diron we won't show you any mercy, and
we know that we shall receive none from you. Each man must do all that's
possibly in him for the glory of his own side of the United Service!
Here's to the better eleven--Army or Navy!"

"I'll bet Dick and Greg will give us all the tussle they know how, if
they get near us in the fight," nodded Dan, passing the letter back.

"Well, they're bound to, aren't they?" demanded Darrin. "And now, Danny
boy, we simply must stow all gab and get busy with our lessons. We've a
recitation between now and the afternoon practice."

"And the game, to-morrow!" breathed Midshipman Dalzell fervently.

The morrow's game was to be against the University of Pennsylvania
eleven. The opposition team being an unusually good one that year, the
Navy's gridiron pets were preparing to strain every nerve in the hope
of victory.

In that afternoon's practice Dave and Dan showed up better than ever.
Farley and Page, too, were coming along splendidly, while Midshipman
Joyce was proving himself all but a joy to exacting Hepson.

But when the morrow came U.P. carried away the game to the tune of five
to nothing, and the Navy goat wept. Dave and Dan made several brilliant
plays, but the Navy average both of size and skill was somewhat below
that of the older, bigger college men.

Other games followed fast now, and the Navy eleven and its subs. had
plenty of work cut out for them. Up to the time of the Army-Navy game,
the middies had a bright slate of eighty per cent. of victories. Dave and
Dan had the pleasure of reading, in the "Army and Navy Journal," that
they were considered the strongest men on the left flank that the Navy
had been, able to show in ten years.

"When we go up against the Army," Hepson informed Dave and Dan, "I don't
know whether you'll play at left or right. It will all depend on where
the Army puts Prescott and Holmes. Friends of ours who have watched the
play at West Point tell me that Prescott and Holmes are armored terrors
on the gridiron."

"They are, if they've gone forward in the game, instead of backward,"
Darrin replied honestly.

"But you and Dalzell can hold 'em, can't you?" demanded Hepson anxiously.

"I don't dare brag," Dave answered. "The truth, if anything, is that
Danny boy and I can hardly hope to hold the Army pair back. You see, Hep,
I know Prescott and Holmes pretty well, from the fact that we played
together on the same High School eleven for two years. Prescott