Kensington Grammar School began their regular sports in 1852, and we believe there are several other private schools round London which have had annual foot races and jumping matches since about the same time, which we have little doubt were suggested, or at any rate encouraged, by the interest taken by the boys' parents in 'The American Deer,' 'The Suffolk Stag,' 'The Greenwich Cowboy,' and other pedestrian worthies of the same kidney. In 1853 Harrow and Cheltenham both started athletic meetings; and Durham University also had a gathering which however, appears to have died a natural death.

Undoubtedly there were races at several of the public schools before this date, but they can hardly be called athletic meetings. The pastime of 'hare and hounds,' as an amusement for schoolboys, is quite as old as any other English athletic pastime. Strutt gives a quotation from an old comedy, written towards the close of the sixteenth century, in which an 'idle boy' says:

'And also when we play and hunt the fox I outrun all the boys in the schoole.'

This is no doubt an allusion to 'hare and hounds,' and Strutt himself, writing in 1801, gives the following account of the pastime which he calls ' hunt the fox' or ' hunt the hare': 'One of the boys is permitted to run out, and having law given him - that is, being permitted to go to a certain distance from his comrades before they can pursue him - their object is to take him, if possible, before he can return home.' The Crick Run at Rugby appears to have been founded in 1837, and at Shrewsbury there is known to have been a school steeplechase a very few years afterwards, while in 1845 Eton started an annual steeplechase, sprint races and hurdle races, which came off on the road all on different days. Curiously enough, this is the first mention that we can find anywhere of short hurdle races.1 Hurdle racing, now so popular amongst amateurs, is almost entirely an amateur sport. In 1853 ' Bell's Life ' has an account of two amateurs competing in an 'all round' competition, which included the following events: A mile race, walking backwards a mile, running a coach wheel a mile, leaping over fifty hurdles, each 3 ft. 6 in. high (the present regulation height), stone picking, and weight putting; and in the same year the ' Times' contains an account of a match between Lieut. Sayers and ' Captain Astley' in a flat race and a hurdle race.

All the school meetings, which began about 1852 and 1853, as we have seen, included hurdle racing in their programmes, and even up to the present day the chief homes of hurdle racing are the public schools and universities. The pastime of hurdle racing, however, can hardly be entirely modern, as Professor Wilson ('Christopher North') appears to have been an adept at something of a similar nature early in the century. The Professor of Moral Philosophy had so distinguished a reputation as an athlete that his name should not be omitted from a chapter on athletic history. Hone has an anecdote of his 'taking down' a brother private in the militia at Kendal. The latter boasted that he had never been beaten in a jumping competition, and Wilson accordingly challenged him to jump for a guinea. The unbeaten champion could only cover 15 feet, Wilson clearing 21 feet, to his opponent's amazement.

1 In 1837 and 1838 we had hurdle races at most of the tutors' and dames' houses at Eton, as I know from the fact of having run in and won races of the sort there in those years. One hundred yards over ten hurdles was the usual course. - B.

About 1852, then, it came to be considered a recognised and reasonable form of sport for a school or college to devote a day or an afternoon to a meeting for competitions in the old English sports of running, jumping, and throwing of weights; but the notion of open competitions, championships, or contests between the Universities in athletic sports, in the same way that they were already competing in cricket and boat-racing, was still far from dawning on the English mind. Races and jumping matches were still considered school pastimes like 'tag' or 'prisoner's base,' and even at the Universities their progress towards popularity was very slow. The following is the information given as to this progress by the writer of 'Modern Athletics': 'At the two Universities there were no athletic sports of any description until 1850, when Exeter College, Oxford, took the initiative and held a meeting, which has since been repeated annually. In 1856, and even in 1858, "Bell's Life," in its report of these sports, styles them "rural and interesting revels," and again, "a revival of good old English sports." . Exeter College was alone until 1855, when mention is first made of any sports at Cambridge, St. John's College and Emmanuel taking the lead.

At Oxford, Balliol, Wadham, Pembroke and Worcester followed the example of Exeter in 1856; Oriel in 1857, Merton in 1858, Christchurch in 1859, and in 1861 separate college meetings had become general. At the close of i860, the Oxford University sports, open to all undergraduates, owed their foundation to the exertions of the Rev. E. Arkwright, of Merton College. At Cambridge the University sports had already been founded in 1857, but annual meetings of the separate colleges were not frequent as at the sister University until 1863.' How suddenly the importance of athletics increased at the Universities in 1864, the first year of the InterVarsity meeting, may be gathered from some remarks of Sir Richard Webster made at the annual dinner of the London Athletic Club in 1886, when he said that for winning half-a-dozen strangers' races in one year he had received a few pounds in coin, while the next year a friend whose performances had been of the same order received about 40l. worth of prizes from the silversmiths.

Soon after 1860 these athletic meetings had become a regular feature of school and college life. Trinity College, Dublin, instituted a meeting in 1857, which has since had a continuous existence and undiminished popularity. In England, Rugby School held its first regular meeting in 1856, Winchester in 1857, and Westminster and Charterhouse in 1861. By this latter year all the public schools, as well as the Universities, were holding sports, and there is little doubt that the growth and popularity of the public school system has done much not only to foster but to spread the spirit of athletic competition throughout the kingdom. Lads who have gained health, pleasure, and reputation from athletic pursuits at school are hardly likely to drop their tastes as soon as school is left behind, and it is certain that the athletic movement was largely aided by the impetus it received from the return of the old public school boys to their homes throughout the country.