I used to play cricket myself, but I could always stop at ten or twenty.

There have been times when I have stopped at even less.
It is the same with everything he puts his hand to.

Either he does not care for boating at all, or, as a matter of course, he pulls stroke in the University Boat-race; and then takes the train on to Henley and wins the Diamond Sculls so easily that it hardly seems worth while for the other fellow to have started.

Were I living in Novel-land, and had I entered for the Diamond Sculls, I should put it to my opponent before the word was given to us to go.
"One minute!" I should have called out to him.

"Are you the hero of this novel, or, like myself, only one of the minor characters?
Because, if you are the hero you go on; don't you wait for me.