"Farewell! be thy destinies onward and bright!
To thy children the lesson still give,
With freedom to think, and with patience to bear,
And for right ever bravely to live.
Let not moss-covered Error moor thee at its side,
As the world on Truth's current glides by;
Be the herald of Light, and the bearer of Love,
Till the stock of the Puritans die."
Since the occasion on which this ode was sung, it has been the practice with the odists of Class Day at Harvard College to write the farewell class song to the tune of "Fair Harvard," the name by which the Irish air "Believe me" has been adopted. The deep pathos of this melody renders it peculiarly appropriate to the circumstances with which it has been so happily connected, and from which it is to be hoped it may never be severed.
See CLASS DAY.
FAIR LICK. In the game of football, when the ball is fairly caught or kicked beyond the bounds, the cry usually heard, is Fair lick! Fair lick!
"Fair lick!" he cried, and raised his dreadful foot,
Armed at all points with the ancestral boot.
Harvardiana, Vol. IV. p. 22.
See FOOTBALL.
FANTASTICS. At Princeton College, an exhibition on Commencement evening, of a number of students on horseback, fantastically dressed in masks, &c.
FAST. An epithet of one who is showy in dress, expensive or apparently so in his mode of living, and inclined to spree. Formerly used exclusively among students; now of more general application.
Speaking of the student signification of the word, Bristed remarks: "A fast man is not necessarily (like the London fast man) a rowing man, though the two attributes are often combined in the same person; he is one who dresses flashily, talks big, and spends, or affects to spend, money very freely."—Five Years in an Eng. Univ., Ed. 2d, p. 23.
The Fast Man comes, with reeling tread,
Cigar in mouth, and swimming head.
MS. Poem, F.E. Felton.