NINA COMES TO OXFORD
There can be few men in Oxford who do not enjoy themselves during
Eights' Week, and I imagine that the only miserable people to be found
are those who happen to be in an eight which is bumped several times
during the week. If any one is so misguided that he wants to make a
study of depression I should advise him to take a seat on the barge of
a college which has a very bad eight, and if he waits until the boat
comes back to the barge he will see some of the most unsmiling faces in
the world.
Rowing is a most serious form of sport, and no one can wonder that a
crew which has been bumped is unable to look very cheerful. It seems
to me that a rowing man deserves a lot of credit even if he rows very
badly; indeed I am not sure that the man who rows the worst does not
deserve the most credit, for he has gone through the same drudgery as
the rest of the crew, and has probably been sworn at a thousand times
more often. I should be very surprised if a rowing man at the end of
so much forcible criticism and strenuous labour could smile when his
boat is bumped. I know that if I had ever been in a boat which had
been bumped, and the only reason why I have not been is because I have
never rowed in a bumping race, I should want to hit somebody over the
head with my oar or denounce the cox. Coxes, indeed, have told me that
although they have never seen my first wish put into practice, my
second is such an ordinary occurrence that the cox who has not suffered
from it must be either deaf or a genius. And if a reasonable man
cannot help being sorry for an eight which has toiled many weeks only
to be bumped, I think he ought to be far more sorry for the cox, whose
cool appearance when the rest of his crew are hot and angry, is in
itself an aggravation.
I must say, however, that the only cox I ever knew well could not have
failed to deserve all he ever heard, he was one of those pretentious
little people who can only be described by the word "perky," and his
side was simply terrific. But all the same, if a very small man goes
up to Oxford and guesses that it will be his fate to steer slow eights
during the time he is there, I should advise him to start a society for
the protection of coxes, and elect himself the first president. He
will not do the slightest good, but he will get some fun from being
president, and he will also be able to choose colours for the society
and wear a gorgeous tie, if there is any combination of colours which
has not already been annexed, and there can't be many left to choose
from.
It is the easiest thing in the world to start clubs if all you want to
get out of them is a remarkable tie and hatband, and I knew a man--by
sight--who started three clubs in two years. The first he called "The
Roysterers," and they were supposed to dine twice a term in waistcoats
decorated with R.D.C. buttons; the second he named "The Oddfish," a
club which was intended to be eccentric, and from the extraordinary
colours they adopted I should think they were aptly named. Their chief
function was drinking, and although I never went to any of their
carousals I believe they discharged it thoroughly. The third club
which this energetic man founded was not given up to eating and
drinking, but devoted itself to the discussion of moral and artistic
subjects. They called themselves "The Bumble-Bees," though I never
could understand the reason why they chose such a name, unless it was,
as Murray suggested, that after they had touched a thing there was no
sweetness left in it. I should not like to say how many more clubs
this man would have started had he been given the opportunity, but he
was sent down at the end of his second year, and I have met him since
in Florence wearing a Bumble-Bee tie and Oddfish ribbon round his
straw-hat. I regret to say that he belonged to St. Cuthbert's, and he
was really a nuisance, because there was so strong a feeling against
these miscellaneous colours during my first summer term that nearly all
the men who could do anything respectably wore black bands on their
straw-hats, and the effect was most dismal.
Dennison heard that my sister was coming up for Eights' week, and he
told me calmly that he should like to meet her. I may have imagined
that he considered this an act of condescension on his part, for I
cannot pretend that I was always fair to him. I distrusted him so
thoroughly that I never believed a word he said, and the only possible
way for peace between us was for each of us to leave the other alone.
But this way did not suit him, for I suppose that I knew too many men
to be left out entirely from his consideration, and it seems to me that
it is more annoying for a man to be friendly when you want to have
nothing to do with him, than it is for anybody to take no notice of you
when you would be glad to be his friend. I did not, however, mean to
let Nina meet Dennison, for I never knew whom she might like or
dislike, and it would have been a most horrible complication if she had
fallen a victim to Dennison's smile. So I told him that Nina would not
be in Oxford for more than two or three days, and that I did not know
her plans, which was true enough as far as it went, and must have been
enough for him to understand what I meant.
Although I was useless in a boat, I was always most vigorously excited
during Eights' week. Three years before I went to Oxford St.
