SPORTING BRITAIN

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 191, 15 May 1928, Page 9

SPORTING BRITAIN

THE BOAT RACE CLEANES THE SOCIAL STRATA

HUGE CEQWDS STAND IN RAIN TO SEE HISTORIC > CONTEST

Dominion Special Service. (By Nellie M. Scanlan.)

. London, April 1. Viewed through foreign eyes, England must present a fantastic spectacle—a spectacle unparalleled in any country. The great sporting festivities are traditional, like the battle of flowers in Nice. They have always been; they will always be. Like the Saints’ days, they are regularly recurring events. If we could see■ into the mind of a man, say the King of the Afghans, who has strenuously participated in the earliest jousts of the sporting-social season, in what grotesque image do we appear? What does he think of our weatherproof heroism? On Friday he went to Liverpool to see the Grand. National. Americans had chartered steamers to come across the Atlantic; they lived on board and returned next day. Parties flew from London and returned by wing that night in time for dinner. Half England and the whole of Lancashire appeared to have downed tools to watch the race. Forty-two horses started, and only two finished. As one paper remarked, it was not so mu<\h a race as a tontine — tho survivor took the money. These Royal eyes from the sunny East watched British thousands standing for hours in drenching rain. They arc the only people who can go about like water rats and look happy, even handsome. Stars and Stripes Fail.

Jockeys plucked the mud from their eyes and miserably tried to sort out their hordes from the welter of saddles and legs and tangled tails. The American horse was leading at the last fence,

and the great heart of America was bursting with pride. But pride had its fall. Down came the stars and stripes at the last jump, and TipperaryTim, an outsider, came galloping home alone. It brought honour and joy to the Emerald Isle. The American horse got up and, finding nothing moving in its vicinity, made for the winning post, arriving there second —and last. And still the rain . rained.

Early next morning these mad British were at it again. They enacted another traditional drama on the Thames —the Boat Race. There is no need to say what Boat Race; there is only one. The poor, bewildered Afghan King was dragged out of bed in the chilly dawn to take his breakfast on a launch, because they would row the race at 9.45 this year. Why? Because the tide turned ' just after ten, and they wanted to catch it at the flood. Like the Afghan King and a quarter of a million others, I, too, was up in the damp,- chilly dawn, and with the ram coming down in ramrods, I turned my face to the Thames. It was an hour before I reached its grey waters and crowded banks, and I had to walk the last half-mile to Hammersmith bridge, because of the traffic jam. It was a solid pack of. buses, cars, and people, and it was not yet nine o'clock.

Horse racing appeals to one class, football to another, golf to another, hunting to a fourth. But the marvel of the Boat Race is the universality of its appeal. In this it differs from the others. England, socially; is like a layer cake, and is built up, strata upon strata, in horizontal slices. Each layer fills a useful or ornamental sphere in the social organism. Start at the top with Royalty. then nobility, aristocracy, the county. Thbre are the professional classes, tne turner middle class, middle class, and lower m“dle-.clas3. Then you reach the lower ordet—the lower class, labourers, away down through many grades to the mendicants that fringe the gutter, poor, pathetic souls. And you may go still further, if you would reach the underworld. . . , ~ Most of these classes are divided, the upper from the under by birth, custom, environment, and; social conditions. There is now, however, a definite seepand the class lilies are less debited tmin before the war. But broadly speakiii<~. they still exist. . , , Une day in the year the horizontal, barriers are removed, and a vital issue cleaves England from top to bottom, from aristocrat to charwoman. It is the beat race. Cut the layer cake down the middle, and you have all grades ranked on either side. Strangely Assorted Partisans.

In the crowd were bluff old colonels and prosperous barristers, the Prime Minister,-and many a sporting peer. Old boys of Cambridge and Oxford, and people who had never seen either university —had never been to any school at all—

were alike flaunting their rival bluCs. Urchins in the gutter, with pinched, pale faces, fought valiantly for their chosen school. I saw a tiny baby, wrapped in a ragged shawl, being wheeled by an excited charwoman. On. the baby's shawl was pinned a little bity of dirty, dark blue rag. The sleeping mite was backing Oxford. An - old woman selling matches wore Cambridge colours, and a drayman, carting dirt, haddiis team tied up in Oxford blue, and a saucy kewpie in the same colour, was stuck in his greasy cap. And on this chill, wet morning, these thousands were hurrying to see the boat nice, many having travelled for two and three hours. From the best vantage point it could be only a few moments’ glimpse. Girls had gathered on the towpath, that 4i-mile grandstand, as early as 6 o'clock, and skipped to keep themselves warm. Many brought their breakfast in parcels, and ate it aS they waited. Half an hour before the race, the sun burst through and played hide-and-seek for a while. All the barges moored along the bank were full. Some had chosen to watch the start of -the race, some tile finish, others preferred a halfway view from around Hammersmith Bridge. All traffic on the river was stopped, and police boats, speedy motor launches, patrolled the course. Not a craft was moving on the quiet waters, scarcely ruffled by the faint breeze. Every roof arid window, fence and bank was full. Impromptu grandstands had been run up on every spare inch. On the Surrey side, the Towpath was packed, and it is always so astonishing that with an eager crowd, ten deep, struggling for a brief view as the slender craft flash past, no one is pushed into the river, for there is not even an inch of ridge to protect the edge. Cosmopolitan Types. I paid 2s. for a view from a moored barge. It was a decrepit affair, and began to leak badly. Only by plugging up the holes with handfulls of mud scraped from the bank were we kept afloat till the race was over. Beside me was a brick-red old gentleman in russet tweed, who talked about "in my day. Behind me was a voluable young Dutchman and his. wife. Two bronzed young Englishmen of the hunting type were there, an ex-university man with his wee son and daughter, and a Chinese student. Iwo mud-spattered labourers, rough ot manner, rough of tongue, and rough of clothes, paid their 2s. and came on board, wearing Cambridge colours. Overhead ten aeroplanes roared and swooped* They wore most!/ sensation-

loving Americans who wanted a novel view of the race. In the distance a bagpipes wailed dismally. Other thousands sat at the wireless at home, and listened to the description ot the race in veriest detail. , ‘'Cambridge are now bringing out their boat. Oxford are removing their scarves, they ate taking off .their sweaters, they are beginning to wish they had never been born.” . . After all,'it was not really a rac°, it was a procession. Cambridge won all tne way, and finished about ten lengt.is ahead. They stepped ashore quite fresh, while Oxford collapsed over their oars. The easy, rhythmic swing of Cambridge was perfect harmony, and the precision of movement, the dip of the oars, the thrust forward, were visual delight. This was the eightieth university boat race. Oxford has won 40, there was one tie, and now Cambridge has climbed steadily up to 39. Cambridge has in recent years gained an ascendancy oyer Oxford in matters of sport. Old Oxford men are worried over this apparent decline in athletics, and are asking the cause. The total expense incurred in training and equipping a crew for the boat nice generally amounts to more than £lOOO. Every year a new boat is built, jivhieh costs about £l3O, and the oars £25. The only cost borne by the members of .the crew is their own outfit. The same afternoon, in drizzling rain, the still more bewildered Afghan King was taken to see Scotland wipe the floor with England at football. The vast stadium at Wembley was crowded, and during the half-time interval, 80,000 people sat in the rain and joined heartily in community singing, and “Pack Up Your Troubles” and "Keep the Home Fires Burning,” rang over' the muddy field and up to the sodden sky. When King Amanullah goes on to Russia, his next country of investigation, he may see strange things, but nothing more impressive, more heroically cheerful, than the Briton's moist enjoyment of his traditional sports, which no rain can diminish nor mud defile,