KNIGHTS HOSPITALLERS

One regrets to hear that yesterday "an unauthorized visitor entered various rooms in Claverly Hall without invitation." This breach of good manners in itself deserves some slight censure. But the entering was relatively unimportant "it was the leaving that really mattered. As a detail of history the young visitor levied contributions on his "various" hosts, to the grand total of approximately $150. To conceal nothing--Claverly Hall was robbed.

The bandit who performed this noteworthy feat must formerly have belonged to the Salvation Army--without intending to reflect upon the good name of that estimable organization--for in his gathering of miscellaneous coins and bills he showed a distinctly evangelistic spirit. Just what use he can have for English pennies is not at once discernible--although, unlike cats, all pennies do not look alike in the dark. He may have thought them quarters, in which case his perception and not his business sense was at fault. At any rate, one is relieved to know that he was "not the plumber."

The one bright ray however which penetrates the gloom of the catastrophe is the fact that the proctor was not robbed. Possibly the astute burglar realized his inability to cope with such a man. Possibly he was so burdened with spoils already that he hesitated to endanger his pockets with more. But perhaps the circumstance that the proctor's door was locked had something to do with it. It appears that his was almost the only door which was locked, and to a sensitive criminal, the hospitality of the generous students who magnificently left their doors open must have been infinitely more appealing than this distrustful attitude of the proctor. One should not be too hard on the proctor; his intimate knowledge of the seamy side of human nature inevitably makes him suspicious, careful even cautious. Rather should one seek to emulate the open-handed benignity of the students, who while no doubt believing implicitly that every Englishman's home is his castle, prefer to leave the drawbridge down and the portcullis up.