AQUATICS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 88, 15 April 1899, Page 4 (Supplement)

AQUATICS.

Mr Pittar's yacht Eainbow left on Wednesday . for a northern cruise.

In an article on 'The Horowhenua Lake and Champion Contests,' the Manawatu 'Farmer' strongly urges the claims of that beautiful and historical lake as a site for the next championship rowing meeting. The paper says:—'lt is in every way suitable for rowing contests —it is surrounded with charming scenery—it is rich in historical events connected with, the Maori race—it is central between Wellington, Napier, and New Plymouth' — it is but a mile from where the train would drop passea': gers —and the majority of the people could arrive in the morning, see the races, and get away home again at night. To hold an aquatic carnival on the Horowhenua Lake would enable whole families to be present, whereas few ladies care to take part in a steamer excursion. If the New Zealand Eowing Association will decide to hold the championship races on the Horowhenua Lake —take the lake under their control on the day of the contest — arrange for excursion trains from all points of the compass —they will have such an attendance and "reap so bountifully in gate money that much more valuable prizes will be offered on future occasions, and still larger attendances ensured.'

A London paper says:—lt is reported that Sir. Thos. Lipton has purchased for £80,000 the steam yacht Aegusa, 1230 tons, built two years ago by Messrs. Scott and Co., Greenock. Sir Thomas will entertain a large company on board during the American races.

American oarsmen will compete at the Paris Exposition in 1900 with the rest of the world. The National Association of American Oarsmen will send the fastest crew in America to Paris, and. in fact, nearly every athletic association in the United States wil send its best team of athletes in the Olympian sports. And what is Australasia doing? asks a contempo-

rary. The annual series of international regattas in the Mediterranean was opened' at Marseilles on February 9 under very favourable weather- conditions. A paucity of entries, however, left much to be desired, and, according to latest files to hand, the interest was mainly centred in the yachts of British design and _ their more immediate rivals. Entries in the big classes did not fill at all. During the first seven days' racing under the Societie Nautique de Marseilles, Lord Wolverton's yacht Mildred (ex Eldred), 18 tons, secured no fewer than four firsts and one second out of five starts. Ruahine (6.6) was the most successfxil among the smaller class, with two firsts and one second to her credit out of six starts. Next on the. list is Prince Colleredo Mansfield's Heartsease (7.2), with two wins, while Emerald, the erstwhile property of Lord Brassey, only succeeded in getting home first on one occasion.

The famous English judge and oarsman .Chitty, died in February last. In the 'Varsity l-ace at Easter, 1849, Mr Ji W. Chitty rowed No. 2. In the Christmas, 1849, race, when Oxfc*d won on the foul, he rowed No. 4. fri 1851 / there was no race over the metropolitan course, but at Henley he stroked the Oxford crew in the Grand Challenge Cup 'Eace against Cambridge, and in 1852 he stroked the Dark Blue crew against Cambridge, Piitney to Mortlake course. In this last year Mr T. S .Egan, the old Cambridge coxswain, took the Oxford crew in hand, and the resiilt was thai the Dark Blues attained such n high degree of excellence that it has been handed down to posterity as a model, and it has been said that the best judges could find no greater fault in it than that 'bow' turned his elbows out a little too much.

The fact, cabled out to this colony, and appearing in a recent paper, that two of the Oxford University crew fainted . after the .. recent boat, race, will no doubt (says a Southern ,'ontemporary) renew for a time iii England the old controversy as to the danger of these annual contests. A

wide difference of opinion has _ existed on this subject for a long1 time, probably ever since that fore-runner of the race now rowed on the Thames which took place at Henley seventy years ago. A peculiar interest attaches to that old-time race for New Zealanders,- for No. 7 in the Camridge crew was the Selwyn who was subseq\iently to become first Bishop of New Zealand, a man who, as was said lately, stands out as a type for the imitation of future oarsmen, 'by the charm of his unrivalled accomplishments, the very King Arthur of "Old Blue" mythology.' We are told that some people maintain that the sufferings entailed by such a struggle as the University boat-race far outweigh any benefits to be derived from the exercise, 'and that the young man who aspires for such laurels deliberately casts in his lot for death or victory, perhaps for both.' Eowing men, of course, deny these imputations, and assert that on the whole the violent exercise .is beneficial rather than otherwise. The facts certainly seem to be on their side. A Dr. "Morgan, of Manchester, some years ago" took the trouble to follow up, in their after life, the crews which rowed in the sixteen University races between 1829 and 1859. The crews in these^contests included altogether 294 men, and assuming that each man was twenty years at the time of the race, and that his 'expectation of life' was another forty years, statistics showed that the average representative University rowing man lived for forty-two years after his race. About 12 per cent, died before reaching the age of sixty; of the 255 who lived beyond this age, 115 declared they had benefited by their exertions, 162 "were none the worse for them, while 17 said they had suffered a certain amount of injury. This does not look as if the 'Varsity boat-race has a particularly bad effect upon those who take part in it, severe though the exertion undoubtedly is. As to the way in which these rowing men held themselves in the mental contests with their fellows, the records of honours gained in the schools and the Senate House, over a period of forty years, show the men in'the Oxford eight to have been well up to the average of thenUniversity, while the men in the Cambridge eight were distinctly better than the average. The eights in the 1829 race, to which we have referred, set a good example to their successors in this respect, for of the sixteen men two became bishops, three deans, one a prebendary, and several others gained distinguished places in clerical and legal circles. It is not at all likely that if the Oxford and Cambridge boat-race was much more dangerous to health than it is, it would be dropped, but it imist be satisfactory to the supporters of o-enuine athletic sports to be able to reply to its detractors with such sound and convincing arguments.