid rather than Eunice,” might have described it in their style. It would not have been the truth. The first ball was held in the Oddfellows’ Hall. It was not strictly “ dress,” as most of the students did not possess even dinner jackets. Indeed, half of the students present couldn’t dance, and so # to while away the weary time they thoughtfully brought their Euclids. This is no exaggeration. The evening was spent in games and competitions, an interrupted concert, and a little dancing. Fair Eunice swept past in Albert’s stiff embrace while Horace pretended to pour over Euclid’s fourth spasm. As a result the ball held in the following year proved a great success, for Horace and the other mathematicians, roused by the scorn of Eunice and Elizabeth, etc., had mastered the complications of the waltz. Dancing has in this manner become a tradition with ’Varsity students. The Waterloo of Horace in 1884 shall never be repeated. No longer does-tho Oddfellows’ Hall satisfy. Not even did the Early Settlers’ Hall suffice, so the City Council built a new Town Hall with a floor for dancing. A certain paper engaged a fresh gossip writer.’ A low cement wall which makes a serviceable seat in times of overcrowding'-was put round the Octagon. And students danced much before the capping ball to get into training, and danced much atter the ball, knowing too well the harm in sudden cessation of training. So capping lives on. __ F I II T