“That’s true,” said Dick Merriwell, “and it shows that we’re really getting civilized. In the old days, when a nation’s blood got hot, the way it’s bound to, sometimes, the only way of letting off steam was for a lot of people to go out and kill a lot of other people they didn’t have any grudge against at all. Now they send their picked men, and race or jump with the other people, and it’s all settled in a friendly way. I think the peace funds ought to be used in promoting international athletics. The one thing that’s done more than anything else to reduce interest in prize fighting is the spread of all sorts of amateur athletics.”
“You’re not opposed to boxing, are you, Mr. Merriwell?” asked Harry Maxwell, who knew that the universal coach was himself an expert boxer, and had taught Jim Phillips nearly, if not all, that the pitcher knew about the art of self-defense.
“Not to boxing, no,” said Dick, with a smile. “But I’m opposed to a good many phases of modern prize fighting. I think every boy who is to grow up into a manly, healthy man ought to learn to use his fists. But he ought to learn to fight without losing his temper, and to take a licking, when he gets it, in the right way.
“Professional boxing is all right, too, when it is carried on in the right way. But nowadays there is too much thinking about the money and the moving pictures. The game has been brutalized, too, and it ought not to be allowed when it is not properly controled by the State or city government.”
“About this game,” said Jim Phillips. “If you play, Mr. Merriwell, you will pitch, I suppose?”
“No,” said Dick, “I’d rather leave that to you, Jim. My arm may be all right still, but I haven’t had much practice of late, and I think I’d rather see you and Briggs fight it out again. Sherman has sailed for Europe with his family, so there will be a hole to fill at first base. I think I can play that position still, and that will do very well for me.
“You and Brady will be the battery; Carter will play third; Jackson second; Green, of the country club, who was on the team here a few years ago, short; Maxwell, Brayson, and Tuthill, of the country club, in the outfield. That will give us a first-class team, I think, and I doubt if the Boston people can put a better one in the field. I’ll telegraph Bowen to-night that we can play. We ought to have neutral grounds, I think, and the New Haven league team will let us use their park.”
CHAPTER XXXVI
THE GAMBLER’S TRAP.
There were others in New Haven as well as the Yale athletes who had been obliged to return. Foote, the associate of Parker in the attempt to prevent Yale from winning the big series with Harvard, was one of them.