Intercollegiate Athletics

ONE of the aspects of American life that must impress every foreigner visiting this country for the first time is the attention given to outdoor sports. Athletic meetings and sporting events are regularly reported in the daily newspapers with a wealth of detail exceeding any other single department of news. The rivalry among cities, clubs, and schools is so keen that our main interest outside of business hours seems to he in some form of physical contest. Organized outdoor sports are recent developments which have begun within the memory of men still young. They seem at first glance like a sudden reaction against former neglect of the body, but they are more logically a development of physical exercise into a newer and more artificial form, and under changed conditions.

Up to the close of the Civil War the need of physical training was not felt, and the stimulus to an outdoor life was supplied by the continual exploration of new country. All life was practically out of doors. Our people were scattered over a wide domain, and the centres of population were small. The great West to be explored and settled easily turned the thoughts of a young man to his rifle, and to the adventures to be found in the forest. Sport was a child’s occupation by the side of the great game that he played.

Colleges suffered from the effect of this drain of men of strength and initiative, who were more likely to turn away from books to seek their careers in the opening up of new territory and in the business connected with developing natural resources. The improvement in physical appearance of college boys generally is often ascribed to the physical training which is now common; but it might with as good reason be ascribed to the large infusion of the stronger type. The pale student no longer holds a monopoly in education. He is still with us, surrounded by so many of his sturdy companions that he is no longer typical of college life. The disappearance of the backwoods and the growth of large centres of population have thus created the demand for an artificial outlet; and the games are the natural successors of the youthful activities of a pioneer period. For boys in a large city far removed from open country organized play is almost a necessity.

What a foreigner would observe of the intensity of sports is only one manifestation of the spirit which American people now put into everything. The commercial growth of the past twenty years is probably equal to that of all the preceding years since the discovery of the continent. The energies of the entire nation have been turned into channels of trade and pleasure, and we are passing through a period of surprise and readjustments calculated to upset the nerves of any people. Many arts are being revolutionized. A machine has no time in the United States to wear out, before it is superseded by something thought to be better, and we are constantly hearing of inventions that will wipe out entire industries. Our sudden leap into prominence as a commercial power has affected us like the discovery of a vast gold mine. The majority are engaged in the struggle for wealth,and most things are judged from a material standpoint. This condition was inevitable from the first, and it constitutes only a phase of American development which will pass away as the novelty wears off.

If in the craze for winning our sports exhibit the spirit and method of trade, it is because boys cannot escape from their environment into an atmosphere more ideal. The only place where we can hope to maintain the higher motive is in colleges and schools. There the young men are collectively under better control, and they are for a season removed from the competition of the outside world. Athletic sports have obtained a strong hold upon them, and the public is entirely familiar with the large number of games among students of different universities and colleges. Much has been said against the contests, and the opinion that they have been allowed to go too far is quite common. In discussing this subject, let us remember that boys and girls will carry to school the impulses and habits learned at home, and that society at large shares the responsibility for degraded sports. Youth is the natural time for play, and it is well to provide some wholesome method of working off superfluous animal spirits. Physical contests are probably the best; at any rate they are far ahead of billiards and horse-play. If, then, disagreeable extremes often spring from them, it does not follow that the ultimate result is not the best that could be attained in the present state of society.

While universities and colleges have become natural centres for athletic contests, scholarship has seemed to lose its proper perspective. The appearance of thirty thousand people to see a football game, and the disappearance of all students from their classrooms during an entire day, would have filled a professor of the old school with despair. He would have looked upon it much as the general public now regard a prize fight or a bull fight. Many professors hold this view to-day, and a very respectable vote could be obtained in most college faculties against the severer forms of intercollegiate contests. It is not intended to imply that teachers are opposed to outdoor sports; but rather to some of the practices that seem to follow in their train. There are evils, and for the good of American students they ought to be stated without reserve. At the same time the subject should be approached without prejudice, as the adequate treatment of the physical side of college life is perhaps one of the most important questions now before educators.

