es
of his club, which he often declared could not be beaten. He improved
wonderfully in his new position, and, while playing some of the junior
clubs, which were by this time beginning to spring up, it was positively
amusing to see how John would advance quietly from his goal when it was
besieged, and punt the ball contemptuously away with quite a crowd of
young ones close up, awe-stricken at the agility shown by such a bulky
form.

A few of the Red Cross and Cedargrove forwards sometimes gave him a
fright, and in one match with the Leven Crowers he was fairly outwitted
by Boyd and Ned M'Donald in a cup tie. I fought hard in that memorable
battle myself, and never got such a saturation with water and mud in my
career; but we were beaten. I will not easily forget Dixy as he came to
the field on that occasion, carrying his umbrella to the goal-posts, and
laying it against the left one. He, poor fellow, expected his club would
have an easy victory, and this belief was shared in by not a few of the
eleven besides, including my master, who had, by the way, emerged into a
centre forward since the last match with the Kilmarackers, and as a
consequence he gave me a deal of extra work as a backer-up to Mat.
Angus. In fact, not long after I was carefully laced and ready for the
fray that wet afternoon, the Conqueror's eleven had a confab about the
tactics they should pursue, and Joe Sayler, our captain (who is now no
more, and lost to his club for ever), remarked it would take them all
their time to beat the Crowers. He had, I could see by his anxious
looks, grave doubts on the issue. At the outset of the game the rain
poured down in torrents, and as most of the play was on the Crowers'
portion of the field, the umbrella was put up, amid the laughter of the
partisans of John's contingent and the pent-up indignation of the
followers of the Crowers, who mustered strong on the occasion, and
demonstrated a strength of lungs truly astonishing. John, by and by,
when the battle became hot, had to discard his old friend and comforter,
and work in front of his fortress in a way that he had never done
before, and when the terrible tussle ended, the Conquerors were beaten
by two goals to one. When chaffed on the "umbrella incident" ever
afterwards Dixy was silent, and declared that in using it he did not
hold his opponents too cheaply, but simply with a desire to save himself
from a ducking. John was also a capital oarsman, and when he was