"Without a word he slipped into the place of a substitute, and did a substitute's work as long as there was need of it. I venture to say that he would have scrubbed out the boathouse if it would have been of service to the crew. Do you know why he took this stand? Not because he did not care, but because he cared so much. When he offered to help as a substitute he said:
"'If I can help the Yale shell to go faster by being out of it, I am glad of it. That is what I am rowing for. And if I can be of any use as a substitute, why, that is what I am here for, too. It is all for Yale, isn't it?'
"He did not know that he was overheard. It was not meant to be overheard. But it expressed his whole attitude, and he stood by it to the end. You youngsters who licked Harvard to-day deserve all the praise and rejoicing that comes to you. We are all proud of you, and we know how hard and well you have worked. But while you are the heroes of this celebration, the hero did not row with you. His name is 'Jack' Hastings, the man who was glad to help a Yale crew go faster by getting out of it.
"And when you hear it said that the Yale spirit is dying out, I want you to think of that remark. That man absorbed the spirit right here that made him take that view as a matter of course. It was because he did not think of anything else to be done under the circumstances that he epitomized the spirit that will make this old place great as long as it stands. Endowments and imposing buildings can never breed that spirit. It grows and blossoms as the fruitage of many generations of tradition, and when Yale loses it, she is become an empty shell, a diploma factory, and no longer a nursery of the right kind of manhood needed in this country.
"Three long cheers for 'Jack' Hastings, who, if he did not help to win this race, will help to win races long after he is gone from the campus world; and so long as his words are remembered Yale men on football field, on track and diamond, and on the dear old Thames will feel their inspiration. Are you ready?"
The men rose the length of the table and shouted, with napkins waved on high. Before the last "rah, rah, rah, Hastings, Hastings, Hastings," subsided, the Assistant Manager had become red in the face and exceedingly uneasy. He wrestled with a weighty ethical problem, because while he had pledged his word not to reveal the secret of Hastings' presence within sight and sound of this ovation, he realized that to lead him in would be a crowning and dramatic episode. A compromise was possible, however, and he slipped around the table and whispered in the ear of "Big Bill" Hall.
In the gallery the little mother had shrunk farther back into the shadows, half afraid of this uproar, yet happier than ever before in her life. She looked at her boy, sitting close beside her, his face hidden so that she could not see the illuminating joy in it, the dazed look of unreality, as if he were coming through dreamland. There was no surprise in her mind. Of course, this triumph was no more than what was due, and she could have hugged the massive chairman as a person of excellent discernment. The boy whispered:
"He does not really mean it, Mother. There is some mistake. He has been out of college so long that he does not know what things mean."
She patted his burning cheek and whispered:
"Why, I knew it all the time. But you would not believe it if your mother said you were a hero. I wonder how the Head Coach feels now? I wish I——"