their flags will be shifted according to the "bumps" made, the boat which is bumped having to drop astern of that which has administered the bump. See, Brasenose is head of the river, there is the yellow flag at the top of the line; then comes Balliol, and St. Chrys'tom's is third; immediately followed by Corpus, which is said to have a good boat on this term.

The 'Varsity barge is already thronged with ladies and Dons, and a band is playing away among them. The other barges have a few fair crews, but not many; it is the summer term when they blossom forth into gay crowds of ladies fair. On the path there are motley groups, smartly dressed towns-people, College scouts, grave old Dons, kindly old Dons, prim young Dons, sniggering nurse-maids, dressy dressmakers, tawdry town-girls, and a few, a very few, ladies.

But now the band has ceased playing, a gun is heard down Iffley way, and all faces are turned in that direction.

"Shall we bump Balliol, do you think?" asks Mr. St. Albyn of Percy Cheyne, who prefers shouting on the barge to running with the crowd on the opposite bank.

"I hope so, sir, but I'm almost afraid not," answers Percy; "there's the second gun, they'll be off in a minute."

A minute of anxious expectation, then bang goes the last gun and the boats have started. Before they come into the sight of those on the barges, the men who are runinng on the Berkshire side have a full view of the race. It is an exciting scene, that crowd of men, many in their different-coloured boating dresses, rushing along at the top of their speed, sometimes getting pushed into the river, and all the while shouting lustily to their College boats and encouraging the crew to do their best. Now the leading boats are in "the Gut," a part of the river where a bump is most commonly made, and the excitement is intense. Brasenose is leading well ahead of the rest, the black oars flashing steadily in the glancing water, and deafening shouts of "Well rowed, Brasenose, well rowed!" resound from the bank and barges.

But the greatest interest now centres in the three next boats. Balliol has given up all hope of bumping Brasenose, and is straining every nerve to avoid being bumped by St. Chrys'tom's, which comes on behind like a very Nemesis; and Corpus behind that again is drawing nearer than formerly to the stern of St. Chrys'tom's, where little Spicer the coxswain is wild with excitement, but for all that is steering his boat admirably. Now comes the shouting as the race is seen from the barges, and the rival cries are reiterated loudly and sharply on every side. "Well rowed, Balliol, go it." "Now, Chrys'tom's, now you're gaining; well rowed, well rowed, St. Chrys'tom's!" "Corpus, Corpus, put it on, Corpus!" And Corpus did put it on, but to no purpose, for St. Chrys'tom's stuck steadily to their work, and got well away from their purple and red pursuers, and all but touched the stern of Balliol as the second pistol was fired, announcing that the wining post was reached.

"Another second and we should have done it," said Spicer, as the band burst forth with "See the conquering hero comes," and Brasenose, still head of the river, rowed quietly back to their barge after the other boats had reached the winning post. Only two bumps had been made, and these were among the lower boats, so that expectation pointed to the next day as the real race. Paul had done his work well in the race. He had felt the responsibility, never having pulled in a race of such importance before, but he had gone through with it steadily, without hurry, or over-excitement, and the long steady pull of his strong arms had never failed or flagged during the minutes of intense and momentarily growing excitement. All the talk in Hall that night was of the Torpids.

"We shall bump Balliol, to-morrow," said Spicer, the cox of the boat, confidently as he sat at dinner.

"I'm not so sure," said Curzon, who was one of the Torpid crew. "I'll bet you two to one we do," said Spicer sharply.

"I shan't bet against our own boat, of course," replied Curzon. "Labor omnia vincit improbus," quoted Douglas, a scholar, from the other side of the table.

"Sconce him, he's said more than three words of Latin," said Stropper.

"Are you sure they were Latin, Stropper?" asked Paul with a sneer. "I'm sure he'll get sconced, and that's enough," replied Stropper, and at once proceeded to send up a note to the senior commoner in Hall, stating the quotation and begging that Douglas might be sconced. And he was sconced accordingly, a quart tankard of beer appearing presently, which went round the table amid the laughter of the men.

This sconcing is a time-honoured institution, though like many others, it is sometimes "more honoured in the breach, than the observance." As far as it is a punishment for swearing, or unseemly talk in Hall, it is excellent, but when so pressed as to include all quotations, and all talking of "shop"-this to be defined by the men presentit often becomes a tyrannical institution, a stopper to all sensible conversation, and an abominable nuisance.

Though Curzon declined to bet against the boat, many bets were made that night on the event of St. Chrys'tom's bumping Balliol, and of Corpus bumping St. Chrys'tom's.

The next day was cold and gusty, and the river was full of small waves which would make the labour of rowing all the harder. Fewer spectators were out in consequence of the weather, but most of the University was present. Again the anxious expectation; again the report of the guns away by Iffley; again the shouting, rushing crowd along the banks. But as the shouts became more audible, the men on the St. Chrys❜tom's barge could hear that hundreds of voices were shouting: "Now, Chrys'tom's, now you're gaining, put it on!" while faint in comparison were the cries: "Balliol, Balliol, well rowed, Balliol!" Just

by the Gut there was a frantic cry of "Now, St. Chrys'tom's!" They answered to the cry nobly. Spicer blew his shrill whistle as a signal for a "spurt," and the boat bounded through the water and ran its nose well into the stern of the Balliol Torpid, amidst a loud shout of triumph from banks and barges.

