It was on a Saturday that the St. Ambrose boat made the first
bump, described in our last chapter. On the next Saturday, the
day-week after the first success, at nine o'clock in the evening,
our hero was at the door of Hardy's rooms. He just stopped for
one moment outside, with his hand on the lock, looking a little
puzzled, but withal pleased, and then opened the door and
entered. The little estrangement which there had been between
them for some weeks, had passed away since the races had begun.
Hardy had thrown himself into the spirit of them so thoroughly,
that he had not only regained all his hold on Tom, but had warmed
up the whole crew in his favour, and had mollified the martinet
Miller himself. It was he who had managed the starting-rope in
every race, and his voice from the towing path had come to be
looked upon as a safe guide for clapping on or rowing steady.
Even Miller, autocrat as he was, had come to listen for it, in
confirmation of his own judgment, before calling on the crew for
the final effort.
So Tom had recovered his old footing in the servitor's rooms; and
when he entered on the night in question did so with the bearing
of an intimate friend. Hardy's tea commons were on one end of the
table as usual, and he was sitting at the other poring over a
book. Tom marched straight up to him, and leant over his
shoulder.
"What, here you are at the perpetual grind," he said. "Come; shut
up, and give me some tea; I want to talk to you."
Hardy looked up with a grim smile.
"Are you up to a cup of tea?" he said; "look here, I was just
reminded of you fellows. Shall I construe for you?"
He pointed with his finger to the open page of the book he was
reading. It was the Knights of Aristophanes, and Tom, leaning
over his shoulder, read,--
[Greek text] chata chathixion malachoz ina meh tribehz tehn en
Salamint, &c.
After meditating a moment, he burst out; "You hardhearted old
ruffian! I come here for sympathy, and the first thing you do is
to poke fun at me out of your wretched classics. I've a good mind
to clear out and not to do my errand."
"What's a man to do?" said Hardy. "I hold that it's always better
to laugh at fortune. What's the use of repining? You have done
famously, and second is a capital place on the river."
"Second be hanged!" said Tom. "We mean to be first."
"Well, I hope we may!" said Hardy. "I can tell you nobody felt it
more than I--not even old Diogenes--when you didn't make your
bump to-night."
"Now you talk like a man, and a Saint Ambrosian," said Tom. "But
what do you think? Shall we ever catch them?" and, so saying, he
retired to a chair opposite the tea things.
"No," said Hardy; "I don't think we ever shall. I'm very sorry to
say it, but they are an uncommonly strong lot, and we have a weak
place or two in our crew. I don't think we can do more than we
did to-night--at least with the present crew."
"But if we could get a little more strength we might?"
"Yes, I think so. Jervis's stroke is worth two of theirs. A very
little more powder would do it."
"Then we must have a little more powder."
"Ay, but how are we to get it? Who can you put in?"
"You!" said Tom, sitting up. "There, now, that's just what I am
come about. Drysdale is to go out. Will you pull next race? They
all want you to row."
"Do they?" said Hardy, quietly (but Tom could see that his eye
sparkled at the notion, though he was too proud to show how much
he was pleased); "then they had better come and ask me
themselves."
"Well, you cantankerous old party, they're coming, I can tell
you!" said Tom in great delight. "The Captain just sent me to
break ground, and will be here directly himself. I say now,
Hardy," he went on, "don't you say no. I've set my heart upon it.
I'm sure we shall bump them if you pull."
"I don't know that," said Hardy, getting up, and beginning to
make tea, to conceal the excitement he was in at the idea of
rowing; "you see I'm not in training."
"Gammon," said Tom, "you're always in training, and you know it."
"Well," said Hardy, "I can't be in worse than Drysdale. He has
been of no use above the Gut these last three nights."
"That's just what Miller says," said Tom, "and here comes the
Captain." There was a knock at the door while he spoke, and
Jervis and Miller entered.
Tom was in a dreadful fidget for the next twenty minutes, and may
best be compared to an enthusiastic envoy negotiating a treaty,
and suddenly finding his action impeded by the arrival of his
principals. Miller was very civil, but not pressing; he seemed to
have come more with a view of talking over the present state of
things, and consulting upon them, than to enlisting a recruit.
