CHAPTER
V—RUGBY AND FOOTBALL.
“Foot and eye opposed
In dubious strife.”—Scott.
And so here's Rugby, sir, at last, and you'll be
in plenty of time for dinner at the School-house, as I telled you,” said the
old guard, pulling his horn out of its case and tootle-tooing away, while the
coachman shook up his horses, and carried them along the side of the school
close, round Dead-man's corner, past the school-gates, and down the High Street
to the Spread Eagle, the wheelers in a spanking trot, and leaders cantering, in
a style which would not have disgraced “Cherry Bob,” “ramping, stamping,
tearing, swearing Billy Harwood,” or any other of the old coaching heroes.
Tom's heart beat quick as he passed the great
schoolfield or close, with its noble elms, in which several games at football
were going on, and tried to take in at once the long line of gray buildings,
beginning with the chapel, and ending with the School-house, the residence of
the head-master, where the great flag was lazily waving from the highest round
tower. And he began already to be proud of being a Rugby boy, as he passed the
schoolgates, with the oriel window above, and saw the boys standing there,
looking as if the town belonged to them, and nodding in a familiar manner to
the coachman, as if any one of them would be quite equal to getting on the box,
and working the team down street as well as he.
One of the young heroes, however, ran out from the
rest, and scrambled up behind; where, having righted himself, and nodded to the
guard, with “How do, Jem?” he turned short round to Tom, and after looking him
over for a minute, began,—
“I say, you fellow, is your name Brown?”
“Yes,” said Tom, in considerable astonishment,
glad, however, to have lighted on some one already who seemed to know him.
“Ah, I thought so. You know my old aunt, Miss
East. She lives somewhere down your way in Berkshire. She wrote to me that you
were coming to-day, and asked me to give you a lift.”
Tom was somewhat inclined to resent the
patronizing air of his new friend, a boy of just about his own height and age,
but gifted with the most transcendent coolness and assurance, which Tom felt to
be aggravating and hard to bear, but couldn't for the life of him help admiring
and envying—especially when young my lord begins hectoring two or three long
loafing fellows, half porter, half stableman, with a strong touch of the
blackguard, and in the end arranges with one of them, nicknamed Cooey, to carry
Tom's luggage up to the School-house for sixpence.
“And hark 'ee, Cooey; it must be up in ten
minutes, or no more jobs from me. Come along, Brown.” And away swaggers the
young potentate, with his hands in his pockets, and Tom at his side.
“All right, sir,” says Cooey, touching his hat,
with a leer and a wink at his companions.
“Hullo though,” says East, pulling up, and taking
another look at Tom; “this'll never do. Haven't you got a hat? We never wear
caps here. Only the louts wear caps. Bless you, if you were to go into the
quadrangle with that thing on, I don't know what'd happen.” The very idea was
quite beyond young Master East, and he looked unutterable things.
Tom thought his cap a very knowing affair, but
confessed that he had a hat in his hat-box; which was accordingly at once
extracted from the hind-boot, and Tom equipped in his go-to-meeting roof, as
his new friend called it. But this didn't quite suit his fastidious taste in
another minute, being too shiny; so, as they walk up the town, they dive into Nixon's
the hatter's, and Tom is arrayed, to his utter astonishment, and without paying
for it, in a regulation cat-skin at seven-and-sixpence, Nixon undertaking to
send the best hat up to the matron's room, School-house, in half an hour.
“You can send in a note for a tile on Monday, and
make it all right, you know,” said Mentor; “we're allowed two seven-and-sixers
a half, besides what we bring from home.”
Tom by this time began to be conscious of his new
social position and dignities, and to luxuriate in the realized ambition of
being a public school-boy at last, with a vested right of spoiling two
seven-and-sixers in half a year.
“You see,” said his friend, as they strolled up
towards the school-gates, in explanation of his conduct, “a great deal depends
on how a fellow cuts up at first. If he's got nothing odd about him, and
answers straightforward, and holds his head up, he gets on. Now, you'll do very
well as to rig, all but that cap. You see I'm doing the handsome thing by you,
because my father knows yours; besides, I want to please the old lady. She gave
me half a sov. this half, and perhaps'll double it next, if I keep in her good
books.”
