A report of one of the most harrowing outrages of the season comes to us from the back-woods of Maine. We have often taken occasion before this to comment upon the awfulness and depravity of the practice of hazing, and Bowdoin College has more than once furnished us a text. But now a case has happened at that college over which it little behooves the public to make light. One freshman, it is reported, after long and vain entreaties on the part of the authorities and assurances of protection, has at last tremblingly confessed the story of his wrongs. One short sentence tells it all: "They stole his peanuts." No ordinary case this of personal assault, of demolishing property or of like indignity, but a bold and malignant robbery. We are not told the full particulars of the awful story; but it is surmised that there exists at the college a secret band of sophomores whose dark and wicked design it is to prey upon the freshmen in all manner of means. Through some unknown source these conspirators got wind of the possession of a quantity of peanuts by the aforementioned freshman - a parting gift from a fond mother or perhaps a sweetheart, as full of hope and trusting courage the youth set out to win his way in college. Peanuts! how many tender associations cluster round this name! Thoughts of boyish joys, remembrance of generous treats, the hoarded pennies invested with the itinerant vendor - and all the recollections that manhood recalls to mind at the mention of this little word. And this parting gift these ruthless despoilers seized with pitiless bands uttering direful threats, unmindful of the tears and entreaties of this unhappy youth thus left at their mercy. "Take my life, but spare my peanuts," he cried in anguish; "sole reminders of my childhood's joys - my only token."

To one who reads this barrowing tale it will afford some satisfaction to learn that the guilty ones are to be dealt with according to their deserts. No penalty should be thought too severe - even to compelling them to devour the whole of their ill-gotten store. When the news of the outrage became known the freshman class promptly met and reported the matter to the faculty. They, on their part, have taken measures for expelling the offenders, who it appears have been guilty of other atrocities only rivalled in cruelty by the above described act. One freshman reports that he was recently visited and forcibly denuded of a mustache that he had only just secured after a great outlay of time and money, and which, it was confidently believed, was the only bona fide article in the entire class. The sophomore class, we are surprised to learn, abets its colleagues in their wicked acts and threatens to withdraw from college if the penalty is enforced against the offenders. This action should help them none. It is time that a warning should be given and an example made, even at the sacrifice of an entire class. The public will uphold the college in any repressive measures against this monstrous evil.