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 up his work. Other rules are designed with no other purpose than to keep the freshman in his proper place in the fraternity household, and work no direct harm against him. If the rules are at all sensible, therefore, I think it right that whenever the freshman fails in his duties, or when he does things which the fraternity forbids, he must take his spanking, or whatever other form of 'horse play' the fraternity uses."

If this man's logic were to be accepted then only those initiates who had been derelict should be subjected to the unpleasant experiences of the preliminary initiation. If there are ever differences made, however, they are so slight as not to be recognized. The boisterous fellow is put through the torture because he is fresh, and the shy bashful boy is beaten to wake him up and to put a little life into him. The theory reminds me vividly of the methods of a quack physician whom I once knew. He had only one remedy. He might vary the dose or the directions slightly to suit different conditions, but whoever came to him for treatment, no matter from what disease he might be suffering, got the same medicine. The patients sometimes died, of course, but that might have been true had they not gone to him.

I quote, also, from a third letter:

"The purpose of 'horse play,' as I see it, is to test the candidates for initiation for those desirable