And so Balliol was bumped, and St. Chrys'tom's was second on the river. On came the other boats, surging through the rough water; the scarlet oars of Magdalen, hard pressed by the blue oars with the golden cross of University; the light blue of Wadham has succumbed to the prowess of Christ Church; and Pembroke is hotly pursued by Jesus, the Welsh boat, with oars and uniform of green. It would strike an uninitiated spectator as being something like profanity to hear the shouts of "Go it, Jesus, well rowed, you'll bump 'em yet!" See yonder are the slow coaches, coming on in a style which shows that the crew are, to use Percy Cheyne's words, "deucedly pumped, and no mistake." The pink oars of Worcester are dipping rather feebly, and the funereal black and white of Magdalen Hall looks especially dreary so far behind.

But St. Chrys'tom's has bumped Balliol, and Paul Romaine is satisfied. The races continued for several days, but St. Chrys'tom's cannot approach the victorious black and yellow of Brasenose, and on the last day of the Torpids when the flags are altered for the last time, the red and yellow still flies first, and next the well-known colours of St. Chrys❜tom's. Then came the bump supper with all its noise and revelry, but I doubt if Mr. Paul enjoyed that half so much as those minutes of anxiety when he was tugging at his oar in the midst of the crowded Isis.

(To be continued.)

PHOTOGRAPHS OF FAMILIAR FACES.

BY A FEMALE PHOTOGRAPHER.

POST-PRANDIAL TALK.

WHEN the ladies have sailed out of the dining-room, like a flock of swans, at the close of a company dinner, bowed out with great alacrity, under the disguise of politeness, by the gentlemen, whose faces seem to say: "At last!" we only hope the lords of the creation deal gently with the characters they leave behind them, and not after the fashion of Mrs. Candour and her tribe. What these forsaken Damons talk about, we cannot, of course, pretend to say-though we doubt not that horses, dogs, havannahs, and ballet girls, form the staple articles of their postprandial talk. But it is for one of their number to divulge the secrets of their prison-house, which sundry novelists have now and then attempted to dò, with what success, said lords of the creation alone can Our business lies with the retreating party.

inform us.

Well! After the flock of swans have safely landed in the drawingroom, and smoothed down their ruffled feathers-for no London staircase is wide enough to hold two crinoline-encased ladies abreast--and shivered a little, if it be winter, on leaving the hot atmosphere of the dining-room, they form a semi-circle round the fire, while the dowagers ensconce themselves in the easy chairs. Presently they divide themselves into smaller knots the cygnets (I mean the young ladies) generally herding by themselves, and crowding round the table to look at the photographs, and admire those fortunate individuals who have a claim to be styled a "duck of a man,” and criticise the dress and appearance of their sister fair ones, more or less disfigured by that popular miniature painter, the sun-all of whom are voted either over-dressed or underdressed, by the uncompromising jury of girls in their teens.

If there is an elderly spinster in the party, she generally joins convoy with one of the dowagers, relative to whom she feels herself almost a young lady again, as she listens patiently to the worthy dame's small talk about her nine grandchildren, and with curiosity and interest to her strictures on men in general and husbands in particular-the dowager having all the authority and right to expatiate on the latter interesting theme which experience can confer. "For I have been married thrice in my time!" observes the portly widow, with a little deprecating sigh. And on the maiden lady's timidly venturing to inquire whether she was equally happy in each of these three phases, the dowager lays down the law rather sententiously, saying that men consist of good, bad, and indifferent-which somewhat trite observation

VOL. VI.

F

may be equally well applied to women or children, and to everything live or otherwise on earth.

I hope, at least, you never met with the bad?" asks the spinster. "I have met with each in turn," says the dowager.

"That is rather discouraging to us single ones," simpers the spinster. "And is it indiscreet to inquire which of your three dear departed was the best?"

"The first," sighs the dowager; "but then, my dear, he only lived three months."

Amongst the group of matrons, the gossip often runs on their living spouses. One lady talks a great deal about the theatres which she is always frequenting, and awakens the regrets of another lady, who complains that her husband is so lazy, that when he is once home from his office, he never cares to stir out to hear the finest opera or play in the world.

"Mr. Quibble is a solicitor, is he not?" inquires the play-going lady; and, being answered in the affirmative, resumes: "Of course he comes home rather fatigued, and so does my husband, who is a barrister-still that is no reason for me to give up theatres."

"Perhaps," suggests the solicitor's wife, with just that shade of deference in her tone, which shows her to be mindful of the superiority of Mr. Flamaway's position in the legal hierarchy over her own plodding mate, “Mr. Flamaway is not so sleepy as my husband, who is poring over tiresome deeds all day long. A barrister who is obliged to be eloquent, must have more fire and poetry in him than a solicitor requires for his humdrum avocations."

"I assure you that all the fire and poetry is extinguished by the time he comes home," says Mrs. Flamaway rather bitterly; "of course he does not take the trouble to be eloquent, to show off before his wife.” "Then how do you manage to get him to the theatre ?" asks Mrs. Quibble, desirous of learning so valuable a secret.

Manage? Why, by going without him, to be sure.

of friends willing to accompany me."

I have plenty

"Yes, of course," replies the solicitor's wife, upon whom a new light seemed to dawn-"I think I must adopt the same plan."

“I shouldn't like to leave my husband," observes little Mrs. Coddle, in a deprecating tone.

"Are you jealous?" inquires the barrister's wife, with that look of haughty contempt, which fine women often bestow on the smaller specimens of humanity.

"No—not exactly—still you know-" Here Mrs. Coddle stopped, half intimidated. She did not belong to the more dashing set of the other ladies, and having only been invited because Mr. Coddle transacted business with the master of the house, did not feel quite at her ease; but conscious that the eagle eye of the barrister's wife was still upon her, as if waiting for a categorical answer, she stammered out: "I try to make him so comfortable at home, that he never wishes to leave it."