P . E.
ORD
THE
P 1 VOL . NIT .
ERIT1 MARCH, 1893 .
No.
~.
103.
BOATING PROSPECTS.
O
UR prospects this year are, to be brief and plain, far from favourable,
and we can never look forward to a successful season, unless football will consent to be more generous . We take up the card of football fixtures and see the last date is March Ilth, and we hear on good authority that Easter holidays fall not later than April 15th, our season then consists of four weeks, one of which is devoted to racing ; a season which is palpably insufficient, not merely for teaching novices, but for those who have not touched an oar for a twelvemonth, and have any intentions of rowing—properly so called—in the future : more harm than good is done, at least for the latter, by these scrappy performances. So much for the time : again, we begin to row when we are worn out, or, to speak more correctly, stale at football and the results of this spasmodic burst of rowing, change of exercise though it be, can never be satisfactory. Material there may be, but so there is for sculptures as good as ever Pheidias turned out. Yet another point we must mention : Mr . Eyre has with great pains raised money from Old Boys . to serve as a nucleus for the purchase of new boats . What use then is there in agitating for or buying costly things like boats, if they arc to lie idle in a dusty house for spiders to spin their webs upon, except for a paltry month in the year? Football is, and deservedly,
the game for boys, but why, with a river as good as any in the kingdom for our purpose, should we, out of nine months term-time, crowd our rowing . cricket, and sports into a poor four? All this we write merely