PLANTATION PROGENY

The custom of giving prizes as reward for meritorious work dates back indefinitely into antiquity, and those awarded to University undergraduates are almost as ancient as is the University itself. It was in year 1, A.V.C. (ab universitate condita), that Edward Hopkins, a London merchant, established the first prize "to give encouragement in those foreign plantations for the breeding up of hopeful youths, for the public service of their country in future times"; and from his legacy the "Deturs" are given each year, in the form of books for those men who, for the first time, have attained "group one" ranking.

From the time when the University consisted of two buildings in the woods, these prize-awards have increased in number and importance. At present they are offered in the fields of History, Government and Economics, Language and Literature, Public Speaking and Debate, Music and Fine Arts, and Mathematics, as well as in hundreds of outside activities, from poetry to political argument. They take up more than eleven pages in the University Catalogue, and are advertised by bulletins wherever there are dormitories or classrooms. There are so many that, to a student attempting to select the one for which he is best suited to compete, there might almost seem an embarrassment of riches. But Edward Hopkins knew whereof he spoke in laying the foundations for a system which has become one of the important parts of the University machinery today. The honor and remuneration in reward for excellence in work have proved of inestimable value to the hopeful youths of this outgrown plantation.