Valedictory Address

The ValedictoryThe University Monthly 23, 8 (June 1904): 239-244. (UA Case 68, Box 1)

Your Honour; Gentlemen of the Senate; Mr. Chancellor, and members of the Faculty; Ladies and Gentlemen :
It now becomes the fluty of another graduating class to bid fare-well to you and to our Alma Mater. For four years we have been looking forward eagerly to our graduation but now that the day has come, we find that during the four years ties have grown which are not easy to break and which make the word farewell hard to say.
The four years, though uneventful from the standpoint of history, have been rich in opportunities and quiet influences. The class of ‘04 matriculated with thirty-nine Freshmen, (twenty-four boys and fifteen girls). During the four years campaign casualties have been heavy; losses from all causes amounting to twenty-one, leaving only eighteen of the original thirty-nine with us. The gaps in the ranks were, however, partially filled by senior matriculants and students from other classes and colleges, bringing the number to twenty-six, the largest class which has yet graduated from the University. Of these graduates, nineteen are boys and seven girls.

Our experiences as undergraduates have been varied. We entered as freshmen in the first year of a new regime. Hazing, we were glad to learn, had been done away with. The road of the modern freshmen is, we are told, a flower strewn avenue compared with the “steep and thorny way” trodden by freshmen of a decade ago. We had, however, no reason to complain of a cold reception. We were welcomed most cordially, even zealously by the Sophomores. In short to use their own hearty form of expression they “used us white.”

The year passed and soon the ravishing charms of “Sweet Analytics,” and the weight of our responsibilities as the guardian angels of an incoming class, impressed upon us the fact that we were promoted to the position of Sophomores.

The Junior and Senior years have been the best of our course. The varied advantages of college life were brought home to us more strongly than before. The options gave us the opportunity of choosing our course more in line with our tastes and needs, and we were able to participate more actively in the various college associations.

In promoting these college societies the class of ‘04 has from the first endeavored to do its duty. During the past year the responsibility of Leadership in these activities has rested upon us. In this leadership we have had the hearty support of all the classes and we take this opportunity of expressing our gratitude. It is largely because of this support that we can look back today upon a year of more than usual success in the different associations.

The work of the Literary and Debating Society has been pushed vigorously. The Saturday evening debates, the class tournaments and the Mock Trial have been successful features. The Mock Parliament was especially successful, in awakening keen interest. In the Intercollegiate contest the fortunes of war were against us. But we have every reason to be proud of the effort our team made. The scheme of Intercollegiate Debates has been extended to embrace not only Mt. A. and U. N. B. as in previous years but also Dalhousie, Acadia and St. Francis Xavier. The tournament is to extend over a period of five years. The plan was drawn up by a conference of delegates from all the colleges, and when put into practice cannot fail to bring about a better development of debating ability and an increasing friendship among the colleges concerned.

The Y. M. C. A. has been an influence for good in the college. Ruskin has said, regarding education, “You do not educate a man by telling him what he knew not, but by making him what he was not and what he will be forever.” If there is this character-making element in the conception of true education, then the aims of the Young Men's Christian Association are in line with the true aims of the University and it therefore deserves the support of every student and friend of the College.

The Glee Club has not been able to accomplish the impossible this year, and therefore some of us who graduate have not learned to sing. The Club continues to be one of the most popular and well attended of the societies. College life would loose much of its attractiveness and charm, without the stirring songs; and these songs would be impossible without the practice and instruction afforded by the Glee Club.

The Athletic Association has made some important advances during the year. A base ball team has been organized for the first time and its first two match games have resulted in victories. An Intercollegiate Athletic league, including Acadia, Mt. Allison and St. Francis Xavier, has been formed and an Athletic contest is to be held each year at St. John City. Hockey, still a comparatively new game with us, yields but a scanty harvest of laurels, but there is marked improvement over last year. The basket ball team have six victories to their credit and no defeats, thus winning by a broad margin the Fowler Cup in the local League. The foot ball team finished the season, the possessor of the first place it the Province, having won four out of five games. The team also won the King Richardson cup, attaining the long coveted first place among the three colleges in the Maritime Intercollegiate League. Six teams of the highest standing in the Maritime Provinces were met and of seven games only two were lost. A Golf and Tennis Club is also in operation. Thus many new steps have been taken along the line of athletics. In fact we are inclined to believe that too many have been taken. This opinion has been expressed by men most interested in athletics and who are most alive to its advantage. The danger is that we undertake too much, especially in the Intercollegiate field and thus make athletics a burden rather than a help.

In the “University Monthly” some changes have been made, and some new departments have been added. We hope that on the whole these changes have been of the nature of improvements.

The Ladies' Society, the Y. W. C. A. and the Ladies’ Debating Society have had a prosperous year, and those who are acquainted with the societies praise highly the work done.

We will not stop to offer advice to undergraduates as to their duty toward all their societies, but we wish to express with all possible emphasis the deeply felt conviction that the student who goes through the college neglecting the advantages and shirking the responsibilities of these societies, has eliminated one of the most potent factors in a university education, and goes out into life with diminished chances of success.

