‘Frightfully dull, isn’t it?’ said the Doctor.
‘Dull’s no name for it,’ said the Clerk of Petty Sessions; ‘this is
the awfullest hole I ever was in.’
‘Never knew it so bad,’ chimed in the Chemist and the Saddler, who
were on this frosty night drinking whisky hot in the snug parlour of
the Shamrock Inn in the little township of Crupperton.
‘I tell you what,’ said the C.P.S. presently; ‘I see by the paper
they’ve started a football club at Cantleville. Why shouldn’t we do
the same? It’ll help to pass away the time, anyhow.’
The Doctor pricked up his ears with interest. The Chemist seconded the
motion enthusiastically.
‘A capital idea,’ said he, ‘and, although I never have played, I’ll go
in for it. It’s simple enough, I should imagine.’
‘Simple!’ said the C.P.S., who had once seen a match in Sydney. ‘It’s
as easy as tea-drinking. There’s no expense, except the first one of
the ball. It’s not like cricket, you know, where you’re always putting
your hands in your pockets for something or other.’
‘I’ll give ten shillings, Mr Brown,’ said the Doctor softly.
‘Same here,’ said the Chemist.
‘How do you play it?’ asked the Saddler, and the Blacksmith, and the
Constable, who had just dropped in for a warm and a yarn that chilly
evening.
‘Well,’ explained the C.P.S., who had ideas, ‘first you get your ball.
Then you put up a couple of sticks with a cross one on the top of ’em.
Then you measure a distance, say one hundred yards by, say, fifty, on
a level bit of ground, and put up another set of sticks. Then you get
your men, and pick sides, and pop the ball down in the middle, and
wade in. For instance,’ he continued, ‘s’pose we’re playing
Saddlestrap. Well, then, d’ye see, we’ve got one goal—that’s what they
call the sticks—and they’ve got the other. We’ve to try and block ’em
from kicking the ball over our cross-bar, and do our best, meantime,
to send it over theirs. It’s just a splendid game for this weather,
and nothing could well be simpler.’
More men came in, the idea caught; a club was formed, and that very
night the C.P.S. wrote to the capital for a ball ‘of the best make and
the latest fashion.’
But it was a very long way to the capital. So, in the interval, the
C.P.S., who was an enterprising young Native, procured and erected
goal-posts and cross-bars of barked pine; and very business-like they
looked with a little pink flag fluttering from the summit of each.
At last the new ball arrived. But, to the secret astonishment of the
C.P.S., in place of being round it was oval. However, he was not going
to expose his ignorance and imperil the reputation already earned as
an exponent of the game, so he only said,—
‘I sent for the very best they had, and I can see we’ve got our
money’s worth. I’ll take her home and blow her up ready for
to-morrow.’
For a long time the ball seemed to go in any direction but the right
one, kick they never so hardly; whilst, as a rule, the strongest and
most terrific kickers produced the least effect.
They tried the aggravating thing in every position they could think
of, and, for a considerable period, without much success.
It was a sight worth seeing to watch the Blacksmith, after scooping a
little hollow in the ground and placing the ball perpendicularly
therein, retire and prepare for action. Opening his shoulders and
spitting on his hands, he would come heavily charging down, and
putting the whole force of fifteen stone into his right foot, deliver
a tremendous kick; then stand amazed to see the ball, after twirling
meekly up for a few yards, drop on his head instead of soaring between
the posts as it should have done.
‘I’m out of practice myself—haven’t played for years, in fact,’ said
the C.P.S. when explanation as to this erratic behaviour was demanded.
‘It’s simply a matter of practice, you know, like everything else.’
But all the same for a long time, deep down in his heart, there was a
horrible misgiving that the thing was not a football at all—that it
should have been round. At last, by dint of constant perseverance,
some of the men began to kick fairly well—kick goals even from a good
distance.
The first difficulty arose from a lack of side-boundaries. Hence, at
times, a kicking, struggling, shouting mob might be seen half-a-mile
away, at the far end of the main street, whereas it should have been
in front of the post-office.