The old idea of education was that a youth could obtain all the benefits of a college training from books. The value of a sound body was recognized in theory, but in practice no systematic method of obtaining it seemed to be thought necessary. A college simply represented study and books. Education, crystallized along conventional lines, was confined mainly to men entering the professions of law, medicine, and divinity. Now all this is changed. The modern college is obliged to take into account the demands of commerce, and the applications of science to the well-being of man. Many of the professions now require the higher education as a foundation, and the majority of subjects taught have been placed on college catalogues within a few years. The dominating note underlying courses of study for undergraduate students is, before all else, the production of enlightened citizens. Physical vigor has therefore acquired a practical significance which it never had before. It is fast becoming as much a man’s duty to take proper care of his body as it is to cultivate his reason. Most colleges have been forced to provide the opportunity for some kind of physical training.

The systematic culture of the body began in this country in a very small way, but its growth has been most rapid. Gymnasiums, such as are now resorted to by many young people, fill a highly useful function. Unfortunately many colleges and universities lose a large part of the benefit accruing from them. Usually there is no recognition of the work done. Competent instructors are provided, and every opportunity is given to the students to benefit by their teaching, but everything is voluntary. Physical excellence does not in any way affect a student’s standing or help him to get his degree. This is a serious handicap to a gymnasium, as the exercises indoors are at best extremely monotonous and dull. It is only natural that a young man should want credit in the shape of marks, as for a course of studies, when he has spent several hours a week during an entire year in manipulating weights for the good of his body. Failing these or any other inducement in the gymnasium, he turns to outdoor sports, wherein success yields an immediate return in the applause of his classmates and friends. This is where college faculties have been slow to recognize their opportunities and duties.

Outdoor sports were for many years left to regulate themselves in the hands of students without experience of life to guide them, and often under the influence of irresponsible persons to whom college contests represented nothing more than the excitement to be found in a horse race or a professional baseball game. It was not sport for sport’s sake, but sport for the sake of beating somebody by fair means, or by political intrigue. The inevitable result was an intolerable condition which had to come under the correction of faculties whether they liked to take the time from their lectures or not. Their interference was resented at first by students and athletic graduates, and mutual confidence was practically destroyed. The difficulty was how to improve the contests without entirely prohibiting them. The enthusiastic promoters of the sports were rarely good advisers, and for some years college professors worked alone on a most troublesome problem. The prevailing notion that they belonged to a class living in the clouds did not increase respect for their opinions even when governed by reason and sound sense. In consequence progress has been slow. The spirit of sport is certainly much better as the newness has worn off, but much remains to be done. The first step was to make rules for the guidance of students in their intercollegiate relations. Committees were necessary to that end, and as a rule representatives of the student body were called into consultation. In most colleges these committees have remained to regulate the sports and to safeguard them against bad practices in the future. The rules commonly in force are similar in spirit, if not in substance, throughout the college world. They are simply records of experience relating to past abuses, as they have invariably been framed to cure some evil or to promote fairness.

There are only three rules that require comment here. The first and most difficult of administration is in the nature of a definition of professionalism. The intention of this rule is to disqualify from participation in college sports all men who have received a money benefit or its equivalent by reason of their previous connection with athletics. It would be foolish to treat this as a moral question, although it does affect the honor of a team. The distinction between an amateur and a professional is one purely in the interest of sport, because the latter has presumably made more or less of an occupation of athletics, and therefore outclasses the former. Hence the contest wherein professionals are set against amateurs is unequal if the facts are known; unfair, if the facts are concealed. In either case the result is bad. A spirit of retaliation, absolutely fatal to friendly contests, is introduced. The rule was made at a time when abuses were common, and some of its provisions now seem too sweeping. The technicalities that arise are often absurd, yet the distinction between the two kinds of players had to be drawn, and the line was not a clear one under the best of circumstances. On the whole, the rule has promoted honorable dealing between college boys, and its influence in the preparatory schools has been far reaching. It should not be modified in spirit except for very weighty reasons, although a greater latitude in its interpretation might be allowed to committees.

