In the Line

by Albertus T. Dudley

In his general point of view Marchmont differed wholly from the average Seatonian. He had no particular ambition, unless to get through school without being expelled, or to slip safely into college. He cared little about lessons, but much about the condition and the perfection of his attire. He had no interest in athletics except as a passing show; his notion of proper exercise was horseback riding and fencing. He could talk, when necessary, on almost any subject, but his favorite topics were automobiles, horse-races, and the theatre. While the democratic spirit of the school did not please him and he found few fellows wholly to his liking among his classmates, his chief grievances seemed to be the food served at his boarding-house, and the necessity of getting up for eight o’clock chapel. The first he tried to remedy by little messes prepared in his room on a chafing dish; the second, being irremediable, he had to endure. He was not popular, for his manners were too supercilious to please the average boy, who is instinctively democratic and always admires the fellow who can do something rather than the fellow who claims to be something; but in a certain small coterie he ranked as king.

Lindsay’s introduction to work in the gymnasium was a novel experience. Here he was stripped, weighed, measured in height, girth of limbs and chest; tested in strength of back and arms and legs. Later he was given a chart with his measurements and strength plotted in lines upon it, so as to show his relative condition compared with the average for his age; and a card with directions as to the particular exercise which he needed to develop his weaker parts. All this the boy took, as he took much that was new to him in the school, with curiosity and temporary interest.

There was one circumstance, however, in connection with the examination, that made a deeper impression. When the measurements and the testing were over, Mr. Doane asked, “Did you ever play football?”

A week before entering school Wolcott would have answered immediately “yes.” But he had heard so much, in the few days that he had spent at Seaton, of the hard games played, of the great contests with Hillbury about which the athletic life of the school centred, of the high standard of the school teams, and what “playing football” really meant to the Seatonian, that he had almost said “no.”

“A very little,” he replied.

“I think you have football in you,” went on the director. “By that I mean that you have fine, solid organs, and muscles developing well; while from the little I have seen of you, I should judge that you might be quick. A heavy man who is quick is a prize to a football team. Should you like to play?”

Wolcott’s eyes brightened. “Of course I should!”

“Then try to build yourself up as your card directs. You must strengthen those abdominal muscles, and harden up your legs and arms. I suppose you have heard of Nowell, who fitted here?”

“The old Harvard tackle?” asked Wolcott, eagerly.

The director nodded. “He was a fine type of the hard trainer. Whenever I think of Nowell the picture in my mind is of a solid, brawny, determined boy standing in the corner of the gymnasium where the heavy dumb-bells lie, and swinging his pair of three-pounders the appointed number of times. He did that in addition to his class exercise without shirking, day in and day out, for months—stuck to it while the other fellows were amusing themselves, till he got to be a regular gymnasium joke. Many a time I’ve seen some rascal standing in front of him mimicking his motions, and laughing at him. It was his turn to laugh when he made the Harvard Varsity the second week he was on the field.”