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 zo, 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. Truly a light blue cap is to the oarsman a glorious prize, but there are many hundreds of ardent enthusiasts who have to content themselves with a place in the college boats in the Lent or the May Term. Want of form, or of weight, or of the necessary strength and stamina may hinder them from attaining to a place in the University Eight, but they should console themselves by reflecting that without their patient and earnest labours for the welfare of their several colleges it would be impossible to maintain a high standard of oarsmanship, or to form a representative University Eight. Let me, therefore, be for a page or two the apologist, nay, rather the panegyrist, of the college oarsman, with whom many of my happiest hours have been spent.
Before entering upon the serious business of life as a freshman at Cambridge, the youth who is subsequently to become an oar will in all proba bility have fired his imagination by reading of the historical prowess of past generations of University oars in races at Henley or at Putney. Goldie who turned the tide of defeat, the Closes, Rhodes, Gurdon, Hockin, Pitman the pluckiest of strokes, and Muttlebury the mighty heavy weight, are the heroes whom he worships, and to whose imitation he proposes to devote himself. A vision of a light blue coat and cap flits before his mind ; he sees himself in fancy wresting a fiercely contested victory from the clutches of Oxford, and cheered and feted by a countless throng of his admirers. With these ideas he becomes as a freshman a member of his college boat club, and adds his name to the " tubbing list." He purchases his rowing uniform, clothes himself in it in his rooms, and one fine afternoon in October finds himself one of a crowd of nervous novices in the yard of his college boat house. One of the captains pounces on him, selects a co-victim for him, and orders him into a gig-pair, or, to speak more correctly, " a tub." With the first stroke the beautiful azure vision vanishes, leaving only a sense of misery behind.
He imagined he could row as he walked, by the light of nature. He finds that all kinds of mysterious technicalities are required of him. He has to "get hold of the beginning" to "finish it out," to take his oar " out of the water clean " (an impossibility one would think on the dirty drain fed Cam), to " plant his feet against the stretcher," to row his shoulders back, to keep his elbows close to his sides, to shoot away his hands, to swing from his hips, under no circumstances to bend his back or to leave go with his outside hand, and, above all, to keep his swing forward as steady as a rock—an instruction to which he conforms by not swinging at all. These are but a few points out of the many which are dinned into his ears by his energetic coach. A quarter of an hour con cludes his lesson, and he leaves the river a much sadder, but not necessarily a wiser man. How ever, since he is young he is not daunted by all these unforeseen difficulties. He perseveres, and towards the end of his first term reaps a doubtful reward by being put into an Eight with seven other novices, to splash and roll and knock his knuckles about for an hour or so to his heart's content. Next term (the Lent Term) may find him a member of one of his college Lent boats. Then he begins to feel that pluck and ambition are not in vain, and soon afterwards for the first time he tastes the joys of training, which he will be surprised to find does not consist entirely of raw steaks and underdone chops. Common sense, in fact, has during the past fifteen years or so broken in upon the foolish regulations of the ancient system. Men who train are still com pelled to keep early hours, to eat simple food at fixed times, to abjure tobacco, and to limit the quantity of liquid they absorb. But there is an immense variety in the dishes put before them ; they are warned against gorging (at breakfast, indeed, men frequently touch no meat), and though they assemble together in the Backs before break fast, and are ordered to clear their pipes by a short sharp burst of one hundred and fifty yards, they are not allowed to overtire themselves by the long runs which were at one time in fashion. Far away back in the dawn of University rowing training seems to have been far Taxer, though discipline may have been more strict, than it is now. Mr. J. M. Logan (the well-known Cambridge boat-builder) wrote to me on this subject : " I have heard my father say that the crews used to train on egg-flip which an old lady who then kept the Plough Inn by Ditton was very famous for making, and that crew which managed to drink most egg-flip was held to be most likely to make many bumps. I believe the ingredients were gin, beer, and beaten eggs, with nutmegs and spices added. I have heard my father say that the discipline of the crews was of an extraordinary character. For instance, the captain of the Lady Margaret Boat Club used to have a bugle, and after he had sounded it the crew would have to appear on the yard in high hats and dress suits with a black tie. The penalty for appearing in a tie of any other colour was one shilling. The trousers worn on these occasions were of white jean, and had to be washed every day under a penalty of one shilling. The wearing of perfectly clean things every day was an essential part of the preparation." All this, however, is a digression from the freshman whom we have seen safely through his tubbing troubles, and have selected for a Lent Boat. I return to him to follow him in a career of glory which will lead him from Lent Boat to May Boat, from that to his college Four, and so perhaps through the University Trial Eights to the final goal of all rowing ambition—the Cambridge Eight. He will have suffered many things for the sake of his beloved pursuit; he will have rowed many weary miles, have learnt the misery of aching limbs and blistered hands, perhaps he may have endured the last indignity of being bumped ; he will have laboured under broiling suns, or with snow storms and bitter winds beating against him ; he will have voluntarily cut himself off from many pleasant indulgences. But, on the other hand, his triumphs will have been sweet ; he will have trained himself to submit to discipline, to accept discomfort cheerfully, to keep a brave face in adverse circumstance ; he will have developed to the full his strength and his powers of endurance, and will have learnt the necessity of unselfishness and patriotism. These are, after all, no mean results in a generation which is often accused of effeminate and debasing luxury.