sy if we're to have a ghost of
a show to win this fall."

"What's the seat of the trouble?" asked Ames. "Are they shirking? Are
they too light? Many accidents? Come, get it off your chest. Tell us the
sad story of your life."

"It wasn't so sad until lately," grinned "Bull," "and up to a week ago I
didn't feel the necessity of weeping on any one's shoulder. In fact, I
was beginning to think that the team was the real goods. They walked all
over the Army, and what they did to Dartmouth was a sin and a shame.
Then somebody must have wished a hoodoo on us and things began to
happen."

And he narrated in detail the unexpected way in which three of his best
men had been whisked off the team, and the results that followed.

"The fellows simply got in the doldrums," he went on, "and, with a few
exceptions, have played like a lot of schoolboys. They seem to have
forgotten all that they ever knew. Now you fellows know as well as I do
that when a team slumps in that fashion there's only one thing to do.
We've got to have new blood, new faces, new tactics. That's the reason I
sent for you fellows. The boys know you by reputation. They've heard of
the big things you did when in college, they look up to you as
heroes----"

"Spare our blushes!" exclaimed Hadley.

"And it will give them a new inspiration," went on the coach, not
heeding the interruption. "They'll forget their troubles and play like
fiends to justify your good opinion, and to show you that the honor of
the old college is safe in their hands. I want you to teach them all you
ever knew, and then some.

"I'm not asking you to make bricks without straw," he continued. "The
stuff is there for a crackerjack team. We're a bit short on beef, and
I'd like to have an average of five pounds more in the line. But I've
got the finest back field in the country, bar none. Wilson at full is
simply chain lightning, and the whole country will be talking of him by
November. Axtell is one of the most savage tacklers I've ever seen, and
if he can only get his conditions worked off soon, we won't have to
worry about right half. Morley, the man I put in his place, is a dandy,
but doesn't come up to Axtell. Henderson at quarter is as quick as a cat
and as cunning as a fox. Trent at center and Drake at right end are as
good as they make 'em. Those fellows I've named are stars. The rest are
good, but I've seen as good and better on many a Blue team.

"Now that's the way I size them up