There's nothing for candour like a lower-school
boy, and East was a genuine specimen—frank, hearty, and good-natured,
well-satisfied with himself and his position, and choke-full of life and
spirits, and all the Rugby prejudices and traditions which he had been able to
get together in the long course of one half-year during which he had been at
the School-house.
And Tom, notwithstanding his bumptiousness, felt
friends with him at once, and began sucking in all his ways and prejudices, as
fast as he could understand them.
East was great in the character of cicerone. He
carried Tom through the great gates, where were only two or three boys. These
satisfied themselves with the stock questions, “You fellow, what's your name?
Where do you come from? How old are you? Where do you board?” and, “What form
are you in?” And so they passed on through the quadrangle and a small courtyard,
upon which looked down a lot of little windows (belonging, as his guide
informed him, to some of the School-house studies), into the matron's room,
where East introduced Tom to that dignitary; made him give up the key of his
trunk, that the matron might unpack his linen, and told the story of the hat
and of his own presence of mind: upon the relation whereof the matron
laughingly scolded him for the coolest new boy in the house; and East,
indignant at the accusation of newness, marched Tom off into the quadrangle,
and began showing him the schools, and examining him as to his literary
attainments; the result of which was a prophecy that they would be in the same
form, and could do their lessons together.
“And now come in and see my study—we shall have
just time before dinner; and afterwards, before calling over, we'll do the
close.”
Tom followed his guide through the School-house
hall, which opens into the quadrangle. It is a great room, thirty feet long and
eighteen high, or thereabouts, with two great tables running the whole length,
and two large fireplaces at the side, with blazing fires in them, at one of
which some dozen boys were standing and lounging, some of whom shouted to East
to stop; but he shot through with his convoy, and landed him in the long, dark
passages, with a large fire at the end of each, upon which the studies opened.
Into one of these, in the bottom passage, East bolted with our hero, slamming
and bolting the door behind them, in case of pursuit from the hall, and Tom was
for the first time in a Rugby boy's citadel.
He hadn't been prepared for separate studies, and
was not a little astonished and delighted with the palace in question.
It wasn't very large, certainly, being about six
feet long by four broad. It couldn't be called light, as there were bars and a
grating to the window; which little precautions were necessary in the studies
on the ground-floor looking out into the close, to prevent the exit of small
boys after locking up, and the entrance of contraband articles. But it was
uncommonly comfortable to look at, Tom thought. The space under the window at
the farther end was occupied by a square table covered with a reasonably clean
and whole red and blue check tablecloth; a hard-seated sofa covered with red
stuff occupied one side, running up to the end, and making a seat for one, or
by sitting close, for two, at the table and a good stout wooden chair afforded
a seat to another boy, so that three could sit and work together. The walls
were wainscoted half-way up, the wainscot being covered with green baize, the
remainder with a bright-patterned paper, on which hung three or four prints of
dogs' heads; Grimaldi winning the Aylesbury steeple-chase; Amy Robsart, the
reigning Waverley beauty of the day; and Tom Crib, in a posture of defence,
which did no credit to the science of that hero, if truly represented. Over the
door were a row of hat-pegs, and on each side bookcases with cupboards at the
bottom, shelves and cupboards being filled indiscriminately with school-books,
a cup or two, a mouse-trap and candlesticks, leather straps, a fustian bag, and
some curious-looking articles which puzzled Tom not a little, until his friend
explained that they were climbing-irons, and showed their use. A cricket-bat
and small fishing-rod stood up in one corner.
This was the residence of East and another boy in
the same form, and had more interest for Tom than Windsor Castle, or any other
residence in the British Isles. For was he not about to become the joint owner
of a similar home, the first place he could call his own? One's own! What a
charm there is in the words! How long it takes boy and man to find out their
worth! How fast most of us hold on to them—faster and more jealously, the
nearer we are to that general home into which we can take nothing, but must go
naked as we came into the world! When shall we learn that he who multiplieth
possessions multiplieth troubles, and that the one single use of things which
we call our own is that they may be his who hath need of them?
“And shall I have a study like this too?” said
Tom.
“Yes, of course; you'll be chummed with some
fellow on Monday, and you can sit here till then.”
“What nice places!”
