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Even had Briggs and Ellis been inclined to "show up" their hazers, they knew too well the fate that would await such a pair of plebes at the hands of the cadet corps. "That shows how easily a suspicious man's eyes may deceive him," mused Lieutenant Topham as he walked along. Kelton now allowed his gaze to follow the retreating O.C., while the yearlings in the tent stood in dazed silence.
"Speaking of that," continued Anstey, wheeling about, "have any of you fellows run into real hazing as yet?" "Not I," replied Prescott, with a shake of his head. "Nor I," added Greg. "It's a shame that we should be expected to put up with any such nonsense," growled Cadet Dodge belligerently. "Who are the yearlings that they should feel at liberty to rub our noses in the mud!
The garb of the cowboy is now one of white alkali which hangs gray in his eyebrows and moustache. Steers bellow as they surge to and fro. Cows charge on their persecutors. Fleet yearlings break and run for the open, pursued by men who care not how or where they ride. We have spoken in terms of the past. There is no calf round-up of the open range today.
If you got a lady's goat, you want to keep it. 'Course, later on, I can kind o' slack up. Then I'm goin' to learn her to read American, and she can read that piece in the paper about me. I reckon that'll kind of cinch up the idea that her husband sure is the real thing. But I got to have them cows till she can learn to read." "We've got to brand a few yearlings that got by last round-up.
Yet all the young men seemed to thrive in their life of hard work and outdoor air. Hazing was proceeding merrily, so far as some of the yearlings were concerned. Perhaps half of the class in all engaged in two or more real hazings through the summer. A few of the third classmen became almost inveterate hazers.
Edwin was looking at a small herd of wild horses which had come down on the hard sand. There were at least twenty of them, young colts and yearlings and mares, led by a beautiful stallion which stood in the foam at the edge of the surf, with arched neck and bright wild eyes, sniffing the salt air from off the sea. "What is it?" Granser queried. "Horses," was the answer.
"Now, I've just been talking with a young cit. fellow, who's visiting one of the officers on post," continued Anstey. "He tells me that, every year, some of the yearlings slyly waylay a plebe whenever they can catch him pacing on number three post late at night." "What do they do to him?" questioned Prescott. "Oh, they don't do a thing to him, I reckon," drawled the Virginian.
As was almost certain to happen, one of the yearlings heard Dodge sounding his trumpet of brag. That yearling, on the other side of a tent wall, grinned, and presently took counsel with other yearlings. It was almost at the stroke of taps that night when Bert Dodge marched from guard tent with the relief under Cadet Corporal Hasbrouck.
"Hell!" ejaculated Bud forcefully. "Yuh sure about that, Pop?" "Sartain sure," nodded the old man. "One of their men, Bronc Tippets, was over here last night an' told me. Said their yearlings is dyin' off like flies." "That sure is mighty hard luck," remarked Jessup as they rode out of town. "I'm glad this outfit ain't any nearer."
The graduates had departed, and the furlough men were away at their homes. A new squad of plebes had been admitted to the school, and the yearlings, mad with joy at being released from plebedom themselves, were trying every scheme their fertile brains could devise for making miserable the lives of their successors.
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