Jack Hall

How many of the fathers of the boys who are reading this story look back on their school days with any great degree of satisfaction as concerns the time spent in the schoolroom? Not a large number, it is safe to assert, if the truth were known. You young fellows do not appreciate your advantages, or, at least, you have small comprehension of what lessons and masters were like twenty and thirty years ago. Not that we were badly treated, in one sense. Even then floggings were in tolerable disrepute; the birch was practically discarded, and if the ferule was employed with some frequency in extreme cases, its popularity as an educator was on the wane. Our teachers, though rarely genial, intended to be just, and though strict were not harsh. Stiffness and constraint were still deemed essential to secure decorum, but the czar-like despotism which made the pedagogues of former generations terrible had passed away.

On the other hand, we were one and all mere machines for the acquisition of so much Latin, Greek, and mathematics; machines, of which some ran faster than others and with a certain show of brilliancy, but the best of which did their work in the mechanical, unintelligent way that machines invariably do. Most education then was a grand system of memorizing, of getting by rote whole pages of Latin grammar, and other subjects, so as to be able to spin them off as fast as the tongue could move without hesitation or mistake. If you made either, and were ambitious, it meant disaster, for there was always some slick-haired, pale-faced lad on the watch to pick you up anywhere and put you down a peg in the class as a consequence. What feats of marvelous mechanism in this line were daily performed with the dry bones of “Andrews & Stoddard’s” and “Baird’s Classical Manual”! Ask your father, any one of you, if he can repeat that memory-confounding list of adjectives which have no superlatives. There are twenty-eight of them, beginning with “adolescens adolescentior young, agrestis agrestior rustic.” If he cannot, there was a time when he could, and when—at least if he were what was called in those days a good scholar—he could rattle off, besides, the twenty-six prepositions governing the accusative and the nouns of the third declension with either e or i in the ablative, not forgetting at the same time that “occiput has only i, rus has either e or i, but rure commonly signifies ‘from the country’ and ruri ‘in the country’; mel has rarely i.”

We were expected to divine, apparently, for few hints were given us of the beauties of Cæsar and Virgil and Ovid, of the Anabasis and the Iliad, of the manners, thoughts, and customs of the Greeks and Romans, and the relations of the classic tongues to ours. But every one of us was expected, when the master gave out from that gloomy little compilation on ancient geography, “Baird’s Classical Manual,” Sybaris for instance, to be able, if called upon, to answer like a flash: “Proverbial for the luxury of its inhabitants;” and then to continue in sequence: “Thurii founded by the Athenians B. C. 443, with whom were Herodotus and Lysias the orator. In the west also, on the coast Elĕa, Helĭa, or Velīa, the birthplace of Zeno and Parmenides, the founders of the Eleatic School of Philosophy;” and so on until bidden to stop. It is no exaggeration to state that there were boys who, if started at any point in its sixty closely printed pages, could recite to the end without slip or falter, and yet who had no further knowledge concerning the places or individuals enumerated than was contained in the brief paragraphs of which those just cited are prolix examples.

It may have been noticed by the parents, if not by the boys who have followed Jack’s experiences up to this point, that very little has been said on the subject of his lessons, and that consideration has been mainly given to his sports, his snow-ball fights, his mischief-making, and what he did in general outside the schoolroom.