“They're well enough,” answered East,
patronizingly, “only uncommon cold at nights sometimes. Gower—that's my
chum—and I make a fire with paper on the floor after supper generally, only
that makes it so smoky.”
“But there's a big fire out in the passage,” said
Tom.
“Precious little we get out of that, though,” said
East. “Jones the praepostor has the study at the fire end, and he has rigged up
an iron rod and green baize curtain across the passage, which he draws at
night, and sits there with his door open; so he gets all the fire, and hears if
we come out of our studies after eight, or make a noise. However, he's taken to
sitting in the fifth-form room lately, so we do get a bit of fire now
sometimes; only to keep a sharp lookout that he don't catch you behind his
curtain when he comes down—that's all.”
A quarter past one now struck, and the bell began
tolling for dinner; so they went into the hall and took their places, Tom at
the very bottom of the second table, next to the praepostor (who sat at the end
to keep order there), and East a few paces higher. And now Tom for the first
time saw his future school-fellows in a body. In they came, some hot and ruddy
from football or long walks, some pale and chilly from hard reading in their
studies, some from loitering over the fire at the pastrycook's, dainty mortals,
bringing with them pickles and saucebottles to help them with their dinners.
And a great big-bearded man, whom Tom took for a master, began calling over the
names, while the great joints were being rapidly carved on the third table in
the corner by the old verger and the housekeeper. Tom's turn came last, and
meanwhile he was all eyes, looking first with awe at the great man, who sat
close to him, and was helped first, and who read a hard-looking book all the
time he was eating; and when he got up and walked off to the fire, at the small
boys round him, some of whom were reading, and the rest talking in whispers to
one another, or stealing one another's bread, or shooting pellets, or digging
their forks through the tablecloth. However, notwithstanding his curiosity, he
managed to make a capital dinner by the time the big man called “Stand up!” and
said grace.
As soon as dinner was over, and Tom had been
questioned by such of his neighbours as were curious as to his birth,
parentage, education, and other like matters, East, who evidently enjoyed his
new dignity of patron and mentor, proposed having a look at the close, which
Tom, athirst for knowledge, gladly assented to; and they went out through the quadrangle
and past the big fives court, into the great playground.
“That's the chapel, you see,” said East; “and
there, just behind it, is the place for fights. You see it's most out of the
way of the masters, who all live on the other side, and don't come by here
after first lesson or callings-over. That's when the fights come off. And all
this part where we are is the little-side ground, right up to the trees; and on
the other side of the trees is the big-side ground, where the great matches are
played. And there's the island in the farthest corner; you'll know that well
enough next half, when there's island fagging. I say, it's horrid cold; let's
have a run across.” And away went East, Tom close behind him. East was
evidently putting his best foot foremost; and Tom, who was mighty proud of his
running, and not a little anxious to show his friend that, although a new boy,
he was no milksop, laid himself down to work in his very best style. Right
across the close they went, each doing all he knew, and there wasn't a yard
between them when they pulled up at the island moat.
“I say,” said East, as soon as he got his wind,
looking with much increased respect at Tom, “you ain't a bad scud, not by no
means. Well, I'm as warm as a toast now.”
“But why do you wear white trousers in November?”
said Tom. He had been struck by this peculiarity in the costume of almost all
the School-house boys.
“Why, bless us, don't you know? No; I forgot. Why,
to-day's the School-house match. Our house plays the whole of the School at
football. And we all wear white trousers, to show 'em we don't care for hacks.
You're in luck to come to-day. You just will see a match; and Brooke's going to
let me play in quarters. That's more than he'll do for any other lower-school
boy, except James, and he's fourteen.”
“Who's Brooke?”
“Why, that big fellow who called over at dinner,
to be sure. He's cock of the school, and head of the School-house side, and the
best kick and charger in Rugby.”
“Oh, but do show me where they play. And tell me about
it. I love football so, and have played all my life. Won't Brooke let me play?”
“Not he,” said East, with some indignation. “Why,
you don't know the rules; you'll be a month learning them. And then it's no
joke playing-up in a match, I can tell you—quite another thing from your
private school games. Why, there's been two collar-bones broken this half, and
a dozen fellows lamed. And last year a fellow had his leg broken.”
