R. C. (Rudolf Chambers) Lehmann - Rowing

THE OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE BOATRACE, 1894.

The Isthmian Library
Edited by B. Fletcher Robinson

No. 4

ROWING

BY
R. C. LEHMANN

WITH CONTRIBUTIONS BY
GUY NICKALLS, G. L. DAVIS, C. M. PITMAN,
W. E. CRUM, and E. G. BLACKMORE

ILLUSTRATED

LONDON
A. D. INNES & COMPANY
LIMITED
1898

AS A SLIGHT TOKEN OF FRIENDSHIP
I DEDICATE THIS BOOK
TO
MR. HERBERT THOMAS STEWARD,
CHAIRMAN OF THE AMATEUR ROWING ASSOCIATION;
CHAIRMAN OF THE COMMITTEE OF MANAGEMENT, HENLEY REGATTA;
AND PRESIDENT OF THE LEANDER CLUB.

My thanks are due to the proprietors of the Daily News and of the English Illustrated Magazine for permission to include in this book the substance of articles originally contributed to their columns. I have not added to the Appendix any lists of winning crews, as these are to be found very fully and accurately set out in the Rowing Almanack, published every year at the office of the Field.

For the rest, I have endeavoured to make the rowing instructions which will be found in this book as concise as was compatible with perfect clearness, assuming at all times that I was addressing myself first of all to the novice. No doubt other oarsmen will differ here and there from my conclusions. Absolute unanimity on every detail of rowing is not to be expected.

All I can do is to assure my readers that nothing has been set down here the truth and accuracy of which I have not provedat least, to my own satisfaction.

The illustrations are reproduced from photographs by Messrs. Stearn, of Cambridge; Messrs. Gillman, of Oxford; Messrs. Marsh, of Henley-on-Thames; Messrs. Hills and Saunders, of Eton; Messrs. Pach Brothers, of Cambridge (Mass.); and Mr. J. G. Williams, of East Molesey.

R. C. L.

October, 1897.

My object in the following pages will be not merely to give such hints to the novice as may enable him, so far as book-learning can effect the purpose, to master the rudiments of oarsmanship, but also to commend to him the sport of rowing from the point of view of those enthusiasts who regard it as a noble open-air exercise, fruitful in lessons of strength, courage, discipline, and endurance, and as an art which requires on the part of its votaries a sense of rhythm, a perfect balance and symmetry of bodily effort, and the graceful control and repose which lend an appearance of ease to the application of the highest muscular energy. Much has to be suffered and many difficulties have to be overcome before the raw tiro, whose fantastic contortions in a tub-pair excite the derision of the spectators, can approach to the power, effectiveness and grace of a Crum or a Gold; but, given a healthy frame and sound organs inured to fatigue by the sports of English boyhood, given also an alert intelligence, there is no reason in the nature of things why oarsmanship should not eventually become both an exercise and a pleasure. And when I speak of oarsmanship, I mean the combined form of it in pairs, in fours, and in eight-oared racing boats.

Of sculling I do not presume to speak, but those who are curious on this point may be referred to the remarks of Mr. Guy Nickalls in a later chapter. But of rowing I can speak, if not with authority, at any rate with experience, for during twenty-three years of my life I have not only rowed in a constant succession of boat-races, amounting now to about two hundred, but I have watched rowing wherever it was to be seen, and have, year after year, been privileged to utter words of instruction to innumerable crews on the Cam, the Isis, and the Thames. If, then, the novice will commit himself for a time to my guidance, I will endeavour to initiate him into the art and mystery of rowing. If he decides afterwards to join the fraternity of its votaries, I can promise him that his reward will not be small. He may not win fame, and he will certainly not increase his store of wealth, but when his time of action is past and he joins the great army of "have-beens," he will find, as he looks back upon his career, that his hours of leisure have been spent in an exercise which has enlarged his frame and strengthened his limbs, that he has drunk delight of battle with his peers in many a hard-fought race, that he has learnt what it means to be in perfect health and condition, with every sinew strung, and all his manly energies braced for contests of strength and endurance, and that he has bound to himself by the strongest possible ties a body of staunch and loyal friends whose worth has been proved under all sorts of conditions, through many days of united effort.