Let us look the matter squarely in the face and acknowledge that the least said regarding his schooling before he went to Utopia the better. But in justice to the masters who had to undergo the discouragement of seeing their efforts to make him learn prove of no avail, it should be stated that the fault lay neither in them nor seriously in their system of teaching. Already the theory of cultivating the memory alone at the expense of the other faculties had fallen into disrepute in the public schools of his native city, and was being supplanted by methods calculated to make boys and girls think for themselves instead of developing into mere machines. But it is to be feared that up to this time the advantages of living in an enlightened age had been lost upon our hero, if the interest he took in his daily tasks be regarded as evidence. To tell the truth, he had been incorrigibly idle; his thoughts rarely kept themselves fixed for five minutes at a time on any branch of knowledge disassociated with the Frog Pond, Ma’am Horn, Joe Herring, or some one or other of the interesting localities or personages whose acquaintance we have already made. It had always been a moment of supreme happiness to him when the bell sounded, announcing that he was at liberty to pitch his dog’s-eared, pencil-marked books into his desk and to depart for the day, and the hours preceding that welcome summons were too apt to drag heavily unless relieved by oases of mischief. It is no easy task, be the master ever so conscientious, to engage the interest of those boys in a large class who count the school hours in much the same spirit that a prisoner counts the weeks which must elapse before he is free. To one fond of his calling and ambitious to have his pupils shine, the good scholars must inevitably commend themselves, and he is only too likely to let the rag, tag, and bobtail shift for themselves, feeling, doubtless, that time and energy spent in endeavoring to make them fond of their books cannot fail to be wasted. It was to the rag, tag, and bobtail emphatically that Jack had belonged. With three or four other boys, among whom was the ever faithful Dubsy, he had disputed the doubtful distinction of being at the foot of his class, and the monthly reports which he had brought home to his mother were monotonous in their uniform lack of excellence.

It will, therefore, be seen that the good advice, regarding the purpose for which he had been sent to Utopia, delivered by Dr. Meredith on that first evening, was peculiarly adapted to Jack’s needs, and should have sunk deep into his heart. But just as one swallow will not make a summer, a single homily will rarely suffice to change an idle boy into an industrious one. If the truth must be told, there is reason to doubt whether Jack gave that part of the Doctor’s lecture—although it impressed him greatly for a moment, I dare say, and made him inwardly resolve to be very diligent for the future—a second thought after he went away under the wing of Mrs. Betty. And if he neglected to consider the matter further that night, he certainly did not think much about it in the morning, when, having escaped molestation from Jack Spratt and his Wife, he awoke and found himself face to face with, and fairly entranced by, the great school world. No wonder that the master who examined the pair after breakfast, with a view to discovering their acquirements, held up his hands in horror upon making his report to Dr. Meredith, and observed, pathetically, that he was at a loss to decide which of the two had made the worse showing.

“They both seemed bright boys when I saw them last night,” answered the Doctor.

“Oh, they’re bright enough,” said Mr. Percy. “I judge, however, that neither of them has ever been made to study.”

“Then we shall have to begin at first principles,” was the reply.

Accordingly Jack and Haseltine were enrolled in the lowest of the six classes into which the school was divided, but in the first of the two divisions composing the class. As they were not to take their places until the following morning, they were free for the rest of the day to look about them. They were left pretty much to their own devices during the forenoon, for until half an hour before dinner time the whole school was busy with recitations and study. So they improved their opportunities, to begin with, by wandering around the large quadrangle, peering up at the buildings, stepping for a moment into the chapel, where they admired, with bated breath, the carving and the stained-glass windows, and bringing up finally at the gymnasium. Here they spent some time in the inspection of the bars, weights, rowing-machines, and other apparatus, the use of which was explained very kindly by the superintendent, Dr. Bolles, who introduced himself to them, and who, at the close of his instructions, invited them into his private office that he might take their measurements. After they had stripped themselves to the skin, Dr. Bolles—having entered their names, age, and birthplace in a large ledger, a separate page of which was devoted to every boy in the school—proceeded to tap their bodies and to listen to their lungs and hearts, in a very attentive manner. Then he weighed them, ascertained their height, and the number of inches they measured round the chest, forearm, biceps, hips, and calves.

Haseltine, who was the first to go through the ordeal, looked a bit lanky, stripped, and somewhat flat-chested. There was not much flesh on his bones, as was apparent from the manner in which his ribs stuck out.

“You must learn to hold yourself up straight, and not to stoop, Haseltine,” said the superintendent, scrutinizing him critically. “You’ll become round-shouldered if you don’t have a care. You should use the upright bars every day. Appetite good?”

“First rate,” answered Haseltine, looking rather crestfallen at this depreciation of his physique.

