The Haverfordian, Vols. 50-51, Nov. 1930-June 1932
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BTACK Locoes, cas^- " ' V ' 50 5 THE LIBRARY 1 OF HAVERFORD COLLEGE THE GIFT OF /I MO. '^ 195 5 ACCESSION NO. / 5./ 7 3/ Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 with funding from LYRASIS Members and Sloan Foundation http://www.archive.org/details/haverfordianvols5051have THE HAVIERFCCDIAN NOVEMBER 1931 Charter House Suits for College Men with extra trousers l 50 or knickers 36. In styles that college men want . and in their favorite patterns and colors. Also the newest ideas in Haberdashery at moderate prices. Jacob Reed*s Sons 1424-1426 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia Atlantic City » » 1127-1129 Boardwalk Printers of (his ! ^J^fi^ book b=r- Most of the school magazines in Phila- delphia AND VICINITY ARE PRINTED HERE. LET US SUBMIT OUR PROPOSITION FOR PRINTING YOUR PERIODICAL OR CLASS RECORD BOOK. Westbrook Publishing Co. 5800 North Mervine Street Philadelphia, Pa. Patronize our Advertisers 'Patronize BREYER the ICE Breyer CREAM Dealer" CO. PHILADELPHIA WASHINGTON NEW YORK Insurance For Students Beyer Company, Inc. Personal Effects, Automobiles, & Accidents, Fire or Theft while at col- 233-235 Callowhill St. lege or elsewhere. Risks to property or person while traveling in this Philadelphia country or abroad. Damage to motor cars. Liability for accidents to persons or property. J. B. LONGACRE BEACHDALE Bullitt Building BRAND 141 S. 4th Street, Philadelphia, Pa. Poultry Eggs Butter Haverford Pharmacy Established 29 Years Cheese GOOD DRUGS Best of Service FAMOUS BEACHDALE To Haverford Men DUCKLING Different from Others Phone, Ardmore 1 22 MEHL&LATTA,Inc. Theodore Petcoff Lumber, Coal and INTERIOR DECORATOR Building Material Wall Board Celotex 1509 North Carlisle Street ROSEMONT, PA. PHILADELPHIA 1300 Stevenson TELEPHONE BBYN MAIVB -l 2583 Phone or Write J'1301 — 645 Table of Contents Haverford Scene, No. 7 J. R. Watkins 2 Obeah C, A. Pitter 3 Venus De Milo F. G. N. 6 The Alban Hills W. E. Miller 7 Stanzas to Margaret Charles W. Hart 13 Song for Winter H. J. Nichol 1 To Isabel /. Hoag 1 Noblesse Oblige Frank Bourne 1 Os Mortis Formosum Lochhart Amerman 20 Four Days in the U. S. S. R Leonard L. Greif, Jr. 21 Sonnet Francis Walton 27 Books Three Reviews 28 The Haverfordian VOL. LI HAVERFORD. PA., NOVEMBER, 1931 NO. 1 "The Haverfordian" is published monthly during the college year. Its purpose is to foster a literary spirit among the under- graduates. To that end contributions are invited. Material should be submitted to the Editor before the fifth of the month preceding publication. Entered as second-class matter March 19, 1921, at the post office at Haverford, Pennsylvania, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Acceptance for mailing at special rate of postage provided for in section 1 103, Act of October 3, 1917, authorized April 1 1, 1921. Editor FRANCIS REDDING WALTON Associate Editors H. F. BOURNE S. A. HUNT J.^H. HOAG W. E. MILLER H. J. NICHOL Business Manager C. B. ALLENDOERFER Circulation Manager C. G. SINGER Assistant Circulation Manager M. W. STANLEY CARV£D FROM LOCKWOOD (WITH APOL06\eSTOTH£S/\Me ) Obeah MOST writers of jungle-tales and stories of savage tribes have made capital of the weird music of the tom-tom, and those who have been gripped by the magic of "Trader Horn" have doubtless felt their spines creep at the rumble of that monotonous and ever- distant rhythm. There is a definite and electric response which this uncanny voice of the African forest calls forth from the breast of the negro, however far "civilization" may have removed him from the influence of the witch- doctors' inexplicable sway. Given a chance to brood and dream amidst cradling hills and slumbrous woods where giant trees blot out the sky and shed dead leaves to carpet the underbrush, his tread becomes light and stealthy and his eyes informed with the somnolent awe of the hypnotized. If one of his race be willing and capable of playing the witch-doctor, the opportunities are bound- less and the profits respectable in a place where the "virgin forest" is not a mere poetic fiction. In Jamaica, the witch-doctor, with well-deserved un- impressiveness, is called an obeahman—"Obi's man". Obi, pariah of the African gods, and yet most feared of all, has never had the limits of his power defined, but primarily he is a god of revenge—not a deity that avenges crime spontaneously, but one that may be invoked by a bribe to harm even the eminently good. Cradled by the Caribbean in one of earth's most beautiful corners, Obi now passes through his second