from the player's favorite ballads. In our play the eldest of the
four players, who was also the best organizer, represented the cruel
father. The youngest little girl was the fair damsel. The other two
represented the wicked lover and the faithful knight, the part of the
faithful knight being taken by the fleetest of the party to balance
the combination of the father and the wicked lover. The game begins by
the fair damsel being imprisoned in the coach-house because she
refuses to marry the wicked lover. (Of course any shed would do.) Here
she waits until her knight comes to rescue her, and they escape
together, pursued by the other two. If the lovers succeed in getting
away the story has a happy ending; but the more dramatic ending is the
tragic one, when the faithful knight is overtaken, and after killing
the cruel father and the wicked lover, himself dies of his wounds, the
fair damsel slaying herself with his sword over his dead body.
"The interest of this game is greatly increased by having retainers.
These are armies of sticks which are planted at particular corners.
There must be some mark by which your own retainers can be
distinguished from the enemy's. For instance, the faithful knight may
have peeled sticks and the others unpeeled. If, when charging round
the house, you come across a troop of the enemy's retainers, you
cannot go on until you have thrown them all down, as they are set to
guard the pass. So, if the lovers are escaping and they find their way
blocked by the father's retainers (the father and the wicked lover may
have separate sets of retainers, in which case the war is always
bitterest between the two rivals, as the father's retainers are
sometimes spared for the damsel's sake), they have to lose time by
first overcoming the retainers and that gives time to their pursuers
to come up. But if they are so far in advance that they can stop to
set up their own retainers in the place of the enemy, it serves to
give them further time to make good their escape, as the others have
to wait to overthrow the knight's sticks in their turn. In no case are
you allowed to take away your enemy's sticks. If the lovers are
overtaken, the rivals have to fight, and meanwhile the father once
more carries off and imprisons the damsel."
Counting-Out Rhymes
To decide who is to begin a game there are various counting-out
rhymes. All the players stand in a circle, surrounding the one who
counts. At each pause in the rhyme (which occurs wherever a stroke has
been placed in the versions which follow) this one touches the players
in turn until the end is reached. The player to whom the last number
comes is to begin. This is one rhyme:--
Eena-a, | deen-a, | dine-a, | dust, |
Cat'll-a, | ween-a, | wine-a, | wust, |
Spin, | spon, | must | be | done, |
Twiddlum, | twaddlum, | twenty-one. |
O- | U- | T | spells | out. |
Others:--
Intery, | mintery, | cutery | corn, |
Apple | seed | and | apple | thorn; |
Wine, | brier, | limber | lock, |
Five | geese |in | a | flock; |
Sit and sing | by a spring |
O- | U- | T | and | in | again. |
One-ery, | two-ery, |
Ziccary | zan; |
Hollowbone, | crack-a-bone, |
Ninery, | ten; |
Spittery | spot, |
Must | be | done, |
Twiddledum, | twaddledum,
Twenty-one.
Ring | around | a ring-pot, |
One spot | two spot | three spot | san |
Bob-tailed | winnie-wack | tittero | tan |
Ham | Scram |
Fortune | man |
Singum | sangum | Buck! |
Daisy Chains
The old way of making a daisy chain is to split one stalk and thread
the next through it up to the head, as in this drawing. That is for
out-of-doors. If you are using the chain for decorations indoors, it
is perhaps better to cut off the stalks and thread the heads on
cotton; but there seems to be no great need to use daisies in this way
at all.
[Illustration: DAISY CHAIN]
An ivy chain is made by passing the stalk of one leaf through the
point of another and then bending it round and putting it through the
point of its own leaf, the hole thus made being used for the stalk of
the next, and so on, as in this drawing.
[Illustration: IVY CHAIN]
Flower Show
A flower-show competition is an excellent garden game. A handkerchief
on sticks forms the tent. Underneath this is a bed of sand in which
the flowers, singly or in groups, can be fixed. Some one can easily be
persuaded to come out of the house to act as judge.
Garden Shop
Shop in the garden or out-of-doors is played with various things that
resemble articles of food. Thus you can get excellent coffee from
sorrel, and capital little bundles of rhubarb can be made by taking a
rhubarb leaf and cutting the ribs into stalks. Small stones make very
good imitation potatoes, and the heads of marguerite daisies on a
plate will easily pass for poached eggs.
