A big boy, ruthlessly thrusting aside all who impeded his progress, quickly jumped between the two.
"Cut it out, Owen Lawrence!" cried Earl Roycroft, sternly. He pushed the belligerent student away. "If you don't look out you'll start such a muss that there'll be no stopping it."
"Then they'll have to chase right off the field!" cried Dan Brown, in a voice which no one would have recognized as his. "Are you going, Somers?"
The chief "outlaw's" words promptly undid the effect of Roycroft's action. Surrounded by his opponents, the captain of the regulars speedily found himself being pushed and jostled off the diamond.
At the same instant a combined rush was made for the other members of the team.
Almost swept from their feet by the fierceness of the attack, they struggled valiantly to stem the tide. Above all the frantic shouts and cries, "Crackers" Brown was heard to yell:
"Keep the bases covered, boys! Don't budge from the field!"
"You bet we won't!" shouted Aleck Parks. "Whoop! Shove the Ramblers right along, fellows!"
The fellows were doing it. "In the hands of the enemy" the players were as helpless as chips upon a seething torrent of water. They quickly lost sight of one another, each compelled to fight his battle alone, for the bodyguard which at first had so valiantly attempted to aid them was already widely scattered.
Bob Somers, thoroughly surprised and indignant, appealed vainly for order. Then, feeling that resistance was useless and ill-advised, he allowed the irresistible tide of boys to sweep him where they willed.