College sports -- Fiction; Short stories, American; Sports stories; Track and field -- Fiction
"Poor old Yale," said Furness, contemplatively, when the applause had
died out, the Americans joining gamely, although they knew their last
hope went with this event. "Poor old Yale, it was not always thus. I can
remember a time when Yale men had a very pretty knack of breaking the
worsted and letting the other fellows run between the posts, but this is
not Yale's day nor year."
We now had time to watch the "high jumping," which was going on in front
of us and a little to the right. The bar had reached five feet ten
inches, and Paget-Tomlinson had gone out at five-five. Rotch comes first
and is over, although he touches the bar, and it trembles a moment
uncertain. Adair is over too. The English lad takes his run a bit across
and goes over with a grand lift from his long legs. Here comes Rice, who
has not yet pulled off his sweater, although the bar is already several
inches over his head. The little chap bends forward, gets on his toes,
gives a short run straight at it, lifts in the air like a bird, shoots
over, turning in the air meanwhile, lands lightly with his face to the
bar he has just cleared, and runs back under it to his place. It is the
prettiest performance for a high jump that the Colonel has ever seen,
and he applauds vigorously, as do many others. At the next lift of the
bar Rotch goes out, for he has not been himself quite, and is not equal
to the six feet which he has so often negotiated. We expected also to
see Adair drop out here, for five eight and one-fourth had been his best
record; but he showed daylight between himself and the bar, and for the
first time I began to be anxious. I truly did not care which team won,
but I did not want to see anything worse than a five-four, and it looked
now as if it might be a six-three.
Up goes the bar to five-eleven, and again both Adair and Rice are equal
to the task before them. With Adair it is the performance of a grand
natural jumper, but with Rice it is all this, and a style that must be
worth inches to him.
At six feet the Oxford man did not go at the bar with quite the
determination he had previously shown, and down it came. Rice now pulls
off his sweater for the first time, showing how well put together he is
from head to foot. Straight for the bar he goes, just the same as when
it was at five-six, and he clears it with apparently the same ease as at
the lower distance. Adair struggles gamely, but his last try is
unsuccessful, and the score stands four to four, with only the
"three-mile" left.
I could see very plainly now that the Colonel was getting a bit nervous.
"Do you consider this a certain thing for Workman?" he asked me, after
Tom had declared that the Americans had no chance at all, and that the
contest was all over "but the shouting."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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