t of the game kept rising up like Banquo's ghost to make them
uncomfortable. But they had redeemed that so royally in the final half
as to silence the most captious critic.

Moreover, they had come through that crucial contest in good shape.
There had been no serious accident to weaken the team. The injuries to
Ellis and Caldwell were only trivial and in a week they would be as well
as ever. Of course there were minor wounds and bruises galore, but they
were incident to the hardening process and were of no consequence.

The mere fact that they had won, satisfying as it was, counted for
little compared with the enormous benefit of the game in welding the
team together. It had taken eleven stars and molded them into a team. No
individual brilliancy, however great, can atone for the lack of team
work. To-day they had tested each other, supported each other, played
into each other's hands, forgotten that they were anything but parts of
one great, smoothly moving, swiftly running machine. And, having so
tested his fellows, each one would play with the confidence and
self-forgetfulness that alone can win a championship.

For all these reasons, it was a very hilarious bunch that foregathered
in the dressing rooms and tumbled into their clothes, after the soothing
ministrations of shower and rubdown.

"I guess we're poor, eh, old top," chuckled Tom, as he poked Bert in the
ribs.

"Ouch," responded that worthy, "haven't I been punched enough to-day
without you soaking me? I'm black and blue all over."

"I don't wonder," put in Dick. "The way that big McAlpin lammed into you
was a crime. He piled on me in one of the scrimmages, and I thought the
Flatiron building had fallen."

"He's a tough bird, all right," said Drake, "but he ran up against a
tougher one when he tried to go through Bert for that last down in the
second quarter. I never saw anything prettier than the way Bert flung
him back as though he had been a lightweight. I caught the bewildered
look on his face as he went over. He didn't know for a minute what had
hit him."

"It was the only thing that saved us from being scored on," said
Martin. "It's the tightest place we've been in so far this season."

"Well, a miss is as good as a mile," said Bert, slipping on his coat.
"But hurry up, you fellows, and let us tackle some eats. I'm so hungry
that it hurts."

He had struck a responsive chord and in a few minutes they were on their
way to the mess hall of the