Cuthbert's had been head of the river, but we had by slow degrees
dwindled down to fifth, and in spite of one or two men who assured me
that we had a much better eight than we were thought to have, I knew
that we were more likely to go down than up. Still I am sorry for the
man who does not feel his nerves tingle at the prospect of a race, and
you tingle all the more if you do not expect to be beaten, so I tried
to forget the general opinion about our eight and to imagine that the
boat in front of us was going to have an anxious time.
Brasenose was head of the river, and after them came New College,
Magdalen, and Christ Church; we were fifth, and I took no interest in
the boat behind us, though I did know that it was Trinity. So keen was
I that I resolved to run with our boat if I could get any one to run
with me, and I asked quite half-a-dozen men before I found somebody who
was not looking after his own or somebody else's sisters. The man who
said he would run with me was Jack Ward, and he surprised me very much
when he told me that he would far rather see some of the racing than
sit on a barge with a crowd of ladies, and he even consented to run all
the first three nights and then help me to look after Nina when she
came up. He knew, I expect, that I was not likely to run very far, and
that there was no danger of his being left somewhere near Iffley to
walk up by himself.
I have a feeling that if I had to sit in a boat and hear the seconds
counted out before the starting-gun is fired that my first stroke would
be a most terrific crab. Even standing on the bank is nervous enough
work, and what it must be like for those who have got to row I cannot
imagine. I kept moving about so much before the start that Ward told
me I should be tired before I began to run, but I am unable to keep
still when things are going to happen, and just before the last gun
went I had an inspiration and moved up to the place from which Christ
Church started. By this means I kept up for quite a long way, but it
would be untrue to say I enjoyed myself. We began to gain on Christ
Church at once, and were very soon within half-a-length of them, but I
had no breath to use for shouting, and not having a rattle I could make
no row at all; moreover I am an erratic runner, so whenever I looked at
the boats I kicked or ran into somebody, and I could not retort when
they said things to me. I pounded along as far as the Long Bridges,
which was really quite a long way, and when I stopped I was sure that
we should catch Christ Church. I stood away from the path and tried to
persuade myself that I was not feeling very unwell, but I waited until
the crowds with the other boats had passed by, and then I walked as
fast as I could up the towing-path. I even ran once, for a short way,
because I wanted to get back before all the excitement had stopped on
our barge. I felt certain that we were going head of the river, and
that comfortable sensation seemed to improve my wind, but it took me
some time to get up the towing-path. The first disconcerting thing I
saw were a lot of people cheering frantically on what I thought was the
Trinity barge, but I did not know all the barges properly, and I came
to the conclusion that whoever had told me that this one belonged to
Trinity could not have spoken the truth. So I forced my way up the
path until I got opposite to our barge, and there I found Jack Ward
looking very purple in the face.
"Did we catch them?" I asked, and I thought that all our men who were
waiting to be punted across to the barge might have made a little more
noise.
"Catch what?" he said.
"Why, the House of course," I answered, for it was not very likely we
should catch any one else.
"Trinity caught us," he replied, and as the punt came over at that
moment he gave a huge shove and managed to get into it. I looked
across the river and saw a very silent crowd on our barge, so I decided
it was no place for me and walked solidly to the end of the towing-path
and went home over Folly Bridge. It was a long way round, and I cannot
imagine any one going back to St. Cuthbert's by such a route if he felt
happy. When I saw Jack Ward at dinner I said that I should not run any
more, and he replied that I was a fairly poor sort of sportsman; so I
did run on both Friday and Saturday, and on Saturday night St.
Cuthbert's was eighth on the river instead of fifth, and as we could
find no other excuse we said that our crew was stale, but I am afraid
the truth was that they were fairly fast for about half the course and
then went to pieces.
I had not told Nina that our eight was a bad one, and what she would
say I did not care to think, for she never paid any attention to
excuses, and was rather inclined to consider that I was insulting her
personally when I was connected with anything which was not successful.
At any rate I was thankful that we were still a long way above Oriel,
for I knew that Nina would never understand that Oriel had given
themselves up, more or less, to cricket and soccer, and were not very
afflicted by the fact that their boat was nearly bottom of the river.
