“This presentation,” he writes, “is a ceremony of long standing.  It has certainly existed for more than a century.  It is very early alluded to, not as a novelty, but as an established custom.  There is now less formality on such occasions, but the substantial parts of the exercises are retained.  The examination is now begun on Saturday and finished on Tuesday, and the day after, Wednesday, six weeks before the public Commencement, is the day of Presentation.  There have sometimes been literary exercises on that day by one or more of the candidates, and sometimes they have been omitted.  I have in my possession a Latin Oration, what, I suppose, was called a Cliosophic Oration, pronounced by William Samuel Johnson in 1744, at the presentation of his class.  Sometimes a member of the class exhibited an English Oration, which was responded to by some one of the College Faculty, generally by one who had been the principal instructor of the class presented.  A case of this kind occurred in 1776, when Mr., afterwards President Dwight, responded to the class orator in an address, which, being delivered the same July in which Independence was declared, drew, from its patriotic allusions, as well as for other reasons, unusual attention.  It was published,—­a rare thing at that period.  Another response was delivered in 1796, by J. Stebbins, Tutor, which was likewise published.  There has been no exhibition of the kind since.  For a few years past, there have been an oration and a poem exhibited by members of the graduating class, at the time of presentation.  The appointments for these exercises are made by the class.

“So much of an exhibition as there was at the presentation in 1778 has not been usual.  More was then done, probably, from the fact, that for several years, during the Revolutionary war, there was no public Commencement.  Perhaps it should be added, that, so far back as my information extends, after the literary exercises of Presentation Day, there has always been a dinner, or collation, at which the College Faculty, graduates, invited guests, and the Senior Class have been present.”

A graduate of the present year[60] writes more particularly in relation to the observances of the day at the present time.  “In the morning the Senior Class are met in one of the lecture-rooms by the chairman of the Faculty and the senior Tutor.  The latter reads the names of those who have passed a satisfactory examination, and are to be recommended for degrees.  The Class then adjourn to the College Chapel, where the President and some of the Professors are waiting to receive them.  The senior Tutor reads the names as before, after which Professor Kingsley recommends the Class to the President and Faculty for the degree of B.A., in a Latin discourse.  The President then responds in the same tongue, and addresses a few words of counsel to the Class.

“These exercises are followed by the Poem and Oration, delivered by members of the Class chosen for these offices by the Class.  Then comes the dinner, given in one of the lecture-rooms.  After this the Class meet in the College yard, and spend the afternoon in smoking (the old clay pipe is used, but no cigars) and singing.  Thus ends the active life of our college days.”