A freshman, when he first comes up to Oxford, has, as a rule, made up his mind to which particular branch of athletics he intends to devote himself. If he intends to play football, and does not happen to have come up with a great reputation from his public school, he finds it somewhat hard at first, however good he may be, to make himself known; but if he makes up his mind to row, he finds everything cut and dried for him.

At the beginning of the October Term, a notice is put up for the benefit of freshmen and others, that those desirous of being coached must be at the barge on and after a certain day, at 2.30. The coaching is undertaken by any of the college Eight of the preceding term who are in residence, and any others whom the captain of the boat club may consider qualified. The men are taken out at first in tub-pairs or heavy fours; and grotesque, to say the least of it, are the movements of the average freshmen during the first few days of his rowing career. The majority of men who get into a boat for the first time in their lives seem to imagine that it is necessary to twist their bodies into the most uncomfortable and unnatural it positions, and is hard at first to persuade them that the movements of a really good oar are easy, natural, and even graceful. It is not long, however, as a rule, before a considerable improvement becomes manifest, and, at the end of the first fortnight or so of the term, most of the novices have begun to get a grasp of the first principles of the art.

About the end of the second week of the term the freshmen are picked up into Fours. These crews, which row in heavy tub-boats, practise for about three weeks for a race, which is rowed during the fifth or sixth week of the term. After a day or two of rest, the best men from these Fours are taken out in eights. No one who has not rowed in an eight with a crew composed almost entirely of beginners can imagine the discomfort, I might almost say the agony, of these first two or three rows. One of the chief causes of this is that the boats used on such occasions are usually, from motives of economy, very old ones, the riggers being often twisted and bent by the crabs of former generations, and the boats themselves heavy and inclined to be waterlogged.

During the last day or two of the term, the captain, with a view to making up his Torpids for the next term, generally tries to arrange one or two crews selected from the best of the freshmen and such of the old hands as are available; and justly proud is a freshman if, having got into a boat for the first time at the beginning of the term, he finds himself among the select few for the first Torpid at the end of it.

At the beginning of the Lent Term the energies of the college boat clubs are entirely devoted to the selection and preparation of the crews for the Torpids. The smaller colleges have one crew and the larger ones two, and in some cases three, crews each. No one who has rowed in his college Eight in the races of the previous summer is permitted to row in the Torpid, so the crews are generally composed partly of men who rowed in the Torpid of the preceding year, but who were not quite good enough to get into the Eight, and partly of freshmen; the boats used must be clinker built of five streaks, with a minimum beam measurement of 2 ft.

2 in. measured inside, and with fixed seats.

Although I do not propose here to say anything about the general subject of training, I cannot refrain from making one remark. It is in practising for the Torpids that freshmen generally get their first experience of strict training, and for this reason there is no crew more difficult to train than a Torpid. Most of the men after their first experience of regular work have fine healthy appetites, and, as a rule, eat about twice as much as is good for them, with the result that, even if they escape violent indigestion, they are painfully short-winded, and find the greatest difficulty in rowing a fast stroke. The Torpids train for about three weeks before the races, which take place at the end of the fourth and the fifth weeks in term. They last for six nights, and are bumping races, the boats starting 160 ft. apart. A hundred and sixty feet is a very considerable distance to make up in about three quarters of a mile, and at the head of a division a crew must be about fifteen seconds faster over the course to make certain of a bump.

Of performances in the Torpids that of Brasenose stands by itself. They finished at the head of the river in 1885, and remained there for eleven years, until they were displaced by New College in 1896.

The only other race in the Lent Term is the Clinker Fours. This race is rowed in sliding-seat clinker-built boats, and the crews consist of men who have not rowed in the Trial Eights or in the _first_ division of the Eights in the previous Summer Term. For some occult reason there is never a large entry for the Clinker Fours, although the race affords an excellent opportunity of seeing how the best of the Torpid men row on slides, and should thus be a great help to the captain of a college boat club in making up his Eight for the next term. With so small an entry for the Clinker Fours, most of the college captains devote their time after the Torpids, for the rest of the term, to coaching their men in sliding-seat tubs, the time at the beginning of the Summer Term being so short that it is absolutely necessary to get the men who have been rowing on fixed seats in the Torpids thoroughly accustomed to slides by the end of the Lent Term, and also to have the composition of the next term's Eight as nearly as possible settled.

