The Yale quarter drove another forward pass to Armstrong who caught it cleanly and was off like the wind.—[Page 279]

FRANK ARMSTRONG
AT COLLEGE

By MATTHEW M. COLTON

Author of

"Frank Armstrong's Vacation," "Frank Armstrong
at Queens," "Frank Armstrong's Second Term,"
"Frank Armstrong, Captain of the Nine,"
"Frank Armstrong, Drop Kicker."

A. L. BURT COMPANY

Publishers New York

Printed in U. S. A.

Copyright, 1914,
BY
HURST & COMPANY

MADE IN U. S. A.

[CONTENTS]

CHAPTER PAGE
I.The Freshman Rush [5]
II.A Brush with the Police [18]
III.The Codfish Creates News [35]
IV.Making the Eleven [49]
V.Frank Learns to Tackle the Dummy [65]
VI.The Great Freshman Battle [79]
VII.A Wreck at the Harbor [95]
VIII.Fun at the Theater [110]
IX.A Jump in Baseball and the Result [124]
X.The Try-outs at Cambridge [138]
XI.A Voyage to London [149]
XII.The Codfish Loses Himself [170]
XIII.The Flying Machine to the Rescue [187]
XIV.Progress and a Wreck [201]
XV.The Match at Queen's Club [212]
XVI.Making the 'Varsity Nine [229]
XVII.The Southern Trip [241]
XVIII.Football in Junior Year [258]
XIX.The Harvard-Yale Game [273]
XX.How All Things Came Out at Last [283]

Frank Armstrong at College.

CHAPTER I. THE FRESHMAN RUSH.

It was the evening of a day in late September and a noticeable chill in the air hinted at the near approach of fall. Through the whole of that day and for several days previous to the opening of our story, incoming trains had deposited their burden of enthusiastic young humanity in the old town of New Haven.

From mountain, shore, city, town and country came the throng of students like an army of youth, to take up the work of the college year at Yale, which opened her doors to them on the morrow. Men from all classes were in that motley throng which surged and billowed around the corner of College and Chapel streets, for this night was the night of "the rush," which tradition says shall be the first event of the college year. There were Seniors, in their new-found dignity of seniority; Juniors, nearer by a year to the coveted goal of a degree; Sophomores, who by the passage of time coupled with an adequate stand escaped from the ignominious position of the youngest class, and last, but not least, the Freshmen who, to-night, began their existence as a class. But the Freshmen kept themselves aloof from the upper class-men, perhaps for reasons of offense and defense for they were to be tried out later on, and did not want to be found lacking.

Bronzed giants whose bulk proclaimed them to be at least "football material" shouldered their way through the crowd and the air was filled with the chatter and hum of many voices. Greetings between men who had been separated for the summer were heard on every side.

"Hello, Dick. Mighty glad to see you!"

"Glad to see you again. It's great to be back, eh?" and the speakers, with a hearty hand-grip would pass on and repeat the formulæ with little variation, to other friends.

Suddenly the blare of a brass band cut through the chatter. Marshals sprang to the work of getting the parade in order, for a parade always precedes and has come to be part of "the rush." These men, conspicuous by their long-handled kerosene torches and the 'Varsity Y emblazoned on sweaters (for only men who have won the coveted letter are eligible for the position of marshals,) began to separate the groups.

"Seniors, this way!" was the shout.

"Juniors, this way!"

"Sophomores, this way!" And, quickly following the command, the various groups, in the order named, dropped into line and, led by the marshals with torches swinging, went dancing down Chapel street to the compelling melody of a popular college marching song.

"Freshmen, this way!" And to the shout, which was caught up and echoed up and down the line, the new-comers to the halls of Yale dropped in behind the Sophomores, feeling themselves, for the first time, a class instead of merely a huddled group without a bond of any kind. Dancing as merrily as their predecessors to the strains of the band, the Freshmen went swinging down the street imitating to the best of their ability the zigzag sweep of their elders. Hands of strangers touched for the first time and arms were thrown over strange shoulders and the feeling was good.

