With Mask and Mitt

swiftly through its short channel. The present soon becomes the past, the past is soon forgotten. While the hero of to-day enjoys the sunshine of popularity, fondly imagining him

ories are ever beginning while t

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ylvania were eagerly discussing plans for the next school year. They had sent to various institutions for catalogues; with the catalogues had arrived circulars, pictures, and letters. But catalogues and pictures are at best but lifeless things; they suggest many questions and answer few. A far better persuader is an enthusiastic

not long manifested an intense ambition to go beyond the bounds of the Terryville High School for his education. He was a light-hearted, quick-witted, intelligent fellow, easy-going and friendly, generally liked in town and liking to be liked. H

ay, a miniature baseball centre. The standard of play in Terryville was high. Mike McLennan, the famous professional, had once pitched on a Terryville nine; and Mike, when he was at home, took an

holly desirable patron for his son. While he did not object to the boy's learning what the expert had to teach, he distinctly discouraged an intimacy which would expose him to questionable ass

Ned as naturally as if they had been born neighbors with only a low fence and a few years' differ[Pg 5]ence in age between them. The boy hailed the ball player as Mike, chatted with him on the street corners, and listened, credulous and admiring, to all the tales of great deeds on the diamond—McLennan bragged like a Homeric he

tizens of Terryville will recall, while the "spit-ball" was still in harmless infancy, and only a few master pitchers were experimenting with it secretly, before the newspapers had seized upon t

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s privilege. On eight afternoons the lad faced the professional's fire, guessed at the sweep of his curves, and bravely struggled to grip the ball. There were times when the man pitched at his amateur catcher as if he held the latter responsible for his enforced vacation. The balls came hissing hot, now a high jump that he had to reach for, now a vicious sweep toward his feet, now a wide out that threw him off his balance, now a straight, swift

d received directly. It was McLennan who showed him how to snap the ball down to second. The theory only he owed to the veteran; his mastery of the trick was due to his own long and diligent practice. It was not a very swift

e out, worried him badly. He could usually put the ball where it was wanted even when a failure to do so meant passing a man; but he possessed a strange faculty for trying the wrong ball. It was here that Owen's good sense and cool head served the pair. Owen knew by instinct what kind of a ball promised most

tion of the opportunities of the school with seductive pictures of school life and sport and joyous[Pg 9] fellowship. To the general ambition of the young American to make the most of his life was added the particular ambition of the natural ball player for a wider field for his genius. When Mr. Carle hesitated at the e

ertain quickness of perception and facility of expression combined with a memory at least temporarily retentive, he possessed what boys usually consider the most important elements of scholarship. Of industry, the great and fund

le's doubts. By midsummer the question was settled. Among the one hundred and twenty-three trunks distributed by