equal or even superior position to that occupied by cricket. The utmost care is taken with promising oarsmen, and the results may be seen both in the success of the Eight at Henley, and in the long roll of great oarsmen which Eton has supplied to the University boatrace. The genuine "wetbob " is in every way as fine a specimen as can be produced by any athletic system, but it is open to question whether the river does not provide greater facilities for loafing than cricket possibly can do. The cricketer has always the stimulus of competition and fellowship, but a boy may call himself a wetbob" and do little more than recline in a boat under a willow or lounge about at the bathing places. His doings have not the publicity which is inseparable from cricket, and with boys there is no stronger coercive than public opinion. But rowing is practically confined to Eton and Radley, and we must return to those pastimes which are common to all. Football is, after cricket, far the most popular game. Most English schools play under Association rules, but Rugby has not a few followers, while Eton, Harrow and Winchester have their own peculiar games, which have the advantage over the recognised codes in antiquity if in nothing else. There are corresponding disadvantages, the chief of which is that football matches with other schools are, of course, impossible, if indeed this is a disadvantage. At these three schools the house matches are the chief football events of the year, and esprit de corps, though more parochial, so to speak, than in the inter-school contest, is none the less fervid. The game is compulsory for every boy unless forbidden by the doctor, or the boy's parents request that he may be excused, and though the system has its opponents, it is rare to meet an old public school boy who regrets having been forced to play when young.

Other games there are

innumerable.

Fives,

racquets, squash, hockey, golf- all have their enthusiastic devotees. Every school has athletic sports at Easter. Rifle shooting is becoming more popular and receiving more attention since the national deficiencies in this respect were pointed out; and Eton has a pack of beagles which provide almost weekly copy for the humanitarian journals. Lawn tennis, for some reason, has never been popular; the prejudice against it was voiced some weeks ago in a school paper by a correspondent who in withering terms referred to the game as the peculiar relaxation of "the tame curate," though the reason why this should be considered to condemn it is somewhat obscure.

Such then roughly described is the athletic régime in vogue at our public schools. It may be objected that some minor details are incorrect as applied to all schools, but as we have already said, the general principles are the same everywhere; the homage paid to the athlete and the widespread sense of the importance of athletic training and selection are common to all. In our opinion the hero-worship of the athlete is in itself a perfectly healthy phenomenon. To most boys hero-worship of some kind is necessary, and if the athlete is dragged from his pedestal it is not easy to see who is to be exalted in his stead. It ought by now to be generally realised that the adoration of the cricketer and the footballer is quite inevitable. Bodily prowess is to boys the most tangible and visible form of success, and, as such, will always be admired and emulated. The danger which must be guarded against is the ever-increasing publicity and deadly seriousness of school athletics; some school matches are becoming merely society functions; the papers print long accounts and illustrations of every detail of the game, the result being that many a hero who has come unscathed through the adulation of his school-fellows must be possessed of rare level

headedness if he doubts any longer of his greatness when assured of it over and over again by a wellmeaning but misguided Press. His sense of proportion is distorted, and he really begins to think that games are the be-all and end-all of life, and that to proficiency in them his intelligence and energies must be directed.

For the rest, the old platitudes as to the many advantages of athletics still hold good-healthful employment, presence of mind, calmness in defeat, and (what is more difficult), in victory, obedience, leadership, hardihood-these are some of the qualities which are learnt in the exacting schools of cricket and football; a boy has the sense of the responsibility of representation; he feels that the honour of others is dependent on him, and such a feeling is a powerful stimulus to his keenness, though it must be admitted that the glamour of publicity which, as we have said, surrounds the foremost athletes tends in some cases to breed a longing for personal distinction to which the success of the side is subordinated, and which is absolutely contrary to the spirit in which all the games should be played. Where the real success of the system appears is not so much in the more distinguished circles as in the rank and file of the school. Here there is no thought of individual glory; the battle is for the victory of the side, it may be house or form, and it is in this kind of game that the real value of athletics as well as the most lasting pleasure is to be found. There must be many, now grey-haired and rheumatic, who still cherish memories of a football match snatched out of the fire, or a last wicket stand with some old comrade against the cock house of the year. These are some of the things that go to make up the charm of school life, and lay the foundations of character; and when one calls to mind the triumphs won, the crises survived, the hardships overcome, and, above

all, the lifelong friendships formed on the playing fields of Eton, or on "the meads of old Winchester, one is inclined to cast judgment aside and vote with the immortal school debating society, which declared its unanimous conviction "that too much athletics are a good thing."

XXII.

ATHLETICS.

BY A. L. F. SMITH.

IT is said that Demosthenes, when asked what was the most important part of oratory, answered that it was gesture; and to the further question-what held the second and third places in importance-returned the same reply. The story is interesting, among other reasons, on account of the weight which it attaches to any appeal made to the most elementary of the senses. The Spartans, who had forgotten the argumentation, or failed to catch the drift of the speech made by the Samian envoys, understood at once the significance of their gesture, when they brought in an empty corn sack. There are many men in the world who can use their eyes, but not so many who can use also their minds. And from the point of view of those who are less favoured in this respect, there can be no doubt that athletics stand in much the same relation to public school life as gesture to the art of public speaking. For them the typical schoolboy is the player of games rather than the reader of books. There are, of course, truer criteria of excellence than successes either in games or at work, but such criteria are more difficult to estimate, and the outsider, who has no special opportunities for judging, is likely to be influenced more by athletic than by scholastic distinctions. How far such a state of things is the inevitable result of the public