Tom listened with the profoundest respect to this
chapter of accidents, and followed East across the level ground till they came
to a sort of gigantic gallows of two poles, eighteen feet high, fixed upright
in the ground some fourteen feet apart, with a cross-bar running from one to
the other at the height of ten feet or thereabouts.
“This is one of the goals,” said East, “and you
see the other, across there, right opposite, under the Doctor's wall. Well, the
match is for the best of three goals; whichever side kicks two goals wins: and
it won't do, you see, just to kick the ball through these posts—it must go over
the cross-bar; any height'll do, so long as it's between the posts. You'll have
to stay in goal to touch the ball when it rolls behind the posts, because if
the other side touch it they have a try at goal. Then we fellows in quarters,
we play just about in front of goal here, and have to turn the ball and kick it
back before the big fellows on the other side can follow it up. And in front of
us all the big fellows play, and that's where the scrummages are mostly.”
Tom's respect increased as he struggled to make
out his friend's technicalities, and the other set to work to explain the
mysteries of “off your side,” “drop-kicks,” “punts,” “places,” and the other
intricacies of the great science of football.
“But how do you keep the ball between the goals?”
said he; “I can't see why it mightn't go right down to the chapel.”
“Why; that's out of play,” answered East. “You see
this gravel-walk running down all along this side of the playing-ground, and
the line of elms opposite on the other? Well, they're the bounds. As soon as
the ball gets past them, it's in touch, and out of play. And then whoever first
touches it has to knock it straight out amongst the players-up, who make two
lines with a space between them, every fellow going on his own side. Ain't
there just fine scrummages then! And the three trees you see there which come
out into the play, that's a tremendous place when the ball hangs there, for you
get thrown against the trees, and that's worse than any hack.”
Tom wondered within himself, as they strolled back
again towards the fives court, whether the matches were really such break-neck
affairs as East represented, and whether, if they were, he should ever get to
like them and play up well.
He hadn't long to wonder, however, for next minute
East cried out, “Hurrah! here's the punt-about; come along and try your hand at
a kick.” The punt-about is the practice-ball, which is just brought out and
kicked about anyhow from one boy to another before callings-over and dinner, and
at other odd times. They joined the boys who had brought it out, all small
School-house fellows, friends of East; and Tom had the pleasure of trying his
skill, and performed very creditably, after first driving his foot three inches
into the ground, and then nearly kicking his leg into the air, in vigorous
efforts to accomplish a drop-kick after the manner of East.
Presently more boys and bigger came out, and boys
from other houses on their way to calling-over, and more balls were sent for.
The crowd thickened as three o'clock approached; and when the hour struck, one
hundred and fifty boys were hard at work. Then the balls were held, the master
of the week came down in cap and gown to calling-over, and the whole school of
three hundred boys swept into the big school to answer to their names.
“I may come in, mayn't I?” said Tom, catching East
by the arm, and longing to feel one of them.
“Yes, come along; nobody'll say anything. You
won't be so eager to get into calling-over after a month,” replied his friend;
and they marched into the big school together, and up to the farther end, where
that illustrious form, the lower fourth, which had the honour of East's
patronage for the time being, stood.
The master mounted into the high desk by the door,
and one of the praepostors of the week stood by him on the steps, the other
three marching up and down the middle of the school with their canes, calling
out, “Silence, silence!” The sixth form stood close by the door on the left,
some thirty in number, mostly great big grown men, as Tom thought, surveying
them from a distance with awe; the fifth form behind them, twice their number,
and not quite so big. These on the left; and on the right the lower fifth,
shell, and all the junior forms in order; while up the middle marched the three
praepostors.
Then the praepostor who stands by the master calls
out the names, beginning with the sixth form; and as he calls each boy answers
“here” to his name, and walks out. Some of the sixth stop at the door to turn
the whole string of boys into the close. It is a great match-day, and every boy
in the school, will he, nill he, must be there. The rest of the sixth go
forwards into the close, to see that no one escapes by any of the side gates.
To-day, however, being the School-house match,
none of the School-house praepostors stay by the door to watch for truants of
their side; there is carte blanche to the School-house fags to go where they
like. “They trust to our honour,” as East proudly informs Tom; “they know very
well that no School-house boy would cut the match. If he did, we'd very soon
cut him, I can tell you.”
