In all games that called for skill, activity, and reckless daring, Hughie was easily leader.

In "Old Sow," "Prisoner's Base," but especially in the ancient and noble game of "Shinny," Hughie shone peerless and supreme.

Foxy hated games, and shinny, the joy of those giants of old, who had torn victory from the Sixteenth, and even from the Front one glorious year, was at once Foxy's disgust and terror.

As a little boy, he could not for the life of him avoid turning his back to wait shuddering, with humping shoulders, for the enemy's charge, and in anything like a melee, he could not help jumping into the air at every dangerous stroke.
And thus he brought upon himself the contempt even of boys much smaller than himself, who, under the splendid and heroic example of those who led them, had only one ambition, to get a whack at the ball, and this ambition they gratified on every possible occasion reckless of consequences.

Hence, when the last of the big boys, Thomas Finch, against whose solid mass hosts had flung themselves to destruction, finally left the school, Foxy, with great skill, managed to divert the energies of the boys to games less violent and dangerous, and by means of his bull's-eyes and his liquorice, and his large, fat smile, he drew after him a very considerable following of both girls and boys.
The most interesting and most successful of Foxy's schemes was the game of "store," which he introduced, Foxy himself being the storekeeper.