“Food runs to muscle, then. No spare flesh here,” he observed, passing his hand over the little fellow’s frame. “Pretty wiry. Sound as a trivet; but those chest-muscles need strengthening; we must build you out. Good arm, very good,” he added, as Haseltine doubled up his biceps with a smile of conscious pride. “Base-ball, I suppose; yes, out of all proportion to the left; I thought so. Ever been examined before?” Haseltine shook his head. “I suppose not. You’ve come here just in time. We’ll make a man of you yet. Now Hall.”

Jack was all of a tremble. In the first place, the stethoscope business was rather alarming and suggested all sorts of possibilities in the way of broken wind and heart-disease, and then he did not relish at all being picked to pieces before Haseltine. He wondered whether he looked equally scraggy, and derived his first ray of consolation from the complimentary expression of Dr. Bolles’ eye, as the superintendent (after taking several measurements in silence) stood off and surveyed him with evident complacency.

“Ah, Carlisle, good morning,” Dr. Bolles exclaimed to a delicate appearing boy who had just entered the office. “There’s a good all round fellow for you to model yourself on. No dyspepsia in him. He doesn’t know what nerves mean. If you don’t grow up into a healthy, well-formed man,” he continued to Jack, “it’ll be your own fault. You’ve got a good start; you can’t be a Hercules, there’s not enough of you for that, but you’re cut out for health if you take care of yourself. You’ve been looked after at home, evidently. That’s all.”

Jack put on his clothes again, feeling proud as a peacock, and entirely reconciled to the fact that Haseltine’s biceps was bigger than his own. The boy addressed as Carlisle, who was sauntering about in the office quite at his ease, gave Jack and Haseltine a critical glance from his handsome dark eyes, and then examined for a few moments the doctor’s entries in the ledger regarding them. He was a striking-looking lad, with an intelligent and at the same time attractive expression, and though he was slight and evidently far from robust, there was nothing effeminate either in his appearance or manner.

“How are you, to-day?” Dr. Bolles inquired of him.

“Oh, I’m better; I feel like a fighting-cock,” was the reply.

“You look better. But now, my dear boy, pray give yourself a chance. You can’t do everything,—be a ball-player, good oar, crack sprinter, and the head of your class, all at the same time, with your present physique, and keep well. Hall and Haseltine,” the superintendent added, “let me make you acquainted with Louis Carlisle, our champion short-distance runner, and poet laureate. He has been in the infirmary for the past fortnight because he wouldn’t take care of himself. I dare say that if you two boys are so inclined, he will stroll with you up to the lake to show you the boat-houses and enlighten you a little as to how we live at Utopia.”

“I shall be very glad, I’m sure,” answered Carlisle politely. “The walk will do me good.”

He was half a head taller than either Jack or Haseltine, and evidently two years their senior. In a tone not unduly patronizing he proceeded to make a running commentary on what they saw, as they accompanied him a few minutes later on the projected tour of investigation.

“What dormitory are you in?” he inquired at the start.

“Fullham,” said Jack.

“That’s mine, too. I’m to go back in a day or two. It’s dreadfully lonely in the infirmary when no one else is sick. I caught cold after winning the hundred-yard dash, and Dr. Bolles says I was threatened with typhoid. There’s the infirmary,” he added, pointing to a good-sized cottage in the field behind Granger Hall. “You can just see it. Every one who is sick is sent there. A year ago there were eighteen cases of measles at the same time. Can either of you leg it any?” he inquired, eying them each in turn with a scientific air.

“I used to run pretty fast at prisoner’s base,” said Jack.

“I’ve practiced stealing second a good deal,” replied Haseltine.

“There’s the track,” continued Carlisle, indicating the flagged half-mile course which surrounded the foot-ball field. “Like to see it near to?”

