"Musgrave. The University Eight is going down, and he wants you to row four. The match with Cambridge is made up."
"Oh, hang it!" said poor Charles; "I can't show after this business. Get a waterman; do, Marston. They will know all about it by this time."
"Nay, I want you to come; do come, Charles. I want you to contrast these men with the fellows you were with last night, and to see what effect three such gentlemen and scholars as Dixon, Hunt, and Smith have in raising the tone of the men they are thrown among."
On the barge Charles met the others of the Eight—quiet, staid, gentlemanly men, every one of whom knew what had happened, and was more than usually polite in consequence. Musgrave, the captain, received him with manly courtesy. He was sorry to hear Ravenshoe was going down—had hoped to have had him in the Eight at Easter; however, it couldn't be helped; hoped to get him at Henley; and so on. The others were very courteous too, and Charles soon began to find that he himself was talking in a different tone of voice, and using different language from that which he would have been using in his cousin's rooms; and he confessed this to Marston that night.
Meanwhile the University Eight, with the little blue flag at her bows, went rushing down the river on her splendid course. Past heavy barges and fairy skiffs; past men in dingys, who ran high and dry on the bank to get out of the way; and groups of dandys, who ran with them for a time. And before any man was warm—Iffley. Then across the broad mill-pool and through the deep crooks, out into the broads, and past the withered beds of reeds which told of coming winter. Bridges, and a rushing lasher—Sandford. No rest here. Out of the dripping well-like lock. Get your oars out and away again, past the yellowing willows, past the long wild grey meadows, swept by the singing autumn wind. Through the swirling curves and eddies, onward under the westering sun towards the woods of Nuneham.
It was so late when they got back, that those few who had waited for them—those faithful few who would wait till midnight to see the Eight come in—could not see them, but heard afar off the measured throb and rush of eight oars as one, as they came with rapid stroke up the darkening reach. Charles and Marston walked home together.
"By George," said Charles, "I should like to do that and nothing else all my life. What a splendid stroke Musgrave gives you, so marked, and so long, and yet so lively. Oh, I should like to be forced to row every day like the watermen."
"In six or seven years you would probably row as well as a waterman. At least, I mean, as well as some of the second-rate ones. I have set my brains to learn steering, being a small weak man; but I shall never steer as well as little Tims, who is ten years old. Don't mistake a means for an end—"
Charles wouldn't always stand his friend's good advice, and he thought he had had too much of it to-day. So he broke out into sudden and furious rebellion, much to Marston's amusement, who treasured up every word he said in his anger, and used them afterwards with fearful effect against him.
"I don't care for you," bawled Charles; "you're a greater fool than I am, and be hanged to you. You're going to spend the best years of your life, and ruin your health, to get a first. A first! A first! Why that miserable little beast, Lock, got a first. A fellow who is, take him all in all, the most despicable little wretch I know! If you are very diligent you may raise yourself to his level! And when you have got your precious first, you will find yourself utterly unfit for any trade or profession whatever (except the Church, which you don't mean to enter). What do you know about modern languages or modern history? If you go into the law, you have got to begin all over again. They won't take you in the army; they are not such muffs. And this is what you get for your fifteen hundred pounds!"