Flower Symbols
In this place a word might be said about some of the curious things to
be found in flowers and plants. If you cut the stalk of a brake fern
low down, in September, you find a spreading oak tree. The pansy
contains a picture of a man in a pulpit. A poppy is easily transformed
into an old woman in a red gown. The snap-dragon, when its sides are
pinched, can be made to yawn. The mallow contains a minute cheese. By
blowing the fluff on a dandelion that has run to seed you can tell
(more or less correctly) the time of day. An ear of barley will run up
your sleeve if the pointed end is laid just within it; and an apple's
seeds make exquisite little mice.
Summer Houses
If the garden has no summer-house or tent a very good one can be made
with a clothes-horse and a rug.
OUTDOOR GAMES FOR BOYS
This book is written for children who need help in amusing themselves.
It is natural that there should be some difficulty about thinking of
games for indoors, or when there is a problem of a large company to
amuse; but it is hard to imagine any healthy boy, turned loose out of
doors, who cannot take care of his own entertainment. The number of
things to do is without limit and the boy so uninventive as to be at a
loss with all outdoors before him must be in a sad way. Hence there
has been no effort made in this chapter to make an exhaustive list of
outdoor games, only those being given which are suggestive, that is,
which can be infinitely varied according to your ingenuity; which are,
so to speak, the first of a series.
Also, the rules of regular games are not given here (such as baseball,
football, hockey, etc.). There are plenty of small manuals, given away
with the outfits for these games, which print in much more detail than
would be possible here, their principles. More than that, most boys
absorb a general knowledge of these games through their pores, and
need a book only to settle some small, knotty, disputed point of
ruling.
One of the best things to have when out of doors is a ball. There is
no end to the uses one can make of it.
Ball Games
The simplest thing to do with a ball is to catch it; and the quicker
one is in learning to catch well the better baseball player one will
become. Ordinary catching in a ring is good, but the practice is
better if you try to throw the ball each time so that the player to
whom you throw it shall not need to move his feet in order to catch
it. This teaches straight throwing too. Long and high throwing and
catching, and hard throwing and catching (standing as close together
as you dare), are important. There is also dodge-catching, where you
pretend to throw to one player and really throw to another and thus
take him unawares. All these games can be varied and made more
difficult by using only one hand, right or left, for catching.
Ball Games Alone
A boy with a ball need never be very lonely. When tired of catching it
in the ordinary way he can practice throwing the ball straight into
the air until, without his moving from his place, it falls absolutely
on him each time. He can throw it up and catch it behind him, and if
he has two others (or stones will do) he can strive for the juggler's
accomplishment of keeping three things in the air at once. Every boy
should practice throwing with his left hand (or, if he is already
left-handed, with his right): a very useful accomplishment. If it is a
solid india-rubber ball and there is a blank wall, he can make it
rebound at different angles, one good way being, in throwing it, to
let it first hit the ground close to the wall's foot. He may also
pledge himself to catch it first with the right hand and then with the
left for a hundred times; or to bat it up a hundred times with a
tennis racket or a flat bit of board. An interesting game for one is
to mark out a golf course round the garden, making a little hole at
intervals of half a dozen yards or so, and see how many strokes are
needed in going round and getting into each hole on the way.
Races
All kinds of races are easy to arrange and these can be repeated from
day to day as your proficiency increases. Here are a few.
The Spanish race, sometimes called the Wheelbarrow race, is played by
forming the boys into two lines, one standing back of the other, and
the front row on their hands and knees. At a signal to begin, each boy
on the back row takes hold of the ankles of the boy is front of him
and lifts his knees off the ground. The boy in front walking on his
hands, and the boy behind trundling him along, make the greatest haste
possible. The pair who first reach the goal are the winners.
Races may be run, hopping on the right foot, or on the left, or with
both together, or with first a hop and then a jump. It is well to
appoint one of the boys umpire during these odd races, to see that
they are run fairly and none of the rules agreed upon are broken.