The boys assented and followed their guide over the terrace for a few yards, until they came to a kind of stand not unlike a witness-box, to which they ascended. “Here’s where the judges sit and where we finish,” he said. “We have athletic sports, that is, running and jumping, and all that sort of thing, twice a year, once in the spring and once in the autumn. The spring meeting comes off in about a month. The hundred-yard dash, which I won, was an extra match got up by the backers of Coleman, Junior. His brother, Coleman, Senior, who went to Harvard last year, was champion of the school for three years, and he is trying to follow in his brother’s footsteps.”

“Were you ever licked?” asked Jack, looking up in the crack runner’s face with respectful admiration.

“Oh yes, often. Coleman, Senior, licked me right along until the last time, when I beat the school record. I dare say Jessup’ll make it warm for me before long. He’s only in the fifth, but I’d almost back him to-day against Coleman, Junior. Are you both in the sixth?”

The boys nodded.

“I’m in the third; quite a patriarch, you see. There’s no reason why both of you shouldn’t make good sprinters if you give your minds to it.”

This prophecy sounded agreeable to Jack and Haseltine as they trotted along, one on either side of him, on their way to the lake, passing out of the quadrangle through the same arched portal by which they had entered it the night before, and so over the base-ball practice field to the main road, from which Carlisle presently diverged to take a cut across the meadows. He explained to them, among other things, that every one had to be inside the quadrangle at the close of the curfew, as the supper-bell at half-past six was called, on pain of an interview with Dr. Meredith.

“Are you on the nine?” inquired Haseltine, who had been burning to ask the question.

“Not on the school nine. I was on the dormitory nine, but I’ve decided not to play this year. I’m trying not to spread my butter too thin, as Dr. Bolles calls it. He thinks I do too many things,” he added by way of explanation. “You know each of the dormitories has its separate nine and foot-ball team, and there’s great rivalry between them. Fullham beat Dudley the first match of the season last Saturday, and plays Rogers this afternoon.”

This announcement was very interesting. Before they reached the lake, Carlisle had also informed them that there was a cricket eleven, a weekly newspaper called “The Utopian,” of which he was one of the editors, a glee club, and four eight-oared crews,—the Atalantas, Orions, Nimrods, and Mohicans. “There are, besides, ten single-scull shells and several pair oars,” he said, leading the way into one of the two tastefully built boat-houses, perched side by side on the bank of the broad lake, each with a covered piazza in front.

The main space in the centre, as they entered, was filled by the eight-oared racing-boats, the sight of which lying side by side delighted and almost awed Jack, who had never examined anything of the sort, and who straightway made the resolution that, no matter what else he did or did not do at Utopia, he would go in for rowing. He had often heard his mother tell that his father had been a famous oar in his day, and he himself was entirely at home in a dory, and able, in his own opinion, already to scull nearly if not quite as well as the fishermen at Nahant and Swampscott, whose companion he was wont to be in the summer time on their expeditions after cod and haddock. He had often wished to look at a paper shell near to, and now his ambition was gratified. There were rests on each side of the building, reaching nearly to the ceiling, along which the small boats were arranged in tiers, and in one corner was a snug little room hung with flags, and photographs of winning crews and crack oarsmen, and furnished with a round table and chairs, where, Carlisle said, the meetings of the club were held. In the adjoining boat-house were more boats, including an eight-oared barge, of which, as Carlisle told them, Mrs. Meredith was the coxswain whenever she was willing to go out on the lake.

“It’s great fun here a little later in the season,” observed their guide as they sat down to rest on the piazza after everything had been inspected. “On a pleasant, still afternoon there are sometimes more than twenty boats out, of one kind and another.”

“Who’s the fastest rower?” asked Jack.

“The Doctor is the crack single sculler.”

“The Doctor? Does he row?”

“Oh, yes, indeed. He came pretty near being beaten, though, last year. Whitehead crawled up on him so that there wasn’t more than half a length between them at the finish. You never saw such excitement.”

“Wasn’t he mad?” inquired Jack, to whom the idea of a master being beaten by one of his scholars seemed most extraordinary.

“Who, the Doctor? Not a bit of it; he’s a true sport,” said Carlisle. “There was no one more pleased than he at being forced to pull for all he was worth.”

