SPORT the cost of the undertaking, including the payment of permit fees and the employment of official handicappers, far greater than they could bear, and they have long since reverted to the old order of things. The tendency to follow this example still exists. It seems likely that in the near future many more clubs will adopt the unregistered principle, while there appears to be little likelihood of new clubs coming forward to fill the gaps caused by these secessions from the ranks of pure amateurism. One cannot but regret this state of affairs, for strictly amateur athletics should everywhere form a part of the curriculum of the youth of England. Other meetings of the long ago in the county of Kent, though still promoted under the laws of the Amateur Athletic Association, have either become less exclusive as regards the rules which govern them, or have gradu- ally drifted into the hands of men with good ideas of sport but possessed of broader minds on the subject of amateurism and more democratic in their views. Belong- ing to this latter class of sports are those held at Belvedere, which meeting may be regarded as the successor to the old Erith and Belvedere fixture. No more popular gathering than this last within easy reach of London ever existed. In its palmy days in the early 'eighties it was loyally supported by the members of the London Athletic Club and similar bodies ; but the character of the meeting has changed consider- ably since then, although it is still popular. At about the same period there flourished meetings at Gravesend, at which athletes of good class were in the habit of competing. Prominent among the competitors of that day was E. C. Carter, a champion cross-country runner. He afterwards went to America, where he still remains, and in that country has won several championships and estab- lished records. At the old North Kent sports his was one of the most familiar figures, and on one occasion at that meeting he carried off the two miles open handicap in very fast time. At the same sports J. M. Cowie, the champion sprinter of the day, was credited with covering the lOO yards in a shade better than ten seconds. Whether he actually did so is open to some doubt, but the proba- bility is that he achieved the record, for he was a good man and the course was a little downhill. At any rate his performance was a remarkable one, although it could not be officially recognized. Shoreham sports, which at one time belonged to the unregistered category, came within the fold of the Amateur Athletic Association a few years ago, and there seems to be every prospect of the Shoreham meeting one day taking a high position in Kent athletics. Dr. Desprez, one of the local officers of the A.A.A., is a resident in the district, and as becomes an old athlete, naturally interests himself greatly in the sport. At Tunbridge Wells, a town ever associ- ated with good men and true in nearly every branch of sport, a couple of sports meetings are held every year, the one by the Tonbridge Invicta Harriers, and the other by the Tunbridge Wells St. John's CM. and A.C. Of the latter body Mr. H. Saville, of Newerman Road, Tunbridge Wells, is the honorary secretary. The old Tunbridge Wells Harriers, winners for a number of years of the South of the Thames inter-club race, are no longer in existence, although a number of their members — prominent among whom is A. Ovenden, of the London Athletic Club — are still to be met with, principally in the capacity of officials, at various athletic meetings both in and out of London. Real athletics never flourished to any con- siderable extent in Kent, albeit as the county in which some important cycling contests have been decided under the auspices of the National Cyclists' Union, it has been rather famous in the past. To find anything of downright historical interest in Kentish field sports, apart from the fact that good men from other districts came to the county meetings, one has to come to the very modern times of 1887 to note that a Lewisham resi- dent (but a Birmingham born man), J. H. Adams, carried off the 50 miles Ordinary Bicycle Championship of the N.C.U. at Birmingham. F. J. Osmond, S. F. Edge, and P. F. Wood, old cycle and tricycle cham- pions, had their Kentish club and residential connexions, and the Crystal Palace itself has long been a home ' of cycle-racing. In 1892 the Heme Hill track was chosen for the N.C.U.'s chief races, and the Catford ground was used in 1896. A winner of a N.C.U. medal for the tandem championship in 1898 was F. Burnand of Catford, who partnered E. J. Callingham, a Surrey resident. The Blackheath Harriers and Heme Hill Harriers are chiefly Kentish men, and while the former is rather an exclusive society, the latter can be said to have turned out some very useful runners within the past decade. For instance, the 15 miles amateur record holder, Fred J. Appleby, is a member of the H.H.H., and the ex-Irish mile and four miles champion, J. N. Deakin, bears the 517