A sack race is fun. Each boy is tied into a gunny sack and shuffles
his way to the goal. A substitute for this is the three-legged race,
run by two boys. They stand side by side, and the right leg of one is
tied to the left leg of the other and so with three legs between them
they must somehow get to the goal.
Hands and knees races, backward races (run with your back to the
goal), races with burdens on your back, or balancing a pole across
your hand or on the tip of your finger--there is no limit to the ones
you can invent.
But the best ones, after all, are the plain old trials of speed. There
is no more fun than a good running race, and a walking race is next to
it. Bicycle races are apt to be dangerous and a course that is very
wide should always be selected.
Quoits
Quoits is a game not played as much as it should be by American boys.
It is easy to arrange, for although there is an outfit sold in the
toy shops, a home-made one is just as good. It consists of a
collection of horseshoes and a stake driven in the ground--certainly
not a difficult apparatus to assemble. The stake should not project
more than an inch above the ground and the players, according to the
grown-up rules, should stand about fifteen yards away from the stake
(which is usually called "the hub"). But for boys the distance from
the hub can be determined by your skill. You may increase it as you
improve with practice. Every player has a certain number of quoits
(horseshoes) and standing at a fixed distance from the hub he tries to
pitch them so that they will go as near as possible to the hub. Some
very good players can cast a quoit so that it falls about the hub.
This is called a "ringer" and counts ten, but it is a rare shot. Every
one pitches his quoits and then all go to the hub and reckon up the
score. The one whose quoits lie nearest to the hub counts one point
for each quoit, but each quoit entitled to count must be nearer the
hub than any of the opponents' quoits. This continues until the score
is complete. People usually play for eleven. This game can be played
with flat stones instead of horseshoes and with any rules that you
choose to make.
Duck on a Rock
Duck on a Rock is a variation of Quoits which is excellent fun. One of
the players, chosen by counting out, puts a stone (called in this game
the "duck") about as big as his fist, on the top of a smooth rock and
stands near it. All the other players have similar "ducks" and try to
dislodge the one on the rock by throwing their stones, or ducks at it.
As soon as each has thrown his duck he tries to watch his chance to
run up to it and carry it back before the player standing by the rock
can touch him. When some one knocks off the duck from the rock the
"it" (the player by the rock) must put it back before he can tag any
of the players. This is therefore, of course, the great time for a
rush of all the players to recover their ducks and get back to their
own territory before the "it" can tag them. If any player is touched
by the "it" while attempting to rescue his duck he must become "it"
and put his duck on the rock.
Bowling
Bowling is the best of sports but this usually needs too much
apparatus for the average boy to have. Nine pins, however, can be
arranged in a rough sort of a way, by setting up sticks and bowling at
them with round apples. Your own ingenuity will devise ways to use the
materials you find about you.
Hop-Scotch
Hop-scotch is a great favorite which scarcely needs a description,
although there are various ways of marking the boards. The game is
played by any number of persons, each of whom kicks a small stone from
one part to another of the diagram by hopping about on one foot. The
diagram is drawn on a smooth piece of ground with a pointed stick or
on a pavement with a bit of chalk. The most usual figure is given
here.
To begin, a player puts a pebble or bit of wood into the place marked
1, and then, hopping into it with his right foot, he kicks the counter
outside the diagram. Then hopping out himself, he kicks it (with the
foot on which he is hopping) into the part marked 2. He hops through 1
to 2, kicks the counter out again, and follows it out. This continues
until he has kicked the counter in and out of every space in the
diagram, without stepping on a line, or so casting the counter that
it rests on a line. If this occurs he is put back a space, and it is
the turn of the next player. Each one plays until he has made a fault,
and when it is his turn again, he takes up the game where he left off.
The one who first gets through the required figures is the winner.
[Illustration]
There is literally no end to the variations of this game, either in
the diagram used or in the rules. Sometimes when people become very
skilful they play it backward, and sometimes at the end the player is
required to place the pebble on his toe and kick it in the air,
catching it in his hand.
