doesn't return soon, Bannister's chances of the Championship are gone."

"As Theophilus says," responded the gloomy Beef, "we just can't get used
to his not being here. We miss his good-nature, his sunny smile, the jolly
crowds in his cozy quarters--why, the campus is talking of nothing but
Hicks--and I don't know what Bannister will do after Hicks graduates--shut
down, I suppose!"

"Well, you know," grinned the Phillyloo Bird, his cadaverous structure
humped over like a turkey on the roost, "our Hicks hath sallied forth on
the trail of a full-back, a Hercules who will smash the other elevens to
infinitesimal smithereens! He told the squad to just leave it to Hicks,
so don't be surprised if he is making flying trips to Yale, Harvard, and
Princeton, striving to corral some embryo Ted Coy. Remember how Hicks often
fulfills his rash prophecies!"

"A Herculean full-back--Bah!" fleered Butch, for all the campus knew of
T. Haviland Hicks, Jr.'s, extremely rash vow to unearth a "phenom." "The
truth of it is, fellows. Hicks has failed to locate such a wonder as Coach
Corridac outlined, for there ain't no such animal! He doesn't like to
come back to Bannister without having made good his promise, without that
Gargantuan giant he vowed to round up for the Gold and Green."

Just then, as if to substantiate Butch's jeering statement, a youth wearing
the uniform and cap of The Western Union Telegraph Company and
advancing across the campus at that terrific speed always exhibited by
messenger-boys, appeared in the offing. Periscoping the four Seniors on the
fence, he navigated his course accordingly and pulling a yellow envelope
from his cap, he queried, in charmingly chaste English: