" Santa Claus's gift one year
took the form of a small, yellow, one-keyed flute, on which simple instrument
he would "practice with the passion of a virtuoso." Like Schumann,
he organized an orchestra among his friends and young playmates.
Simultaneously he was receiving his first initiation into
the joy of literature. He would frequently retire from playing
with his brother and other companions to the library of his father,
where he followed with absorbing interest the stories of Sir Walter Scott,
the romances of Froissart, the adventures of Gil Blas, and other stories that
his boyish mind delighted in. He was already producing among his playmates
a sense of the distinction of his personality, that caused them
to reverence him as one above them.
Chapter II. College Days
January 6, 1857, Lanier entered the sophomore class in Oglethorpe University,
situated at Midway, Ga. -- two miles from Milledgeville, which was then
the capital of the State. It would be difficult to imagine a greater contrast
than that between the sleepy town of Milledgeville and progressive Macon,
or between Oglethorpe and the better colleges of the South
at the present time. The essentially primitive life of the college
is seen in an act which was passed by the legislature
making it unlawful for any person to "establish, keep, or maintain
any store or shop of any description for vending any species of merchandise,
groceries or confectioneries within a mile and a half of the University.
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