8 THE TEINITY FOOT BEAGLES 



anon ; but the intention of the Founder was not humanitarian — as 

 the prohibition is directed against persons who were in those days 

 all tonsured " clerks," and the motive was not very far removed from 

 that of the Puritans, who disliked bear-baiting, as says Lord 

 Macaulay, not because it gave pain to the bear, but pleasure to the 

 spectators. Of course the ecclesiastical atmosphere of all such 

 ancient foundations is a thing of the past. The prejudice, however, 

 survives though the rational motive for it is long forgotten. 



The result of all this is that Sport holds no recognised position in 

 University life, and that the Barbarians form a minority, self- 

 sufficient and aloof, like " Stalky and Co.," who instead of saying, 

 " Yes, Sir ! " and " No, Sir ! " and " Oh, Sir ! " and " Please, Sir ! " and 

 playing cricket and football for their house at appointed times, went 

 exploring in Colonel Dabney's coverts and made friends with his 

 retainers. And the analogy is the closer in that from the way that 

 M'Turk reported the keeper for attempted vulpicide, he at least was 

 as full-blooded a Barbarian as the Colonel himself. 



The aloofness is a fact in my judgment as regrettable as the over- 

 exaltation of athletics. The latter are of course free from anything 

 like professionalism in the ordinary sense. They are as high-toned and 

 whole-souled as their Greek prototypes who, so we were told at 

 school, gained no prize other than a quickly corruptible crown of 

 laurels. But it always seemed to me that the victors of those days 

 made a fairly good thing of it. They received handsome testimonials 

 from their fellow-citizens, and had the further joy of being made a 

 fuss of ; and the case is not altogether different with a modern game- 

 playing blue. He is a personage with grounds for a good conceit of 

 himself, he is interviewed and illustrated by the enterprise of modern 

 journalism, and, if he turn dominie, sometimes gets a rather 

 better mastership than he could ever aspire to on learning alone. 

 The sportsman on the other hand, who matches himself against the 

 cunning of animate and the forces of inanimate nature, has no 

 reward beyond the pleasure of the sport itself, the triumph of endur- 

 ance, and of survival where there is danger, and perhaps something 

 extra good to eat, such as a snipe or pheasant. The sportsman more- 

 over, in his contests with nature, develops his powers of observation 



