This, again, is a very important place; for your No. 6 must back up stroke, and must, by genuine hard work, take as much as possible of the burden off stroke's shoulders. Choose for the position a man who combines great weight and power and endurance with a large share of experience, a man who can row every stroke hard, and by his swing can help to keep it long. Mr. S. D. Muttlebury, in the Cambridge crews of 1886 and 1887, was such a No. 6. Such, too, was Mr. W. A. L. Fletcher, in the Oxford and Leander crews of a later date, and such is the veteran Mr. Guy Nickalls at the present time. It must be an inspiration to the rest of the crew to have the broad back of this iron oarsman swinging up and down with an untiring vehemence, and slogging at every stroke as if he had no
thought whatever of the strokes that had to come after. But then Mr. Nickalls is equally at home at No. 5 in an Eight; and as stroke-oar of a Four or pair—a position from which he invariably steers the boat—he is to my mind unapproachable. He would not himself assert that he was a model of elegance, but for power and endurance, and for the knack of infusing these qualities into the rest of the crew, no man has ever, in my experience, surpassed, and very few indeed have equalled, him.
No. 5 and No. 4.
These two are places which require weight and power. The details of elegance and polish are not here so important, though it is, of course, well to secure them if you can. A No. 5 who swings long and steadily is of the utmost value, and the same may be said of No. 4. For instance, no small part of the merit of the Oxford and Leander crews in which he rowed was due to Mr. W. B, Stewart, their No. 5. A very tall, well-built, and extremely powerful man, he rowed, I think, with the longest swing I have ever seen. It was for this quality that we picked him out of his college crew, when he was a comparative novice, and
gave him No. 5's seat in the Leander crew of 1893, and his rowing in that crew and in others subsequently proved the correctness of our judgment. The late Mr. T. H. E. Stretch, too, was a remarkable No. 5, a position in which, however, he only rowed once, viz. in the Leander crew of 1896. He was then certainly, for style and power combined, the best heavy-weight oar at Henley Regatta. Mr. Broughton, of the Thames Rowing Club, was another fine example of what a No. 5 ought to be—a really slashing oar of wonderful power. I might use the same words to describe Mr. R. S. Kindersley, of the Oxford crews of 1880, 1881, and 1882. Amongst good No. 4's, I should specially select Mr. S. Swann, in the Cambridge crew of 1884; Mr. C. B. P. Bell, of the Cambridge crews of 1888 and 1889; and Mr. F. E. Robeson, of the splendid Oxford crew of 1892.
No. 3 and No. 2.
Of these positions little need be said. Weight here ceases to be of great importance compared with briskness and liveliness of movement. Yet instances are not wanting of genuine heavy-weights who rowed at No. 3 in fast crews. Mr. E. F.
Henley, in the Oxford crew of 1866, rowed at 12 st. 13 lbs.; Mr. P. W. Taylor, in the Oxford crew of 1885, and Mr. W. B. Stewart, in the Oxford crew of 1894, were placed at No. 3 in spite of their weighing well over 13 st.; and Mr. Vivian Nickalls, in the Leander crew of 1891, was little short of this weight. But where these cases have occurred, they were generally due to the fact that the authorities had at their disposal a great number of really good heavy-weights, and, rather than lose one of them, they placed him at No. 3.
Bow.
Bow should be light, alert, compact, springy and cat-like, and a good waterman. Such discomforts as may exist in a boat seem to concentrate themselves at bow's seat. He has less room than any other man in the boat, and any unsteadiness affects him more. I can recall a long list of good bows, but none better than Mr. W. A. Ellison of Oxford, Mr. R. G. Gridley of Cambridge, Mr. C. W. Hughes of the Thames R.C., Mr. W. F. C. Holland and the late Mr. H. B. Cotton of Oxford, and Mr. C. W. N. Graham