childhood. No longer does the tom-tom call his worshippers by its compelling insistency. No longer is he a god. Christianity has relegated him to the hosts of Satan; so he is invoked but never worshipped. But even on his last legs, he 4 THE HAVERFORDIAN menaces most the forces that have vanquished him. When the night is still and moonbeams accentuate the deep shadows, human footprints add their beat to the myriad sounds that are a part of the night-silence in a tropical forest. Sure of his gulls the obeahman waits, culling nauseous fragments from the grave and the grave- yard herbs. They come; he names his fee and the amount required in advance, an amount sometimes more than his client could save in a year though he went without food. A loan is obtained and a lifetime spent in paying for it. The obeahman goes to work. Inky night in the churchyard, with the traditional owl boring augur holes in the black silence, chilling the marrow of every benighted traveller. The sky is a close drawn curtain of grey emphasizing the futility of monu- ments to the dead by changing their white massiveness into black silhouettes on the fringe of the dark. The fireflies have folded their wings despairingly and gone to sleep. A cricket makes high festival by the ear of an aged skull and young frogs move restlessly in the tall grass. Surely this is no place for humans who dread the dark hours and tremble at the screech of a night-bird. Yet a sound of whispers and the striking of a match betoken human presence. Emerging from some strange hiding place, appear two grown men and a boy who bears a light which is nothing more than a bottle whose cork has been steeped in oil, and lit. Their tread is inaudible in the grass but echoes sufficiently underground to silence the cricket and send the frogs scampering. The small company approaches a newly-moulded grave and the light falls on their features as they instinctively form a close group. One is a woolly-headed boy of about — OBEAH 5 twelve years; next in age is a rather well-dressed man of forty with the air about him of a typical Jamaican church- member. One hesitates to assign a definite age to the third. His hair is grey and rather long. With no sugges- tion of baldness it rises in a comb-defying mass. He is naked to the waist and as rugged as a century oak. Perfect teeth, a low forehead, and keen eyes burning strangely serve to close his description. This is the obeahman. Unwinding a ragged scarf from his waist, he produces a dirty cloth-bag, a bottle that smells of rum and a bunch of green "snake-weed". The last he crushes between his palms, rubbing the juice quickly all over his hands and arms, till the air is acrid with its reek. Then he straddles the grave while the younger man stands to one side with his head bared, and the boy inverts the bottle from time to time so that the oil keeps feeding the flame of the burning cork. Mumbling strange words, the obeahman takes in one hand some rice from his bag while with the other he holds the bottle of rum. His mumbling gradually grows more noticeable without getting louder. The effect on the spectators is very peculiar. The boy is shivering as though naked, yet the arm that holds the light is held rigid above his head, while the illumination grows dim for lack of fuel. The other's features seem torn by indescribable anxiety probably for the efficacy of the exorcism. The obeahman's drone ceases, and for an instant the group might have been a sculptor's nightmare done in ebony. Then suddenly, raising both hands above his head the exorcist dashes their contents on the grave, where the rice scatters and the bottle litters the ground with splinters. As quick as light he bends over and makes a cross with his finger where a few grains of rice are mingled with the trickling liquor. The spell is ended. The churchman mops his brow and looks around. The obeahman and his aide have dis- appeared. He is left in complete darkness, but he must 6 THE HAVERFORDIAN show no fear if the witchery is to work. So he sets off for home as slowly as he can make his twitching legs carry him. Next morning he awakes with a feeling of perfect faith that the ghost which has been haunting him has been laid—condemned to walk forever along the lines of the invisible cross made upon his dwelling place in the churchyard. Thus all the beauty is stripped from an ancient rite, and, hounded by new divinities, Obi condescends to sneak into their shrines and perpetrate deeds unworthy of a god. But still in the true land of his birth, the forest stands primeval in its sable mystery, and the tom-tom's pregnant voice is still unchallenged.