In the middle of that swaying mass of Freshmen it does not take long to discover our three friends, Frank Armstrong, Jimmy Turner and last but not least the irrepressible Codfish, clad immaculately as usual. To-night he wore a delicate gray Norfolk suit with a vivid blue tie and socks to match, a tribute to the colors of the college he had adopted.

"You are a brave one to appear in that Paris model," laughed Frank, who had arrayed himself in the oldest clothes he could find in anticipation of rough times before the evening was over.

"Merely trying to uphold the reputation of the class and inject a little beauty into the occasion," returned the Codfish. "Look at our friend James. He has the ear-marks of a hobo!"

Jimmy was far from being a beauty, it is true.

"Safe and sane, sonny. Safe because the attentive Sophomores won't take a second look at me and sane because I need my good ones when I go calling," retorted Jimmy.

"I think this Sophomore scare is pure bunkum," the Codfish suggested. "A fellow told me to-night that hazing at Yale has been given up. Someone was hurt a while ago in the merry pranks and the Faculty stopped it, eh?"

He wasn't quite certain about it, and wanted verification.

"You're safe," said Jimmy, "they never trouble the lady members of a class. Hello, what's the matter?" he went on as the parade came to a sudden halt at the corner of Church and Chapel streets.

"Scrap, I guess," said Frank. "Bunch of town fellows trying to muss up the leaders. Always do that, they say. There they go across the street, and here we go!" as the band, which had stopped for a moment while a gang of young rowdies tried to cut the line of parade and were worsted in the attempt, began again and the merry zigzag went on.

Around the central Green or square of the city tramped the jolly hundreds, occasionally giving voice to the chorus of a song the band was playing or a cheer in which the Freshmen joined as well as they were able, but in spite of their desire to be real Yale men, stumbling badly on the nine "Yales" at the end.

Up Elm street, lined with hundreds of townsfolk glad to see the college once again in full swing, their faces lit up by the red fire and Roman candles in the hands of the marchers, swung the leaders. At High street the procession turned and entered the Campus. The gang of town boys and young men which had trailed the procession tried to force themselves into line, but were summarily thrown out, and without further molestation the marchers circled the Campus or college yard, and, opposite the Library, finally halted at a spot of green sward previously selected for the wrestling.

The instant the leaders stopped there was a grand rush of the hundreds behind to gain a vantage point, and in a second the little circle the leaders had formed was squeezed together like paper.

"Get back, get back," yelled the torch bearers, and emphasized their commands by pushing the lighted torches under the noses of those composing the living wall. Of course, there was only one thing to do and that was to go back with all haste. Pushing the ever-widening circle of spectators back with threatening fury, the marshals made a circle of sufficient capacity to carry on the wrestling bouts, which were the climax of "the rush."

"Down!" howled the chief marshal, at which the front rank of that squeezed and straining wall squatted on the ground, but so great was the pressure of the hundreds behind that a score of the second row were shot clear over the heads of the first row and into the ring.

"Out with the intruders," yelled a marshal, and the unfortunates were seized and thrown bodily into outer darkness over the heads of the first rows and were lost to view in the ruck.

"Now I know why it is a good thing to put on your old duds," Frank gasped to Turner as they bored their way toward the center of activity. Our three friends had left the ranks of their class with many others when the head of the parade reached the Campus, and dashed over to a point where they were told the wrestling usually took place, on a chance that it would be in that spot this time.

Their guess was right and for a moment they were actually within the coveted circle, but when the marshals made their onslaught on the crowd in order to expand the ring they were whirled into outer ranks and had only, after a desperate effort and "under a pressure of a hundred pounds to the square inch" as Turner expressed it, succeeded in digging their way back to the third or fourth tier in that circle of human faces. They were more fortunate than the hundreds who prowled around outside without a chance of a glimpse at the wrestling.

"We've lost the Codfish," exclaimed Frank. "Oh, Gleason," he called, but there was no answering voice.

"Lost in the shuffle," said Turner. "He was with us a minute ago but he'll turn up. He won't miss any tricks, don't you forget it."

"He isn't much for this kind of a scramble game," returned Frank. "I thought he was holding back a bit when we struck in this last time, but——"

"Sophomores, bring out your candidates," roared a big man who wore the football Y on his blue sweater.

