The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-10-07
"AnEnglishC Crowd nderD efeat'
ooooooooooooooooooocooocoooe
A Yankee HUmorists Impressions Of the Cambridge Harvard
Boat Race.

l a up my mind to sink all feelings
OF pride In my rowing compatriots when
they should come and simply give my
self up to q calm contemplation Of the
Englishmen about me.
It was a good natured crowd, as good
natured as a New York one out for a holiday
I'M not trying to get to Brooklyn by way
Of the Bridge.
My neighbor In the next cart, an English
man, told me that he hoped it would be a
close race and l echoed his hope. l really
did not want to see Cambridge trailing
along a half mile after our boys. There is
no excitement in such a race. And l told
him that next to seeing Harvard win I'd
be best pleased to see Cambridge win.
B u there only the two crews. you know
said he. and my little joke lay in the bot
tom Of the cart. demolished.
A party Of Harvard men in a barouche
went by and spotted my two companions
and me for A mericans and gave us a cheer
that ca used the quiet English people to
look amazed. But they smiled indulgently.
1t was only a little pre-enthusiasm.
My unknown friends were from the West, :
and they, like myself, had come to see how
an English crowd would bear itself in
defeat.
We were all sure that the English would
bear themselves like true sports and we all
established very friendly relations with
the Britons about us in the hour and a half
that elapsed before the dropping Of a flag
on Barnes Bridge told us that the race had
begun.
Now wa my chance to watch the English
and see whether they were the phlegmatic
manila fhaV ara papNneoA 20 ka INz,Il
they bear to be wiped OF OF the river by a
little university only 30 years old that
dayH Wouldn't they make a scene? For
myself l was going to be the calm, self
possessed, disinterested spectator OF an
international event.
The course. ably polioed by the Thames
Conservancy, had been cleared some time
before, and but six or seven launches were
to be allowed to follow the rowen.
We stood up in the donkey cart, the
crowd in the street craned their necks.
people In an unfinished building leaned
from the windows and the mob on the
river bank risksd being pushed into the
historic but damp stream-and the race
was on.
I fixed my eyes on the bend Of the river,
where the shells would shortly appear,
until l remembered that l was not there
to look at the boats, but to note the behavior
Of an English crowd under defeat.
Thus reminded Of them 1 turned my
Q and watched them until my eyes
happened to fall on the river again and
refused to bulge fDom that bend beyond
which two world watched crews were put
ting their sir weeks OF training into the
work OF rowing 4 great race. The thought
came that at that very moment people in
America, in India, in Australia, in Canada ,
In South Africa were an1iously awaiting
news Of the event that was now unfolding
itself ON the river before me.
But II did not seem a bit real. l seemed
to be In a theatre with my eyes riveted
on the first public view Of the biograph
or k~inetoscope. The crowd around me
was not a real crowd but only the wonder
full moving picture Of q crowd. l myself