of the rose, in spite of the presence of her old play-mate in the opposite ranks.  The doctor is as much delighted as the youngest man on the ground, and the cabman waves his arms and shouts in a highly indecorous fashion.  The two pounds’ difference in weight is beginning to tell.  The English sway back a yard or two.  A blue coat emerges among the white ones.  He has fought his way through, but has left the ball behind him, so he dashes round and puts his weight behind it once more.  There is a last upheaval, the maul is split in two, and through the rent come the redoubtable Scotch forwards with the ball amongst them.  Their solid phalanx has scattered the English like spray to right and left.  There is no one in front of them, no one but a single little man, almost a boy in size and weight.  Surely he cannot hope to stop the tremendous rush.  The ball is a few yards in advance of the leading Scot when he springs forward at it.  He seizes it an instant before his adversary, and with the same motion writhes himself free from the man’s grasp.  Now is the time for the crack Cambridge quarter-back to show what he is made of.  The crowd yell with excitement.  To right and left run the great Scotch forwards, grasping, slipping, pursuing, and right in the midst of them, as quick and as erratic as a trout in a pool, runs the calm-faced little man, dodging one, avoiding another, slipping between the fingers of two others.  Surely he is caught now.  No, he has passed all the forwards and emerges from the ruck of men, pelting along at a tremendous pace.  He has dodged one of the Scotch quarters, and outstripped the other.  “Well played, England!” shout the crowd.  “Well run, Buller!” “Now, Tookey!” “Now, Dimsdale!” “Well collared, Dimsdale; well collared, indeed!” The little quarter-back had come to an end of his career, for Tom had been as quick as he and had caught him round the waist as he attempted to pass, and brought him to the ground.  The cheers were hearty, for the two half-backs were the only University men in the team, and there were hundreds of students among the spectators.  The good doctor coloured up with pleasure to hear his boy’s name bellowed forth approvingly by a thousand excited lungs.

The play is, as all good judges said it would be, very equal.  For the first forty minutes every advantage gained by either side had been promptly neutralized by a desperate effort on the part of the other.  The mass of struggling players has swayed backwards and forwards, but never more than twenty or thirty yards from the centre of the ground.  Neither goal had been seriously threatened as yet.  The spectators fail to see how the odds laid on England are justified, but the “fancy” abide by their choice.  In the second forty it is thought that the superior speed and staying power of the Southerners will tell over the heavier Scots.  There seems little the matter with the latter as yet, as they stand in a group, wiping their grimy faces and discussing the state of the game; for at the end of forty minutes the goals are changed and there is a slight interval.