[Illustration: LENT RACES IN THE PLOUGH REACH.]

At the beginning of the Summer Term, time, as I have said, is rather short, and consequently it is the custom at most colleges to make the Eight come into residence about a week before the end of the vacation.

The _esprit de corps_ and energy which are shown during the practice are, perhaps, the most noticeable features of college rowing at Oxford--a circumstance to which may be attributed the fact that the crews turned out by the colleges at the top of the river are often wonderfully good, considering the material out of which they are formed.

The Eights are rowed at the end of the fourth week and at the beginning of the fifth week in term, six nights in all. They start 130 ft.

apart--that is to say, 30 ft. less than the Torpids. About the same number of boats row in a division in the former as in the latter, the bottom boat starting at the same place in each case; consequently the head boat in the Eights has a slightly longer course to row than the head Torpid.

The start of a boat race is always rather nervous work for the crews, but the start of a bumping race is worse in this respect than any. A spectator who cares to walk down the bank and look at the crews waiting at their posts for the start cannot fail to notice that even the most experienced men look extremely uncomfortable.

[Illustration: A START IN THE EIGHTS.]

The start is managed thus: at the starting-point of each boat a short wooden post is driven firmly into the ground. These posts are exactly 130 ft. apart, and to each is attached a thin rope 60 ft. long with a bung at the end, while by each post a punt is moored. About twenty minutes or a quarter of an hour before the appointed time, the crews start from their barges and paddle gently down to their respective starting-places, where they take up their positions alongside of the punts. Five minutes before the starting-time the first gun is fired as a sort of warning. These guns are fired punctually to the second, and by the first gun the men who are going to start the different crews set their stop-watches. The duty of these "starters" is to keep the crews informed of the exact time, by calling out, "One minute gone," "Two minutes gone," etc. The second gun goes one minute before the start, and as soon as it is fired, the waterman slowly pushes the boat out from the side of the punt by means of a long pole pressed against stroke's rigger, the coxswain holding the bung at arm's-length in his left hand, with the cord taut so as to counteract the pressure of the pole, and "bow" and "two" paddling very gently so as to keep the boat at the very furthest extension of the rope. "Thirty seconds more," calls the starter; "fifteen," "ten," "five," "four," "three," "two," "look out"--Bang! and, except for those who are doomed to be bumped, the worst is over till the next night. Directly a bump is made both the boat which has made the bump and the boat which is bumped draw to one side, and on the next night the boat which has made the bump starts in front of its victim of the preceding evening. The Eights are the last event of the season in which the colleges compete against one another on the river, and the interest and excitement of the college in the doings of its crew generally find their final outlet, in the case of a college which has made five or six bumps or finished head of the river, in a bump supper--an entertainment of a nature peculiar to Oxford and Cambridge, which is, perhaps, better left to the imagination than described in detail.

It is a curious fact that, although the ideal aimed at by each college is the same, different colleges seem to adhere, to a very considerable extent, year after year to the same merits and the same faults. One college gets the reputation of not being able to row a fast-enough stroke; another, of being ready to race a week before the races and of getting worse as the races proceed, and, try as hard as they like, they do not seem to be able to shake off the effect of the reputation of their predecessors. So, again, one college gets the reputation of rowing better in the races than could possibly be expected from their form in practice, or of always improving during the races. The most notable case of late years, perhaps, was the traditional pluck of Brasenose. For eleven years in the Torpids and for three years in the Eights their certain downfall was predicted, but year after year, sometimes by the skin of their teeth and sometimes with ease, they managed to get home.

The best performances in the Eights, as a matter of mere paper record, are those of Trinity and Magdalen, who have each rowed head of the river for four years in succession, the former in 1861, 1862, 1863, and 1864, and the latter in 1892, 1893, 1894, and 1895. Magdalen can also boast of not having finished lower than third in the Eights for some fifteen years. Brasenose have finished head of the river fourteen times since the races were started in 1836; University nine times, and Magdalen seven times. The best performance in any one year is that of New College in the season 1895-96, when they completely swept the board, being head of the river in Eights and Torpids, and winning the University Fours, Pairs, and Sculls. The only other college race besides those I have described is the Fours. This race is rowed in coxswainless racing-ships during the fourth week of the October Term. It is a "time" race, the crews, which row two in a heat, starting eighty yards apart, the finishing-posts being, of course, divided by the same distance. A time race is a very unsatisfactory affair compared with an ordinary "breast"

