1 6 Among Men and Horses. 



was stationed in Ireland at the time about which I am writ- 

 ing, was a fast runner ; although his chief forte was hopping, 

 at which accomplishment he had no equal in England. I 

 have often heard people talk of his hopping on to the chim- 

 ney-piece of the Kildare Street Club, which, if I remember 

 rightly, was about 5 feet from the ground. He was also 

 known to have hopped over a billiard table. The I4th Regi- 

 ment also possessed a very good all-round man in Captain 

 Aubrey Patton. 



In the late Fifties and early Sixties there was keen rivalry 

 between the Cork athletes and English visitors. The arrival 

 of the celebrated London Rowing Club four-oared crew, of 

 which Playfair was stroke and Cassamajor bow, was an event 

 which stirred into excitement every man, woman and child of 

 our sporting city. As might have been expected, the uncon- 

 quered strangers were too good for the local men. The visit 

 was justly regarded as a high compliment ; and the defeat, as 

 a stimulant to increased exertion. During the seven years 

 which followed, the River Lee in the summer time was the 

 busy scene of hard training and well-contested boat races, in 

 some of which I rowed. There were two great rival clubs : 

 the Glenbrook and the City. The members of the former, of 

 which I was one, regarded themselves as gentlemen amateurs, 

 and the latter, as amateurs without the prefix ; for our rivals 

 and worthy ones they frequently proved themselves to be 

 were chiefly recruited from shop assistants ; while we con- 

 sidered ourselves to be untainted by trade, in centra-distinction 

 to commerce. The City men, not to be behindhand in a vice 

 which has been castigated by Thackeray, drew the ' line ' be- 

 tween themselves and the members of a mechanics' rowing 

 club. The fact of the beautiful situation of our club on the 

 river, close to Queenstown, prompted its committee to en- 

 large and improve the club-house, until they had made it a 

 very pleasant resort for social meetings, with the result that 

 its luxurious surroundings killed love of rowing, which needs 

 for its highest development, self-denial and hard work. The 