Hardy met him more than halfway, and speculated on all sorts of
possible issues, without a hint of volunteering himself. But
presently Jervis, who did not understand finessing, broke in, and
asked Hardy, point blank, to pull in the next race; and when he
pleaded want of training, overruled him at once by saying that
there was no better training than sculling. So in half an hour
all was settled. Hardy was to pull five in the next race,
Diogenes was to take Blake's place, at No. 7, and Blake to take
Drysdale's oar at No. 2. The whole crew were to go for a long
training walk the next day, Sunday, in the afternoon; to go down
to Abingdon on Monday, just to get into swing in their new
places, and then on Tuesday to abide the fate of war. They had
half an hour's pleasant talk over Hardy's tea, and then
separated.
"I always told you he was our man," said the Captain to Miller,
as the walked together to the gates; "we want strength, and he is
as strong as a horse. You must have seen him sculling yourself.
There isn't his match on the river to my mind."
"Yes, I think he'll do," replied Miller; "at any rate he can't be
worse than Drysdale."
As for Tom and Hardy, it may safely be said that no two men in
Oxford went to bed in better spirits that Saturday night than
they two.
And now to explain how it came about that Hardy was wanted.
Fortune had smiled upon the St. Ambrosians in the two races which
succeeded the one in which they had bumped Exeter. They had risen
two more places without any very great trouble. Of course, the
constituencies on the bank magnified their powers and doings.
There never was such a crew, they were quite safe to be head of
the river, nothing could live against their pace. So the young
oars in the boat swallowed all they heard, thought themselves the
finest fellows going, took less and less pains to keep up their
condition, and when they got out of earshot of Jervis and
Diogenes, were ready to bet two to one that they would bump Oriel
the next night, and keep easily head of the river for the rest of
the races.
Saturday night came, and brought with it a most useful though
unpalatable lesson to the St. Ambrosians. The Oriel boat was
manned chiefly by old oars, seasoned in many a race, and not
liable to panic when hard pressed. They had a fair, though not a
first-rate stroke, and a good coxswain; experts remarked that
they were rather too heavy for their boat, and that she dipped a
little when they put on anything like a severe spurt; but on the
whole they were by no means the sort of crew you could just run
into hand over hand. So Miller and Diogenes preached, and so the
Ambrosians found out to their cost.
They had the pace of the other boat, and gained as usual a boat's
length before the Gut; but, first those two fatal corners were
passed, and then other well-remembered spots where former bumps
had been made, and still Miller made no sign; on the contrary, he
looked gloomy and savage. The St. Ambrosian shouts from the shore
too changed from the usual exultant peals into something like a
quaver of consternation, while the air was rent with the name and
laudations of "little Oriel."
Long before the Cherwell Drysdale was completely baked (he had
played truant the day before and dined at the Weirs, were he had
imbibed much dubious hock), but he from old habit managed to keep
time. Tom and the other young oars got flurried, and quickened;
the boat dragged, there was no life left in her, and, though they
managed just to hold their first advantage, could not put her a
foot nearer the stern of the Oriel boat, which glided past the
winning-post a clear boat's length ahead of her pursuer, and with
a crew much less depressed.
Such races must tell on strokes; and even Jervis, who had pulled
magnificently throughout, was very much done at the close, and
leant over his oar with a swimming in his head, and an approach
to faintness, and was scarcely able to see for a minute or so.
Miller's indignation knew no bounds, but he bottled it up till he
had manoeuvered the crew into their dressing-room by themselves,
Jervis having stopped below. Then he did not spare them. "They
would kill their captain, whose little finger was worth the whole
of them; they were disgracing the college; three or four of them
had neither heart, head nor pluck." They all felt that this was
unjust, for after all had they not brought the boat up to the
second place? Poor Diogenes sat in a corner and groaned; he
forgot to prefix "old fellow" to the few observations he made.