There is no doubt that college boys often dishonor themselves consciously or unconsciously by concealing facts in relation to their standing as amateurs. Even older men are sometimes willing to degrade sports by deception. A letter was received at Harvard several years ago, informing the Athletic Committee that the services of a well-known athlete could be secured as coach, if he could be paid a stated sum in such a way that no evidence could be found against his amateur standing. The most common lapses among students occur in the summer in connection with baseball. Some of the men undoubtedly play on hotel and summer resort nines for a substantial gain. They know that they are cheapening themselves, but the practice continues with concealment of the actual facts. There are various methods of receiving financial benefit without violating the letter of the athletic rules. One of these is exhibited in a letter, by no means unique, received last spring by a first-rate college ball player. A few extracts are given below: —

“ I write to ask if you know of a firstclass pitcher that can be obtained for the summer, to pitch on the — team of the — League, a team that will be made up entirely of fast college players. Such a pitcher would be used most liberally here, — in fact, he could have almost anything he wanted, and he would be protected in the matter of privacy concerning any arrangement made. This is the best summer town on the coast, and clean baseball players will be taken into the best society here. Our players will come from —, —, —, and other colleges. It is possible that you may know of one or two good men on the Harvard team who would like such an outing, which will cost them nothing from the time they leave home until they return there. If so, I shall consider it a great favor if you will write me about them. We must have a corking team this year and stand willing to plunge on a pitcher. The right man will find seventy-five monthly in his jeans, and he can wonder as much as he likes how it got there. Couldn’t you be induced to visit some friends who will be provided for you down this way ? ”

Another rule requires all members of athletic teams to be genuine students of the college which they represent, and to be satisfactory in their studies. A student who is not promoted every year to a higher class, or is on probation for neglect of studies, is not allowed to play on any team. It does not follow from this that athletes as a class are good students. The eager desire to play acts as a spur to many otherwise dull men, and some of them have been thus goaded into mental activity. The games are powerful incentives to some boys, and can be depended upon to keep them straight. In this respect their advantage to mental and physical discipline cannot be denied. Statistics on the scholarship of athletes are not conclusive. Allowance is rarely made for the fact that young men in bad standing are carefully weeded out of the teams, and that therefore comparison with all other students is unfair. It does not stand to reason that a student in intercollegiate athletics can do as much work as one who devotes all his time to study. The athletic season of football, for example, lasts six weeks in the fall, and, so far as classroom work is concerned, the time is practically thrown away. The members of the team attend lectures regularly, they are obliged to; but their minds are on signals and plays for the next game or practice. As a consequence, one fifth of the year is lost, and the players have to do as much work in the remaining four fifths as others do in the five fifths. With average students it will not be done. The physical training which the football men have gone through cannot under favorable circumstances increase their efficiency enough to make good the difference. Then, as a rule, their participation in athletics has made them natural leaders in the social life of the college, and so they lose still more time. The only point that may be regarded as established by the records is that few students admitted to the teams are subsequently thrown off for poor scholarship. This proves that most athletes can usually do enough work to remain satisfactory in their studies. Of late years a good player has lost caste if he permits himself to be disqualified through any fault of his own.

The question of scholarship should not be approached in a narrow spirit. Do students gain anything in athletics that justifies the time taken from their studies ? That is the vital consideration. While a definite and convincing answer cannot be given in all cases, it is safe to say that many do. It is a inatter of common observation that athletes as a class have more initiative, and know better how to deal with men, than other students, especially when they first graduate. Whether they really hold their own in a long life is another matter. Much depends upon the individual.

A third rule relates to the procurement of good players from other colleges, by social or money inducements. To discourage this practice no ex-player of a college team is allowed to join the team of another college until after he has been enrolled for one entire year. This has removed one cause of complaint, but a real evil nevertheless remains. There is too much solicitation of boys in the preparatory schools with a view to the strengthening of college teams. Agents are constantly on the lookout for good candidates. Let a boy exhibit any unusual ability as an athlete, and half a dozen colleges will be after him. Inducements are offered in the nature of social advantage or of sinecure positions, which carry with them substantial financial gains. Often good athletes or their friends set a value on their services, and solicit positions. An example of this is shown in the following extract from a letter lately received by the Athletic Committee at Harvard: —

“ I should like to call your attention to Mr. —, who is thinking of entering college. We want to place him in some college where his athletic talents will be recognized and will be of use to him. ”

Then follows a list of his achievements, with a request to know what the university can do for him. College teams should be made up of men who come to them naturally, and the secondary schoolboys should be freed from all forms of solicitation. They unsettle the judgment of both parents and boys. An extension of the one year rule to include all students from going into the intercollegiate games during their first year in college would be wholesome in its effects.

