y to see the game."

"Why, we can see the game better," retorted Dave, "if we don't make
the team."

"Why, are midshipmen who don't belong to the eleven allowed to see the
game?" asked Belle in some surprise.

"Are we?" demanded Dave. "Belle, don't you know what the Army-Navy game
on the Saturday after Thanksgiving Day is like? The entire brigade of
midshipmen and the whole corps of cadets travel over to Philadelphia.
There, on Franklin Field, before an average of thirty thousand yelling
spectators, the great annual game of the two great national academies is
fought out."

"You haven't gone to see the annual game at Philadelphia before this,
have you?" asked Miss Meade.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because, Belle, both years, at Thanksgiving time, Danny boy and I have
found ourselves so far behind in our studies that we just took the time
to stay behind and bone, bone, bone over our books."

"And you think this year will be different?"

"Oh, yes; when a man is half way through Annapolis the studies become
easier to him. You see, in two years of the awful grind a fellow, if he
lasts that long, has learned how to study in the right way. I'm going to
get two tickets, Belle, so that you and your mother can go to see the
game. And of course good old Dick can do as much for Laura Bentley and
her mother. You'll come, of course, to root your hardest for the Navy,
just as Laura will go and root for the Army. By the way, have you heard
whether Dick and Greg expect to play on the Army eleven?"

"When they were here this summer they said they hoped to play
football with the Army. That's all I know, Dave, about the plans of
Dick and Greg."

"I hope they do play," cried Midshipman Darrin cheerily. "Even with two
such old gridiron war horses as Dick and Greg against us, I believe that
the Navy team, this year, has some fellows who can take the Army scalp
with neatness and despatch."

Dave rambled on, for some time now, with of the athletic doings at the
Naval Academy. It was not that he was so much interested in the
subject--at that particular moment--but it was certainly fine to have
Belle Meade for an interested listener.

"Well, you're half way through your course," put in Belle at last. "You
passed your last annual examinations in June."

"Yes."

"How did you stand in your exams?"

"I came through with honors," Dave declared unblushingly.

"Honors?" repeated Belle delightedly. "Oh, Dave, I didn't know you were
one