ed on half-holidays. On the other hand, the season of 1876
gained a character of its own from the novelty of its matches against
Welsh teams. One of these was the eleven of Shrewsbury School. With
this ancient seat of learning our troubles brought us into genial
intercourse, and a few months later we met them again on the football-
field. Both matches were played at Shrewsbury; in the former we gained a
victory over our kind hosts, the latter was a drawn game.

The athletics were held on the straight reach of road beyond Old Borth;
the steeple-chases in the fields which border it. At the prize-giving,
the "champion" was hoisted as usual, and carried round the hotel, instead
of along the _via sacra_ of the Uppingham triumph, with the proper
tumultuary rites. For the make-believe of paper-chases we had the
realities of hare-hunting, of which we will speak again in its season.
Grounds for football were found when the autumn came; the best was a
meadow just below Old Borth, of excellent turf, which dries quickly after
rain; though the peaty soil, lately reclaimed from the marsh, would quake
under the outset of the players.

The village boys, fired by a novel example, began to hold their own
athletics. One might see the corduroyed urchins scrambling down the
street in a footrace, or jerking their awkward little limbs over a
roadside ditch. Our boys looked on as men look at a monkey, half amused,
half indignant at the antics "which imitated humanity so abominably."

If we were little worse off than at home in the appliances for games,
there were other recreations which were proper to the place, and clear
gain to the immigrants. For example, the fishing in the Lery, along
whose banks groups of anglers might be seen strolling, whipping the water
to the full entertainment of themselves and the fish, or now and then
blessing Sir Pryse, as the angler landed his first trout from our good
friend's waters. Yet we had our old sportsmen too, who could kill trout
as well as amuse themselves, and bring home a delicate dish for a half-
holiday tea. For masters, there was a little shooting to be had on the
land of some friendly neighbours; and on the no-man's-land of the coast,
a variety of sea-fowl fell to our guns, and were stuffed to enrich our
museum with a "Borth Collection." We must not forget the Rink at
Aberystwith, for which parties used to be formed on half-holidays; nor
the Golf, which the long strip of rough ground