At the top of the football scoreboards of ten years or so ago there appeared these two words in huge letters: "harvard - opponents." To-day the lettering runs: "harvard - visitors." The same change has been made at Yale and Princeton and at other institutions East and West. A change small in itself, but unmistakable proof of the new order of things and the progress of a better feeling among the great football institutions. The first institution to change the scoreboard lettering came in for a deal of good-natured guying, and certain of the old-timers called the proceeding "soft." To be fair, to be courteous, in football, however, is no longer considered "soft." There is still a long way to travel in order to reach the ideal condition, but the progress has been steady.

little by little the general public has come to look not for the old cartoonist's idea of the football player - a gladiator in armor - but an athlete playing the moat exacting of college games, an athlete prepared to undergo with honor the severest test to which sportsmanship can be put. Personal physical contact in any game stirs in any manly man worthy the name the old fighting spirit, and there were games in the old days when the players "saw red."

That sort of thing is rare nowadays. There are plenty of hard knocks, to be sure, and the game is still rough, as it always will be, but out-and-out slugging, tripping, falling on a man's head or "kneeing" him in the soft part of the lower leg have all but disappeared from the game. The rules against this sort of thing are more severe than they used to be, the officials are quicker to note offenses, for there is team work among the officials too, and the game has been so frequently under the fire of outside criticism that its supporters have done their utmost to curb lawless play. This granted, I believe that the general sentiment both among the players and the graduate and undergraduate bodies has had a great deal to do with "cleaning up" the sport.

Time was when the player was led to believe that the man who was to be his opponent in the big game concealed under his uniform both horns and a tail. Two utter strangers came face to face on the field before a crowd of 10,000 or more and fought each other to a finish, by fair means if possible, but too often by foul. Not that there were not good sportsmen in those days, not that the football field was not the scene of more than one generous action - merely that the sportsmanship was spasmodic. And there were years, too, in which two whole teams went at each other hammer and tongs - simply "beat each other up." Then came charge and countercharge, and not infrequently the severance of all athletic relations between two ancient rivals. It followed that the two teams could not get together again until each university was equipped with a new set of undergraduates and the hatchet could be decently buried.

Nowadays there are still quarrels and cross-charges of rough play, but they are not lasting and they do not cause the tremendous upheavals in the college world they used to do. There are signs of permanent health in football, and the lapses from virtue here and there only serve to accentuate the general good feeling. The players of to-day are too absorbed in the business of learning the intricacies of a much more difficult game than of old to have any time to devote to undue roughness and personal rancor, and so great is the demand for personal efficiency that the player cannot afford to waste any of his precious energy in "rough house," even if so inclined. The big games are usually "clean," even if the lesser ones cannot go scot free of criticism.'

Granted that splendid progress has been made it is worth while making an organized effort to guarantee further progress in years to come. In this the National Collegiate Athletic Association, organized under another name in a time of stress, and in old-fashioned football opinion foredoomed to failure, has led the way. This organization has brought together representatives of football institutions all over the country, and as a result of the free interchange of opinion and a great deal of courageous truth-telling, has been able to wield a tremendous influence for good in football as well as in other sports. Even tie schoolboys have been reached to some extent, and although the organization seeks no power it has done splendid work. Perhaps the very fact that it sought no power was the reason of its

I refer to this association principally to show that the cure for whatever ill remains in football lies not so much in legislation as in force of opinion, and opinion from the "inside."

Some of this "inside" opinion might well be brought to bear on the relations between the collegian and the schoolboy. These relations ought to be closer than they have been and they ought to be on a higher plane. Too often the collegian has appeared at the school only to look over the football team and induce its more promising members to enter his own university. Too often "inducements" of one sort or another have been offered, and too often the schoolboy goes up to the university with an exaggerated opinion of his own prowess and importance only to do harm to himself and to the university. Since freshmen are no longer eligible to varsity football teams the evil has dwindled noticeably, but certain of the smaller colleges are still in the ranks of the offenders.

Another great bar to the old form of proselyting is the advance in scholastic requirements. It takes a good student nowadays to stay on the football team, and yet the average collegian has made no organized effort to advise the schoolboy of that fact. He might name man after man, if he would, who is well up in his class and who plays football well largely because he does everything well. It seems not to have occurred to the 'varsity football man to go before his old school and tell the boys about the serious business of the university, omitting all reference to football. If he were to do so there would be fewer cases of schoolboy athletes who are willing to play on the team of any institution they may be sure of entering and remaining in without hard work.

There are earnest and capable students on most of the big elevens, but how many who might have made the team and at the same time have been valuable members of the undergraduate body have been lost by the wayside, simply because when schoolboys they were made to believe that athletic proficiency would make up for ordinary scholarship To put it even from the viewpoint of the coach - of what value to the team in the end is the man who is always in difficulties with the college office? And the pity of it is that such a man might never have been in such difficulties had he only been warned in time. The larger preparatory schools understand this thing better than they used to, and they are m closer touch with the collegian who is at once athlete and student, but apparently no helping hand, save in rare instances, has been held out to the smaller schools where the need is great, and also immediate. It is a mistake to suppose that the schoolboy will not listen to the college athlete on any subject other than athletics. On the contrary he is sufficiently impressed with the collegian's reputation to give respectful attention to his discourse whether it be on Calculus or intensive farming. The football may come later.

It is to the interests of the college athlete that the "prep" school boys who come up to the university be well prepared. It is the only absolute safeguard against the revival of ancient feuds with the faculty, and the only guarantee of thorough co-operation between the faculty and the athletic heads. Committees are all well enough in their way, but committees are not human, while individual members of them are. The faculty member with the "grouch" against athletics is well known. I do not think, however, that he is a permanent institution, but rather the fruit of the agelong misunderstanding between what used to be called the "high brow" and the "low brow" elements. I have spoken elsewhere of the increasing dignity of the professional coach and of his responsibilities in the practical outdoor guardianship of the candidates for the teams. With the increasing importance of the general playground idea at all the universities there will be more of these men in demand. I do not seek to maintain that all of them should be connected with the faculty in one form or another, but he is a short-sighted professor or instructor who fails to recognize the value of the newcomer's work.

The problem of maintaining harmony between what in the past were warring elements differs at different institutions, and each must work out the problem in its own way. The main point is that there must be the disposition to get together.

A great many faculty men have complained from time to time that those who were connected with sports occupied the lime lightwith too great frequency, although their complaints were couched in loftier language. The sponsors of athletics, however, have never sought to deny them a hearing. Let them be publicists if they will, only let them spend some time and more than the customary care in a study of the subject. Their opinions will be welcomed, just as the National Collegiate Athletic Association has welcomed opinions on athletic welfare from any quarter whatsoever. Football, in greater need than any other sport of intelligent and constructive criticism, has been beset with vastly more of the other kind.

College football I believe to be a permanent American institution, and every man who will may have a share in building it up and keeping it on a high plane, whether player, coach, student, teacher or spectator. This particular "slice of life" is worth every man's while.