RECREATION
(At Tables) "Recreation at table, which is much appreciated by the students, is to be given at dinner on Wednesdays and Saturdays."
-- Scholastic Sept. 28, 1872.
(See Father Elliott at Diamond Jubilee, 1917: "I saw no reading today. Ye degenerate sons of Notre Dame!")
"The long walks in summer, dinners in the woods, staying until 9:00 by the bigger students contributed to make life more agreeable; moreover, the monthly exhibitions in public made the institution better known and more popular, and so by degrees the goodwill of the neighborhood."
-- Sorin Chronicles. 1850.
(Days of Recreation at University)
-- Minutes of Granger's Visit.
(Recreations neglected) "Brother Gatian observed that Messrs. Steber, Clarke, and Biersbach seldom took their recreations with the other boarders; wherefore, the Council decided that Father Superior should be requested by Father Cointet to declare what exercises they should follow or not follow."
Council of Professors. Oct. 4, 1844.
"The students took prodigious delight in long excursions on foot, and they scoured the fields far and wide, seeking what they may devour. Over hill and dale they would have roamed, had there been that variety in the surrounding country, and they made up for the loss of such pleasure by trudging manfully through sandy roads and swampy prairies. a favorite mode of passing the days was to start out immediately after breakfast, carrying the main part of the dinner along with them, and trusting to the neighboring farmers for butter, eggs, and milk, though the farmers rarely returned the compliment of trusting them. At other times they would give notice a week in advance, and then make a raid on some farmhouse nearby, and soon demolish the chickens, hot cakes, pies, and other dainty edibles, which, besides being more toothsome than the college commons, tasted fifty per-cent better from the fact that they had to be paid for...."
-- Lyons.