unctually
at six o'clock.

"Here is an egg and half cupful of milk for each of you," Skinner said
as they gathered below. "Look sharp and beat up your egg with the milk.
Here is a mouthful of biscuit for each. River-Smith said he did not like
our going out without taking something before we started, and Cornish,
who rowed in the trials at Cambridge, told me that egg and milk was the
best thing to take."

Five minutes later, comforted by the egg and milk, the party started.

"We don't want to go at racing speed," Skinner said; "merely a good
steady trot to make the lungs play. We don't want to pull ourselves down
in weight. I don't think, after the last month's work, we have any fat
among us. What we want is wind and last. To-morrow we will turn out with
the heaviest boots we have got instead of running shoes. When we can run
four miles in them, we ought to be able to keep up pretty fairly through
the hardest game of football."

There was a good deal of lagging behind towards the last part of the
run, a fact that Skinner pointed out triumphantly as a proof of want of
condition, but after a wash and change of clothes all the party agreed
that they felt better for the run.

Mr. River-Smith was as much concerned as the boys at the defeats of the
house at football, and when they sat down to breakfast the members of
the team found that a mutton-chop was provided for each of them. Strict
orders had been issued that nothing was to be said outside the house of
the football team going into training; and as, for the afternoon's
exercise, it was only necessary that every member of the team should
take part in football practice, and play up to the utmost, the matter
remained a secret. In the first two or three matches played the training
made no apparent difference.

"You must not be disheartened at that," Mr. Cornish, who was the
"housemaster," told them. "Fellows always get weak when they first begin
to train. You will find the benefit presently."

And this was the case. They won the fourth match, which was against a
comparatively weak team. This, however, encouraged them, and they were
victorious in the next two contests, although in the second their
opponents were considered a strong team, and their victory had been
regarded as certain.

The improvement in the River-Smithites' team became a topic of
conversation in the college, and there were rumours that they had put
themselves into regular training, and that some one