“A good many of the cases of accident in the newspapers are fakes,” said Ware; “the dead man is attending recitations the next morning. Most of the real accidents happen to absolute greenhorns—fellows playing for the first time, without the slightest knowledge of the rudiments of the game,—and it’s almost always off in some remote place where they don’t know much about football, not in the centres where the game has been going on for a long time.” “Put those things down,” said Laughlin to the last speaker. “You act as secretary, Dan.” “There are some accidents in games where little, young fellows are played against heavy teams,” said Poole; “but that’s the fault of the management.” “None of these conditions are found here,” commented Laughlin, “and as a result we don’t have accidents of any account. Got that down, Dan?” “There’s one thing you’ve forgotten,” suggested Wolcott. “There are the accidents that come from foul play.” “Dirty football!” ejaculated Laughlin. “That’s true; but we shan’t have that in the game with Hillbury.” “Put it down, just the same,” said Poole. “Let’s give him all the facts.” “Now about the newspaper stories,” said Ware, looking up after a few minutes of scribbling, during which he had translated “dirty football” into terms less concise but more comprehensible to Mr. Lindsay. “Wouldn’t it be well to send him Walter Camp’s investigations of football accidents reported in the newspapers, and those figures that a Western college professor[1] got out? I have them both somewhere.” ----- Footnote 1: Professor Edwin Grant Dexter, of the University of Illinois, in the _Educational Review_, April, 1903. ----- “That’s good,” said Laughlin, “and give him a good straight statement of this poor chap’s condition. Collins said to-day he never saw a fellow thrive on the game like Lindsay. Gaining all the time, aren’t you, Wolcott?” Wolcott nodded without a smile. His heart was wholly with the arguments, but that they would prove effective he had little hope. He knew well the strength of his father’s convictions, the honesty and sincerity of his desire to do the best possible for his only son. He could hardly be imagined as yielding to the arguments and sentiments of a lot of boys. “Who’ll explain about that slap in the head and taking him out of the Harvard Second game?” asked Ware. “I’ll do that,” said Laughlin, “in my part.”