Blake had great difficulty in adjusting his necktie before the
glass; he merely remarked in a pause of the objurgation, "In
faith, coxswain, these be very bitter words." Tom and most of the
others were too much out of heart to resist; but at last Drysdale
fired up--
"You've no right to be so savage that I can see," he said,
suddenly stopping the low whistle in which he was indulging, as
he sat on the corner of the table; "you seem to think No 2 the
weakest out of several weak places in the boat."
"Yes, I do," said Miller.
"Then this honourable member," said Drysdale, getting off the
table, "seeing that his humble efforts are unappreciated, thinks
it best for the public service to place his resignation in the
hands of your coxswainship."
"Which my coxswainship is graciously pleased to accept," replied
Miller.
"Hurrah for a roomy punt and a soft cushion next racing
night--it's almost worth while to have been rowing all this time,
to realize the sensations I shall feel when I see you fellows
passing the Cherwell on Tuesday."
"_Suave est_, it's what I'm partial to, _mari mango_, in the last
reach, _terra_, from the towing path, _alterius magnum spectare
laborem_, to witness the tortures of you wretched beggars in the
boat. I'm obliged to translate for Drysdale, who never learned
Latin," said Blake, finishing his tie before the glass. There was
an awkward silence. Miller was chafing inwardly and running over
in his mind what was to be done; and nobody else seemed quite to
know what ought to happen next, when the door opened and Jervis
came in.
"Congratulate me, my Captain," said Drysdale; "I'm well out of it
at last."
Jervis "pished and pshaw'd" a little at hearing what had
happened, but his presence acted like oil on the waters. The
moment the resignation was named, Tom's thoughts had turned to
Hardy. Now was the time--he had such confidence in the man, that
the idea of getting him in for next race entirely changed the
aspect of affairs to him, and made him feel as "bumptious" again
as he had done in the morning. So with this idea in his head, he
hung about till the Captain had made his toilet, and joined
himself to him and Miller as they walked up.
"Well, what are we going to do now," said the Captain.
"That's just what you have to settle," said Miller; "you have
been up all the term, and know the men's pulling better than I."
"I suppose we must press somebody from the torpid--let me see,
there's Burton."
"He rolls like a porpoise," interrupted Miller, positively;
"impossible."
"Stewart might do, then."
"Never kept time for three strokes in his life," said Miller.
"Well, there are no better men," said the Captain.
"Then we may lay our account to stopping where we are, if we
don't even lose a place," said Miller.
"Dust unto dust, what must be, must;
If you can't get crumb, you'd best eat crust." said the Captain.
"It's all very well talking coolly now," said Miller, "but you'll
kill yourself trying to bump, and there are three more nights."
"Hardy would row if you asked him, I'm sure," said Tom.
The Captain looked at Miller, who shook his head. "I don't think
it," he said; "I take him to be a shy bird that won't come to
everybody's whistle. We might have had him two years ago, I
believe--I wish we had."
"I always told you so," said Jervis; "at any rate let's try him.
He can but say no, and I don't think he will for you see he has
been at the starting place every night, and as keen as a freshman
all the time."
"I'm sure he won't," said Tom; "I know he would give anything to
pull."
"You had better go to his rooms and sound him," said the Captain;
"Miller and I will follow in half an hour."
We have already heard how Tom's mission prospered.
The next day, at a few moments before two o'clock, the St.
Ambrose crew, including Hardy, with Miller (who was a desperate
and indefatigable pedestrian), for leader, crossed Magdalen
Bridge. At five they returned to college, having done a little
over fifteen miles fair heal and toe walking in the interval. The
afternoon had been very hot, and Miller chuckled to the Captain,
"I don't think there will be much trash left in any of them after
that. That fellow Hardy is as fine as a race-horse, and, did you
see, he never turned a hair all the way."
The crew dispersed to their rooms, delighted with the performance
now that it was over, and feeling that they were much the better
for it, though they all declared it had been harder work than any
race they had yet pulled. It would have done a trainer's heart
good to have seen them, some twenty minutes afterwards, dropping
into hall (where they were allowed to dine on Sundays on the
joint), fresh from cold baths, and looking ruddy and clear, and
hard enough for anything.
