Page:Ralph Paine--The praying skipper.djvu/124

102 forty men around the board had known the test of the four-mile course, brothers of the oar through nearly two generations of rowing history.

The outcast was able to keep his poise until the Glee Club quartette rose to sing, by special request of the Head Coach, "Jolly Boating Weather." The first tenor had a sweet and sympathetic voice, and he had heard the story of the singing of this song on the float just before the race, wherefore he did the verses uncommonly well.

Then the old fellows, some with grizzled thatches, and some with thatches scant and thin, had their innings and pounded the table to emphasize their harmonious declaration that

The song carried to Hastings was the last straw to break the endurance which had pulled him through the long, long