Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume III.djvu/174

 168 BOWLING BOWLING GREEN in six books. In 1807 he published an edition of Pope's works in 10 volumes. From this time new works appeared in rapid succession, and comprised a great number of poems, of which the "Missionary of the Andes," pub- lished in 1815, acquired the greatest fame, lie continued a prolific writer of verse and prose till 1837, when he seems to have retired from literary life. In the mean time he had received important preferment in the church, having been made rector of several parishes, in 1818 chaplain to the prince regent, and in 1828 canon of Salisbury cathedral. He was a man of eccentric habits, very absent-minded, and singularly timid. Bowles's edition of Pope, containing an essay with some severe com- ments on the poet, gave rise to a discussion which has become historical as " the Pope and Bowles controversy." In it Byron was his principal opponent, but Campbell, Gilchrist, and others were warmly engaged in it. Bowles defended his opinions with great ability. BOWLING, or Bowls, an ancient athletic game, played with balls of different shapes rolled on a flat expanse of turf in the open air. The name is also sometimes applied to a modern American game more commonly call- ed tenpins, which but slightly resembles the ancient sport, from which it is nevertheless un- doubtedly derived. I. The ancient game of bowls, still a favorite pastime in Great Britain, requires, in order that it may be played with skill, the most careful preparation of the ground, called a bowling green, on which the turf must be closely shaved, watered, and rolled. It must be surrounded by a shallow trench. The balls (called bowls) which are used by the players are of hard wood, generally lignum vita, six or eight inches in diameter, but are not exactly spherical, having a bias to one side. A small white spherical ball, called the jack, is placed at one end of the green, and the play- ers endeavor so to roll their bowls that they shall fall as near as possible to this conspicuous mark. The irregular shape of the bowl makes it very difficult for a novice to calculate its course, and renders necessary a peculiar motion in rolling it. The players are generally ar- ranged in sides, every man of each side having two bowls. The side which places its bowls nearest the jack counts one point in the game for each bowl so placed. The number making game is settled by the players before beginning. With unimportant variations, this method of playing bowls has been in use in Great Britain for centuries. The game has been the subject of several legislative enactments, having been prohibited altogether during the reign of Henry VIII., by a law repealed in 1845. Bowls was formerly a favorite game with the Dutch. The early inhabitants of New York city (in their time New Amsterdam) made it a common rec- reation, and the ground they used for play, at the lower end of Broadway, near the Bat- . tery, is now a small ornamental park, which still bears the name of the Bowling Green. II. The modern game of tenpins or bowling is practised in saloons, on alleys of carefully fitted carpenter's work, from 50 to 65 ft. in length, and about 4 in width. The alley has a gutter, as it is termed, on each side, and is very slightly convex in the centre, regularly bevelled to the sides. At the further extremity are set up 10 pins, usually of ash wood, about a foot in height and 2 or 2| Ibs. in weight, ar- ranged in the form of a pyramid, with the apex toward the bowler. The apex consists of a single pin, the 2d rank of 2, the 3d of 3, and the 4th of 4, the last occupying the whole width of the alley, and the first standing on the crown of it. All the pins are equidistant from each other. At these the bowler rolls wooden balls, perfectly spherical and usually of lignum vitse, from 4, 5, or 6 Ibs., down to half a pound in weight, with the object of knocking down as many of the pins as pos- sible at each roll. The pins, when set up, are called a frame; and at each frame the bowlei- rolls three balls, when the number of pins down is counted to him, and the frame is set up again for the next bowler. A game ordina- rily consists of 10 frames, or 30 balls. If the bowler takes all the pins with his first ball, he counts 10; this is called a "ten-strike;" the frame is again set up for his second ball, when, if he again takes all, he counts 10 more, and the frame is again set up for his third, when what- ever number he scores with the three balls counts to him as if all had been made off one frame. If he takes all the 10 with his first two balls, he is entitled to a fresh frame for his third or last ball ; this is called a spare. It is now everywhere customary to employ a somewhat complicated method of counting gains th us made. By this arrangement, when a player gets a ten- strike or spare, he does not immediately have the frame set up for him especially, and pro- ceed to roll the remaining one or two of his three balls while the other players wait for him ; but in order to save time and the labor of unnecessary resetting, he waits till his next regular turn comes, and then counts the first ball or first two balls of it doubly i. e., both as additions to his former ten-strike or spare, and as new counts for himself. BOWLING GREEN, a town and the capital of Warren co., Ky., on Barren river, 120 m. S. W. of Frankfort; pop. in 1870, 4,574, of whom 1,670 were colored. The river is navigable to this point by steamboats of 200 tons, and regu- lar lines run to Louisville. The Louisville and Nashville railroad passes through the town. Its trade, chiefly in pork and tobacco, is con- siderable, and there are a number of mills, and some manufactories of iron, woollens, &c. There are several churches and schools, and a weekly newspaper. At the beginning of the civil war it was regarded as a point of great strategic importance, and was occupied by Gen. Buck- ner in September, 1861, with a force of 10,000. confederates, which was subsequently largely increased, for the purpose of defending the ap-