I was sure that when Fred explained things to her she would say, "But
why don't you row as well, I should hate to have my college at the
bottom?" and this was almost exactly what happened. Fred made an
effort to get out of it by saying that Oriel was only a small college
and could not be expected to be good at everything, but Nina evidently
thought that it was large enough to have eight men who could row, and
she was not inclined to be pleased with either Fred or me when we went
to the Rudolf and lunched with Mrs. Faulkner on the Monday. It was
characteristic of Mr. Faulkner that he had not been able to come to
Oxford, and his chief function in life, as far as I ever discovered it,
was to get out of accompanying his wife on her countless expeditions.
"It seems stupid coming up here to see St. Cuthbert's bumped and Oriel
nearly last on the river. I understood from Godfrey that St.
Cuthbert's had a great reputation for rowing," Nina said.
I avoided Fred's eye, for I thought that he might be amused, and to
turn the conversation away from a dangerous subject, I took upon myself
to make what seemed to me a wise remark.
"There are other things to see in Oxford besides the bumping races," I
answered.
Nina sniffed very audibly, but Mrs. Faulkner hastened to the rescue.
"I think Godfrey is quite right," she said; "it is disappointing to
find that the colleges in which we are especially interested are so
unlucky, but Nina hasn't seen Oxford before, and I am sure she will be
delighted with it;" and Nina, who really could be quite nice when she
liked, forgave Fred and me for the iniquities of our eights, and
answered that she was longing to go out.
Of course Mrs. Faulkner fell to my lot, and while we walked down the
Broad it pleased her to talk about Nina and to make me say that she was
very pretty. I did think that Nina was not bad-looking, but she was my
sister and I should as soon have thought of saying that she was
wonderfully pretty, as I should of declaring that there was a striking
resemblance between the Apollo Belvedere and myself, and my imagination
has never carried me as far as that. As I was not saying much about
Nina Mrs. Faulkner tried to make me talk about myself, but I
interrupted her.
"This is St. Cuthbert's," I said; "shall we go in?"
She looked at me and smiled. "You are really rather extraordinary,
Godfrey; if any one tries to flatter you, you shut up like a hedgehog.
I am sure you have improved immensely and I am beginning to like you
very much," she declared.
I simply detested her at that moment, for when people make remarks like
that I feel as if some one was pouring cold water down my spine, and as
I meant to show Nina round St. Cuthbert's I managed to change
companions in the lodge, and left Fred to listen to the improvements in
himself, which Mrs. Faulkner, with her great gift for romance, was sure
to say that she had discovered.
As soon as I got Nina into the big St. Cuthbert's quad she forgot that
she had started by almost quarrelling with me. I was born,
unfortunately, without a keen eye for beautiful things, and even when I
see something which I like to look at again and again, some scene which
gives you a peaceful feeling or a picture which helps you to forget
that there is anything ugly in the world, I cannot express myself.
When I like anybody I want to tell them so, but once when I saw a
splendid sunset in Bavaria and said, "How simply ripping," my father
told me not to make a fool of myself, and somehow or other I felt that
he was right. So I was very glad that I had to show Nina the beauties
of St. Cuthbert's while it was her duty to admire them. She had never
been inside an Oxford quadrangle before, and though I think any one
with two eyes and a grain of common-sense would say that Oxford is
beautiful, I must admit that Nina saw St. Cuthbert's for the first time
under the most favourable circumstances possible. She looked at the
old walls and the flower-boxes which were outside nearly all the
windows, and did not talk any nonsense about them; even the creepers
seemed to be greener than usual in the sunlight of the afternoon. In
the chapel somebody was playing the organ, which may have been a
meretricious effect, but it pleased Nina, and that was all I cared
about. The whole college was most wonderfully peaceful, no one could
imagine that the quadrangle had ever been made hideous by Bacchanalian
yells. And I felt proud of it, which was quite a new sensation to me,
and I suppose it was Nina's delight that made me see things
differently. I took her to my rooms, which seemed to be small and
gloomy enough after the hall and the quadrangle, but she said that they
were far more comfortable than she had expected them to be, and she sat
down in the most comfortable of my easy-chairs and looked as if she
intended to stop for ever. I suggested to her that we should go down
to the river and see Oriel struggling in the second division, but she
decided that one dose of racing would be enough for her, and said that
Fred could take Mrs. Faulkner to the river if she wanted to go. She
had not been so fond of my society for a long time, and for quite ten
minutes, with the aid of cherries, we got on splendidly together. Then
the conversation languished and I began to show her things which she
did not want to see; it is so very hard to please anybody who does not
pretend to like things which they do not like. Nina began to hum at
last, and if there is one noise which I detest it is humming. To make
matters worse her tune was one I especially disliked, but as I was her
host I made a gallant attempt not to listen to it. So I whistled, and
I expect we had nearly reached a crisis when Mrs. Faulkner and Fred
appeared. I was very fond indeed of Nina, and I am sure that she would
have been indignant if any one had told her that she was not fond of
me, but when we had not seen each other for some time and were left
alone together we often irritated each other. It was a terrible
nuisance, but it is no use denying that I was glad to see Mrs. Faulkner
again, and if any one had told me that such a thing was possible when I
left her at the lodge I should have denounced him with many words. I
could see that Fred had not been enjoying himself, and while Mrs.
