"Now what is he hanging around here for with that bunch of his cronies, I'd like to know," said Jimmy. "I wonder if he has a notion of hazing you. By Jove, I'll bet you a dollar that's it. They were waiting for you to grab you, but seeing me here they probably gave it up for the time at least. Let's walk on."
"Why would they give it up? You talk like a Senior, and if I haven't been sleeping like old Rip Van, you're nothing more than a Freshman yourself. My head isn't as hoary as yours by three weeks, that's all."
"O, no, I've been through the mill and they never haze a fellow twice. They gave me a jolly roast though, and that let's me out for the rest of my natural school life."
"What did they do to you?" inquired Frank, who had heard of such doings on the persons of unsuspecting and confiding youth. "I supposed that hazing had been stopped here completely. The Milton Gazette said that Doctor Hobart had ordered it stopped after they ducked that fellow in the river one night and he got his death from it."
"Yes; Dr. Hobart stopped hazing, and threatened to fire anyone he caught at it, but while that has stopped some of the worst of it maybe, it isn't dead by a long shot. They didn't do much to me, tied my hands and feet and rolled me down the hill over there, and gave me an egg shampoo and mussed me up considerable, but I came out of it all right. Dixon was in the gang that did for me, I think, but I'm not sure, because they were masked."
"Well, they're not going to haze me," said Frank, "if I see them first."
"Interference with your personal liberty resented, eh?"
"Yes, maybe. I wouldn't mind anybody but Dixon, and I certainly will not have such a galoot as he is mauling me around, if I have to fight the whole gang."
"Better not fight, Frank. Better take it good naturedly, and it will be over quick. If you resent, you're likely to get it harder."
"Well, if they really are out to haze me there's no help for it, but I'll have some fun, too," and he stretched out his arm and flexed his muscles. "Haven't been paddling canoes around the Florida Everglades for nothing, Jimmy."