" Even in a
football match it is possible for an aunt occasionally to distinguish
her nephew and say, "Look, there is Edward." But if she says, "Look,
there is Edward," meaning No. 5 in the Cambridge boat, you know she is
imagining. All she sees is a vague splashing between two bowler-hats,
or possibly the Oxford rudder moving at high speed through a horse's
legs. If the race were rowed against the tide we should all get our
money's worth; and the oars-men could then put more realism into their
"After-the-Finish" attitudes. As it is, they roll about in the boat
with a praiseworthy suggestion of fatigue, but nobody really believes
they are tired--nobody at least who has rowed on the Thames with the
tide.
No, I am afraid the actual race is a sad hypocrisy. But the training
must be terrible. Think of it. They started practising in the second
week in January: they row the race in the fourth week in March. For
ten weeks and more they have been "getting those hands away" and
driving with those legs and not washing-out. For ten weeks horrible
men with huge calves have shouted at them and cursed them and told
them their sins, like a monk telling his beads--"Bow, you're late;
Two, you're early; Three, you're bucketing; Four, you're not bucketing
enough.
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