Harvard has long contented itself with a legendary mascot to avoid the embarrassment of a physical one. The symbolized figure of John Harvard, which the newspapers have invented to fill this vacancy, exists only on the sport page. He is no more than a paper-and-ink-cartoon.
Since the time of John the Orangeman, Harvard's lack of a mascot has been a cause of satisfaction rather than regret. The college has not had to feel responsible for the silly antics of mascots in the Stadium. Nothing makes a team appear more completely foolish than to have its mascot insist on turning somersaults in mid-field during the tensest moments of a game.
While other colleges were adopting an entire menagerie of appropriate animals, Harvard remained aloof and chaste, refusing parentage even of so mild a nature. Yale became big brother to a bull pup; Princeton mothered a tiger; but Harvard was father only to the gentle wish that some day this foolishness might cease.
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