race, but it is rendered necessary by the narrow winding river, for there is not room between Iffley and Oxford for two boats to row abreast. Oxford College crews, undoubtedly excellent though they often are, have been singularly unsuccessful at Henley. The Grand Challenge Cup has only been won by a college crew from Oxford twice within the memory of the present generation (_i.e._ by Exeter, in 1882, and by New College in the present year). Wadham, it is true, won it in almost prehistoric times (1849), and the tradition is handed down that they took the light blue in their colours from those of the crew which they defeated--a tradition which I need hardly say the members of the sister University always meet with a most emphatic denial.

It may, perhaps, seem that so far I have described college rowing as if its organization were so perfect that there is little or no difficulty in managing a college boat club successfully. This is by no means the case. Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown, even though it be merely that of the captaincy of a college boat club.

In the first place, it is not always as easy as might be imagined to get men to row. Men who cannot be induced to row when they come up to the University may be divided into two classes--those who refuse because they do not wish to take up any branch of athletics, and those who will not row because they wish to do something else. The former class (_i.e._ those of them who, after a moderate amount of persuasion, will not come down to the river) are not, as a rule, worth bothering about. They are generally weak, soft creatures, whose highest ambition is to walk overdressed about the "High," and, if possible, to be considered "horsey" without riding--the class, in fact, generally known as "bloods." Or else they belong to that worthy class of beings who come up to the University to read and only to read, and imagine that it is therefore impossible for them to row. The "blood" is, or should be, beneath the contempt of the rowing authorities, and the "bookworm" is generally impervious to argument, in spite of the fact that he would be able to read much harder if he took regular exercise.

With regard, however, to those men who refuse to row because they want to go in for something else, a little diplomacy and a little personal trouble on the part of the college captain, such as coaching men at odd hours, once or twice a week, when it suits their convenience, will often work wonders. Instances of this may be seen in the fact that many colleges have of late years been materially assisted by a sturdy football player in the Torpid or Eight, and in the fact that Rugby football blues have rowed in the University Eight during the last three years. Another great difficulty which the captains of the smaller college boat clubs have to face is that of procuring good boats with very limited finances. The usual practice is to save up money for several years to buy a new eight, and to continue to row in her long after she has become practically useless, and, indeed, positively incompatible with good rowing. This is a difficulty which can to a great extent be got over by getting second-hand boats. These can be bought for about half price when they have only been used one or two seasons by the University, or by one of the larger (and therefore richer) college boat clubs, which can afford to get a new boat as often as they want one. By this means a college boat club, however poor, can always have a boat which, if not quite new, is at least comparatively modern, instead of being a water-logged hulk some eight or ten years old, such as one often sees wriggling along at the tail end of the Eights.

Yet another obstacle is there which it is not easy to overcome. It is often almost impossible to find a trustworthy coach. There is nearly always some one in residence who is considered capable of looking after the college Eight, but the ignorance of college coaches is often only too manifest from the arrant nonsense they may be heard shouting on the bank. There is only one remedy I can suggest. Let the college captain secure some member of the University Crew, or any one else who knows what he is talking about, to take the crew for a couple of days, and _make the College coach accompany him_. He will thus learn something of the rowing of the crew, and you will hear him the next day pointing out the _real_ faults to which his attention has thus been called.

In conclusion, I must add that, keen though the rivalry between the various colleges always is, it is a rivalry which, by the encouragement it gives to rowing, confers good and good only upon the interests of the O.U.B.C., and never degenerates into a jealousy which might be prejudicial to the success of the University as a whole. The college captains elect as president of the O.U.B.C. the man whom they consider to be best fitted for the post, to whatever college he may belong, for they know that the president will select his crew absolutely impartially, will never think of unjustly preferring men who belong to his own college, but will always do his best to serve the interests of the University.[13]

[13] For further details of college rowing at Oxford and Cambridge, the reader is referred to the extracts from the rules and regulations of the two University Boat Clubs printed in the appendix to this book.

[Illustration: THE GOLDIE BOATHOUSE.]