Strength Tests
Various trials of strength are good for boys out of doors, provided
rules are fixed and adhered to. Cane-spreeing is good sport, but
should only be tried by boys pretty well matched in size and
strength. A cane (or broom-stick) about three feet long is held by two
boys facing each other, each with a hand on each end of the cane, the
respective right hands being outside the lefts, that is, nearest to
the end. Then one tries to get the cane away from the other. It sounds
simple, but there are a great variety of strategic tricks to be
learned by practice. No struggle should last more than two minutes by
the watch, when the boys should stop and get breath. The feet are not
used, but it is quite allowable to use your body, if you get down on
the ground in a sort of wrestling.
Hare and Hounds
Hare and Hounds can be played either in the country or the city and is
fine fun, although it should be begun with a short run. In the
excitement of the chase boys are apt to forget, and over-strain
themselves. The "hares" are two players who have a bag of small paper
pieces which they scatter after them from time to time as they run.
They are given a start of five or ten minutes and then all the others,
who are the "hounds," start after them, tracing their course by the
bits of paper. In the city the hares take a piece of chalk and mark an
arrow on the wall thus ----> showing in which direction they have
gone. Good stout shoes should be worn to run in, or you will blister
your feet.
Dog-Stick
A game for city pavements or for smooth country roads has so many
names that it is difficult to say which is its right one, but a common
one is "dog-stick." It is played something like hockey, the aim being
to get a ball or counter over your opponent's goal line. The ball in
this case is not a ball but a piece of wood which you can make
yourself, of an odd shape. It is like a flattened ball with a tail to
it. With a club or stick you strike the tail so that the ball springs
up in the air and then before it falls you strike it with your club
toward your enemy's goal line. The players are divided into sides who
try to defend their goal lines and to send back the ball to the other
side. Make your own rules as experience teaches you is fair.
Other Games
The endless variations of leap-frog should not be forgotten in
devising outdoor games: and tournaments of long or broad jumping and
high jumping are good. Stilts and the games to be arranged with them
are also another great resource. And the seasons bring, as regularly
as flowers and snow, the round of tops, and kites and marbles. Of
these last a very summary account is given here as most boys and
regions have their own rules.
Marbles
The first thing to learn in "Marbles" is the way that the marble
should be held. Of course one can have very good games by bowling the
marble, as if it were a ball, or holding it between the thumb-nail and
the second joint of the first finger and shooting it with the thumb
from there; but these ways are wrong. The correct way is to hold it
between the tip of the forefinger and the first joint of the thumb.
Marbles are divided into "taws," or well-made strong marbles with
which you shoot, and "clays," or the ordinary cheap colored marbles at
which you aim and with which you pay your losses.
Ring Taw
Two or three boys with marbles could never have difficulty in hitting
on a game to play with them, but the best regular game for several
players is "Ring Taw." A chalk ring is made on as level a piece of
ground as there is, and each player puts a clay on it at regular
distances from each other. A line from which to shoot during the first
round is then drawn two yards or so from the ring, and the game begins
by the player who has won the right of leading off (a real advantage)
knuckling down on the line and shooting at one of the marbles in the
ring. If a player knocks a marble out of the ring, that marble is his
and he has the right to shoot again from the place where his taw comes
to a stand; but if in knocking a marble out of the ring his taw
remains in it (or if his taw remains in it under any condition
whatever), he has to put all the marbles he has won into the ring, in
addition to one for a fine, and take up his taw and play no more till
the next game. There is one exception to this rule: If only one marble
is left in the ring, and if, in knocking it out, a player's taw
remains in the ring, he does not suffer, because the game is then
over. The other two rules are these: If a player succeeds in hitting
the taw of another the owner of that taw not only must leave the game
but hand over any marbles he has won. (In no case are taws parted
with.) Also, if it happens that only two players are left, and one of
these has his taw hit, that ends the game, for the player who hit it
not only has the marble of the taw's owner but all the marbles left in
the ring too.
"Ring Taw" can be played by as few as two players; but in this case
they must each put several marbles in the ring.
To decide which player is to begin, it is customary for them all to
aim at the ring from the knuckling-down line, and whichever one places
his taw nearest to the middle of the ring has the right to lead.
Other Games
Other garden games for boys will be found in the Picnic section. We
might mention also "Steps" (p. 4), "Tug of War" (p. 38), and "Potato
Races" (p. 40).
