Page:Out-door Games Cricket and Golf (1901).djvu/22

Rh racing was really confined to the few who own horses and do not bet, like the late Lord Falmouth and the Duke of Westminster, it would be even more than it is now the sport of rich men, because a horse is an expensive animal, and to keep horses in training on the chance of winning prizes that, apart from betting, would have comparatively small money value, will always be an expensive luxury. What has then really contributed most to the gaiety of nations, confining the word nations to those who speak English?

The one article which is mentioned without hesitation as an answer to this question is the ball. This is of different sizes or different weights, sometimes hard and sometimes soft, sometimes kicked, more frequently hit, but in whatever size or weight you find it, it somehow or other forms the indispensable chief part in games. Take away, if possible, that blessed ball, what would a large majority of the inhabitants of the British Empire do for recreation? The very idea takes our breath away; we should have to take to keeping tame rabbits or haunting tea-gardens. The ball in some shape or other was introduced