; we
told him it was against the rules for strangers to go on the campus in
the morning; we told him it was dangerous to go out-of-doors because of
the Alfalfa Delta, who were suspected of being cannibals; we told him
forty thousand things, most of which contradicted each other. If it
hadn't been for the boys who kindly started a fight whenever his
reverence had tangled Bangs and me up hopelessly on some question we
couldn't have survived the inquisition. As it was, I perspired about a
barrel and my brain ached for a week.

We went to lunch and put on another exhibition of free-hand feeding,
getting more grumpy and disgusted every minute. We were all ready to
yell for mercy and put on our civilized clothes when we heard a terrific
riot from outside. Then Petey came in.

If there ever was a sure-enough Wild Westerner it was Petey that
afternoon. He had on the whole works--two-acre hat, red woolen shirt,
spurs, and even chaps--nice hairy ones. I discovered next day that he
had swiped my fine bearskin rug and cut it up to make them. In his belt
he had a revolver which couldn't have been less than two feet long.
Petey was a little fellow, with one of those nineteen-sizes-too-large
voices, and when he turned the full organ on you would have thought old
Mount Vesuvius had wakened up and rumbled into the room.

"Howdy, Reverend," he thundered. "We jest come along to take you on a
little ride over to college. Got a nice gentle cow-pony out here. She
bucks as easy as a rockin'-horse. Don't mind about your clothes. Just
hop right on. The boys is some anxious to get along, it being most
classtime."

We followed the two of them out to the back yard. There were seven Rep
Rho Betas on seven moth-eaten ponies which they had dug up from goodness
knows where. The rigs they had on represented each fellow's idea of what
a cowboy looked like, and would have made a real cowpuncher hang himself
for shame. Petey confessed afterward that, of all the Rep Rho Betas,
only seven had ever been on a horse, and, of these, three kept him in
agony for fear they would fall off and compel him to explain that they
were on the verge of delirium tremens. They were a weird-looking bunch,
but, gee! they were fierce. Pirates would have been kittens beside them.

[Illustration: We spent another five minutes hoisting him aboard a
prehistoric plug
_Page 125_]

I guess the Reverend Pubby had never done much in the Centaur line, for
he c