The three rules mentioned form in the main the backbone of college regulation of athletics. There are other rules intended mainly to keep the contests within bounds, and to promote so far as possible a friendly relation between contestants, but, unhappily, many things cannot be reached by rules. Student tradition and public opinion when rightly directed are of greater value than even regulation, if the players can be made to feel them. Various abuses creep in from an intense desire to win, and every year brings its crop of tricks. One of these is found in coaching a team from outside after the men have gone on the field to play. When eleven young men appear on the football field, it is commonly understood that they are going to win or lose on their merits, and not with the assistance of some one on the side lines. Outside coaching is in this sense entirely wrong, and yet it is often done secretly. In most cases the only justification pleaded by those guilty of it is that the other side does the same, — just as a corrupt politician would justify buying votes, — and that we have to resort to this method to enable the good to triumph. As a matter of fact, trickery is usually resorted to, not because the other side actually does it, but because some one suspects that the other side is going to do it. In some eases he is wrong, in others he is right. The best that can be said for side line coaching in football, however, is that it belongs to that class of shady practices which lessen the interest in the game.

Intercollegiate athletics seem at times to suffer from a kind of insanity which bids fair to ruin them by destroying the interest of people who like to see fair play. There is no reason why games should not be made to build up character, and to teach patience, grit, and courage; but, unfortunately, winning in these days is put above everything else. This I believe to be a mere fad that we can live down in course of time, for deep in every young man’s heart there is a love of fairness which permits him to be led into trickery only under the mistaken idea that it is justified as a last resort. No good business man in America can ever derive satisfaction over success achieved by sharp practice or dishonesty. This is the saving grace of the nation. The principal lessons that rules and tradition can teach are to play the games fairly without whining over the result, and to introduce no element prejudicial to the highest ideal of college life.

There are several claims for intercollegiate sports. First, that they establish the physical vigor necessary to enable the mind to do its most effective work; second, that they stimulate outdoor exercise all over the country; third, that they form an atmosphere of temperance and moderation in living, and thus restrain students from excesses; fourth, that they teach self-control and fairness; fifth, that they bring the graduates and undergraduates of different universities together in bonds of friendship; sixth, that college loyalty is promoted. Let us examine these claims somewhat more in detail.

At present all sports do serve as physical developers to a number of college students, but not equally. Some are better suited to the purpose than others. A moderate game which does not try the powers to the utmost, and which can be entered by any one, is undoubtedly beneficial. Others, which involve a tremendous strain on the system and elaborate preparation continued over long periods, are of doubtful benefit. It is the daily exercise extending over years that builds up the physical strength, and keeps a man up to his highest mental powers. Regular sleep and moderate eating are even more important than exercise. For this reason the military schools are vastly superior to the ordinary colleges in the physical setting up of boys. The teams need very little special training at West Point and Annapolis, for the cadets are always in training. They are kept busy during a four years’ course in which the body receives as much daily attention as the mind. Every afternoon has its drill, usually out of doors, and every evening finds the cadet in bed by ten o’clock.

The sports most commonly found in colleges are football, baseball, track athletics, ice hockey, lacrosse, basket ball, hand ball, cricket, rowing, tennis, golf, fencing, and swimming. The first six usually end with graduation; the others may be continued through life as opportunity offers. Three of them, football, rowing, and track athletics, demand at times an exhausting strain, which may leave behind it a permanent weakness in some part of the body. Statistics would be difficult to obtain, and the statement should be made with due reservation; nevertheless, it stands to reason that no physical effort that leaves a man in a fainting condition can be of real benefit. All of us have seen men collapse in a boat, or after a hard foot race. It may be that this is generally due to poor preparation for the contest, and that better methods would remove all danger. Rowing and the track games are so improving and satisfactory to a large number of students that they could not be given up without serious loss. Some modification of the length of the course might make rowing less exhausting. Four miles does not seem any better than three miles in testing two crews, and it is usually the fourth mile that does all the damage.

