The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-14 00:00:00

Who's Champion of the Thames 1

" Who's champion of the Thames ?" is a question that
may be naturally asked by our aquatic readers, and " Who's
champion of the Thames ?" is not a question so easily an-
swered. We are always most happy and willing to afford
the public at all times any information in our power, but

that which we do not in ourselves possess we cannot impart

to others. Once upon a time during our long existence, and
once upon a time only, were we in something like a similar
fix to the present ; but the affair was not so complicated.
Then we had only two heroes in question claiming precisely
the same thing, but now we have four; consequently, taking
it only as an arithmetical problem, the question is just
twice as difficult ? But it involves infinitely more than this
in its ramifications, and in its complexity admits of many
considerations. No such difficulty to determine who was
the Champion existed in former days. From the time
of the celebrated Richard Farsons up to a few months
ago the thing was as straight as the road, save in the
one particular instance to which we have adverted. Although
Farsons was avowedly the best man of his day, he was
never exactly dubbed "Champion," but his successor,
Charles Campbell, was, and his reign of supremacy com-

menced on the 9th of September, 1831. But a few years after
this came the dispute as to whether he was entitled to retain
the honour, which Robert Coombes disputed with him.
Campbell atway9 held this great little man very cheaply ;

he beat Coombes so signally on Nov. Ist, 1838, that he ap-
peared to hold his subsequent pretension to the title of
Champion as too contemptible to be worthy of notice. The
assumption of the title by Coombes was founded upon his
second defeat of R,3bert Newell, on October 15th, 1842,
when he challenged the world, and as Campbell did not
notice the thing at all, the friends of Coombes laid claim to
the title, and many and severe were the discussions upon
the rights of that claim, and then only, as we have before
said, was there until now a dispute as to who was the
Champion. On August 19, • 1846, the dispute between
Coombes and Campbell's claim to the Championship
found its termination by Coombes beating him as easily as
he himself had formerly been beaten, and we suppose ere
long the present knotty point will receive some such un-
ravelling. On Sept. 29th, 1859, the renowned Robert
Chambers (of Newcastle-upon-Tyne) acquired the Cham-
pionship of the Thames from Henry Kelly (of Fulham).
The end crowns the work. He was proved by this and other
victories to be avowedly the best man afloat, for on Sept.
18th, 1860, he beat Tom White for the Championship, and
after other great encounters in the provinces was once more

in his wager-boat upon the Thames to contend against
George Everson (of Greenwich) for the Championship cf
the London river. This was on April 14th, and on June
16th he had to encounter a more formidable rival, the Aus-
tralian, who had come over to this country months before to
contend with the very best man our waters could produce,
and had been carefully training for the event during the
whole time that Chambers and Everson's match, of which
not much can be said, was in its tardy progression. The defeat
of Green by Chambers for the Championship must be fresh in
the memory of our readers, and the subsequent sending of
£5 and articles for a fresh match by the Australian's friends.
This amount was covered, but no terms come to as to
the time of rowing, and Green received £5 for felt of the
Champion of the Thames, and thus, as it seems, considered
himself justified in claiming that title. The next race
which is at all connected with the Championship question
took place at Newcastle-on-TYne on the 28th of July, for

£lOO a side, the course extending over a mile, and the com-
petitors being Chambers (the Champion) and Robert Cooper,
a man there who has rendered himself famous as a sculler.
This ended the defeat of Chambers, and, being beaten by
Cooper, the latter styled himself " Aquafic Champion of
the World." The next epoch is the Tyne Regatta, in
which some of the finest scullers ever seen contended. Green
(the Australian) was unavoidably absent, and the three
trials heats were won by Chambers, Cooper, and Henry
Kelly (the ex-Champion of the Thames). After a great deal
of fouling and squabbling, the race was ordered to be
rowed again, and Cooper, who had come in first, with
Chambers second, refused to row, as he considered himself
justly entitled to the cup and stakes. The other two there-
fore contended, and this race was only characterised by
boring and fouling, and Chambers came in a winner by two
or three lengths, Kelly claiming a foul, which was dis-
allowed. The ex-Champion (Kelly) then sent £lO and a
challenge to Chambers to row him from Putney to Mort-
lake, for £2OO and the Championship, but this was un-
heeded by the north countryman, and some time having
elapsed, Kelly now takes upon himself the title of
Champion of the Thames, so that our readers will see that
we have no less than four candidates for the Championship
of the Thames, or the " World," whichever they please to
• term it, for Green has left a polite invitation to pay liberal
expenses to any one to make a journey to the "far West"
to contend against him for the Championship of the Globe.
Next summer we presume some more definite notion may
be formed of who may really be entitled to the appellation
of Champion, until which we leave our readers at perfect
liberty to exercise their own judgment and entertain their
own opinions upon this knotty subject.—Era.

Affecting Tributes to the Genius of
Shakspere

King George 111. remarked (as Miss Burney tells us),
" Was there ever such stuff as great part of Sbakspere
only one must not say so I But what think you ? What.?
Is there not sad stuff ? What ? What ?"
Mr. Knight, in his newly published autobiographic Re-
collections, takes occasion to observe that Farmer George
was not singular in this abuse of Shakspere. " I have
heard," ho says, " one such heretic, whose intellectual
dimensions would appear gigantic in comparison with those
of the King, say of the writer of the sad stuff, D— and I
always call him silly Billy.' " Who, asks the Athencum,
lelatter's " Diary and Let-
'seeing that Lord Byron,
can this "heretic" he ? Is he alive? The opinion, how-
eivcceorr,dising not so T
so
ovmerymroeomrear(kvaid9 the b
Let-
ters") protested with an oath that he deemed Shakspere " a
d'd humbug I" Such is Fame!

TEEL STABLES AT SANDRING
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HAM pAltic are being
Pram of Wales's stud had tormerly.