"Who is that whale of a man?" asked Frank.

"That's Howard, the football captain," volunteered a boy just in front of them, who had overheard the question. The speaker held a notebook in his hand and they afterward learned he was a news-heeler getting a story for the News, the official college paper.

"Freshmen?" inquired the heeler, looking our friends over.

Frank nodded.

"That fellow, yelling for a Freshman lightweight candidate, is the crew captain," went on the heeler; "and over there to his left is Dunnelly, the chap who kicked the goal against Princeton last year and saved us the game." The heeler pointed out the celebrities as they prowled around the ring, calling loudly for wrestling champions.

"You see," explained the heeler, "there are wrestling bouts in the three weights,—light, middle and heavy, between the Sophomore and Freshmen for the class championship. Three bouts in each event."

"O, you Freshmen, show your sand, trot out a candidate!" bawled one of the men within the ring. The crowd outside clamored for candidates from the Freshmen.

"We want a Sophomore lightweight!" roared another, and the crowd took up the cry and repeated it. "Sophomore lightweight, Freshman lightweight, don't be quitters, come across with the champions!"

"Sophomore lightweight, Sophomore lightweight!"

"Freshman lightweight!"

"Don't be quitters!"

"Show your sand, Freshmen!"

Suddenly there was a commotion on one side of the ring, and amid yells and the shaking of torches, the living wall opened and a slender, blond-haired youth stepped into the ring.

"Who is he?"

"What's his name?"

"Sophomore or Freshman?"

"Sophomore," said the boy.

"Your name," demanded a marshal.

"Ballard."

"Your weight?"

"One twenty-nine, stripped."

"You'll do."

Immediately two Juniors volunteered to second him, and fell to work stripping him to the waist, the traditional custom for the friendly combat.

Meanwhile the calling for a Freshman lightweight went on without success, and the crowd was throwing red-hot taunts at the youngest class for shirking their duty. The Freshmen had pushed one of their number into the ring, but he proved to be over the required weight and was cast out without ceremony.

A commotion on the outside of the ring started anew the calls for a Freshman lightweight, and the call was unexpectedly answered by the appearance of a young man in delicate light gray clothes with blue necktie and socks to match, who was passed unceremoniously over the hands of the crowd and deposited right-side-up on the green grass of the enclosure.

Jimmy gasped. "The Codfish, or I'm a Hottentot!"

"No one else, for sure. How did they get him?" exclaimed Frank.

The Codfish was greeted by a rattling cheer, followed by much advice.

"Well done, Freshman!"

"Take off those pretty clothes!"

"He certainly is a Yale man, look at that tie!"

"Good work, Freshman, eat him up!"

The referee, the Captain of the Yale Wrestling Team, strode over to the Codfish, and looked him up and down.

"You are not a very promising specimen," he said. "Ever wrestle before?"

"Never," said Gleason. "All I know about wrestling wouldn't hurt anyone."

"What's your name and weight?"

"Gleason, and I weigh one twenty-five."

"Stripped or with those clothes on?"

"Clothes and all," said the Codfish with a grin, and his eyes wandering around the sea of faces, chanced to light on his two friends, Armstrong and Turner. He waved an airy salute to them, and began with his seconds, two Seniors, to divest himself of his coat, shirt and undershirt.

"He really means to wrestle," gasped Frank. "Can you beat it?"

"He certainly has his nerve with him," returned Jimmy.

"His middle name is nerve."

The preliminaries over, Ballard and the Codfish faced each other in the flickering light of the torches, shook hands, and at the shrill scream of the referee's whistle, rushed at each other. Neither was versed in the art of wrestling, but both were about the same size. Down they went on the ground, Gleason underneath, the Sophomore struggling to pin the shoulders of the Freshman to the ground, which meant victory. But just at the moment when things looked bad for the under-dog, he slipped out of the hold, squirmed free and threw himself with all his force against the Sophomore, bearing him over sideways. The assault was so sudden that Ballard was taken unawares, and before he could gather himself, Gleason sprang on the prostrate boy and shoved his shoulder points on the grass. A resounding slap on the back by the referee testified to the success of the attack, and it was the Freshmen's turn to cheer, which they did right lustily.