colours."

"It would improve some of them," said Clowes.

Allardyce resumed his melancholy remarks. "But, as I was saying, it's
not only that the footer's rotten. That you can't help, I suppose. It's
the general beastliness of things that I bar. Rows with the town, for
instance. We've been having them on and off ever since you left. And
it'll be worse now, because there's an election coming off soon. Are
you fellows stopping for the night in the town? If so, I should advise
you to look out for yourselves."

"Thanks," said Clowes. "I shouldn't like to see Trevor sand-bagged. Nor
indeed, should I--for choice--care to be sand-bagged myself. But, as it
happens, the good Donaldson is putting us up, so we escape the perils
of the town.

"Everybody seems so beastly slack now," continued Allardyce. "It's
considered the thing. You're looked on as an awful blood if you say you
haven't done a stroke of work for a week. I shouldn't mind that so much
if they were some good at anything. But they can't do a thing. The
footer's rotten, the gymnasium six is made up of kids an inch high--we
shall probably be about ninetieth at the Public Schools'
Competition--and there isn't any one who can play racquets for nuts.
The only thing that Wrykyn'll do this year is to get the Light-Weights
at Aldershot. Drummond ought to manage that. He won the Feathers last
time. He's nearly a stone heavier now, and awfully good. But he's the
only man we shall send up, I expect. Now that O'Hara and Moriarty are
both gone, he's the only chap we have who's up to Aldershot form. And
nobody else'll take the trouble to practice. They're all too slack."