the heart of a boy, in all the glory and youth of his strength, a few

pefore
anette $e -bite- -b-hne- =e2en he strides out on the athletic arena and

matches his brute strength, skill, wits and brain with his opponents
‘on the other team.

Berton Braley in 1912 wrote "The Half Back". It is my
opinion that he has perhaps described the reaction of our scholastic

half back better than most any man I know.

"When the stands are black with people, and they yell, yell, yell,
When the whistle shrills the signal for the start,

‘Then the spirit sort of grips me in a potent spell,
And the blood goes dancing swiftly through my heart."

"And the rooters are forgotten with their flags and all,

And the i of battle pulses through my frame,
And there isn't anything worth the having but that “old pigskin ball,
And there isn't any glory but the game."

"Is there anything that thrills you with a zest more keen —
S Than to spill the interference in a pile,
Or to throw the runner earthward with a tackle clean,

Or to gather in a punt in proper style?"

"There's the thump of men colliding. There's the thud of feet,
There's the play that starts as sudden as the flame,

‘There's the grit that knows no quitting and won 't be beat,
They're all a part and parcel of the game."

"It's the game of Anglo-Saxons. It's the hard old stuff.
. It's the horror of the timid and the tame.
‘And calls for men of daring and of fibre tough
Who are worthy of a chance to play the game."

"Rumple ‘em! Crumple ‘em! Never twice the same
Keep forever on the jump and play the game."

When the more zestful days are over and we drift into the
quietude of middie or later life, we like to turn to the pages of
the "Prayer of a Sportsman", writtearby Berton Braley in 1919 - in
which he said - - - :