CHAPTER XXII.
BEFORE THE BATTLE.
"Harwell, Harwell, Harwell! Rah-rah-rah, Rah-rah-rah, Rah-rah-rah, Harwell!" The lobby grew empty on the instant, and outside on the steps and on the sidewalk the crowd spread itself.

The procession had just turned the corner, the college band leading.
"The freshmen won!" cried a voice on the edge of the throng, and the news was passed along from man to man until it swept up the steps, through the lobby and to the dining room upstairs where the football men of the Varsity team were impatiently awaiting lunch.

"A good omen," said the head coach.
Below in the street admonitory thumps upon the great drum, with its college coat-of-arms on the head, were heard, and a moment later the shouts of the exuberant freshmen and their allies were drowned in the first strains of the college song.

Off came the silk hats of the frock-coated graduates and the plaided golf caps of the students, and side by side there in the sun-swept street they lifted their voices in the sweet, measured strains of the dear familiar hymn.

And stout, placid-faced men of fifty, with comfortable bank accounts and incipient twinges of gout, felt the unaccustomed dimming of the sight that presages tears, and boyish, carefree students, to whom the song was as much an everyday affair as D marks and unpaid bills, felt strange stirrings in their breasts, and with voices that stumbled strangely over the top notes sang louder and louder.