Again on Monday, not a chance was lost. The St. Ambrose boat
started soon after one o'clock for Abingdon. They swung steadily
down the whole way, and back again to Sandford without a single
spurt; Miller generally standing in the stern and preaching above
all things steadiness and time. From Sandford up, they were
accompanied by half a dozen men or so, who ran up the bank
watching them. The struggle for the first place on the river was
creating great excitement in the rowing world, and these were
some of the most keen connoisseurs, who, having heard that St.
Ambrose had changed a man, were on the look-out to satisfy
themselves as to how it would work. The general opinion was
veering round in favor of Oriel; changes so late in the races, at
such a critical moment, were looked upon as very damaging.
Foremost amongst the runners on the bank was a wiry, dark man,
with a sanguine complexion, who went with a peculiar long, low
stride, keeping his keen eye well on the boat. Just above
Kennington Island, Jervis, noticing this particular spectator for
the first time, called on the crew, and, quickening his stroke,
took them up the reach at racing pace. As they lay in Iffley Lock
the dark man appeared above them, and exchanged a few words and a
great deal of dumb show with the Captain and Miller, and then
disappeared.
From Iffley up they went steadily again. On the whole Miller
seemed to be in very good spirits in the dressing room; he
thought the boat trimmed better, and went better than she had
ever done before, and complimented Blake particularly for the
ease with which he had changed sides. They all went up in high
spirits, calling on their way at "The Choughs" for one glass of
old ale round, which Miller was graciously pleased to allow. Tom
never remembered till they were out again that Hardy had never
been there before, and felt embarrassed for a moment, but it soon
passed off. A moderate dinner and early to bed finished the day,
and Miller was justified in his parting remark to the Captain,
"Well, if we don't win, we can comfort ourselves that we hav'n't
dropped a stitch this last two days, at any rate."
Then the eventful day arose which Tom, and many others felt was
to make or mar St. Ambrose. It was a glorious early-summer day,
without a cloud, scarcely a breath of air stirring. "We shall
have a fair start at any rate," was the general feeling. We have
already seen what a throat-drying, nervous business, the morning
of a race-day is, and must not go over the same ground more than
we can help; so we will imagine the St. Ambrose boat down at the
starting place, lying close to the towing path, just before the
first gun.
There is a much greater crowd than usual opposite the two first
boats. By this time most of the other boats have found their
places, for there is not much chance of anything very exciting
down below; so, besides the men of Oriel and St. Ambrose (who
muster to-night of all sorts, the fastest of the fast and the
slowest of the slow having been by this time shamed into
something like enthusiasm), many of other colleges, whose boats
have no chance of bumping or being bumped, flock to the point of
attraction.
"Do you make out what the change is?" says a backer of Oriel to
his friend in the like predicament.
"Yes, they've got a No. 5, don't you see, and, by George, I don't
like his looks," answered his friend; "awfully long and strong in
the arm, and well ribbed up. A devilish awkward customer. I shall
go and try to get a hedge."
"Pooh," says the other, "did you ever know one man win a race?"
"Ay, that I have," says his friend, and walks off toward the
Oriel crowd to take five to four on Oriel in half-sovereigns, if
he can get it.
Now their dark friend of yesterday comes up at a trot, and pulls
up close to the Captain, with whom he is evidently dear friends.
He is worth looking at, being coxswain of the O. U. B., the best
steerer, runner and swimmer in Oxford; amphibious himself and
sprung from an amphibious race. His own boat is in no danger, so
he has left her to take care of herself. He is on the look-out
for recruits for the University crew, and no recruiting sergeant
has a sharper eye for the sort of stuff he requires.
"What's his name?" he says in a low tone to Jervis, giving a jerk
with his head towards Hardy. "Where did you get him?"
"Hardy," answers the Captain, in the same tone; "it's his first
night in the boat."
"I know that," replies the coxswain; "I never saw him row before
yesterday. He's the fellow who sculls in that brown skiff, isn't
he?"
