A Collection of College Words and Customs by Benjamin Homer Hall
page 84 of 755 (11%)
page 84 of 755 (11%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
before I'll _mount a barrel_,' &c. (Act II. Sc. 6.)--Again: 'Had I
been once i' th' Butteries, they'd have their rods about me. But let us, for joy that I'm escaped, go to the Three Tuns and drink a pint of wine, and laugh away our cares.--'T is drinking at the Tuns that keeps us from ascending Buttery barrels,' &c." By a reference to the word PUNISHMENT, it will be seen that, in the older American colleges, corporal punishment was inflicted upon disobedient students in a manner much more solemn and imposing, the students and officers usually being present. The effect of _crossing the name in the buttery_ is thus stated in the Collegian's Guide. "To keep a term requires residence in the University for a certain number of days within a space of time known by the calendar, and the books of the buttery afford the appointed proof of residence; it being presumed that, if neither bread, butter, pastry, beer, or even toast and water (which is charged one farthing), are entered on the buttery books in a given name, the party could not have been resident that day. Hence the phrase of 'eating one's way into the church or to a doctor's degree.' Supposing, for example, twenty-one days' residence is required between the first of May and the twenty-fourth inclusive, then there will be but three days to spare; consequently, should our names be crossed for more than three days in all in that term, --say for four days,--the other twenty days would not count, and the term would be irrecoverably lost. Having our names crossed in the buttery, therefore, is a punishment which suspends our collegiate existence while the cross remains, besides putting an embargo on our pudding, beer, bread and cheese, milk, and butter; for these articles come out of the buttery."--p. 157. |
|