The master of the week being short-sighted, and
the praepostors of the week small and not well up to their work, the
lower-school boys employ the ten minutes which elapse before their names are
called in pelting one another vigorously with acorns, which fly about in all
directions. The small praepostors dash in every now and then, and generally
chastise some quiet, timid boy who is equally afraid of acorns and canes, while
the principal performers get dexterously out of the way. And so calling-over
rolls on somehow, much like the big world, punishments lighting on wrong
shoulders, and matters going generally in a queer, cross-grained way, but the
end coming somehow, which is, after all, the great point. And now the master of
the week has finished, and locked up the big school; and the praepostors of the
week come out, sweeping the last remnant of the school fags, who had been
loafing about the corners by the fives court, in hopes of a chance of bolting,
before them into the close.
“Hold the punt-about!” “To the goals!” are the
cries; and all stray balls are impounded by the authorities, and the whole mass
of boys moves up towards the two goals, dividing as they go into three bodies.
That little band on the left, consisting of from fifteen to twenty boys, Tom
amongst them, who are making for the goal under the School-house wall, are the
School-house boys who are not to play up, and have to stay in goal. The larger
body moving to the island goal are the School boys in a like predicament. The
great mass in the middle are the players-up, both sides mingled together; they
are hanging their jackets (and all who mean real work), their hats, waistcoats,
neck-handkerchiefs, and braces, on the railings round the small trees; and
there they go by twos and threes up to their respective grounds. There is none
of the colour and tastiness of get-up, you will perceive, which lends such a
life to the present game at Rugby, making the dullest and worst-fought match a
pretty sight. Now each house has its own uniform of cap and jersey, of some
lively colour; but at the time we are speaking of plush caps have not yet come
in, or uniforms of any sort, except the School-house white trousers, which are
abominably cold to-day. Let us get to work, bare-headed, and girded with our
plain leather straps. But we mean business, gentlemen.
And now that the two sides have fairly sundered,
and each occupies its own ground, and we get a good look at them, what
absurdity is this? You don't mean to say that those fifty or sixty boys in
white trousers, many of them quite small, are going to play that huge mass
opposite? Indeed I do, gentlemen. They're going to try, at any rate, and won't
make such a bad fight of it either, mark my word; for hasn't old Brooke won the
toss, with his lucky halfpenny, and got choice of goals and kick-off? The new
ball you may see lie there quite by itself, in the middle, pointing towards the
School or island goal; in another minute it will be well on its way there. Use
that minute in remarking how the Schoolhouse side is drilled. You will see, in
the first place, that the sixth-form boy, who has the charge of goal, has
spread his force (the goalkeepers) so as to occupy the whole space behind the
goal-posts, at distances of about five yards apart. A safe and well-kept goal
is the foundation of all good play. Old Brooke is talking to the captain of
quarters, and now he moves away. See how that youngster spreads his men (the
light brigade) carefully over the ground, half-way between their own goal and
the body of their own players-up (the heavy brigade). These again play in
several bodies. There is young Brooke and the bull-dogs. Mark them well. They
are the “fighting brigade,” the “die-hards,” larking about at leap-frog to keep
themselves warm, and playing tricks on one another. And on each side of old
Brooke, who is now standing in the middle of the ground and just going to kick
off, you see a separate wing of players-up, each with a boy of acknowledged
prowess to look to—here Warner, and there Hedge; but over all is old Brooke,
absolute as he of Russia, but wisely and bravely ruling over willing and
worshipping subjects, a true football king. His face is earnest and careful as
he glances a last time over his array, but full of pluck and hope—the sort of
look I hope to see in my general when I go out to fight.
The School side is not organized in the same way.
The goal-keepers are all in lumps, anyhow and nohow; you can't distinguish between
the players-up and the boys in quarters, and there is divided leadership. But
with such odds in strength and weight it must take more than that to hinder
them from winning; and so their leaders seem to think, for they let the
players-up manage themselves.
But now look! there is a slight move forward of
the School-house wings, a shout of “Are you ready?” and loud affirmative reply.
