The Chautauquan, Vol. 04, October 1883Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle
Philosophy
The Chautauquan, Vol. 04, October 1883
Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle
Chautauqua Institution -- Periodicals; Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle -- Periodicals
More than a hundred and fifty of the “Society of the Hall in the Grove”
(graduates of the preceding year), entered the Hall, and were seated in
its western side.
Precisely at ten o’clock, as the booming of the great bell at the Point
indicated the hour, the members of the Class of 1883, with such members
of the Class of 1882 as had not last year passed the Arches, standing
at the gate of St. Paul’s Grove, read responsively the devotional
services, Rev. George C. Wilding acting as precentor of the first
section, and Rev. H. C. Farrar as the precentor of the second section.
The “Messenger,” Rev. A. H. Gillet, in slow and solemn utterance gave
the announcement as follows:
I come to inform all candidates for enrollment in
the “Society of the Hall in the Grove” that the hour
appointed for your reception has arrived; the Hall
has been set in order; the Path through the Grove has
been opened; the Arches under which you must pass have
been erected; the Key which will open this Gate has
been placed in my hands. And to you who, as members of
the CHAUTAUQUA LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC CIRCLE, have
completed the four years’ Course of Reading, and now
hold in your hands a pledge of the same, I extend, in
the name of the authorities, a welcome into St. Paul’s
Grove, under the First Arch—and let the watchman guard
carefully the Gate.
After the announcement by the Messenger, he turned and opened the gate.
The first to enter was Mr. Miner Curtis, an invalid, borne in a wheeled
carriage by the advance members of the class of ’83, and accompanied by
his wife and son, who were graduates of last year.
Having entered the Gate, and the Gate having been closed, the class
proceeded very slowly toward the Hall, passing the second and third
Arches. As they walked up the beautifully decorated way, the “Choir of
the Hall in the Grove” stationed at the fourth Arch, and led by Prof.
C. C. Case, sang “A Song of To-day:”
“Sing peans over the Past!
We bury the dead years tenderly.”
At the entrance to the Hall stood the Superintendent of Instruction to
welcome the coming class, and as they passed by the Arch nearest the
Hall, the fifty-two little girls standing in double columns, scattered
the way of the coming graduates with the beauteous flowers, emblematic
of the flower-strewn paths of intellectual light which they may hope to
tread in the coming years.
On entering the building the “Society of the Hall in the Grove”
received their brothers and sisters with the most marked tokens of good
cheer, waving their handkerchiefs and vocally expressing the kindly
feeling of the seniors of the year agone.
At precisely 10:20 the “C. L. S. C. Glee Club,” Prof. W. F. Sherwin,
conductor, led the classes (which filled the Hall to repletion), as
they sang
“A sound is thrilling thro’ the trees
And vibrant thro’ the air.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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