Football stands in a class by itself. It attracts enormous crowds, and is more spectacular than anything else we have ever had in American colleges. This is considered by many to be one of the chief objections to it. In some respects it is superior to any other sport. The combinations, like those in war, are endless, and the same quality of mind is required to work them out. Then, while the element of the unexpected is not lacking, games are seldom won by a fluke. The best equipped team almost always wins. Yet as at present played, it is doubtful if football ought to have a place on college grounds. The old idea of fun has long since passed away, and although the excitement of a great final contest still remains, the players cannot possibly enjoy the season of drudgery that leads up to it. I have heard students say that they cared little for the ordinary game. One young man told me that he loathed it, and that only the pressure of his friends, and an ambition to share in the glory of a winning team, carried him into it.

There is always the risk of serious injury to the participants. No season passes without many of them being in the doctor’s hands for bruises, sprains, and broken or displaced bones. Frequently in the heavy games, players have to be carried off the field, sometimes unconscious. Often in stopping a play, the side on the defensive take chances with their own lives and with those of their opponents, justified only in certain professions like fire protection, life-saving, sea-faring, and railroading. Another aspect of the game is that foul play cannot well be detected by an umpire, and, worse still, it often pays.

It is a fact that modern life demands courage, and that football develops it; nevertheless it is foolish to risk life and limb in a game because it teaches physical courage. There are so many ways of learning courage, which is most often a matter of temperament, that we may well look around for some less dangerous method, unless the roughness of the game can be regulated out of it. This is by no means impossible. The steady improvement in spirit and the great reduction in the number of injuries promise much for the future. It is only fair to add that the advocates of the game seem to be fully warranted in claiming that injuries indicate lack of skill, and that proper training teaches a boy how to take care of himself on the field. The attitude assumed by most colleges that the game has merits which entitle it to further trial is perhaps justifiable ; at any rate, it is the most practical. There is a mistaken idea that football is peculiarly fitted to train men for military service, and there is absolutely no evidence to justify it. Quick decision, courage, and ready resource are often called out in a game as in a campaign; but there is much more demanded of a good soldier. The monotonous and regular performance of duty in the long delays between battles, and in the many years that happily intervene between wars, tests a man’s moral fibre more than the charge across a bloody field. The bulk of a soldier’s or of a sailor’s work lies in the preparation for the thing he may be called upon to do, while the principal work of a team, and that for which they entered college, is neglected during the six weeks of the season. This is the proper point of view in considering the value of a training for war. As to the moral courage which is more frequently the badge of good citizenship than physical courage, that is about evenly distributed throughout the student body, with perhaps a slight advantage to the young man who is working hard for his education .

It is difficult to make a clear case for intercollegiate athletics as a stimulus to outdoor sports. We may be confusing cause and effect, and it may be the craving for an outdoor life which has stimulated college sport. Without doubt, the great intercollegiate games do appeal to the imagination of all small boys, and lead them away from mischief to baseball, football, and the track games. In this respect they are of unqualified good to every community. We see hundreds of boys at their games today where we saw only tens a generation ago.

One of the chief objections to intercollegiate games is that at present they require only a handful of specially qualified men on the big teams, with a very large number of unqualified men sitting on the bleachers to watch them. Now, it is the latter class that most need physical training and that waste much of their time in college. With the present rage for victory at almost any cost, sports cease to be all round developers, and teams are necessarily made up by a weeding process which pays little attention to any who are not physically able to stand the strain of a hard season. The sports cannot, therefore, be considered in a thoroughly healthy condition. Intercollegiate games ought to be the result of a great deal of competition wholly within each university, where every student should be encouraged to go out on the field an hour every day.

No one can associate with the athletes of our large universities without being struck with their general temperance and moderation. They commonly talk more about their sports than their studies, and they are sometimes too demonstrative; but in the essential things that go to make men of good physique they establish the fashion at college. In this respect alone, outdoor sports and intercollegiate games offset much of the trouble they cause. The presence of a large number of young men who are in training and who keep themselves in good condition has a wholesome effect upon every entering class. The practical disappearance of hazing may be fairly credited to athletics as much as to faculty regulation. The upper class men would find it difficult to haze a possible candidate for a team. Another consideration is the atmosphere of democratic equality that prevails on the athletic fields.

