a final ground for
resisting the authority of any captain but their own. Their boat was
certainly one of the best which the school had turned out, and compared
with their competitors' it seemed as if nothing short of a miracle could
prevent its triumph.

But the schoolhouse fellows, little as they expected to win, were
meaning to make a hot fight of it. They were on their mettle quite as
much as their rivals. Ever since Wyndham had left, the schoolhouse had
been sneered at as having no pretensions left to any athletic
distinction. They meant to put themselves right in this particular--if
not in victory, at any rate in a gallant attempt.

And so the schoolhouse boat might be seen out early and late, doing
honest hard work, and doing it well too. Strict training was the order
of the day, and scarcely a day passed without some one of the crew
adding to his usual labours a cross-country run, or a hard grind in the
big tub, to better his form. These extraordinary exertions were a
source of amusement to their opponents, who felt their own superiority
all the more by witnessing the efforts put forth to cope with it; and
even in the schoolhouse there were not a few who regarded all the work
as labour thrown away, and as only adding in prospect to the
glorification of the enemy.

However, Fairbairn was not the man to be moved by small considerations
such as these. He did not care what fellows said, or how much they
laughed, as long as Porter swung out well at the reach forward, and
Coates straightened his back, and Gilks pulled his oar better through
from beginning to end. To secure these ends he himself was game for any
amount of work and trouble, and no cold water could damp either his
ardour or his hopefulness.

But the chief sensation with regard to the training of the schoolhouse
boat was the sudden appearance of Riddell as its coxswain. As the
reader has heard, the new captain had already been out once or twice "on
the quiet" in the pair-oar, and during these expeditions he had learned
all he knew of the art of navigation. The idea of his steering the
schoolhouse boat had never occurred either to himself or Fairbairn when
he first undertook these practices at the solicitation of his friend.
But after a lesson or two he showed such promise that the idea did
strike Fairbairn, who mentioned it to one or two of his set and asked
their advice.

These judges were horrified naturally at the idea. Riddell was too