otted off to join the rest of their comrades on the field of
battle.

And, indeed, for the next two hours there was no opportunity, even, had
they desired it, for any one to think of anything but this momentous
struggle.

For three years running the County had beaten the schoolboys, each time
worse than before, until at last the latter had got to be afraid the
others would begin to think them foemen not worthy of their steel. This
year they hardly dared hope a better fate than before, for the enemy
were down in force. Yet the boys had determined to die hard, and at
least give their adversaries all the trouble they could before their
goal should fall; and of this they were all the more sanguine, because
their team was the very best the school could muster, and not a man
among them but knew his business, and could be depended on to do it too.

Bad luck! Of course, just when it's not wanted there's a breeze got up,
blowing right down the field, and in the very teeth of the schoolboys,
who have lost the toss, and have to play from the oak-tree end for the
first half of the game!

"It's always the way," growls Ricketts. "They'll simply eat us up while
they've got the chance, you see!"

"No they won't," says Stansfield, bound to take a cheerful view of
things. "We're strong in backs. It's not like last match, when
Greenfield wasn't playing, and Loman was there to make such a mess of
it."

"Well, it's a comfort, that, anyhow."

"Of course it is," says the captain. "What you fellows have got to do
is to keep the ball in close, and nurse it along all the while, or else
run--but you'd better let the quarter-backs do that."

This sage advice is not thrown away on the worthies who lead the van for
Saint Dominic's, and an opportunity for putting it into practice occurs
the moment the game begins. For the School has to kick-off, and to
kick-off against that wind is a hopeless business. Stansfield does not
attempt anything like a big kick, but just drives the ball hard and low
on to the legs of the County forwards, sending his own men close after
it, so that a scrimmage is formed almost at the very spot where the ball
grounds.

"Now, School, sit on it! Do you hear?" calls out the captain; and
certainly it looks as if that unhappy ball were never destined to see
the light again. The enemy's forwards cannot get it out from among the
feet of the School forwards, try all they will, until, by sheer weight,
they simpl