Further inquiry revealed that the Atalantas were for the time being the champion of the eight-oared crews; and after a score more questions, which Carlisle answered most good-naturedly, the boys retraced their footsteps so as to get back in time for dinner. Seeing that their mentor was so well disposed, Jack took occasion on the way to impart a little of what Horace Hosmer had dropped regarding Jack Spratt and his Wife, which Carlisle listened to at first with no other comment than an occasional sidelong glance, which struck them as far from reassuring. Once Carlisle started to speak, but some impediment in his throat checking him, he seemed to change his mind, until Haseltine’s remark that they were fortunate in being in a different dormitory from the formidable pair drew out the laconic observation, “That won’t help you much.”

“Why?” asked Jack.

“Those fellows are all over the lot,” was the answer. “They’d think nothing of snaking a new boy out of bed in the small hours of the morning, no matter where he was.”

“But I wonder the Doctor allows it,” said Haseltine, hoping for a more satisfactory response to this exclamation than it had elicited from Horace.

“Who’s to tell him?” cried Carlisle sternly, looking straight at the offender. “You boys may count on one thing, and that is that tale-bearing doesn’t go down at Utopia. Any fellow who told tales here would be hustled out of the school, and the Doctor’d be the first to avoid him.”

The decision with which these words were spoken caused Jack and Haseltine to hang their heads guiltily, and presumably to reflect that the couplet—

formed a no less important part of the code of youth than of childhood.

“It’s hard on new boys, I admit,” continued Carlisle, after a moment, in a contemplative tone, “and if those fellows keep on in their cruel ways they’ll kill somebody next.”

“Horace Hosmer told us they did kill two boys last term,” said Jack, in a stage whisper.

“Yes,” exclaimed Haseltine; “it was reported to be chicken-pox, but he says he helped to lay them out after they were dead, and they were a mass of bruises from the crown of the head to the soles of the feet.”

Carlisle looked very grave and nodded his head with an ominous air. “I didn’t suppose Horace knew about it,” he said; “it was kept very dark.”

“Then you knew of it?” asked Jack.

“Bless you, yes. It ought to have taught Tobey and Donaldson a lesson,” Carlisle added gloomily, “but it didn’t. They’re just as bad as ever, this term.”

“What is the best thing to do if—if they should ever happen to fix on us?” asked Jack presently, with a slight gulp.

Carlisle whistled reflectively. “I’ll be doggoned if I know,” he replied at last. “I’d keep a stiff upper lip, if I were you, and be as sandy as you can. They’ll let you off easily, perhaps, if they see you’ve got grit; but if you funk, I wouldn’t give much for your chances of getting through with a whole skin. I’ll say a good word for you in advance. It may save you a broken leg or arm.”

After the delivery of this speech, Carlisle indulged in a short, hysterical laugh, which seemed to his listeners quite out of keeping with their own feelings. But it was evidently a mere spasmodic expression of sympathy, for his countenance immediately regained the expression of deep gloom which it had worn ever since the subject of Spratt and his Wife had been introduced.

“Thank you very much indeed,” answered each of the boys in turn.

“Not at all—not at all. I fear that my words cannot avail you much,” he responded.

They were now within school bounds again, and there was only just time to go to their rooms before dinner. Carlisle, in keeping with his previous kindness, announced that as it might be advisable to say what he had to say to Tobey and Donaldson at once, he would take his dinner with the school. Accordingly, assuring the boys that he felt well enough for this exertion, he started off at a lively jog for the infirmary so as to be on hand.

Jack and Haseltine had been given provisional seats at breakfast, but Mrs. Betty, who presided over the younger boys, now assigned them to places not far from one another at her own table. It was an impressive moment, and one could have heard a pin drop while the Doctor asked a blessing in his clear, manly tones on the repast spread for his two hundred hungry pupils, who stood behind their chairs in long lines up and down the big hall waiting for the signal to fall to, which they did with a vengeance you may be sure, when they got it. Dr. Meredith and his wife, the married masters, and a few of the prefects occupied a table on a platform at one end of the room at right angles with the others and overlooking them all. There was a master at the end of each, who did the carving and kept good order.