The college has felt keenly the need of a gymnasium, but it is a source of gratification that the classes returning after vacation will find, if present plans materialize, a building which will be a permanently creditable feature of the University.

We look forward too with interest to the putting into practice of a recommendation made in one of the meetings of the Senate, viz. the establishment of a Chair of Forestry and Agricultural Chemistry.

Of like nature is a suggestion which has been talked of to some extent among students and others—the possibility of adding to the curriculum a course of lectures in Elementary Law. It is probably true that the University loses a number of students every year, through the lack of such a course. Would it not be possible for arrangements to be made whereby a course of lectures could be given by a lawyer of the city, covering the ground of the first year in Law. Thus students, who are looking forward to the legal profession, would be prepared, upon graduation, to enter Law School in the second year. That this plan is practicable, is shown by its successful operation in other colleges. We respectfully offer this suggestion for the consideration of those in authority. Another deeply felt need is that of a Residence capable of accommodating all the students who wish it. The present group of seven rooms cannot be called a Residence, but to use the words of a former valedictorian is only “a small boarding house run at a certain expense to the college.” A large Residence would attract students, would improve the college spirit, would bring students more in touch with college activities and in every way increase the educative power of the University and in addition to this there seems no reason why it could not be run at a financial gain to the College. Would not the more difficult undertaking, be in reality the easiest, since it would appeal to men as in every way a more profitable enterprise?

With the joys the past year has brought to us, sorrows have also come. For the first time in many years, death visited us and carried away from our midst a fellow-student. Few men of a stronger, physique than Fraser have ever been seen upon our foot ball field or in our college, and none with a more cheerful disposition. The opening of the year saw him returning with others from his vacation, full of energy and hope, to continue his training for his life work. Two weeks later saw him followed by a sad procession of students and borne away to the “silent village,” his life's work ended. This sad incident will not soon be erased from our memories.

The news lately received from Dr. Davidson has been a source of mingled feelings of rejoicing and regret. We rejoice with him in the hope of his ultimate restoration to health; but we sincerely regret that it has been necessary for him to resign his position as our professor of Economics and Philosophy. With the class of ‘04, go out the last students who have had the privilege of taking lectures under Dr. Davidson, and we know how thoroughly he won the confidence, admiration and intellectual respect of his pupils. His reputation throughout Canada, as a writer and an authority on economic subjects, and his unsurpassed ability as a teacher, brought his department up to a standing second to none in the Dominion.

Our class possesses the honour of having in its ranks the first two graduates from the new department of Electrical Engineering. Though the department is still in its infancy we are proud of the creditable position it has already attained. The professor in charge deserves the highest commendation for the eminent success he has achieved with the somewhat limited apparatus now at his disposal.

We are glad to be able to congratulate the University on the appointment of its first Rhodes Scholar. We wish the winner of the scholarship all success and have every confidence in his ability to win during his course at Oxford and in his after life, honours for himself and for his New Brunswick Alma Mater.

Gentlemen of the Faculty, we wish to thank you for the efforts you have made in our behalf during the years we have been with you. We thank you not only for the careful and patient instruction, but also, and especially for personal advice and encouragement and in many cases for inspiration to greater efforts and higher attainments.

To the citizens of Fredericton our gratitude is extended for assistance rendered to student enterprises, for social courtesies and for the many kindnesses shown us. Your beautiful city has been to us the scene of four happy years, and our “farewell” is a reluctant one.

To our own class-mates, a word might be said as we are about to part and go out into the world. May our lives be worthy of the class to which we belong and of the college whose name we bear. As the Spartan youth who went out from his home into the battle—his armour buckled upon him by his own mother—we today go out girded by our Alma Mater for the battle of life. May the coming years of strife see no dishonorable defeat or lowering of ideals.

To our fellow-students but little need be said. Because you are fellow students you understand us: therefore few words are necessary. Nevertheless we are learning that the word “farewell” means more to us who go out from the old halls this afternoon to return no more as undergraduates, than to you who look forward to one, two, or three more years of activity here. One of the many things we will look back to with pleasure is the grand college spirit which has existed among us. We have been a united body. Singing together in the halls the ringing songs welcoming visiting foot-ball teams on the terrace, posing for the big group photos on the college steps, rejoicing together over victories, or accepting defeats—at all times there has been the feeling of union. “We have joined our hands together” and our hearts together by some bond, unseen, yet one of the most real forces of our college course. It is because “we have been nursed upon the self-same
bill”—sons of the same dear old Alma Mater.

We have even at times criticized together some phases of the old college. But at the same time we remember that we ourselves have not always been entirely faultless. And even while criticizing, there has been in our hearts a feeling, perhaps best expressed in the old song, “With all her faults we love her still.” May this loving loyalty to the best interests of our Alma Mater be always and increasingly the predominant feature of your college spirit. Let it not be simply a student spirit but a broader University spirit, ever ready to relegate personal preferences or class matters to the background, and to throw the force of the united body on the side of the true advancement of the institution which is doing its best for you.

With sorrow that we must now sever the ties that have bound us together as fellow-students, we say to you and to all “Farewell.”