“The following stories were picked up by me,” says Johnny, “through the course of college years, and after.  Some of the incidents I have actually witnessed, of others my brothers have told me, when we talked over Princeton victories and defeats with the reasons for both, and still others I have heard from the lips of Princeton men as they grew reminiscent sitting around the cozy fireplace in the Trophy room at the Varsity Club House, with the old footballs, the scores of many a hard fought Princeton victory emblazoned upon them, and the banners with the names of the members of the winning teams thereon inscribed looking down from their places on the walls and ceilings.”

How the undergraduates long to have their names enrolled on the victorious banner, knowing that they will be looked up to by future college generations of the sons of Old Nassau!

These old banners have much the same effect upon Princeton teams as did the name of Horatius upon the young Romans’!

    And still his name sounds strong unto the men of Rome,
    As a trumpet blast which calls to them to charge the Volsian home;
    And wives still pray to Juno for boys with hearts as bold
    As his who kept the bridge so well
    In the brave days of old.

Well do they know that Mother Princeton is not chary of her praise, when she knows that they have planted her banner on the loftiest tower of her enemies’ stronghold.

The evenings spent in the Trophy room, the Grill Room of the Princeton Inn and in the hallways around a cheerful fire of the numerous Princeton clubs make me think of nights in the Mess room of crack British regiments, so graphically described by Kipling.

The general public cannot understand the seriousness with which college athletes take the loss of an important game.  There is a Princeton football Captain who was so broken up over a defeat by Yale that, months after on the cattle range of New Mexico, as he lay out at night on his cow-boy bed and thought himself unobserved, he fell to sobbing as if his heart would break.

A football victory to many men is as dearly longed for as any goal of ambition in life.  How else would they strive so fiercely, one side to take the ball over, the other to prevent them doing so!

Very few of the public hear the exhortation and cursing as the ball slowly but irresistibly is rushed to the goal of the opponent.

“Billy, if you do that again I’ll cut your heart out!”

“Yale, if you ever held, hold now!”

How the calls to victory come back!

As Hughes says in Tom Brown’s School Days, a scrimmage in front of the goal posts, or the Consulship of Plancus, is no child’s play.

My earliest Princeton football hero was Alex Moffat ’84.  My brother Johnson was in his class and played on the same team, and would often talk of him to my brothers and to me.  He used to give us a sort of