It is hardly worth while taking up anew the discussion suggested by President Eliot's report as to the matter of college athletics as a training school for "professional" athletics. Very few new suggestions have appeared as a result of the discussion. With the majority of the supporters of college athletics, it is a matter of sincere regret no doubt, that of late years there has been so many cases of the entrance of college athletes into the professional arena. We certainly share in that feeling of regret. And yet there is undoubtedly another side to the question. Professional sports in general have not the reputation of being the most desirable vocation to which an educated gentlemen can devote his energies for the sake of earning a living. And yet the business is not necessarily-need not be a dishonorable one. The case of Ward, cited by the N. Y. Times, is, we believe one in point.

A young man without other resources, but with a talent for base-ball playing, has devoted himself to that business for the last few years for the sake of earning enougn money to pay the expenses of an education. We do not know that the commission of any professional or dishonorable acts has been imputed to Mr. Ward, nor that otherwise his standing as a gentleman has bebn impugned. Doubtless many of the other cases named are much of the same sort. The case of Mr. Bancroft, coach of the Harvard crews, is decidedly inapt for the Times' argument. Why Mr. Bancroft engaged in instructing Harvard students in one branch of athletics, should be pursuing any less respectable calling than Dr. Sargent engaged in instructing the same students in another branch it is difficult to see. Surely the fact that one is employed by the college indirectly, for the benefit of the students, while the other is employed directly by the students themselves, does not make the difference. No, there is professionalism and professionalism, and a distinction must be made so as not to include in one term of reproach all those whose partial or entire vocation is athletics. As a matter of fact it is only in base-ball playing tlrat the tendency has been at all reprehensible, and in many cases in this sport there have been extenuating circumstances.