That college sports promote self-control and fairness is quite evident in spite of occasional lapses. There has been a steady improvement in the spirit of the college youth during the past twenty years. After all it is only by experience in the actual conduct of affairs, such as those relating to sports, that young men learn fairness. The majority of them go to college unformed, with experience only in what is proper in the home circle, but with no adequate notion of what is due to their fellow beings in the world at large. From this spring many of the errors into which they fall. A freshman often violates the spirit of ordinary courtesy and fairness in his sports, not because he is bad, but simply because he has never come into contact with other men in such a way as to show him what is really square. The games exert a very wholesome influence in this respect. The cheerfulness with which the average student will suffer a penalty in a game, or will accept exclusion from a game, is proof that athletics teach self-control. When a young man says that he “did not make the team, ” that is the whole story. There is very little whining about unfairness in the selection of a team or about the one - sidedness of the coach and captain. It usually comes down to the statement, “I was not good enough to make it. ” This kind of education is unqualifiedly good. Team play which means that the individual must give way to the needs of the society in which he is placed is a valuable antidote to the spirit of the age, — individual success at almost any cost.

One feature of the games is particularly disagreeable to any one not interested in either side. That is the organized cheering. The home team always has the advantage, if there is any, as their friends are most numerously represented on the seats, and are well prepared to assist them by shouting at critical moments. They always cheer the good plays of their own side, and often the mistakes of the opposing side. Nothing could be more discourteous or unfair to visitors, and yet it seems impossible to make students understand this. The call that is regularly issued, “Come out and help the team,” carries with it the implication that they are willing to win by shouting and playing against a team that can only play. The amusing side of this is that students always complain of the organized attempt to rattle their own men when visiting other universities. There is no possible objection to the cheers that spring naturally to a young man’s lips over a good play, and enthusiasm is a beautiful sight in a crowd of boys; but let the whole thing be natural and not pumped up.

The friendships and memories associated with one’s college days become increasingly attractive as the years pass. A boy of fine temper and strong sympathy is always an influence, and there is no place where his true qualities may be discovered as they can be in a team. It is doubtful, however, if games between two teams ameliorate college courtesies in any great degree. There is at present a prevailing atmosphere of suspicion, and colleges are too often set at odds with one another by a game. This extends to the graduates and sometimes even to the faculties, and it is shocking to hear what one university will say about another when there is a difference of opinion upon some eligibility question. The newspapers are full of it. As a matter of fact, one athletic dispute can destroy for years the good will of two otherwise friendly colleges. We see so many cases of it, that we may be pardoned some skepticism on the promotion of intercollegiate friendship by intercollegiate games. When students and officers of one university point the finger of scorn at those of another, we may usually be sure that both are wrong, and that their games should be suppressed as common nuisances. We still have much to learn, and the effort to study the subject in conference of representatives from all universities is a movement in the right direction.

The loyalty of college men is without doubt quickened by regular return to the alma mater to see the chief games; but it is not unfair to charge it with being the shouting kind of loyalty which does not yield adequate return. The great gifts to the universities rarely come from men who have been athletes, and not seldom from men who have never been to college. In some institutions, athletic teams are encouraged and intercollegiate contests are deliberately promoted for advertising purposes. It is doubtful if the resulting gains are of solid advantage. The real value of the athletic system in stimulating loyalty and in fostering the growth of a college is not yet fully tested. It has been in effective operation less than a generation, and exmembers of teams have not had time to earn great wealth. Of the good will of the graduated athlete there is no possible doubt. He always holds his college in affectionate remembrance. He will work for it, and beg for it, but he would not claim to be alone in this.