CHAPTER XIII.

COLLEGE ROWING AT CAMBRIDGE.

The casual visitor would scarcely imagine that Cambridge resembled either Macedon or Monmouth in the possession of a river. He sees in The Backs what looks rather like a huge moat, designed to keep marauders from the sacred college courts, and filled with discoloured water, destitute seemingly of all stream. This he knows cannot be the racing river. The innumerable bridges forbid the notion, although Ouida has, in one of her novels, sprinkled it with a mixture of racing Eights and water-lilies. He wanders on from college to college, and nowhere does he come across the slightest sign of the river of which he has heard so much. Indeed, a man may stroll on Midsummer Common within about a hundred yards of the boat-houses without suspecting the existence of the Cam. I can well remember convoying to the river an enthusiastic freshman who had just joined his college boat club. At every step I was asked whether we were yet approaching the noble stream. I answered evasively, and with an air of mystery which befits a third-year man in the presence of freshmen. At length we turned on to the common, which is bounded by the Cam; on the further bank stand the boat-houses. There were crowds of men busy in the yards, there were coaches riding on the nearer bank, but of the river itself there was no indication. We were still about two hundred yards away when a Lady Margaret Eight passed, the heads of the crew in their scarlet caps being just visible above the river-bank as they swung backwards and forwards in their boat. I felt my freshman's grip tightening on my arm. Suddenly he stood stock still and rubbed his eyes. "Good heavens!" he said in an awestruck voice, "what on earth are those little red animals I see running up and down there?

Funniest thing I ever saw." I reassured him, and in a few moments more we arrived at the Cam, crossed it in a "grind," and solved the puzzle.

Distance, therefore, can scarcely be said to lend enchantment to the view, since at anything over one hundred yards it withdraws the Cam altogether from our sight. It is not easy, indeed, to see where the attractions of the Cam come in. It has been called with perfect justice a ditch, a canal, and a sewer, but not even the wildest enthusiasm would have supposed it to be a running stream, or ventured at first sight to call it a river. Yet this slow and muddy thread of water has been for more than seventy years the scene of excitements and triumphs and glories without end. Upon its shallow stream future judges and bishops and Parliament-men--not to speak of the great host of minor celebrities and the vaster army of future obscurities--have sought exercise and relaxation; to its unsightly banks their memory still fondly turns wherever their lot may chance to be cast, and still some thousand of the flower of our youth find health and strength in driving the labouring Eights and Fours along its narrow reaches and round its winding corners.

It may well excite the wonder of the uninitiated that, with so many natural disadvantages to contend against, the oarsmen of Cambridge should have been able during all these years to maintain so high a standard of oarsmanship. Time after time since the year when First Trinity secured the first race for the Grand Challenge have her college crews carried off the chief prizes at Henley against all competitors, until, in 1887, Trinity Hall swept the board by actually winning five out of the eight Henley races, other Cambridge men accounting for the remaining three. The record of Cambridge rowing is thus a very proud one; but those who know the Cambridge oarsman and his river will find no difficulty in accounting for it. The very disadvantages of the Cam all tend to imbue the man who rows upon it with a stern sense of duty, with the feeling that it is business and not pleasure, hard work and not a picnic, that summon him every day of the term to the boat-houses and urge him on his way to Baitsbite. We are forced to do without the natural charms that make the Isis beautiful. We console ourselves by a strict devotion to the labour of the oar.

The man who first rowed upon the Cam was in all probability a lineal descendant of the daring spirit who first tasted an oyster. His name and fame have not been preserved, but I am entitled to assume that he flourished some time before 1826. In that year the records of Cambridge boat clubs begin. There is in the possession of the First Trinity Boat Club an old book, at one end of which are to be found the "Laws of the Monarch Boat Club," with a list of members from 1826 to 1828, whilst at the other end are inscribed lists of members of the Trinity Boat Club, minutes of its meetings, and brief descriptions of the races in which it was engaged from the year 1829 to 1834. The Monarch Boat Club was by its laws limited to members of Trinity, and, I take it, that in 1828 the club had become sufficiently important to change its name definitely to that of Trinity Boat Club. At any rate, it must always have been considered the Trinity Club; for in the earliest chart of the Cambridge boat races--that, namely, of 1827--in the captains' room of the First Trinity Boat-house, "Trinity" stands head of the river, and no mention is made of a Monarch Club. These ancient laws form a somewhat Draconian code. They are twenty-five in number, and eight of them deal with fines or penalties to be inflicted upon a member who may "absent himself from his appointed crew and not provide a substitute for his oar," or who may "not arrive at the boat-house within a quarter of an hour of the appointed time." There were fines ("by no means to be remitted, except in the case of any member having an _aegrotat_, _exeat_, or _absit_, or having been prevented from attending by some laws of the college or University") for not appearing in the proper uniform, for "giving orders or speaking on a racing day, or on any other day, after silence has been called" (exception being made in favour of the captain and steerer), and for neglecting to give notice of an intended absence. To the twelfth law a clause was subsequently added enacting "that the treasurer be chastised twice a week for not keeping his books in proper order."