To remedy this state of affairs, the C.P.S. drove in pegs at what was
voted ‘a fair thing’ to serve as guides. When the ball was sent beyond
the pegs no one pursued, and little boys stationed there kicked it
back again. Also, the cows, pigs and goats of Crupperton, who must
have imagined that a lunatic asylum had taken possession of their
feeding grounds, returned, and henceforth fed peacefully about the
grass-grown streets and allotments at the lower end of the township.
Presently, to vary the monotony, the Cruppertonians got up a match
amongst themselves for drinks—East _versus_ West was the title of it.
But it never went beyond the first scrimmage, if that can be called a
first where all was one big scrimmage, caused by two compact bodies of
men fighting for the possession of a ball. Out of this quickly emerged
the Chemist with, as he averred, a fractured wrist. Anyhow, he wore a
bandage, and played no more.
Then the Blacksmith accused the Saddler of kicking him on the shins,
wilfully and of malice prepense. For some time past there had been
bad blood between these two, and the fight that ensued was so gorgeous
that the game was quite forgotten in the excitement of it.
Presently, the village of Saddlestrap, a little lower down the river,
in emulation of its larger neighbour, started football also.
The Saddlestraps mostly got their living by tankmaking, were locally
known as ‘Thicklegs,’ and were a pretty rough lot. So that, when a
match was arranged between the two places, fun was foretold.
The rules of the Saddlestrap club were, like those of the Crupperton
one, simplicity itself, consisting, as they did, of the solitary
axiom—‘Kick whatever or wherever you can, only kick.’
Therefore, as remarked, fun was expected. The C.P.S. chose his team
carefully, and with an eye to weight and size. Superior fleetness, he
rightly imagined, would have but little to do with the result of the
day’s sport.
With the exception of half-a-dozen of the townspeople, the Crupperton
players consisted of young fellows from a couple of stations
adjoining. Therefore, the Saddlestraps somewhat contemptuously dubbed
their opponents ‘Pastorialites.’
The Doctor pleaded exemption on account of his age, and was,
therefore, appointed ‘Referee.’
For a while the play was somewhat weak and desultory, and lacking in
effect. The ball was continually being sent outside the pegs, and the
urchins stationed there were kept busy. But, at length, to the
delight of the spectators, consisting of the entire population of the
two townships, there was a hot scrimmage. ‘For all the world like a
lot o’ dorgs a-worryin’ a ’possum!’ as one excited bystander yelled,
whilst the crowd surged around the mixed-up heap of humanity, the
outside ring of which was frantically kicking and shoving at the
prostrate inner one, serving friend and foe alike.
‘A very manly and interesting game,’ remarked the Doctor, placidly
ringing his bell for ‘Spell, oh!’ whilst the Chemist ran to his shop
for plaster and bandage.
Presently, the undermost man of all was dragged out, torn and gory,
and spitting teeth from a broken jaw.
Him the Doctor caused to be carried to the nearest house, and, after
attending to his wounds, returned hurriedly to the field, where his
coadjutor was looking to the minor casualties, and both teams were
refreshing themselves with rum, and boasting of their prowess.
The Doctor rang his bell, and play was resumed. It was, he explained,
unhealthy to dawdle about in such weather and after severe exertion.
As the C.P.S. pointed out very eloquently that night at the banquet,
football was a game in which people must learn to give and take, and
that, until this had been fully understood and practised, the game
would never get beyond an initial stage.
This was probably the reason that on a Saddlestrap in full pursuit of
the ball being deliberately tripped up by a ‘Pastorialite,’ and sent
headlong to mother earth, which was hard and knobby, in place of
rising and going on with the game, he began to punch the tripper.
Five minutes afterwards might be seen the curious spectacle of a ball
lying neglected in the centre of the ground, whilst outside raged a
big fight of thirty.
For a time the trouble was strictly confined to the two teams. But
when it was observed that Crupperton was getting the worst of it,
partisans quickly peeled off and took sides; so that, directly, both
townships were up to their eyes in fight, and the Doctor seriously
contemplated sending for professional assistance to Cantleville.
