have a good chance to make points for your class
for the Inter-Class cup. The contest is going to
be very close this year, as all the classes except
the Juniors stand good chances of winning. The
Juniors also will draw no small number of points
so that the paltry one or two points of a second or
third place may decide the fate of the cup. The
mid-winter sports count points, and it is just here
that many classes have lost their hold on the cup
by not taking that fact into account. This year
the competition will be sharp even there as the
classes all recognize the value of points at this
meeting. If you wish to help your class, if you
wish to help your Alma Mater, if you wish to
show the stuff you are made of, come out and train.
Don't leave it till to-morrow or the next
day, but go and consult Prof. Hoskins as soon as
you have read this all too weak and impotent edi
torial.
*
* 1
SINCE the close of the foot-ball season, quite a
good deal of discussion has arisen over sev
eral of the articles of the athletic associa
tion constitution. The one most objected to is
the rule providing for a football committee of five
undergraduates, and the captain and manager as
ex-officio members. The rule depending on this
that the committee shall elect the manager has
also come in for a large share of adverse criticism.
The matter has at least been brought to a head
by the appointing of a committee at the last ath
letic meeting, to formulate amendments and report
as soon as possible. Before we go any further, it
is well to stop and consider just what we want,
and whether the new state of things will be any
better than the old. We acknowledge that elect
ing the manager by popular vote has many good
features and might be a big improvement, but it is
well to go slow. On the other hand, it is doubt
ful if it is a good idea to abolish the committee.
There must necessarily be some substitute for it,
and it is not altogether certain that better results
could be obtained from the other plans which are
THE FREE LANCE.
under consideration. If we trace the trouble
back to its source, we find the whole objection
has arisen on account of the unpleasantness and ill
feeling that existed in the committee during this
past season. Without wishing to condone this de
plorable fact, we would state that it was only a
combination of unfortunate circumstances that
caused the difficulty. Whatever plan is adopted
this trouble is liable to come up again and may
manifest itself in a worse phase. It is therefore
well for us to be conservative in the matter and
take a good long time to think it over before we
act. We have before us the example of the last
baseball season, as well as the football season of '92,
where just the same sort of a committee conducted
a very successful season. It will not pay to be hasty,
and as the season is far in the future, there is plenty
of time to make the necessary change.
SHORTLY after the withdrawal of the Univer
sity of Pennsylvania and Wesleyan from the
intercollegiate football association and the
consequent breaking up of that organization, it be
came quite the fad for the sporting editors of the
great dailies to inveigh against inter-collegiate
leagues, as productive of nothing but strife and ill
feeling. In .their wisdom, they predicted the
gradual dissolution of all leagues and associations,
and return to the good old way of college chal
lenging college at will. They even had the kind
ness and forethought to suggest that colleges form
natural rivalries here and there; depending on
their nearness and community of interest, etc. We
are sure the college world feels very grateful for
this eager solicitude and the kind suggestions of
fered, but we can hardly help thinking that inter
collegiate associations are by no means dead yet.
Nor are they sources of evil. On the contrary,
they promote in almost every case the best inter
ests of college athletics by keeping an iron hand
on any tendency toward professionalism that may
manifest itself, and by establishing especially in
track athletics legal and recognized records which