CHAPTER XVI

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WATERMEN AND PROFESSIONALS.

The London waterman is the oldest type of professional oarsmanship. He was called into existence for the purpose of locomotion, and race-rowing was a very secondary consideration with him in the first instance. Just as in the present day credentials of respectability are required by the Commissioners of Police of drivers of cabs and omnibuses (and none may ply for hire in these capacities within the metropolis unless duly licensed), so in olden days great stress was laid on the due qualification of watermen. An aspirant was and is required to serve seven years' apprenticeship before he can be 'free' of the river, and until he is 'free' of it he may not ply for hire upon it under heavy penalties for so doing. This regulation is in the interests of public safety. If apprentices exhibit special talent for rowing they can win what are called 'coats and badges,' given by certain corporate bodies, and by so doing they can take up their 'freedom' without paying fees for the privilege. We believe that no such restrictions exist on our other British rivers. The rule survives on the Thames because in olden times the Thames was a highway for passenger traffic in 'wherries.' In those times, where a passenger would now go to a thoroughfare or call a cab, he would have gone to the nearest 'stairs' and have hailed a wherry. London had not then grown to its present dimensions, and the Thames lay conveniently as a highway between Westminster, the City, and the docks.

Amateurs began to take up rowing early in the present century as a sport; and these contests seem to have fostered the idea of match-making among watermen. The title of a Champion of the Thames seems first to have been held by one R. Campbell, who beat C. Williams, another waterman, in a match on September 9, 1831, and also beat R. Coombes in a match the date of which is doubtful, but it was in heavy boats. Campbell was a powerful and heavy man, while Coombes weighed less that ten stone. Coombes turned the tables on Campbell a few years later (in 1846), and for some years Coombes was held to be invincible. In those times London watermen could, at scratch, man an eight to hold or even beat the best trained crew of amateurs. The original waterman's wherry was a vehicle of conveyance; it was of much greater size than would be required to carry one man alone in a sheer contest for speed, but so soon as 'racing' came into vogue among watermen, lighter craft were built for matches, and were called 'wager' boats. The hull of the wherry was constructed as narrow as possible, and the sides flared out just at the greatest beam, so as to allow of sufficient width to carry the rowlocks with the requisite leverage for the sculls. This detail has already been treated in