News

Cambridge Residents Slam Council Proposal to Delay Bike Lane Construction

News

‘Gender-Affirming Slay Fest’: Harvard College QSA Hosts Annual Queer Prom

News

‘Not Being Nerds’: Harvard Students Dance to Tinashe at Yardfest

News

Wrongful Death Trial Against CAMHS Employee Over 2015 Student Suicide To Begin Tuesday

News

Cornel West, Harvard Affiliates Call for University to Divest from ‘Israeli Apartheid’ at Rally

LEST WE FORGET

NO WRITER ATTRIBUTED

When the last cheer has died, and the shadows of approaching evening cast lengthened palls upon the greensward of the Palmer Stadium, the presses of the great metropolitan dailies will already be pounding out, over and over again, the name of the Hero. Unnoticed in the crowd that rushes for the railroad station, unnoticeable, except that perhaps his felt hat is a little twisted by fingers that itched for the rough surface of a ball, will return the scrub. He has made no sensational tackle beneath the very gallows shadow of the goalpost, he has run back no punts through the very heart of the enemy, he has not heard his name on the tongues of fifty thousand people.

But he has worked for the glory of the team, and he has worked as long as the hero. For hours, beneath the direct rays of a beating sun, and when the rains of November were thrumming a monotonous tattoo on the roof of the baseball cage, he has practised for but one thing: that the Varsity might be great. In return he asks nothing; though, when honor's at the stake, like the heroine of almost any novel, he has been ready always to "go the whole way."

Toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing, the scrub fights his way through an unlighted life, and labors only that another may hear the cheers, that another may have his name listed among the immortals. Beneath the whiplash tongue of professional coaches he has never failed to bend his back to the oar, parrying thrusts till the beads of sweat stood out on his bosom. But when earth's last picture is painted, and the tubes are twisted and dried, there need be little sympathy for this graduate of the school of hard Knox. The name of the Blackshirt will lead all the rest.

Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter.

Tags