Athletics and Football (extract)

136 ATHLETICS ship meeting, being over 10,000 in number—wasextreme, for the English sportsman is always intensely patriotic, and especially so when he has put his moneyupon the native product against the foreigner. In that year, too (1881), the public had lost a lot of its coin to Americansupon the turf, and an unexpected British victoryon the cinder-path was refreshing. Raby, at the time, walked in wonderfully fair style, with exactly the same action, in spite of his great speed, as an ordinary pedestrian on the road. He was not allowed long to remain an amateur, and soon joined the professional ranks. As has been the case withmany another fine, natural walker, a little artificial cultiva­ tion soon made him walk as shiftily as the rest. The champion of the next two yearswas H. Whyatt, of the Notts Forest F.C., who is also credited with havingwalked a mile at Birmingham,in 1883, in 6 min. 34^ sec. Whyatt wasa tall, wiry man, who progressed witha veryshort stride ; and we can only express an opinion of him that he never walked at all, but merely trotted on his heels, taking care upon such occasionsnever to have both feet off the ground at once. His action was very like that of Webster in his later days, only ' verymuch more so '; but as long as a manwasconsidered to be walkingbecause one foot reached the ground before the other quite left it, it became impossible to disqualify him. In 1884 two Americanswere in this country, F. P. Murray and W. H. Meek. The former arrived here as the guest of some English clubs, and under some mysteriousarrangements, in which ( gate money' played an important part, he was unable to appear at the championship meeting. Meek, how­ ever, who came over independently, and witha desire, as weare informed, of showing that the invited guest was not the best American walker, reached England a day or two before the championship meeting,and won the walking race with great ease, in most excellent style. Like his compatriot Myers, he had a most remarkable physique. He was a verylittle man, with a large pair of thick, strong legs. His stride waslong, and his walking of a perfectlyfair road-goingstyle. At Stam-