countenance grim, and his jaw set. "Not for five years has a Gold and Green
team won the Championship--not since the year before Butch and I were
Freshmen! We've got a splendid bunch of material to build a team with,
and--"

"Our biggest problem is this," spoke Coach Corridan, as with a phenomenal
display of strength he took Beef McNaughton between thumb and forefinger
and placed him on the field. "We must strengthen both line and backfield,
for we lost by graduation Babe McCabe, Heavy Hughes, and Jack Merritt. Now,
to replace that lost power--"

Just then, from directly beneath the open window by which they had
gathered, like the midnight serenade of a romantic lover, sounded
the well-known foghorn voice of T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., as to the
plunkety-plunk of a banjo accompaniment, he warbled melodiously:

"Gone are the days--I used to spend with Car-o-li-nah!
She had the sunshine in her laughter (plunkety-plunk)
Just like that state they named her after--"

"Hicks!" announced Butch, stealthily approaching the window, and
beckoning his companions. "Easy--look at him, Deke, there he is, Hicks,
the irrepressible! We might as well attempt to stab a rhinocerous to death
with a humming-bird's feather, as to try and reform him!"

Arrayed like a lily of the field, a model of sartorial splendor, Hicks
occupied a chair beneath the window, tilted back gracefully against the
side of the grub-shack. He had decked his splinter-structure with a
dazzling Palm Beach suit, and a glorious pink silk shirt, off-set by a
lurid scarf. A Panama hat decorated his head, white Oxfords and flamboyant