All day yesterday the most exaggerated rumors were flying about the college concerning the management of the sale of tickets for the Yale game, and it is due to all parties that an exact statement of the facts in the case be made. In the first place there was ignorance as the exact number of seats put on sale and as to the reasons why more seats were not offered. Of the 4,500 seats on the Harvard side of the field, 1,000 were exacted by the municipal authorities of Springfield before a permit for the game would be issued; 1050 were reserved by the men who have played on the first and second elevens and by those who have been closely identified with the team; 350 were sent to the Harvard Club of New York, and the remaining 2100 were put on sale in Cambridge.

With regard to the 1050 seats reserved by the players it should be said that many of them went to graduates prominently identified with athletics and the college life. Still it was unquestionably a mistake to allow the foot ball players to reserve as many seats as they chose. The players are entitled to a reasonable number of tickets, but some of them on this occasion abused the privilege extended to them. The manager of the eleven realized this, but only when it was too late to help the matter.

As for the method followed in disposing of the 2100 ticket placed on sale yesterday morning, the criticism of it has been anything but temperate. The plan of issuing extra orders to those who offered adequate reason was not an entire success perhaps, but it worked much better than anyone would admit yesterday. It prevented the speculators from securing any considerable number of seats and distributed the tickets among the students as effectually as any other method which has been tried. Orders for extra tickets were given only after an assurance that they represented several undergraduates or graduates and would not speculate with the tickets. The highest order issued was to a party of graduates who wanted forty-six seats. There were no other orders for more than forty seats, and only eight altogether for more than twenty five. The orders were issued with strict impartiality, and were given largely in a spirit of accommodation. It is fairly safe to say that if the extra orders had not been issued there would have been just as big as howl because they were not as there is now because they were.

The whole trouble lies in the fact that the grand stand is not large enough to enable every man in college to have a good seat rather than in the method of selling the seats. And this difficulty is one not easily obviated. It is a pleasant thing to talk about seeing that every man in college is provided with one seat. But half the men in college don't want to be provided with one seat, they want enough seats to be able to take their friends, and they are just selfish enough to be satisfied with nothing else. Moreover, the responsibility of 'varsity managers is not to the undergraduates alone, but to the graduates. One of the mistakes of this year's management is that it has considered the graduates too little. We grumble because we did not get better tickets and more of them; but the Boston graduates have no tickets whatever except the few they secured at yesterday's sale and the few they will get through friends in college. A little later, when some of those who are most disgusted with the foot ball management now have worked themselves into a more cheerful mood, perhaps they will be willing to see things in a slightly different light. Then they may be interested to know that the Yale manager was forced to give the Springfield authorities 1350 tickets while our own manager got off for 1000, and thus was able to put 2100 grand stand tickets on sale here as against less than 1800 at Yale.