“Oh, wake up! You’re sleeping! You are the deadest man I ever saw breathing! Come to life!”
“You won’t do at all! It’s wasting time to fool with you!”
A dozen different coachers were at work on the Yale football eleven and the substitutes, and they were working the men like slaves. Each coacher seemed to have a particular man to whom he was giving his attention, and he was expressing himself in vigorous language. It was an absolute relief to hear a word of praise now and then.
“That’s better, Ridley; you’re coming.”
“Well done, Hodge! You’ve got the idea now.”
“That’s first-rate, Ibbson.”
“Do it like that—do it like that, Spofford!”
It was a scene of the greatest activity. All over the field men were punting, running, dropping on the ball, tacking, and doing other things required of football-players in practise. They seemed possessed by a frenzied determination, and it mattered not how severely they were criticized, they kept at it till told to stop. No man seemed to get discouraged.
Yale was working into shape for the great game with Harvard. Thanksgiving day was at hand, and sportlovers of the country were waiting for the great contest that was to take place on Soldiers’ Field. In a few days the eyes of the whole nation, figuratively speaking, would be turned on the chief gladiators of these two representative colleges of the country. It almost seemed that already the public at large was waiting breathlessly for the hour of battle to arrive.
Harvard was confident, being flushed with repeated victories, and remembering the glorious manner in which she had trounced Yale a year before. It was said that never had a better team represented the Cambridge college. Already betting had begun, and Harvard was the favorite by long odds. Old sports predicted that Harvard would win. They demonstrated that Harvard was at least a third stronger than Yale. Then men on the two elevens were compared man for man, and the comparison seemed to indicate that Harvard could not lose.