The Yale Letter.

To the Editors of the Harvard Crimson:

Interest in athletics at Yale, which has been dormant since the final games of football were played early in December, is revived by the opening of the rowing season. In response to Captain Armstrong's call, twenty-one men presented themselves as candidates for the university crew, and over fifty for the freshman. The work of the six members of last year's crew, who are now in training, will be very light at first, principally running and calisthenics. The rest of the candidates, including all of the '97 freshman eight, row daily in the tank, but their work will also be lighter than usual, this being the policy of all the athletic managements this year. The temporary captain of the freshman crew, E. H. Brewer '97 S., has had experience in rowing at St. Paul's School, as have many of the other candidates. The outlook is that both crews will be up to the usual standard, but experience has shown that it is impossible to forecast with any degree of accuracy so early in the season.

It is expected that the new candidates for the athletic team will begin preliminary work within a week. Baseball training will be deferred to a much later date than usual, and contrary to a custom of some years standing, the services of a professional coach will be dispensed with this spring.

The initial number of the Alumni Weekly for 1895 appeared in a new and enlarged form on Tuesday. It has been increased from four to eight pages, and a graduate, L. S. Welch '89, has been added to the board of editors, which before consisted of undergraduates only. The policy of the paper will not be materially changed, but its scope will be broader, and it is hoped that it will serve as a closer bond than ever between the alumni and their alma mater.

A radical change in the system of ranking the members of the academic freshman class was instituted at the beginning of the present term. Hitherto the entire class has been ranked on the basis of scholarship, but after a careful consideration of the question, the Faculty have decided to put a new plan in operation. By it the class is divided into three sections each of which is further subdivided into three divisions, the first of which contains the high-stand men, the other two being arranged on a purely alphabetical basis. While the method just adopted is somewhat of an experiment, and may in its turn be modified or discarded, the principle on which it is based - the recognition of scholarship to the fullest possible degree - would seem to point to its permanent adoption for the freshman, and its ultimate extension to the sophomore class.

The present term witnesses the greatest social event of the year at Yale - the Junior Promenade. The class germans, receptions and other festivities of the week begin on Monday and end with the Junior Prom., on Wednesday night. The '96 committee have exerted themselves to out-do their predecessors and it is safe to predict that they will succeed. A commendable change is the initiative taken by the committee in checking the tendency toward extravagance. The marked reduction in the price of boxes and the lowering of other expenses stand as a precedent that will doubtless be followed in the future.

THE YALE NEWS.