One point, however, must not be omitted with reference to the 'passing' game, that it is always liable to break down upon a wet day, when the ground is so slushy that it is hard for players, and especially for heavy players, to keep their feet. When fingers are numbed, and the ball as slippery and hard to hold as an eel, then the passing game becomes all but impracticable, and as fast running is also difficult the dribbling game 'comes off.' In all weathers, and under all conditions, the team which can dribble with skill and combination will always do well. The soundest advice then that we can give to forwards, although it has not a moral sound, is not only to play with the feet, but to 'play fast and loose.'

It is difficult to deal with footballers as with runners, and pick out the best players as easily as the best athletes, for the best player is but one of fifteen, and contributes but little more or less than one-fifteenth of the skill which gains the victory. Even in the historical matches of the year in which time after time we have noticed fine players playing beneath their form, through being associated with strangers, it is almost impossible to form a true estimate of each 'crack's ' abilities. In addition to this, in speaking both of forwards and backs it is difficult to institute trustworthy comparisons, so much has the style of play varied from time to time. Some forwards have earned their places in international matches without possessing any great amount of skill, because strength and weight were required to hold their scrimmages and their men. Other very heavy men, however, have been genuinely clever players, like Fowler and Vassall, of Oxford, and E. T. and C. Gurdon, of Cambridge. The two Gurdons, indeed, were the best pair of forwards whom we have ever seen in the football field, and their excellence is the more remarkable as they have played through almost every stage of the game; when scrummaging was the chief essential they knew how to scrummage, when the dribbling game came in they proved themselves the best of dribblers, and when the rage for passing arose they adapted themselves to it with as much success as any of the youngsters; but others, such as Arthur Budd and G. W. Burton, of Blackheath, H. G. Fuller of Cambridge, Harrison of Yorkshire, and many others whom it is impossible to name without being prolix, have owed no part of their reputation to their weight, so that it is no longer a reproach to the Rugby Union game that skill is at a discount as compared with strength.

To turn now to play behind the scrummage, there is little more to add to what we have said before in our discussions of the tactics of the game, both in the past and in the present, and of the science and methods of passing and tackling. In the earliest days the half was expected to run; to-day he is expected to pass rather than run, and scarcely ever to run except when the ball is passed back to him from a three-quarter or he has no good chance of passing. If the ball comes out of the scrummage the business of the half-back is, as we have said, to fling to the three-quarter in the open with one motion - indeed, to sweep the ball clean from the ground into the threequarter's hands. He must lose no time, or the 'halves' of the other side will be upon him. If they cannot pass, the best halves more often punt into touch than run, for in most cases it follows that if they cannot pass they are not in a position to do much good by running themselves. So much for the offensive part of their work; the defensive part is to pounce like lightning on the opposing halves or three-quarters before they can get away or pass, and to stop the rushes of forwards by nipping up the ball or falling upon it.

In fact, quick picking up is the chief merit of a half in the latter-day style of play, and to be a speedy or dodgy runner is of less use in this place upon the field than it was. Indeed, as we have seen, this new style of play has been forced upon the halves by the increasing looseness of the play amongst the forwards, which gives the half-back little chance of doing much brilliant work by his own unaided efforts.

Before the importance of passing by the half-back became paramount, the half-back of the day was the strong dodgy runner and deadly tackier of the type of whom H. H. Taylor of Black-heath and R. T. Finch of Cambridge were the best examples. The latter was very hard to collar, and could fasten upon the biggest men like a burr and bring them to the ground, but though, perhaps, more brilliant than Taylor, the strength of the latter made him the safest player we ever recollect upon this place in the field, his strength of arm being so great that even the strongest could never break away from him. For the defensive part of the work of a half-back we have never seen his superior. The best half-back of his day, as far as running was concerned, was the Cambridge captain and Scottish international, A. R. Don Wauchope; but he also was not so strong and hard as Taylor. On the whole, however, we are inclined to class Don Wauchope and the Oxonian A. Rotherham as the two best half-backs of history since loose scrummaging became known.

Rotherham more properly figures in a later stage of the sport, after the passing game had fully come in, and therefore, perhaps, it is only to his credit to say that he showed less brilliant form as a runner than Don Wauchope, but his strength and weight made him a perfect defensive player, and his clever passing and admirable following up entitle him to be considered one of the best halfbacks seen in the South since the passing game came in.

The pick of the play now falls to the three-quarter backs They alone in the field are sure (if the halves are up to their work) to have some opportunities of getting well away with a run. As we have seen before, no club now ever plays with less than three three-quarter-backs, while a very large number, including most of the leading clubs, put four three-quarters into the field. Of these all do not play quite the same game, although all have equally to learn how to give and to receive those accurate short 'passes' which are now the feature of the game as it is played in the open. But, apart from this, a different game is played by the three-quarter or the pair of three -quarters placed in the centre, to that played by those who play on the outside.