AS THE WEST SEES US

In an article published by the Stanford Illustrated Review J. K. Norton, one of the Leland Stanford University hurdlers who was such a noteworthy competitor in the Intercollegiate Track Meet of last May, records his impressions of Harvard. A distinction which he draws in regard to the democracy found at the two universities is a little misleading. "The spirit of easy democracy," he says, "is absent at Harvard. . . . and the air of general familiarity that exists at Stanford is absent on the Harvard Yard."

A certain stiffness and restraint in the Harvard manner invariably makes an unfavorable impression on a man accustomed to the breeziness of the free-and-easy West, but it can hardly be taken to mean that there is less of real democracy at Cambridge than in the college towns on the Coast. Harvard democracy is accustomed to express itself in a less demonstrative fashion, that is all, and although it lies deeper beneath the surface, its presence cannot be denied.

Various of Mr. Norton's other remarks, inaccurate because founded on observations that were necessarily hasty and incomplete, are so amusing as to lose much of their sting. We are surprised to learn for example that "the touch of tradition holds sway, appearing at every turn." Tradition preserves the old and uncomfortable classroom benches and plank desks of a former age instead of replacing them with up-to-date equipment." And again: "The rickety old dormitories of a former century are kept unchanged, a tablet on the door of each room telling who has occupied the room for the past century or more, and if by chance the list includes the name of some famed man the room brings a ridiculous rental from a rich student."

A glance at the price list of Yard rooms might have proved enlightening as to the ridiculous rentals paid by rich students, and a trip through the new Freshman Dormitories might have corrected some of the ideas of this son of the young and growing West in regard to Harvard's devotion to the rickety old dormitories of a former century. The comical irritation which he shares with other Westerners over the "affectations" of our Eastern speech might have also been tempered had he but stopped to consider the counter irritation which an occasional raucousness of the Western voice often produces upon more fastidious Eastern ears.

Yet most of these differences are both trifling and superficial. Even if Harvard and Stanford are separated by many miles, the ties that unite them are far stronger, their differences less fundamental than the chance observer would suppose. When representatives from two such remote universities can be brought to that mutual understanding which is the basis of all true friendship and respect, intercollegiate athletics will have more than justified the large amount of money and effort that have already been spent upon them.