MUMMERS AND MEN

Judging from the front pages of various Sunday prints it would seem that at least one engineer has felt and keenly resented the often heard references to greasy hands and awkward monkey wrenches. At least he is determined that the younger generation shall not follow in these same steps and has vigorously exhorted the graduating class at the Tech to change their collars every evening, presumably to rid themselves of the stains of honest toll acquired from too close contact with the machine age during the day.

It is little short of astonishing that a man belonging to a profession usually considered to represent the sternest of realism should have fallen for the vagaries of the "right crowd". Perhaps the boys at Technology have not had time to frequent the polished dance halls of Back Bay and so discover that the boss's daughter and his stenographer are sisters under a very thin skin. At any rate this naive belief in the "right kind" of wife as a stepping stone to the happy life hardly does credit to an intellect which has spent many years over the exact sciences.

Somehow there seems to be something wrong with attributing Harvard's "greatness" to a preoccupation with sartorial expertness and a will to "belong". Most of the current criticism in regard to this institution centers around its familiar indifference to the press of the trousers or the shine on the shoes. It is true that a large number of men do shave daily but it is hardly to this that they owe the remarkable front which has apparently enabled them to get away with murder for the past three hundred years. To become really serious about the matter, however out of place it may be, it may be well to point out that the reason Harvard "never apologises, never argues, never listens to criticism" is that she has never been fooled by the sort of distinction that appearance, manners, or artificial social orders create.