“Candidates for the track team report to Professor Beck, at the gymnasium, at 3.45 P. M., Saturday, February 12th.
“Donald Cunningham, Captain.”
This notice was posted on the bulletin board in Academy Building one morning, and fellows on their way to recitations read it and became suddenly aware that, from an athletic standpoint at least, spring had begun. From that same standpoint winter is a short-lived season in Hillton—a mere ten weeks between the last football game and the call for track team candidates; a brief space in which the hockey players pose as heroes, the Hillton and St. Eustace chess clubs prepare for and hold their annual contest, the debating club membership grows, the school librarian is for once busy all day long, and the juniors conduct mimic battles and sieges on the green, their citadels and ammunition both constructed of snow. And then some morning while the mercury still lingers affectionately about the zero mark a little square of paper appears on the bulletin board, and, officially at least, the vernal season is ushered in.
This year, as usual, with the appearance of the call for track team candidates a veritable epidemic of athletic enthusiasm swept over the Academy. The crew candidates, who for weeks past had been quietly exercising with chest weights and dumb-bells and running around the track without occasioning any particular notice, now went to work on the rowing machines and were daily viewed by a throng of their fellows. The baseball players congregated in the cage and pitched and batted and slid about on the canvas to an accompaniment of low-voiced criticism from chaps who pressed their noses through the wire meshes for a half-hour at a time. Golfers polished up their clubs, bought brand new books on the sport, and were to be found practicing putting in the dormitory halls. A few lads flocked together in warm studies and talked of wickets and overs and bowls, and tried hard to convince themselves and each other that they were enthusiastic cricketers. And all the while the ice on the river was thick and hard, the wind swept across the green in wintry gusts, and the snow was piled high on either side of the walks.
But if the green and the campus and the frozen paths were deserted, the gymnasium, especially after two o’clock in the afternoon, was a busy scene. Of the fifty-odd boys who reported for the track team, forty-two were put to training. With most of them the new work was disappointingly similar to that gone through with all winter. The chest weights banged up and down, the rings swung about under the high roof, the ladders creaked and bent between their braces, and the dumb-bells and Indian clubs swung faster than ever. But many of the candidates were put to work on the wooden track in the hour when twilight filled the gymnasium with strange and grotesque shadows, and now and then some candidate for honors with the sixteen-pound shot was allowed to toss a leather-covered sphere about the place, to the imminent danger of everybody’s toes.
Professor Beck, from a quiet, even-voiced, little gentleman, suddenly became a commanding figure, who was here, there, and everywhere, and whose least word was like a trumpet sound. Boys who were not candidates for the track team or the baseball team or the crew or something—and there appeared to be few of them in those days—were not admitted to the floor of the gymnasium after a certain hour in the afternoon, and so congregated at the little walled-off inclosure by the entrance and scoffed or praised, envied or admired, to their heart’s content and to the despair of the performers.
One afternoon, a few days subsequent to the beginning of the track candidates’ training, the gymnasium was more than usually full and noisy. The crew was hard at work in the rowing room, a half dozen fellows were trotting about the track, and the boys under Don were putting in a preliminary ten minutes at the weights. Taken as a whole they were a fine-looking lot, though to the uninitiated many would have appeared too slight in build for athletic success. These were the sprinters and hurdlers and those of the new candidates who were desirous of becoming such. They showed speed rather than strength and were in some cases slender to a degree. It was not difficult to distinguish the new candidates from the experienced, even when they were in gymnasium attire; the matter of chest development alone afforded unmistakable proof. In the same way the jumpers and pole vaulters could be picked out. A greater development of the chest muscles was noticeable, resultant on the short, sharp effort required in their work. Of the several boys present who had been members of the last year’s team as long-distance runners, three at least indicated their specialty by their build. Their chests were quite as highly developed as those of the jumpers, but the development was more general; their tasks required staying power as well as strength of lung. Of the performers with the heavy weights, Dave Merton was a fair example. Both the twelve-pound hammer and the shot belong of right to athletes who have weight in their favor, since it is only by putting their weight into the effort that success with hammer or shot may be hoped for. The exercise brings into play the muscles of the back and loins, widens the body across the shoulders, and gives plenty of room to the heart and lungs. To a less extent the legs are benefited and the entire muscular system gains in elasticity.
Professor Beck emerged from the rowing room and cast his gaze over the gymnasium floor, letting his eyes rest first on one and then another of the exercisers at the weights.
“That will do at the weights, boys,” he announced presently. He referred to a book which he took from his pocket. “Morris and Graham and Gordon, to the running track and do a half mile; and by the way, Graham, don’t labor under the impression that you’re trying to catch a train; take your pace from Morris. You too, Gordon; you run too fast. Jumpers and sprinters had better get in some work with the dumb-bells. I’ll have a look at you presently. The rest of you know your work, I think.”
He turned to Don, and the two discussed the candidates for some time, while Wayne joined the men on the track and proceeded to put twelve laps behind him at a moderate pace. Wayne’s presence among the track team candidates requires some explanation. Continued study with but little outdoor recreation had begun to create a listlessness that had surprised and worried him. Don, when consulted, explained the matter in very few words.