Old Brooke takes half a dozen quick steps, and away goes the ball spinning
towards the School goal, seventy yards before it touches ground, and at no
point above twelve or fifteen feet high, a model kick-off; and the School-house
cheer and rush on. The ball is returned, and they meet it and drive it back
amongst the masses of the School already in motion. Then the two sides close,
and you can see nothing for minutes but a swaying crowd of boys, at one point
violently agitated. That is where the ball is, and there are the keen players
to be met, and the glory and the hard knocks to be got. You hear the dull thud,
thud of the ball, and the shouts of “Off your side,” “Down with him,” “Put him
over,” “Bravo.” This is what we call “a scrummage,” gentlemen, and the first
scrummage in a School-house match was no joke in the consulship of Plancus.
But see! it has broken; the ball is driven out on
the School-house side, and a rush of the School carries it past the
School-house players-up. “Look out in quarters,” Brooke's and twenty other
voices ring out. No need to call, though: the School-house captain of quarters
has caught it on the bound, dodges the foremost School boys, who are heading
the rush, and sends it back with a good drop-kick well into the enemy's
country. And then follows rush upon rush, and scrummage upon scrummage, the
ball now driven through into the School-house quarters, and now into the School
goal; for the School-house have not lost the advantage which the kick-off and a
slight wind gave them at the outset, and are slightly “penning” their
adversaries. You say you don't see much in it all—nothing but a struggling mass
of boys, and a leather ball which seems to excite them all to great fury, as a
red rag does a bull. My dear sir, a battle would look much the same to you,
except that the boys would be men, and the balls iron; but a battle would be
worth your looking at for all that, and so is a football match. You can't be
expected to appreciate the delicate strokes of play, the turns by which a game
is lost and won—it takes an old player to do that; but the broad philosophy of
football you can understand if you will. Come along with me a little nearer,
and let us consider it together.
The ball has just fallen again where the two sides
are thickest, and they close rapidly around it in a scrummage. It must be
driven through now by force or skill, till it flies out on one side or the
other. Look how differently the boys face it! Here come two of the bulldogs,
bursting through the outsiders; in they go, straight to the heart of the
scrummage, bent on driving that ball out on the opposite side. That is what
they mean to do. My sons, my sons! you are too hot; you have gone past the
ball, and must struggle now right through the scrummage, and get round and back
again to your own side, before you can be of any further use. Here comes young
Brooke; he goes in as straight as you, but keeps his head, and backs and bends,
holding himself still behind the ball, and driving it furiously when he gets
the chance. Take a leaf out of his book, you young chargers. Here comes
Speedicut, and Flashman the School-house bully, with shouts and great action.
Won't you two come up to young Brooke, after locking-up, by the School-house
fire, with “Old fellow, wasn't that just a splendid scrummage by the three
trees?” But he knows you, and so do we. You don't really want to drive that
ball through that scrummage, chancing all hurt for the glory of the
School-house, but to make us think that's what you want—a vastly different
thing; and fellows of your kidney will never go through more than the skirts of
a scrummage, where it's all push and no kicking. We respect boys who keep out
of it, and don't sham going in; but you—we had rather not say what we think of
you.
Then the boys who are bending and watching on the
outside, mark them: they are most useful players, the dodgers, who seize on the
ball the moment it rolls out from amongst the chargers, and away with it across
to the opposite goal. They seldom go into the scrummage, but must have more
coolness than the chargers. As endless as are boys' characters, so are their
ways of facing or not facing a scrummage at football.