From the minutes of the Trinity Boat Club I extract the following letter, dated Stangate, December, 1828, which shows that even at that early date the first and third persons carried on a civil war in the boat-builder's vocabulary:--

"Rawlinson & Lyon's compliments to Mr. Greene wish to know if there is to be any alteration in the length of the set of oars they have to send down have been expecting to hear from the Club, therefore have not given orders for the oars to be finished should feel obliged by a line from you with the necessary instructions and be kind enough to inform us of the success which we trust you have met with in the New Boat.

we remain Sir Your ob^t Servts RAWLINSON & LYON."

In 1833 it is curious to read, "towards the end of this Easter term six of the racing crew were ill of influenza, etc., when the boat was bumped by the Queens', which we bumped next race, but were bumped again by them, and next race owing to a bad start the Christ's boat bumped us immediately being nearly abreast of us at the bumping-post." Was this the _grippe_, I wonder? In the Lent Term, 1834, it is stated, "The second race we touched the Christ's after the pistol was fired the first stroke we pulled, and lost our place to the Second Trinity for making a foul bump." By the way, in the oldest minute-book belonging to the University Boating Club, extending from 1828 to 1837, I find the Second Trinity boat occasionally entered on the list as "Reading Trinity." It continued to enjoy this bookish reputation up to 1876, when a debt which continued to increase while its list of members as constantly diminished, brought about its dissolution. Its members and its challenge-cups were then taken over by First Trinity.

In an old book belonging to First Trinity is preserved a map of the racing river, which explains much that would be otherwise inexplicable in the various entries. In those days the races began in the short reach of water in which they now finish. A little below where Charon now plies his ferry were the Chesterton Locks, and in the reach above this starting-posts seem to have been fixed for the various boats. When the starting-pistol was fired the crews started rowing, but apparently no bump was allowed before the bumping-post, fixed some little way above the first bend where the big horse-grind now works. Any bump before this was foul, and the boat so fouling appears to have been disqualified.

This post once passed, the racing proper began and continued past Barnwell up to the Jesus Locks. It must be remembered that the Jesus Locks were not where they are now, but were built just where the Caius boathouse now stands, there being a lock cut in the present bed of the river, and the main stream running quite a hundred yards south of its present course, and forming an island, on which stood Fort St. George.

This was altered in 1837, when the Cam was diverted to its present course, and the old course from above Jesus Green Sluice to Fort St.

George was filled up.

A few more extracts relating to the first beginnings of college boat-races may be of interest. In 1827 there were six boats on the river--a ten-oar and an eight-oar from Trinity, an eight-oar from St.

John's, and six-oars from Jesus, Caius, and Trinity, Westminster. In 1829 this number had dwindled to four at the beginning of the races on February 28; but in the seventh race, which took place on March 21, seven crews competed, St John's finishing head of the river, a place they maintained in the following May. Usually from seven to nine races appear to have been rowed during one month of the term, certain days in each week having been previously fixed. Crews were often known by the name of their ship rather than by that of their college. I find, for instance, a _Privateer_, which was made up, I think, of men from private schools, a _Corsair_ from St. John's, a _Dolphin_ from Third Trinity (which was then, and is still, the Club of the Eton and Westminster men), _Black Prince_ from First Trinity, and _Queen Bess_ from the Second or "Reading" Trinity. The following regulations, passed by the University Boat Club on April 18, 1831, will help to make the old system of boat-racing quite clear:--

"1. That the distance between each post being twenty yards will allow eleven boats to start on the Chesterton side, the length of the ropes by which they are attached to the posts being ten yards.

