i 3 2 SPORTS AND ANECDOTES. 



water, and what with boots and mackintosh, and so 

 forth, I was beginning to feel somewhat tired and 

 weighed down by so many wet incumbrances. 

 Having reached us they tried to help me into their 

 boat, but I was so heavy that they could not manage 

 it in the ordinary way, and so, getting hold of one 

 of my legs, which I managed to turn up for them 

 to get hold of, they pulled me head over heels into 

 the punt as if I had been a sack of beans. By 

 the time this rescue was achieved it was growing 

 quite dark, rain was coming down pretty heavily, 

 and it was thundering and lightening in first-rate 

 style ; but we were safely out of the water, which 

 was the main point. It would have been an amus- 

 ing sight to any one who could have seen us as we 

 floated down the river. My companion had managed 

 to get on to the end of the punt, and the old pointer 

 had got on to the middle of it, whilst I was to be 

 seen, hanging like grim death on to the other 

 end, which, from my friend being a pretty heavy 

 man, was tilted out of the water. There is no doubt 

 but that we cut a most ridiculous and miserable 

 figure ; and had it been daylight, we might have 

 been fair subjects for a little ridicule ; as it was, had 

 we both been drowned, and the old pointer with us, 



