But Andover does not go in for athletics alone. In their studies the boys are so well trained that at college they usually take high position in their classes without any difficulty whatever. For those who are inclined to literary pursuits there is the Phillipian to try for. It is issued twice a week, and it is considered a great honor to become a member of the editing board. Then there is the Mirror every month, which contains literature of a more solid character. Besides these there are yearly publications which offer prizes for drawings. The Philomathean Society, which has held meetings for seventy years, is the debating society. Those who are sensible enough to join this, and practise speaking before a crowd, receive a training that helps them wonderfully all their lives. This society and a flourishing branch of the Y.M.C.A. are powerful influences in the school. What with the different prize speakings, the glee and banjo clubs, the track-athletic and tennis teams, and numberless other organizations, every boy has a chance to distinguish himself.
Sunday is a delightful day at Andover. The afternoon stroll with one's best friend in the beautiful country around is perhaps the pleasantest experience in the week. Boys are obliged to attend church twice on Sunday, but few of them object to this compulsory attendance, for the services are conducted in turn by the professors of the Theological Seminary, all of whom are very distinguished and interesting men, who never fail to interest their hearers.
The Theological Seminary is situated near the school, and as is always the case, the men are closer students and more devoted to their work than are the members of the Academy proper. That does not mean, however, that they do not join the latter in their social and athletic life. Once they had a baseball team that could completely demolish the Phillips nine. Their pitcher, a famous Yale player, was said to be the only man in the country who could deliver a "snake" curve.
Near Phillips Academy also is situated the Abbot Female Academy. This is a large girls' school. No uninvited boy is allowed on these sacred premises, and all intercourse between the two schools is forbidden. Nevertheless, the stories of midnight serenaders and of encounters with Pat, the Fem. Sem. policeman, would fill a volume.
Every Andover man loves his school, not only for the fun and scrapes that he had there, but for the good that he has received from it. Many of his strongest friendships were formed there, and much of his success at college and in after-life has depended on the associations made at school, while those who have not gone to college feel that they gained at Andover an education by no means scanty.
A REVENGEFUL WHALE.
BY W. J. HENDERSON.
The ship was under a cloud of canvas. Old Handsome lay on his side away forward near the knight-heads, where the rhythmic rise and fall of the bows lulled him like the rocking of a cradle.
"Say," he drawled, in a lazy voice, "the old ship looks very gay in the sunset, doesn't she?"