As the membership in the Shakespeare and Greek letter societies is limited to between forty and fifty members in each society, the great majority of the students are without these social privileges, but the Barn Swallows, founded in 1897, to which every member of the college may belong if she wishes, gives periodic entertainments in the "Barn" which go far to promote general good feeling and social fellowship. The first president of the Barn Swallows, Mary E. Haskell, '97, says that it arose as an Everybody's Club, to give buried talents a chance. "Suddenly we adjured the Trustees by Joy and Democracy to bless our charter, to be gay once a week, and when they gave the Olympic nod we begged for the Barn to be gay in—and they gave that too.
"It was a grim joy parlor; rough old floor, bristly with splinters, few windows, no plank walk, no stage, no partitions, no lighting. We hung tin reflectored lanterns on a few of the posts,—thicker near the stage end,—and opened the season with an impromptu opera of the Brontes'." To Professor Charlotte F. Roberts, Wellesley '80, the Barn Swallows owe their happy name.
Besides these more formal organizations there are a number of department clubs, the Deutsche Verein, the Alliance Francaise, the Philosophy Club, the Economics Club, and informal groups such as the old Rhymesters' Club, which flourished in the late nineties, the Scribblers' which seems to have taken its place and enlarged its scope, the Social Study Circle, the little Socialist Club, and others through which the students express their intellectual and social interests.
Of Wellesley's many festivities and playtimes it would take too long to tell: of her Forensic Burnings, held when the last junior forensic for the year is due; of her processional serenades, with Chinese lanterns; of her singing on the chapel steps in the evenings of May and June. These well-beloved customs have been establishing themselves year by year more firmly in undergraduate hearts, but it is not always possible to trace them to their "first time." Most of them date back to the later years of the nineteenth century, or the first of the twentieth. Wellesley's musical cheer seems to have waked the campus echoes first in the spring of 1890, as a result of a prize offered in November, 1889, although as far back as 1880 there is mention of a cheer. The musical cheer has so much beauty and dignity, both near at hand and at a distance, that many of the early alumnae and the faculty wish it might some time quite supersede the ugly barking sounds, imitated from the men's colleges, with which the girls are fain to evince their approval and celebrate their triumphs. They invariably end their barking with the musical cheer, however, keeping the best for the last, and relieving the tortured graduate ear.
Formal athletics at Wellesley developed from the gymnasium practice, the rowing on the lake, and the Tree Day dancing. In the early years, the class crews used to row on the lake and sing at sunset, in their heavy, broad-bottomed old tubs; and from these casual summer evenings "Float" has been evolved—Wellesley's water pageant—when Lake Waban is dotted with gay craft, and the crews in their slim, modern, eight-oared shells, display their skill. This is the festival which the public knows best, for unlike Tree Day, to which outsiders have been admitted on only three occasions, "Float" has always been open to friendly guests. Year by year the festival grows more elaborate. Chinese junks, Indian canoes, Venetian gondolas, flower boats from fairyland, glide over the bright sunset waters, and the crews in their old traditional star pattern anchor together and sing their merry songs. There are new songs every spring, for each crew has its own song, but there are two of the old songs which are heard at every Wellesley Float, "Alma Mater", and the song of the lake, that Louise Manning Hodgkins wrote for the class of '87.
Lake of gray at dawning day,
In soft shadows lying,—
Waters kissed by morning mist,
Early breezes sighing,—
Fairy vision as thou art,
Soon thy fleeting charms depart.
Every grace that wins the heart,
Like our youth is flying.
Lake of blue, a merry crew,
Cheer of thee will borrow.
Happy hours to-day are ours,
Weighted by no sorrow.
Other years may bring us tears,
Other days be full of fears,
Only hope the craft now steers.
Cares are for the morrow.
Lake of white at holy night,
In the moonlight gleaming,—
Softly o'er the wooded shore,
Silver radiance streaming,—
On thy wavelets bear away
Every care we've known to-day,
Bring on thy returning way
Peaceful, happy dreaming.
After the singing, the Hunnewell cup is presented for the crew competition; and with the darkness, the fireworks begin to flash up from the opposite shore of the lake.
Besides the rowing clubs, in the first decade, there were tennis clubs, and occasional outdoor "meets" for cross-country runs, but apparently there was no regular organization combining in one association all the separate clubs until 1896-1897, when we hear of the formation of a "New Athletic Association." There is also record of a Field Day on May 29, 1899. In 1902, we find the "new athletics"—evidently a still newer variety than those of 1897—"recognized by the trustees"; and the first Field Day under this newest regime occurred on November 3, 1902. All the later Field Days have been held in the late autumn, at the end of the sports season, which now includes a preliminary season in the spring and a final season in the autumn. An accepted candidate for an organized sport must hold herself ready to practice during both seasons, unless disqualified by the physical examiner, and must confine herself to the one sport which she has chosen. During both seasons the members may be required to practice three times a week.