ANOTHER MARCH

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23436, 26 February 1938, Page 22

ANOTHER MARCH

By M. B. M.

Another University year has opened, and another generation enters into their heritage, to have their crowded hour Of glorious life before responsibility lays its heavy hand upon them and they pass on to the sterner realities of adult years. To-morrow they may be found in hospital wards where the issues are of life or death, distant lands may claim service or the Muses enslave them, but to-day is their own. To them now is given the opportunity to pass through wider gates of learning than the secondary schools opened to them, to make of their minds a treasury which will enrich all the years to come, to experience those> contacts of youth with youth which bring idealism into the world.

And so the gay cavalcade throngs our town again. As the years pass, the outward man and maid change somewhat. The green sport coat is the insignia of to-day, as were the Oxford bags of yesterday. An untrammelled head of curls is the mode of the moment for the sweet girl undergrad. Gone are the steel hatpins and the untidy bobs of hair, newly created out of a school girl plait, which marked out the blue stocking of the past. But the inner man—or maid—is much the same. Nineteen hundred and thirty-eight has’ touch the /same complex as 15X28 or 1918—or indeed 1218, when Green tells us Oxford was a “ seething mass of turbulent life ” as thousands of young scholars crowded to the chosen seats of the “masters.” “We are the people, and wisdom shall die with us,” each generation says in turn. But if youth hasn’t an abundance of self-esteem pity help old age. . The University buildings, which are called old in this new country of ours, awaken from their vacation slumbers. Gay voices echo in the corridors, eager feet climb the stairs, another generation rushes late to lectures as we did, and for a season the University becomes theirs as once it was ours. What has fate in store for these newcomers? That red-headed lad who stands apart from his fellows on the steps. Is he different with the difference of genius? As he passes into the lecture room is he . entering upon studies which will bring him world fame? ■ Is New Zealand to have a second Rutherford of Nelson? A group of maids come laughing through the entrance gates, their gay summer frocks patterned here and there with shadows from the dim archway. Blue eyes, grey eyes, brown, Which of you will see a little further into the mysteries of life than your fellows, and so be called great? The year begins with the inaugural address, when the young student hears that privilege and responsibility go hand in hand. Youth is a time of idealism, of romanticism. As he learns of his sacred trust, of the lamp of knowledge which he must pass on with its flame brighter than before, time and place for a moment cease to be. Before his eyes appears the “banner with a strange device.” He feels the bite of the tempest as he presses up the mountain slopes, and in his ears is the echoing cry “Excelsior.” To most of us such a vision comes only once in our career. Other inaugural addresses heard later are appreciated for their artistry, or used merely as a background for meditation on the respective merits of this arrangemen t of units or that, the possibility of doing Stage 111 in one year, the prospects for getting into the first fifteen.

And so it is with most things. We can taste the full pleasure only once. No half-mile swimming race won with a record broken gives quite the thrill that came when for the first time we felt ourselves afloat in a new element. Only once can we soar to the clouds and feel ourselves at one with the gods pn high Olympus. Air travel may remain a pleasure, become a convenience, but the ultimate joy comes only once. Sp with student life. The first year is the magic year, the first degree the magic degree. Other, honours may come, studies may be prolonged by research scholarships, fellowships and the likfe, but nothing that the future years may hold can give the radiance which belongs alone to the first beginnings. So, Freshers, here’s to you!