"2. That the remainder of the boats do start on the Barnwell side at similar distances, but with ropes fifteen yards in length.

"3. That there also be a rope three yards long fixed to the head of the lock, which will be the station of the last boat, provided the number exceed twelve."

These arrangements allowed thirteen boats to start at once, and special provision was made for any number beyond that. Obedience to the properly constituted authorities seems from an early period to have characterized the rowing man. I find that in 1831 a race was arranged between the captains of racing crews and the rest of the University, to take place on Tuesday, November 29. On Monday, the 28th, however, there arrived "a request from the Vice-Chancellor, backed by the tutors of the several colleges, that we should refrain from racing on account of the cholera then prevailing in Sunderland. We accordingly gave up the match forthwith, and with it another which was to have been rowed the same day between the quondam Etonians and the private school men." The secretary, however, adds this caustic comment, "It is presumed that Dr. Haviland, at whose instigation the Vice-Chancellor put a stop to the race, confounded the terms (and pronunciations?) 'rowing' and 'rowing,' and while he was anxious to stop any debauchery in the latter class of men, by a _slight_ mistake was the means of preventing the healthy exercise of the former."

The umpire for the college races seems never to have been properly appreciated. Indeed, in 1834, the U.B.C. solemnly resolved "that the umpire was no use, ... and accordingly that Bowtell should be cashiered. In consequence of this resolution, it was proposed and carried that the same person who had the management of the posts, lines, and starting the boats should also place the flags on the bumping-post, and receive for his pay 4_s._ a week, with an addition of 2_s._ 6_d._ at the end of the quarter in case the starting be well managed, but that each time the pistol misses fire 1s. should be deducted from his weekly pay."

In 1835, in consequence of the removal of the Chesterton Lock, the U.B.C. transferred the starting-posts to the reach between Baitsbite and First Post Corner, and there they have remained ever since.

Side by side with the college boat clubs, formed by the combination of their members for strictly imperial matters, regulating and controlling the inter-collegiate races, but never interfering with the internal arrangements and the individual liberty of the college clubs, the University Boat Club grew up. With two short but historical extracts from its early proceedings, I will conclude this cursory investigation into the records of the musty past. On February 20, 1829, at a meeting of the U.B.C. Committee, held in Mr. Gisborne's rooms, it was resolved _inter alia_ "That Mr. Snow, St. John's, be requested to write immediately to Mr. Staniforth, Christ Church, Oxford, proposing to make up a University match;" and on March 12, on the receipt of a letter from Mr. Staniforth, Christ Church, Oxford, a meeting of the U.B.C. was called at Mr. Harman's rooms, Caius College, when the following resolution was passed:--"That Mr. Stephen Davies (the Oxford boat-builder) be requested to post the following challenge in some conspicuous part of his barge: 'That the University of Cambridge hereby challenge the University of Oxford to row a match at or near London, each in an eight-oared boat, during the ensuing Easter vacation.'"

Thus was brought about the first race between the two Universities. Mr.

Snow was appointed captain, and it was further decided that the University Boat Club should defray all expenses, and that the match be not made up for money. It is unnecessary for me to relate once again how the race was eventually rowed from Hambledon Lock to Henley Bridge, and how the Light Blues (who, by the way, were then the Pinks) suffered defeat by many lengths. The story has been too well and too often told before. Each crew contained a future bishop--the late Bishop of St.

Andrew's rowing No. 4 in the Oxford boat, whilst the late Bishop Selwyn, afterwards Bishop of New Zealand, and subsequently of Lichfield, occupied the important position of No. 7 for Cambridge. Of the remainder more than half were afterwards ordained.

So much, then, for the origins of College and University racing.

Thenceforward the friendly rivalry flourished with only slight intermissions; gradually the race became an event. The great public became interested in it, cabmen and 'bus-drivers decorated their whips in honour of the crews, sightseers flocked to the river-banks to catch a glimpse of them as they flashed past, and their prowess was celebrated by the press. It is not, however, too much to say that without the keen spirit of emulation which is fostered by the college races both at Oxford and Cambridge, the University boat-race would cease to exist.