The dinner was simple but extremely good. A clear, honest soup well flavored with vegetables; ribs of roast beef carefully basted and neither done to death nor so distressingly blue as some cooks are capable of sending it up from the kitchen; potatoes, tomatoes, macaroni, light bread, sweet butter, and for dessert a cup of baked custard invitingly served. Everything was clean and neat, thanks to the vigilant eye of Mrs. Betty and her assistants, and thanks, first of all, to the founders of Utopia, who laid it down as one of the principles of the school that so everything must be. No extravagance, no rich dishes, no wine or beer, but plenty of blood-making, sinew-strengthening, bone-building food, fresh, appetizing, and unspoiled.

I have seen school tables, and between you and me private tables also, at which such a dinner as that just described was made thoroughly unpalatable by the manner in which it was prepared; where the soup was a thin, unseasoned, straw-colored fluid, the beef ruined by one of the extremes of cooking already referred to, the vegetables greasy, the bread clammy, the butter rancid, and the cup of custard pale and watery. There are persons who do not think such matters worth considering, who believe that any time devoted to making our daily repasts savory is misspent, and that young people, boys in particular, should eat what is set before them without asking questions, thankful that there is anything to eat at all.

It is easy to perceive that such doctrines are thoroughly pernicious and unsound, if you reflect that our capabilities as men and women are chiefly dependent on what our bodies permit us to be, and that the component parts of these bodies are determined in the main by the food we eat, the air we breathe, the clothing we wear, and the sleep we get. There is no greater mistake in the world than to disregard the laws of health under the plea that they are not worthy of notice; and if they are thus important for those of us who are grown up to bear in mind as essential to human wellbeing, how much more vital is it that the young should be given every opportunity to fit themselves physically for the battle of life. Bear this in mind, boys, and when you are served with slovenly, unwholesome cookery, protest with all your might. Do not be ashamed to know and recognize good things to eat. The temperate enjoyment of the pleasures of the table is a legitimate and important element of happiness.

Meanwhile our young friend, Jack Hall, has been enjoying his dinner mightily, though it is no better, in truth, than what he has been accustomed to at home, which is not surprising if we recall the double devotion of his mother and the faithful Hannah, whose hearts are doubtless pretty sore at this time. When his hunger is somewhat appeased he ventures to gaze about him a little, exchanging a few shy words with the boys near him, all of whom seem friendly and willing to receive him as a companion. He makes the acquaintance of Buck on one side of him, Horton on the other, and Travers, Bailey, and Cunningham across the table. Horton, who is a plump, talkative little chap of his own size, points out to him the various school celebrities, including Ramsay, Bedloe, and Goldthwaite of the nine; Burbank, the stalwart, bearded captain of the fifteen; and little, active-looking Bobby Crosby, who, as Jack knows, is expected to take Burbank’s place next year; Hazelhurst, the stroke of the Atalantas and champion oar of the school (always excepting the invincible Doctor) now that Whitehead has graduated; and Carlisle, who nods across the room in a friendly manner from his seat with the big second-class boys, so that Horton asks with interest, “Do you know him?”

“I was introduced to him this morning at the gymnasium,” replies Jack. “He showed Haseltine and me to the boat-houses.”

“He’s the smartest boy at Utopia,—first rate at games, head of his class, and champion sprinter. There’s Coleman, Junior, sitting with the third next to Jumbo,—his real name’s Blair, but every one calls him Jumbo because he’s so fat,—he can run pretty fast, and it’s neck and neck between him and Jessup, that boy on the right of Mr. Sawyer, but neither of them can catch Carlisle. You ought to hear Jumbo sing; he’s the best tenor we’ve got.”

Most of this information is not new to Jack, but he is glad to hear the heroes catalogued again at a time when he can take a good peep at them. He feels proud of his acquaintance with Carlisle, and glances from time to time in that direction, for he has not forgotten his senior’s promise to speak a good word for him.