Faulkner and Nina were discussing loudly what they should do next, he
told me that he had been asked a perfect fusillade of questions none of
which he could answer. "How old is that fig-tree in your garden?" he
asked thoughtlessly, and Mrs. Faulkner's attention was turned upon me.
"What fig-tree?" I asked.
Fred tittered audibly, and Mrs. Faulkner seemed to forget that only a
short time before she had discovered an immense improvement in me.
"Do you mean to say that you live close to that beautiful fig-tree and
don't even know of its existence?" she demanded.
"Oh yes, I know about it," I answered; "it has stuff put round to keep
it warm in the winter, but I have never asked how old it is. You see
the dons more or less monopolize our gardens, so you can't expect us to
know much about them."
"Notices are put up to say that certain parts of them are reserved for
the dons of the college, aren't they?" Foster said, and he laughed
again, but I said nothing. "I shall tell Nina the tale if you don't,"
he added.
"I should like to hear something amusing," Nina said, as if there was
not the slightest chance of her wish being gratified.
"It's not very funny," I began, for I had a feeling that Mrs. Faulkner
would not like this tale.
"Well, anything's better than nothing," Nina declared wisely, and so,
to pacify her, I continued.
"These notices annoyed some men, so they dug a hole and bought a large
sort of milk-pail arrangement to fit into it and a box of sardines.
Then we filled the pail with water and put in the sardines, and Jack
Ward put up a little notice, 'This fishing is reserved for the dons of
the college. Licences may be obtained at the lodge.' The dons should
not be so greedy about the garden," I added, because Mrs. Faulkner
looked very disgusted.
"Did you really make a large hole in that beautiful turf?" she asked at
once. "You began in the third person, but I expect you and this Mr.
Ward did it; you ought to have been rusticated, or whatever the word
is."
"We were never found out, and the dons didn't mind; they thought it not
a bad joke of its kind," I answered.
"Then their sense of humour must have become perverted," she replied.
"I think Mr. Ward must have a very bad influence over you."
Nina laughed and said she insisted upon meeting Jack.
"I sincerely hope you won't do anything of the kind," Mrs. Faulkner
stated. "The dons must know what is best for the undergraduates, and
such tricks are very unbecoming; I am sure my husband always admitted
this when he was at Cambridge."
It was hardly fair to pull in Mr. Faulkner, so I said that I would get
some tea, which put an end to the discussion, for I did not think it
wise to say that I had asked Jack to meet Nina at luncheon on the
following day. By the time we had finished tea Fred was tired of Mrs.
Faulkner, and he slipped off with Nina in a way which was really too
clever to be very nice. Mrs. Faulkner, however, was quite amiable, and
she smiled on me steadily from the beginning of the Broad Walk to the
end of it, which as a feat of endurance I feel it my duty to mention.
When we got down to the river the band was playing on the 'Varsity
barge, and Mrs. Faulkner really began to enjoy herself. The flags
flying from all the barges pleased her, and the smartness of the ladies
made her compare the scene to church parade on a June morning in Hyde
Park. I knew nothing about church parades and very little about Hyde
Park, but I said that I thought this must beat anything in London.