PICNIC GAMES
A picnic may be either a complicated affair which has occupied you all
the day before, or the most impromptu expedition which you arrange on
the spur of the minute; and the last kind are often more fun. Any
place out of doors will answer for a picnic, but if possible it should
be near water. Anything will answer for a picnic lunch, but it is
pleasant, if older people are with you, if you are allowed to have
fires to do some outdoor cooking. This is always easier than it sounds
and adds infinitely to the fun of the lunch. Bacon is one of the
easiest things to cook outdoors, all that is needed being a forked
stick which you can cut for yourselves. The strip of bacon is
impaled on the forks and toasted over the fire, each person cooking
his own slice and eating it on bread. Or with two larger forked sticks
a steak can be deliciously broiled for the whole company, or chops can
be cooked. It is the easiest and most delightful task to arrange a
sort of cooking-hole of stones over which the coffee pot may be set
and potatoes may be boiled over another similar hole. You will find
that it is far better to have a number of very tiny little fires
entirely separated from each other, than one big bonfire which is
almost sure to grow unmanageable. It will be seen that it is far
easier to take a big piece of bacon (to be sliced after reaching the
picnic grounds) a loaf or two of bread and raw potatoes than to spend
hours in making sandwiches and packing cake. Beside the things cooked
out of doors always taste so much better. Great care should be taken
to put out every spark of fire before going home, and to leave no
scraps of paper, or egg-shells lying about. These should be burned or
buried.
It, Touch Last, or Tag
For a short time "It" is a good warming game. It is the simplest of
all games. The "It" runs after the others until he touches one. The
one touched then becomes "It."
Touchwood
The name explains the game, which is played as "It" is played, except
that you can be caught only when you are not touching wood. It is a
good game where there are trees. It is, of course, not fair to carry a
piece of wood.
Cross Tag
This is the ordinary "Tag," save that if, while the "It" is chasing
one player, another runs across the trail between him and the pursued,
the "It" has to abandon the player he was at first after and give
chase to the one who has crossed.
A good variety of tag is "French Tag." The first one caught must join
hands with the "It," the next one with him, etc., and so on in a long
line all running together. Any one can catch an opponent, but the
original "It" must touch him before he can take his place in the line.
The Little Dog
The players form a ring, leaving one outside, who passes round it
singing, "I have a little dog and he won't bite you," and as he does
so, touching each player in turn with a knotted pocket-handkerchief.
"And he won't bite you," "And he won't bite you," he calls to one
after the other, and then suddenly changes this to "But he will bite
_you_." The player touched when this is said has to run after the
toucher with all his might. When caught they change places.
Hunt the Squirrel
All the players except one join a ring. This one, with a knotted
handkerchief in his hand, walks round the outside of the ring for a
while, and then, dropping the handkerchief behind one of the players,
runs off crying--
Hunt the squirrel through the wood.
Now I've lost him--now I've found him!
Hunt the squirrel through the wood.
The player behind whom the handkerchief was dropped must
catch the squirrel before he can take up the empty place in
the ring left by the pursuer. It is more fun if, in dropping
the handkerchief, it can be done without the player discovering
it for a little while.
The way in which old-fashioned country children play
this game (called usually "Drop the handkerchief"), is a little
different. As the one with the handkerchief walks around
and around the outside of the ring all join in singing,
"A tisket! A tasket!
A green and yellow basket!
I sent a letter to my love
And now I find I've lost it.
I've lost it! I've lost it!
And where do you think I found it?
Up in the sky, ever so high
With angels gathered 'round it."
As the words "I've lost it!" are repeated, the player outside
must drop the handkerchief, but no one must look behind
him until the verse is ended. Then the one who finds the
handkerchief behind him must try to catch the first one, who
in turn tries to slip into the empty place.
Gaps
The players form a ring: all except one, who is "It." This
one runs round the ring and touches one of the players in the
circle. They both set off running immediately in opposite
directions, the object of each being to get first to the gap
made in the circle by the player who was touched. The one
who gets to the gap first remains in the circle, while the other
becomes "It."
Twos and Threes, or Terza