“I wonder what’s up at the second form table,” says Horton presently. “Some one or other keeps turning round and laughing. There must be a gag on you,” he adds, turning to Jack, who has already noticed this tendency on the part of the boys in the vicinity of his benefactor. “Have you done anything fresh?”

“Not that I know of,” answers poor Jack, who is feeling far from comfortable.

The dessert is finished, and in another minute dinner will be over. All of a sudden Carlisle gets up, and after saying a word to the master at the head of the table, crosses to one of those occupied by the fourth class, and stoops to speak to two boys sitting side by side, whom Jack recognizes instantly as Tobey and Donaldson, the redoubtable Spratt and Wife. He has not perceived them before, though he has been on the lookout for them, and now that he takes a glance at them they do not strike him as very terrible in appearance. They are good-natured looking enough, but appearances are deceitful in this world, as Jack very well knows, and he quails as he observes the gaze of the trio rest on him and Haseltine alternately. Carlisle’s eyes sparkle as he talks, and he keeps his hand to his mouth so that Jack cannot judge much by its expression. Spratt and Wifey listen for a moment or two in judicial silence, then a broad, convulsive smile, which suggests, at least to Jack, the hilarity of a hyena, overspreads the features of each, only to be succeeded by a look of glowing fierceness, which seems to the unhappy lads—for Haseltine is no less conscious of it than Jack—to argue ill for the future. While they are still beneath its spell the school rises from table, and the two boys are swept along to the terrace, where Carlisle presently joins them, but only to draw them aside and whisper the ominous tidings, “I’ve done my best for you, but they think you look too cocky,” an announcement which makes them both feel very miserable.

Just then a big boy, bat in hand, and wearing a large F embroidered on the bosom of his shirt, accosted their mentor with the eager inquiry,—“Won’t you help us out, Carlisle? Dobson has a game knee and can’t possibly play.”

“Wish I could, Chalmers, but I’ve promised Dr. Bolles to let up on base-ball for the rest of the term. I’m only just out of the infirmary.”

“Yes, I know; but it’s mighty tough lines on us to have so many of our best men knocked up. Potts had word this morning that his mother is sick and started for home before dinner, and Plummer bust his finger against the Stars yesterday.”

“What’s the matter with Cochrane?”

“Oh, Cochrane’s no good. He’ll fan himself out every time, cock sure, on Bedloe’s pitching. We’re hard up for third base, and Cochrane’s useless except in the field. They’ve got their strongest team,” said Chalmers impatiently.

“What is it?” whispered Haseltine to Carlisle.

“Fullham against Rogers.”

“I can play third base,” continued Haseltine, to Jack’s infinite astonishment.

Carlisle laughed gayly. “Here’s your chance, Chalmers,” he said. “This new Fullhamite says he’s an artist.”

“What’s your name?” asked Chalmers, scanning Haseltine from top to toe.

“Frank Haseltine.”

“Have you played much?”

“I’ve played third base on the St. Louis Rising Suns for two years.”

“Are you in practice?”

“First rate.”

There was an assurance about the applicant that evidently impressed Chalmers. “Would you try him?” he asked Carlisle.

“He talks well.”

“Talk is cheap,” growled Chalmers. “Well, be on hand, then,” he said to Haseltine. “Get into your togs as soon as you can. The game’ll be called in fifteen minutes.”

Haseltine looked radiant with delight as the large boy strode away. “Do you think he’ll let me play?” he inquired beseechingly of Carlisle.

“I guess so; he’s captain of the Fullham nine. It’s a big chance for you, youngster, to show what you’re made of. Now run along and get ready.”

Jack felt rather envious, but not so much so as not to be thoroughly glad of his friend’s good fortune. Indeed, as he sat by while Haseltine got into his flannels, he was very well pleased to think that he was not going to play himself. It was pretty evident from the way Haseltine had spoken of the Rising Suns the day before, that they were a much superior nine to the Massasoits, of which club Jack knew that he had by no means been the strongest player, a conviction which helped to reconcile him to being left out.