"Yes, and I think he'll do; keep your eye on him."
The coxswain nods as if he were somewhat of the same mind, and
examines Hardy with the eye of a connoisseur, pretty much as the
judge at an agricultural show looks at the prize bull. Hardy is
tightening the strop of his stretcher, and all-unconscious of the
compliments which are being paid him. The great authority seems
satisfied with his inspection, grins, rubs his hands, and trots
off to the Oriel boat to make comparisons.
Just as the first gun is heard, Grey sidles nervously to the
front of the crowd as if he were doing something very audacious,
and draws Hardy's attention, exchanging sympathizing nods with
him, but saying nothing, for he knows not what to say, and then
disappearing again in the crowd.
"Hallo, Drysdale, is that you?" says Blake, as they push off from
the shore. "I thought you were going to take it easy in a punt."
"So I thought," says Drysdale, "but I couldn't keep away, and
here I am. I shall run up; and mind, if I see you within ten
feet, and cock-sure to win, I'll give a view holloa. I'll be
bound you shall hear it."
"May it come speedily," said Blake, and then settled himself in
his seat.
"Eyes in the boat--mind now, steady all, watch the stroke and
don't quicken."
These are Miller's last words; every faculty of himself and the
crew being now devoted to getting a good start. This is no
difficult matter, as the water is like glass, and the boat lies
lightly on it, obeying the slightest dip of the oars of bow and
two, who just feel the water twice or thrice in the last minute.
Then, after a few moments of breathless hush on the bank, the
last gun is fired, and they are off.
The same scene of mad excitement ensues, only tenfold more
intense, as almost the whole interest of the races is tonight
concentrated on the two head boats and their fate. At every gate
there is a jam, and the weaker vessels are shoved into the
ditches, upset and left unnoticed. The most active men, including
the O. U. B. coxswain, shun the gates altogether, and take the
big ditches in their stride, making for the long bridges, that
they may get quietly over these and be safe for the best part of
the race. They know that the critical point of the struggle will
be near the finish.
Both boats made a beautiful start, and again as before in the
first dash the St. Ambrose pace tells, and they gain their boat's
length before first winds fail; then they settle down for a long
steady effort. Both crews are rowing comparatively steady
reserving themselves for the tug of war up above. Thus they pass
the Gut, and those two treacherous corners, the scene of
countless bumps, into the wider water beyond, up under the
willows.
Miller's face is decidedly hopeful; he shows no sign, indeed, but
you can see that he is not the same man as he was at this place
in the last race. He feels that to-day the boat is full of life,
and that he can call on his crew with hopes of an answer. His
well-trained eye also detects that, while both crews are at full
stretch, his own, instead of losing, as it did on the last night,
is now gaining inch by inch on Oriel. The gain is scarcely
perceptible to him even; from the bank it is quite imperceptible;
but there it is; he is surer and surer of it, as one after
another the willows are left behind.
And now comes the pinch. The Oriel captain is beginning to be
conscious of the fact which has been dawning on Miller, but will
not acknowledge it to himself, and as his coxswain turns the
boat's head gently across the stream, and makes for the Berkshire
side and the goal, now full in view, he smiles grimly as he
quickens his stroke; he will shake off these light heeled gentry
yet, as he did before.
Miller sees the move in a moment, and signals his captain, and
the next stroke St. Ambrose has quickened also; and now there is
no mistake about it, St. Ambrose is creeping up slowly but
surely. The boat's length lessens to forty feet, thirty feet;
surely and steadily lessens. But the race is not lost yet; thirty
feet is a short space enough to look at on the water, but a good
bit to pick up foot by foot in the last two or three hundred
yards of a desperate struggle. They are over, under the Berkshire
side now and there stands up the winning-post, close ahead, all
but won. The distance lessens, and lessens still, but the Oriel
crew stick steadily and gallantly to their work, and will fight
every inch of distance to the last. The Oriel men on the bank who
are rushing along sometimes in the water, sometimes out, hoarse,
furious, madly alternating between hope and despair, have no
reason to be ashamed of a man in the crew. Off the mouth of the
Cherwell there is still twenty feet between them. Another minute
and it will be over one way or another. Every man in both crews
is now doing his best, and no mistake; tell me which boat holds
the most men who can do better than their best at a pinch, who
will risk a broken blood-vessel, and I will tell you how it will
end. "Hard pounding, gentlemen; let's see who will pound
longest," the Duke is reported to have said at Waterloo, and won.