Three-quarters of an hour are gone; first winds
are failing, and weight and numbers beginning to tell. Yard by yard the
School-house have been driven back, contesting every inch of ground. The
bull-dogs are the colour of mother earth from shoulder to ankle, except young
Brooke, who has a marvellous knack of keeping his legs. The School-house are
being penned in their turn, and now the ball is behind their goal, under the
Doctor's wall. The Doctor and some of his family are there looking on, and seem
as anxious as any boy for the success of the School-house. We get a minute's
breathing-time before old Brooke kicks out, and he gives the word to play
strongly for touch, by the three trees. Away goes the ball, and the bull-dogs
after it, and in another minute there is shout of “In touch!” “Our ball!” Now's
your time, old Brooke, while your men are still fresh. He stands with the ball
in his hand, while the two sides form in deep lines opposite one another; he
must strike it straight out between them. The lines are thickest close to him,
but young Brooke and two or three of his men are shifting up farther, where the
opposite line is weak. Old Brooke strikes it out straight and strong, and it
falls opposite his brother. Hurrah! that rush has taken it right through the
School line, and away past the three trees, far into their quarters, and young
Brooke and the bull-dogs are close upon it. The School leaders rush back,
shouting, “Look out in goal!” and strain every nerve to catch him, but they are
after the fleetest foot in Rugby. There they go straight for the School
goal-posts, quarters scattering before them. One after another the bull-dogs go
down, but young Brooke holds on. “He is down.” No! a long stagger, but the
danger is past. That was the shock of Crew, the most dangerous of dodgers. And
now he is close to the School goal, the ball not three yards before him. There
is a hurried rush of the School fags to the spot, but no one throws himself on
the ball, the only chance, and young Brooke has touched it right under the
School goal-posts.
The School leaders come up furious, and administer
toco to the wretched fags nearest at hand. They may well be angry, for it is
all Lombard Street to a china orange that the School-house kick a goal with the
ball touched in such a good place. Old Brooke, of course, will kick it out, but
who shall catch and place it? Call Crab Jones. Here he comes, sauntering along
with a straw in his mouth, the queerest, coolest fish in Rugby. If he were
tumbled into the moon this minute, he would just pick himself up without taking
his hands out of his pockets or turning a hair. But it is a moment when the
boldest charger's heart beats quick. Old Brooke stands with the ball under his
arm motioning the School back; he will not kick out till they are all in goal,
behind the posts. They are all edging forwards, inch by inch, to get nearer for
the rush at Crab Jones, who stands there in front of old Brooke to catch the
ball. If they can reach and destroy him before he catches, the danger is over;
and with one and the same rush they will carry it right away to the
School-house goal. Fond hope! it is kicked out and caught beautifully. Crab
strikes his heel into the ground, to mark the spot where the ball was caught,
beyond which the school line may not advance; but there they stand, five deep,
ready to rush the moment the ball touches the ground. Take plenty of room.
Don't give the rush a chance of reaching you. Place it true and steady. Trust
Crab Jones. He has made a small hole with his heel for the ball to lie on, by
which he is resting on one knee, with his eye on old Brooke. “Now!” Crab places
the ball at the word, old Brooke kicks, and it rises slowly and truly as the
School rush forward.
Then a moment's pause, while both sides look up at
the spinning ball. There it flies, straight between the two posts, some five
feet above the cross-bar, an unquestioned goal; and a shout of real, genuine
joy rings out from the School-house players-up, and a faint echo of it comes
over the close from the goal-keepers under the Doctor's wall. A goal in the
first hour—such a thing hasn't been done in the School-house match these five
years.
“Over!” is the cry. The two sides change goals,
and the School-house goal-keepers come threading their way across through the
masses of the School, the most openly triumphant of them—amongst whom is Tom, a
School-house boy of two hours' standing—getting their ears boxed in the
transit. Tom indeed is excited beyond measure, and it is all the sixth-form
boy, kindest and safest of goal-keepers, has been able to do, to keep him from
rushing out whenever the ball has been near their goal. So he holds him by his side,
and instructs him in the science of touching.
At this moment Griffith, the itinerant vender of
oranges from Hill Morton, enters the close with his heavy baskets. There is a
rush of small boys upon the little pale-faced man, the two sides mingling together,
subdued by the great goddess Thirst, like the English and French by the streams
in the Pyrenees. The leaders are past oranges and apples, but some of them
visit their coats, and apply innocent-looking ginger-beer bottles to their
mouths. It is no ginger-beer though, I fear, and will do you no good. One short
mad rush, and then a stitch in the side, and no more honest play. That's what
comes of those bottles.
But now Griffith's baskets are empty, the ball is
placed again midway, and the School are going to kick off. Their leaders have
sent their lumber into goal, and rated the rest soundly, and one hundred and
twenty picked players-up are there, bent on retrieving the game. They are to
keep the ball in front of the School-house goal, and then to drive it in by
sheer strength and weight. They mean heavy play and no mistake, and so old
Brooke sees, and places Crab Jones in quarters just before the goal, with four
or five picked players who are to keep the ball away to the sides, where a try
at goal, if obtained, will be less dangerous than in front. He himself, and
Warner and Hedge, who have saved themselves till now, will lead the charges.
