noticeable how that vast crowd began to stir, and show
signs of increased interest when the numerous trim runners entered
for the big Marathon started to gather for the preliminary stage of
the race.

Each of the many contestants had a large number fastened upon both
the front and back of his thin upper garment. By these they might be
recognized even at a distance; and many persons carried field or
opera glasses of various types just on purpose to make out who each
runner was when he came in sight around the bend half a mile away, to
open on that last stretch that was likely to see the cruelest work of
all, if the competition chanced to be keen.

The boys, as a rule, looked very much like lithe grayhounds, for your
natural runner is light of body, and can course along like the wind.
Still, this applies more to short-distance sprinters than those whose
specialty is endurance in a fifteen- or twenty-mile race.

Several of the fellows were quite muscular in build, and gave
evidence of a grim determination such as the bulldog possesses.
These chaps might be easily distanced in the start, but they would
keep doggedly on, under the spur of the knowledge contained in that
old adage that "the race is not always to the swift."

Hugh Morgan was, perhaps, the best built of them all, neither too
heavy, nor yet betraying a weakness that would crop out after the
first five miles had been covered, as might be the case with the more
slender fellows.

They stood in line, listening to the last words of caution delivered
by Mr. Hitchens, a former Yale man who had umpired the baseball games
the preceding summer in such an impartial manner that everyone had
the utmost reliance on his fairness.

He explained to them the simple conditions of the race,--how there
must be no fouling of any kind; just how often and where the
contestants must register their names in books kept by judges on the
course; how each was supposed to give his word of honor not to accept
any sort of lift for even a dozen feet; and that the great crowd
assembled would be waiting to acclaim the first-comer as the victor
in the greatest long-distance race ever attempted by high-school
boys, at least in that particular county.

They were allowed a certain latitude as to their methods of running.
If any of them could cut across lots, and still cover the entire
course, as well as register faithfully wherever required, that was to
be their option.

Having finished hi