"Now, Tommy, lad, 'tis thou or I," Big Ben said as he came up to
the last round of his hardest fight, and won. Is there a man of
that temper in either crew tonight? If so, now's his time. For
both coxswains have called on their men for the last effort;
Miller is whirling the tassel of his right-hand tiller rope round
his head, like a wiry little lunatic; from the towing path, from
Christchurch meadow, from the row of punts, from the clustered
tops of the barges, comes a roar of encouragement and applause,
and the band, unable to resist the impulse, breaks with a crash
into the "Jolly Young Watermen," playing two bars to the second.
A bump in the Gut is nothing--a few partisans on the towing-path
to cheer you, already out of breath; but up here at the very
finish, with all Oxford looking on, when the prize is the
headship of the river--once in a generation only do men get such
a chance.
Who ever saw Jervis not up to his work? The St. Ambrose stroke is
glorious. Tom had an atom of go still left in the very back of
his head, and at this moment he heard Drysdale's view holloa
above all the din; it seemed to give him a lift, and other men
besides in the boat, for in another six strokes the gap is
lessened and St. Ambrose has crept up to ten feet, and now to
five from the stern of Oriel. Weeks afterwards Hardy confided to
Tom that when he heard that view holloa he seemed to feel the
muscles of his arms and legs turn into steel, and did more work
in the last twenty strokes than in any other forty in the earlier
part of the race.
Another fifty yards and Oriel is safe, but the look on the
captain's face is so ominous that their coxswain glances over his
shoulder. The bow of St. Ambrose is within two feet of their
rudder. It is a moment for desperate expedients. He pulls his
left tiller rope suddenly, thereby carrying the stern of his own
boat out of the line of the St. Ambrose, and calls on his crew
once more; they respond gallantly yet, but the rudder is against
them for a moment, and the boat drags. St. Ambrose overlaps. "A
bump, a bump," shout the St. Ambrosians on shore. "Row on, row
on," screams Miller. He has not yet felt the electric shock, and
knows he will miss his bump if the young ones slacken for a
moment. A young coxswain would have gone on making shots at the
stern of the Oriel boat, and so have lost.
A bump now and no mistake; the bow of the St. Ambrose boat jams
the oar of the Oriel stroke, and the two boats pass the
winning-post with the way that was on them when the bump was
made. So near a shave was it.
Who can describe the scene on the bank? It was a hurly-burly of
delirious joy, in the midst of which took place a terrific combat
between Jack and the Oriel dog--a noble black bull terrier
belonging to the college in general, and no one in
particular--who always attended the races and felt the misfortune
keenly. Luckily they were parted without worse things happening;
for though the Oriel men were savage, and not disinclined for a
jostle, the milk of human kindness was too strong for the moment
in their adversaries. So Jack was choked off with some trouble,
and the Oriel men extricated themselves from the crowd, carrying
off Crib, their dog, and looking straight before them into
vacancy.
"Well rowed, boys," says Jervis, turning round to his crew as
they lay panting on their oars.
"Well rowed; five," says Miller, who even in the hour of such a
triumph is not inclined to be general in laudation.
"Well rowed, five," is echoed from the bank; it is that cunning
man, the recruiting-sergeant. "_Fatally_ well rowed," he adds to
a comrade, with whom he gets into one of the punts to cross to
Christchurch meadow; "we must have him in the University crew."
"I don't think you'll get him to row, from what I hear," answers
the other.
"Then he must he handcuffed and carried into the boat by force,"
says the O. U. B. coxswain; "why is not the press-gang an
institution in this university?"