One aspect of athletics which stands apart from the merits of the games is the large sum of money necessary to run them. At one university, for instance, the expenditure on the teams was over fifty thousand dollars. This seems unduly large, but when we divide the total outlay for all teams by the number of boys who appeared upon the fields, the amount for each one does not appear so out of proportion. There were about two thousand men in rowing, baseball, football, track athletics, tennis, and many other minor sports, and the annual expense was about twenty-five dollars per student. Of course this does not represent the whole case, as most of the money was used to pay the expenses of the university football, baseball, track, and rowing teams on which only a small percentage of the students actually played. There are undoubtedly great wastefulness and extravagance where undergraduates are entrusted with the management of finances. They have not had the experience to safeguard them against loss. A graduate treasurer, or manager, is an absolutely necessary part of the administration. Under the best of conditions, a large part of the income from the sale of tickets for the games goes into expenses that would have been thought wholly unnecessary twenty years ago. The training and equipment for a game are immeasurably more expensive than they were when a young man provided himself with a single garment to use in a boat race, and no trainer was thought of. Nowadays no player is expected to pay any part of the expense beyond what he would have to pay for his board under ordinary circumstances. Everything is provided by the management. This proceeds from two causes: first, the praiseworthy desire to give all students an equal chance for the teams, when otherwise the rich man would have the advantage of the poor one; second, the questionable desire to give every competitor recognition for his participation in athletics. The young man who makes a team usually looks upon himself as one deserving well of his university, just as a man who has fought for his country expects to hear of it. It is essentially the same spirit that creates a large pension appropriation. As a member of a second eleven once said, “ I am working faithfully for the university, and I ought to have some recognition.” He was arguing that he ought to be sent with the first eleven to a neighboring city, where he could enjoy a vacation during term time. Not that any of the athletes are paid, but their relation to the management is precisely that of a citizen to the Treasury Department. The money seems to roll in freely, and the average boy does not realize the value of it. This is the real evil of gate money. No student should have his responsibility in money matters destroyed by the undermining and agreeable process of spending unlimited means easily obtained. The correction is found in the graduate treasurer, and in a committee responsible for the collection of money and for the sale of tickets. By holding team captains and undergraduate managers to rules laid down by a committee, and relieving them of all money that comes in, reckless expenditure is at least checked. At the same time, income and expenditure should be reduced by common agreement among colleges.

One of the largest items in the yearly budget is for training, which requires trainers, coachers, physicians, rubbers, and a special diet. The fundamental cause of the employment of doctors is that the men are undergoing preparation for extraordinary effort, and extraordinary risk. The heart has to be examined, and those who develop weakness rejected. Then, too, young men who are nearing the end of a season are said to be “on edge,” when the nervous system is on the verge of a breakdown. The services of physicians are most necessary in football.

The trainer is usually a man who supervises the food and the general relation of the students to exercise, very much as a nurse looks after a patient, or as a mother tends a family of children. He is often, especially if goodtempered and straight, a very useful man. On the other hand, if suspicious and jealous of his reputation as a skillful manipulator of muscle, he is likely to set rival teams by the ears, and to exert his influence toward the worst kind of jockeying. He seldom possesses the ideals that should prevail in a college atmosphere. His introduction into sports springs probably from the difficulty of getting practical advice from the doctors. Their experience has usually been with sick men, and with the remedial methods necessary to cure the sick. When confronted with the problem of taking care of well men, they seem to fail. There is no telling what a man’s nerves will do under stress of emergency, and a good judgment of character is generally superior to a knowledge of anatomy. That there is much to be learned, however, is shown by the many disastrous failures of overtrained teams. The best training seems to be in a natural and regular life, with common sense applied to the choice of food, and great temperance in the use of alcohol and tobacco.

Another large item of expense is in traveling between colleges. A number of substitutes and advisers are often carried along, as, for instance, in a recent game requiring eleven men about sixty formed the squad whose traveling expenses were paid by the management. It is like moving a theatre troupe. The engagements are made six months ahead, and scheduled games have to be played on the hour, regardless of expense.

How far intercollegiate sports have demonstrated their permanent value as part of a college education is still a matter of opinion. They must be judged in the end by their effect upon character. If they can be made to teach selfcontrol and manliness to a large number of students without a sacrifice of the regular classroom work, they are worth keeping and assisting. The present evidence is, on the whole, favorable, although there is nothing to show that outdoor games wholly within the confines of each university would not accomplish as much. The intercollegiate feature is the main cause of the great publicity and of the numerous disputes.

There is no doubt of the false perspective which on account of this publicity athletics assume in the eyes of every schoolboy. A boy preparing for college once explained the situation to me. “I must learn baseball and football. It doesn’t make any difference how poorly I pass the examinations, so long as I get through. That has nothing to do with my career in college. If I can play football I amount to something immediately after I get in. What is the good of the other things, if I don’t amount to anything? ” This theory of the case will not produce scholars or enlightened citizens, and it is upon this issue that the case must be worked out,

Ira N. Hollis.