One day when the disturbances became most flagrant, and the poor professor was really quite helpless, I ventured to point out to him how he might bring about order. He received my suggestion most favorably, so I asked him to let me take his chair for a few moments. I made a brief appeal to the class, reminding them that we were now seniors, and that there were some, especially those intending to study for the ministry, who were interested in the subject and prevented from following it by the boisterous behavior of the rest. I was jeeringly dubbed Professor Straus, but I went right on. I said I knew there were a number who were opposed to the study of Evidences of Christianity, and I proposed that they rise. To those who got up I gave permission to leave the room, and as I recall it, there were some eight or ten left. Then I turned to Dr. McVickar and said, "Here is a class you can teach." And the session went on smoothly enough. Subsequently a petition was drawn up and signed by a large majority of the class, asking that we be excused from examinations in this particular subject; but President Barnard replied that the request could not be entertained.
On the whole my four years at college were full of serious effort and not altogether free from anxiety. I had a restless ambition to have a useful career and it seemed difficult to discover for what I was best fitted. For a while, in those dreamy days, I even believed I might achieve some measure of success as a poet. I recall with a smile that the choice for class poet at commencement lay between Brander Matthews, whom we then knew as James Brander Matthews, and myself. And for some reason, which posterity will doubtless find even more difficult to fathom than I have, I was chosen. Matthews had already given evidence of his literary talents; he contributed much to the college papers, and wrote humorous poems. However, at our graduation exercises held in the Academy of Music, Fourteenth Street and Irving Place, the city's largest auditorium then, my class poem was well received by a capacity audience of proud parents and sympathetic friends. I had gravely entitled it "Truth and Error."
A more fervent aspiration held by me in those years was to devote my life to the nation, and I could conceive no better way of doing so than to enter the army. One day I saw an item in the press that President Grant had several appointments to make to the United States Military Academy. I consulted with Dr. F. A. P. Barnard, president of Columbia, and he gave me a letter of introduction to Grant, highly commending me for an appointment. When President Grant came to New York I called on him. He received me very kindly, but informed me that he had only something like eight appointments allowed him by law, and he had decided to give them where possible to the sons of officers who had been killed in the war; if, however, there were not enough such candidates he would be glad to give me a chance. I told him I thoroughly agreed that his decision was so appropriate that I would not even ask to be appointed under the circumstances.
OSCAR S. STRAUS At the time of his graduation
During the second half of my senior year I finally chose the law as my vocation. I preferred it to a business career because I disliked the idea of devoting my life to mere money-making, as business appeared to me then. My outlook was idealistic rather than practical, and to harmonize it with the workaday world caused me much mental anguish and struggle, as it does many a young man, even where affluent fortune has smiled. However, my father and brother had begun to prosper and had no need for my coöperation unless on my own account I chose to join them. Besides, I was the youngest and had the benefit of the brotherly interest and economic protection of Isidor and Nathan, should I need it. This gave me a feeling of security, and encouraged me to put forth my best efforts not only to succeed for myself, but to show my appreciation to them. Where, under moderate circumstances, a family puts forth coöperative effort in making its way forward, closer family ties result, with the advantages of stimulating unselfishness and common devotion, which in turn promote a happiness that members of richer families often miss because of their more independent relations.
So I prepared to enter Columbia Law School in the fall of 1871. Meanwhile that summer I took my first vacation since coming to New York. I went to Wyoming Valley, near Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where I had a good time despite the farmer with whom I boarded. Perhaps I had no right to expect much for the five dollars a week I paid him; but whatever I expected I know I got less. However, there were fish in the brooks and I do not recall that I starved. I had spent other summers assisting in some branch of my father's business, not because I relished work unduly, but because I regarded it less as labor than as diversion. It was interesting and useful activity which gave me an understanding of business that was valuable later in following my chosen profession.