"Now," continued the Athletic Association President, "we decided to keep this new ruling a secret until the present, for this reason: Many good football and baseball players, not making the first teams, lack the loyalty to stick on the scrubs, and others, not as brilliant, but with more college spirit, give their best until the season's end. We knew that if we announced this rule last fall, several slackers, who had quit the squad, would come out again, just on the hope of getting sent into the Ballard game, for their B. This would not be fair to those who loyally stuck to the scrubs. So we did not announce the rule until the year closed, and then a practically unanimous vote of the students made the rule effective from September 25. So--all athletes who took part in the Ballard football game, last fall, for any period of time whatsoever, are eligible for the gold B, and the same, as regards the green letter, applies to the Ballard baseball game this spring." T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., gasped. Slowly, the glorious truth dawned on the happy-go-lucky Senior--he had been sent into the Bannister-Ballard football game; the crucial and deciding play had turned on him, hence he had won his gold letter! And thanks to his brilliant "mismanaging" of the nine, losing shortstop Skeet Wigglesworth and the substitutes, he had played the entire nine innings of the Ballard-Bannister baseball contest, and, therefore, was eligible for his green B. In a dazed condition, he heard Dad Pendleton saying: "You remember how T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., was sent into the Ballard game, and how the fake-play fooled Ballard, who believed he would try a drop-kick? Well, knowing Hicks to be eligible for his football B, we planned a surprise party. The Advisory Board kept the new rule a secret, and not until this week was it voted on. Then, the required two-thirds majority made it effective from last September--we managed to have Hicks absent from the voting, and the fellows helped us with our surprise! So instead of Mr. Thomas Haviland Hicks, Sr., presenting his son with one B, that for track work, we are glad to hand him _three_ letters, one for football, one for baseball, and one for track, to give our own T. Haviland Hicks, Jr. And, let me add, he can accept them with a clear conscience, for when the rule was made by the Advisory Board, we had no idea that Hicks would ever be eligible in football or baseball." A moment of silence, and then undergraduates and alumni, thrilled at Dad Pendleton's announcement, arose in a body, and howled for T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., and his beloved Dad. Mr. Hicks, unable to speak, silently placed the three monograms, gold, green, and white, in his son's hands, and placed his own on the shoulders of that sunny-souled Senior, who for once in his heedless career could not say a word! "What's the matter with Hicks?" Big Butch Brewster roared, and a terrific response sounded: "He's all right! Hicks! Hicks! Hicks!"