For some time victory hovered in the balance. But men fight well on
their own ground, and at last the Saddlestraps broke and fled for
their horses and buggies. Those who stayed behind did so simply
because there was no doctor in their native village.
A banquet for both teams had been prepared at the leading (and only)
hotel. But there was only a remnant of one side that felt like
banqueting, so the gaps were filled by residents who had been
prominent in the fray.
The C.P.S., with a couple of beautifully blackened eyes, took the
chair. At the other end of the table presided the Constable, whose
features presented a curiously intricate study in diachylon, many of
the Saddlestraps having seized a mean opportunity of wiping off old
scores.
Speeches and toasts were made and drunk, and football enthusiastically
voted the king of all games. As the Blacksmith—whose arm was in a
sling—observed, ‘It was a fair an’ square game. A man know’d what he’d
got to do at it. There wasn’t no tiddleywinkin’ in the thing.’
The Doctor had been too busy to come early; but he dropped in for a
minute or so during the evening, and with great fire, and amidst much
applause, made a splendid speech. In its course he quoted Gordon’s
well-known lines—‘A game’s not worth a rap for a rational man to
play,’ etc.; and also adapted that saying of the ‘Iron Duke’s’ about
the battle of Waterloo being won upon the British football grounds.
It was decidedly the ‘speech of the evening,’ and was greeted with
hearty cheers as, concluding, he retired to look after his patients.
But Crupperton was very sore next morning; and for a whole week there
was no more football. Then they looked about them for more victims to
their prowess. But they found none at all near home.
At last, in despair, and in defiance of the advice of the C.P.S., the
executive challenged Cantleville itself—agreeing to journey thither.
In due course, and after the C.F.C. had recovered from its surprise,
and consulted a ‘Gazetteer,’ it accepted.
Cantleville was a very long distance away. Moreover, it was the ‘City’
of those inland parts, and the headquarters of the Civil Service
therein. Therefore the C.P.S. and the Constable discreetly refused to
accompany their fellows. One of the pair, at least, had doubts as to
whether Cantleville played the Crupperton game.
So the Blacksmith was elected Captain. ‘You’d better stay at home,’
said the C.P.S., ‘the chaps over there are regular swells, up to all
the latest dodges, and they wear uniforms. Besides they may not quite
understand our rules.’
‘Then we’ll teach ’em,’ said the Blacksmith. But the question of a
uniform troubled him. So he took counsel with his now fast friend the
Saddler, and the result was that everyone packed a stiffly-starched
white shirt and a pair of black trousers into his valise.
‘How about your uniforms now?’ said the Blacksmith, ‘nothin’ can’t be
neater’n that.’
So they went forth to battle, accompanied by the good wishes of the
populace; but neither by Doctor nor Chemist. There were plenty of both
at Cantleville. Also they were wise in their generation, and had
doubts.
Communication in these days was limited. Cantleville news arrived
_via_ Sydney, and the newspapers were a week old when delivered. So
that the team brought its own tidings home. They had not had a good
time. They had also been heavily fined, and they proposed to go afield
no more. The Blacksmith and the Saddler, who had ‘taken it out,’ were
the last to appear.
‘I suppose you play Rugby rules?’ had asked blandly the Secretary of
the C.F.C., as he curiously surveyed the ‘Bushies’ on their arrival.
‘No, we don’t,’ said the Blacksmith. ‘We plays Crupperton,’ and no
more questions were asked. But when it was seen what Crupperton rules
meant, backs, half-backs, forwards, and all the rest of it, struck and
refused to continue. Instead, they took to chaffing the ‘black and
white magpies.’
Whereupon, Crupperton, putting the question of football on one side,
went at its opponents _à la_ Saddlestrap. Their places, however, they
presently found taken by policemen. These latter every man handled to
the best of his ability, and had to pay for accordingly.
‘Shoo!’ said the Blacksmith, as he finished. ‘They’re nothin’ but a
lot o’ tiddleywinkers up there. Let’s have another match with
Saddlestrap.’