A final passing thought. Were an old student given an hour in
which to revisit the St. Andrews of his day, would he spend more
than half of it at lectures? He is more likely to be heard
clattering up bare stairs in search of old companions. But if you
could choose your hour from all the five hundred years of this seat
of learning, wandering at your will from one age to another, how
would you spend it? A fascinating theme; so many notable shades
at once astir that St. Leonard's and St. Mary's grow murky with them.
Hamilton, Melville, Sharpe, Chalmers, down to Herkless, that
distinguished Principal, ripe scholar and warm friend,
the loss of whom I deeply deplore with you. I think if that hour
were mine, and though at St. Andrews he was but a passer-by,
I would give a handsome part of it to a walk with Doctor Johnson.
I should like to have the time of day passed to me in twelve
languages by the Admirable Crichton. A wave of the hand to
Andrew Lang; and then for the archery butts with the gay Montrose,
all a-ruffled and ringed, and in the gallant St. Andrews student
manner, continued as I understand to this present day, scattering
largess as he rides along,
'But where is now the courtly troupe
That once went riding by?
I miss the curls of Canteloupe,
The laugh of Lady Di.'
We have still left time for a visit to a house in South Street,
hard by St. Leonard's. I do not mean the house you mean. I am
a Knox man. But little will that avail, for M'Connachie is a
Queen Mary man. So, after all, it is at her door we chap, a last
futile effort to bring that woman to heel. One more house of call,
a student's room, also in South Street. I have chosen my student,
you see, and I have chosen well; him that sang--
'Life has not since been wholly vain,
And now I bear
Of wisdom plucked from joy and pain
Some slender share.
'But howsoever rich the store,
I'd lay it down
To feel upon my back once more
The old red gown.'
Well, we have at last come to an end. Some of you may remember
when I began this address; we are all older now. I thank you for
your patience. This is my first and last public appearance,
and I never could or would have made it except to a gathering
of Scottish students. If I have concealed my emotions in addressing
you it is only the thrawn national way that deceives everybody
except Scotsmen. I have not been as dull as I could have wished
to be; but looking at your glowing faces cheerfulness and hope would
keep breaking through. Despite the imperfections of your betters we
leave you a great inheritance, for which others will one day call
you to account. You come of a race of men the very wind of whose
name has swept to the ultimate seas. Remember--
'Heaven doth with us as we with torches do,
Not light them for themselves. . . .'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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