ong Dormitory, be it said to their credit, were
not fellows to form a scheme and then think no more about it, and the
next day their minds were exercised with preparations for the sports,
the chief difficulty being in arranging costumes which should answer to
the descriptions given on Rosher's card. These vagaries in dress
caused an immense amount of amusement, and when the masters'
supper-bell gave the signal for the commencement of operations, every
one found it difficult to retrain from shouts of laughter at the sight
of the various styles of war-paint. Perhaps that of Jack Fenleigh,
though simple to a degree, was most comical: his colours were described
as "red and white," and his costume consisted of his night-shirt, and a
large scarlet chest-protector which he had borrowed from a small boy,
whose mother fondly believed him to be wearing it according to her
instructions, instead of utilizing it to line a box containing a
collection of birds' eggs.

As every race had to be run in a number of heats the events were
necessarily few in number. There were a hopping race, a hurdle race
over the beds, and a race in which the competitors were blindfolded,
and each carried a mug full of water, which had not to be spilt by the
way.

Teal, over whose bed, as the result of a collision, two boys happened
to empty the contents of their half-pint cups, professed not to see
much fun in the performance, though every one else voted it simply
screaming.

But the contest looked forward to with the greatest amount of interest
was the obstacle race. It was placed at the end of the programme;
Garston's pocket-mirror, the only prize worth having, was to reward the
winner; and the conditions were as follows:--

The runners were to go once round the room, alternately crawling under
and hopping over the sixteen beds; the finish was to be down the middle
aisle, across the centre of which a row of chairs was placed, on which
boys stood or sat to keep them steady while the racers crawled under
the seats. In spite of the fact that the pocket-mirror was to be the
prize, only Jack and Hamond appeared at the starting-point when it came
to this last item on Rosher's programme, their companions voting it too
much fag, and preferring to sit on the obstacles and look on.

The signal was given, and the two competitors started off in grand
style, plunging in and out among the beds like dolphins in a choppy
sea. Jack led from the first; he dash