"I am," assented Dalzell, "and I admit it. Why, man alive, one has to have a big head here. No small head would contain all that the Academic Board insists on crowding into it."
By the time that the chums had attended the first section recitations on the following day, their despair was increased.
"Davy, I don't see how we are ever going to make it, this year," Dalzell gasped, while they were making ready for supper formation. "We'll bilge this year without a doubt."
"There's only one reason I see for hoping that we can get through the year with fair credit," murmured Darrin.
"And what's that?"
"Others have done it, before us, and many more are going to do it this year," replied Dave slowly, as he laid comb and brush away and drew on his uniform blouse.
"I know men have gotten through the Naval Academy in years gone by," Dalzell agreed. "But, the first chance that I have, I'm going to look the matter up and see whether the middies of old had any such fearful grind as we have our noses held to."
"Oh, we'll do it," declared Darrin confidently. "I shall, anyway—for I've got to!"
As he spoke he was thinking of Belle Meade, and of her prospects in life as well as his own.
As the days went by, however, Dave and Dan became more and more dull of spirits. The grind was a fearful one. A few very bright youngsters went along all right, but to most of the third classmen graduation began to look a thousand years away.