The week closed with an old scene on a new stage--a football match on Sir
Pryse's field at Bow Street. It was the last of the house-matches, which
had been interrupted at Uppingham to be played out here. The sight of
the school swarming into the railway carriages, which carried us to the
four-mile-distant ground, and then the mimic war of the red and white
jerseys contrasting the gray Gogerddan woodlands which overhang the
meadow, and the shouts of the English boys blending with the excited but
unintelligible cries of the Welsh rustic children, who were rapt
spectators of the game, brought home to us the piquant contrast between
our unchanged school habits and the novelty of their framework.
The weather of this first week was dry and genial; and it had no
pleasanter moments than those spent on the beach at sunset, whither the
school flocked down after tea for half an hour's leisure in the after-
glow. There is plenty of amusement for them on this broad reach of sand
and shingle. Some are groping for shells or for pebbles, which the
lapidary will transform for a trifle into dazzling jewels; others are
playing ducks and drakes on the waves, or entertaining themselves like
Prospero's elves,
That on the sands, with printless feet,
Do chase the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him
When he comes back again.
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