Then I got a chair for her and looked round to find Nina and Fred, but
as I could not see them anywhere, I said that I must go and hunt for
them. Mrs. Faulkner, however, had no intention of letting me go, and I
had to be a kind of Baedeker for over half-an-hour. I was not a very
good Baedeker, I confess, but I had found out that one way to make
things uncomfortable with this lady was not to answer every question
she asked, so I supplied her with a good deal of information which I
sincerely hope she never passed on to any one else. Unfortunately our
barge is near the 'Varsity's, and during the races a string of little
flags fly from the 'Varsity barge to show the order of the colleges on
the river. I knew them well enough down to ours, and I even knew the
ninth and tenth, but when Mrs. Faulkner wanted to know the whole lot, I
had to use my imagination. I know that I said Hertford twice and I
finished up with All Souls, who only have about three undergraduates,
so if they had rowed at all they would have been several men short.
"I should like to write the colleges down if I had a pencil," she said;
"you rattle them off so fast. Didn't you say that one flag belonged to
the University, but the University flag is surely dark blue?"
And then I had to explain that University was a college and not the
whole place, and she replied that she knew so much more about Cambridge
than Oxford, and complained that our colleges had very confusing names.
"Oriel!" she said scornfully, "it reminds me of a window, and then you
have no originality. Exeter, Worcester, Lincoln, why they are just
names of towns, you can find them all in Bradshaw."
"Well, at any rate Bradshaw's got nothing to do with it," I replied.
"These colleges are hundreds of years old, and Bradshaw's a chicken
compared with them."
"What dreadful slang. Fancy calling Bradshaw a chicken!" she
exclaimed. "Besides, you have a college called Keble, and my father
knew Dr. Keble, so that _can't_ be hundreds of years old. No,
Cambridge have chosen their names better than Oxford."
"Sidney Sussex," I said, for I thought it necessary to make some reply;
"it's more like the name of one of Ouida's heroes than a college."
She shook her head gently. "I can't get over your colleges sounding
like railway-stations," she answered.
"You must blame the bishops who founded them and not Bradshaw or me," I
replied, for I was getting very tired.
"Some one told me Keble is built of red-brick," she said.
"Red-brick is so bright," I answered, but I wanted to say something
quite different, and at last a dim noise which quickly developed into a
tremendous roar told us that the boats were coming.
Brasenose paddled home first, and not one of the next six boats were in
any danger of being caught. It was reserved for us and Merton to give
the people on the barges some excitement, but when I saw Merton
pressing us fearfully I wished that I was not hemmed in by a crowd of
ladies. I yelled tremendously because I could not help myself, and
Mrs. Faulkner, after saying something which I did not catch, put her
hands over her ears. But shouting was useless. The abominable thing
happened right in front of our barge, and when I saw our cox's hand go
up to show that all was over, it was a very bad moment indeed.
"Poor St. Cuthbert's, how very unfortunate they are," I heard a girl
say; and some one else answered, "Yes, it's quite pathetic, so
different from what one used to expect from them, but I am told that
they are not the college they were." That remark made me feel furious,
and it was not until Mrs. Faulkner pulled my coat violently that I
remembered that she was sitting close to me.
"Did you make a bump?" I heard her asking me.
"No, Merton bumped us. We shall soon be sandwich boat," I answered,
for I spoke without thinking.
"Sandwich boat, my dear Godfrey, is this a picnic?" she returned, and I
did not know whether she was serious or only trying to be funny.
"There's not much picnic about it," I replied; "we've gone down four
places in four nights."
"But what is a sandwich boat. They don't have such things at
Cambridge."
"They do, at any rate my cousin rowed eight times in four nights and
nearly died after it. A sandwich boat is bottom of one division and
top of the other, so it has got to row in both; it's got nothing to do
with ham. Shall we go?"
Every one was leaving the barges, but Mrs. Faulkner remained in her
chair.
"Isn't that girl in mauve a perfect dream?" she said to me, but I
pretended not to hear. I had to wait for several minutes while dresses
and the people who wore them were criticized, and I am sure that
nothing but the National Anthem or force could have stirred Mrs.
Faulkner from her seat.
We found Nina and Fred waiting for us, and Nina said she had been
having a splendid time on the Oriel barge. But I could think of
nothing except that we were not the college we used to be, and I left
Fred to talk to both Mrs. Faulkner and Nina.