GREAT OAKS

According to the CRIMSON census lately made, summer will scatter the undergraduates far and wide. More than one-half of the college intends to travel. Of this number the percentage going West and the percentage going abroad is very nearly equal. In general, going West has no formidable connotation, but means a ranch or a pack-trip with an unconscious study of the art of Nature; while a trip abroad means steamers and hotels, with a very conscious study of the art of man.

It would seem that Europe was assured of another great American invasion. With the large number that go in a normal year, and the opportunity opened to many more by such inexpensive and congenial methods as the Student Tours, the temptation is great. College men will be everywhere; on the boulevards at the cafes, at the theatres, at the Louvre, the National Galleries, or the Pitti Palace, struggling with art, being rounded out. During the summer they will become conscious of a speaking acquaintance with the cathedrals and paintings they have seen. But they are less likely to have a speaking acquaintance with the people. The people are taken for granted.

Perhaps the question will occur to a few of these innocents abroad: "I wonder what an Englishman thinks about?", "I wonder what a Frenchman thinks about?" If it does, and they seek an answer, the impossible might happen--a few might return home with the avowed purpose of going into politics, and from that beginning attain the rarest of American titles, Statesman.