Next to him stood Lane, the learned Latin scholar. I do
not believe that anybody ever went through Harvard College
who performed four years of such constant and strenuous labor.
What he did in his vacations I do not know, but there was
no minute lost in the term time. It is said that he never
missed attendance on morning and evening prayers but once.
The class were determined that Lane should not go through
college without missing prayers once. So one night a cord
was fastened to the handle of his door and attached to the
rail of the staircase. But Lane succeeded in wrenching open
the door and got to morning prayers in time. He was the monitor,
whose duty it was to mark the students who were absent from
prayers and who were punished for absence by a deduction
from their rank and, if the absences were frequent enough,
by a more severe penalty. The next time the measures were
more effective. Lane's chum, Ellis, was in the conspiracy.
The students bored holes carefully into the door and into
the jamb by the side and took a quantity of hinges and screwed
them carefully on to the door and the jamb. When Lane got
ready to start for prayers in the morning, he found it impossible
to open the door. As soon as he discovered what was the trouble,
he seized his hatchet and undertook to cut his way out. His
chum, Ellis, who had remained quietly in bed, sprang out
of bed and placed his back against the door and declared
that the door of his room should not be hewn down in that
manner. Lane was obliged to desist. He however took his
monitor's book, marked himself and his chum absent, and submitted.
There were a good many such pranks played by the boys in those
days, in the spirit of a harmless and good-natured mischief.
I do not know whether the College has improved in the particular
or no. I do not think anybody in my day would have defaced
the statue of John Harvard.