DEAN OF CONVOCATION. At Trinity College, Hartford, this officer presides in the House of Convocation, and is elected by the same, biennially.—Calendar Trin. Coll., 1850, p. 7.
DEAN'S BOUNTY. In 1730, the Rev. Dr. George Berkeley, then Dean of Derry, in Ireland, came to America, and resided a year or two at Newport, Rhode Island, "where," says Clap, in his History of Yale College, "he purchased a country seat, with about ninety-six acres of land." On his return to London, in 1733, he sent a deed of his farm in Rhode Island to Yale College, in which it was ordered, "that the rents of the farm should be appropriated to the maintenance of the three best scholars in Greek and Latin, who should reside at College at least nine months in a year, in each of the three years between their first and second degrees." President Clap further remarks, that "this premium has been a great incitement to a laudable ambition to excel in the knowledge of the classics." It was commonly known as the Dean's bounty.—Clap's Hist. of Yale Coll., pp. 37, 38.
The Dean afterwards conveyed to it [Yale College], by a deed transmitted to Dr. Johnson, his Rhode Island farm, for the establishment of that Dean's bounty, to which sound classical learning in Connecticut has been much indebted.—Hist. Sketch of Columbia Coll., p. 19.
DEAN SCHOLAR. The person who received the money appropriated by
Dean Berkeley was called the Dean scholar.
This premium was formerly called the Dean's bounty, and the person who received it the Dean scholar.—Sketches of Yale Coll., p. 87.
DECENT. Tolerable; pretty good. He is a decent scholar; a decent writer; he is nothing more than decent. "This word," says Mr. Pickering, in his Vocabulary, "has been in common use at some of our colleges, but only in the language of conversation. The adverb decently (and possibly the adjective also) is sometimes used in a similar manner in some parts of Great Britain."
The greater part of the pieces it contains may be said to be very decently written.—Edinb. Rev., Vol. I. p. 426.
DECLAMATION. The word is applied especially to the public speaking and speeches of students in colleges, practised for exercises in oratory.—Webster.
It would appear by the following extract from the old laws of Harvard College, that original declamations were formerly required of the students. "The Undergraduates shall in their course declaim publicly in the hall, in one of the three learned languages; and in no other without leave or direction from the President, and immediately give up their declamations fairly written to the President. And he that neglects this exercise shall be punished by the President or Tutor that calls over the weekly bill, not exceeding five shillings. And such delinquent shall within one week after give in to the President a written declamation subscribed by himself."—Laws 1734, in Peirce's Hist. Harv. Univ., App., p. 129.
2. At the University of Cambridge, Eng., an essay upon a given subject, written in view of a prize, and publicly recited in the chapel of the college to which the writer belongs.