“Are you ready?” “Yes.” And away comes the ball,
kicked high in the air, to give the School time to rush on and catch it as it
falls. And here they are amongst us. Meet them like Englishmen, you Schoolhouse
boys, and charge them home. Now is the time to show what mettle is in you; and
there shall be a warm seat by the hall fire, and honour, and lots of bottled
beer to-night for him who does his duty in the next half-hour. And they are
well met. Again and again the cloud of their players-up gathers before our
goal, and comes threatening on, and Warner or Hedge, with young Brooke and the
relics of the bull-dogs, break through and carry the ball back; and old Brooke
ranges the field like Job's war-horse. The thickest scrummage parts asunder
before his rush, like the waves before a clipper's bows; his cheery voice rings
out over the field, and his eye is everywhere. And if these miss the ball, and
it rolls dangerously in front of our goal, Crab Jones and his men have seized
it and sent it away towards the sides with the unerring drop-kick. This is
worth living for—the whole sum of school-boy existence gathered up into one straining,
struggling half-hour, a half-hour worth a year of common life.
The quarter to five has struck, and the play
slackens for a minute before goal; but there is Crew, the artful dodger,
driving the ball in behind our goal, on the island side, where our quarters are
weakest. Is there no one to meet him? Yes; look at little East! The ball is
just at equal distances between the two, and they rush together, the young man
of seventeen and the boy of twelve, and kick it at the same moment. Crew passes
on without a stagger; East is hurled forward by the shock, and plunges on his
shoulder, as if he would bury himself in the ground; but the ball rises
straight into the air, and falls behind Crew's back, while the “bravoes” of the
School-house attest the pluckiest charge of all that hard-fought day. Warner
picks East up lame and half stunned, and he hobbles back into goal, conscious
of having played the man.
And now the last minutes are come, and the School
gather for their last rush, every boy of the hundred and twenty who has a run
left in him. Reckless of the defence of their own goal, on they come across the
level big-side ground, the ball well down amongst them, straight for our goal,
like the column of the Old Guard up the slope at Waterloo. All former charges
have been child's play to this. Warner and Hedge have met them, but still on
they come. The bull-dogs rush in for the last time; they are hurled over or
carried back, striving hand, foot, and eyelids. Old Brooke comes sweeping round
the skirts of the play, and turning short round, picks out the very heart of
the scrummage, and plunges in. It wavers for a moment; he has the ball. No, it
has passed him, and his voice rings out clear over the advancing tide, “Look
out in goal!” Crab Jones catches it for a moment; but before he can kick, the
rush is upon him and passes over him; and he picks himself up behind them with
his straw in his mouth, a little dirtier, but as cool as ever.
The ball rolls slowly in behind the School-house
goal, not three yards in front of a dozen of the biggest School players-up.
There stands the School-house praepostor, safest
of goal-keepers, and Tom Brown by his side, who has learned his trade by this
time. Now is your time, Tom. The blood of all the Browns is up, and the two
rush in together, and throw themselves on the ball, under the very feet of the
advancing column—the praepostor on his hands and knees, arching his back, and
Tom all along on his face. Over them topple the leaders of the rush, shooting
over the back of the praepostor, but falling flat on Tom, and knocking all the
wind out of his small carcass. “Our ball,” says the praepostor, rising with his
prize; “but get up there; there's a little fellow under you.” They are hauled
and roll off him, and Tom is discovered, a motionless body.
Old Brooke picks him up. “Stand back, give him
air,” he says; and then feeling his limbs, adds, “No bones broken.—How do you
feel, young un?”
“Hah-hah!” gasps Tom, as his wind comes back;
“pretty well, thank you—all right.”
“Who is he?” says Brooke.
“Oh, it's Brown; he's a new boy; I know him,” says
East, coming up.
“Well, he is a plucky youngster, and will make a
player,” says Brooke.
And five o'clock strikes. “No side” is called, and
the first day of the School-house match is over.
