Chapter XV Ball, Bat and Racket
And now for ball! Some good games that can be played with ball, bat and racket. Town ball; two old cats; hand ball.
Chapter XVI American Baseball
The great American game of baseball. Some things every player should know. Rules.
Autumn
Chapter XVII All About Football
The strenuous game of football. How to lay out the ground. Pointers for players.
Chapter XVIII Mumbly Peg — Hop Scotch
Mumbly peg; jackstones; Hop Scotch.
Chapter XIX How to Camp Out
How and where to prepare camp. A delightful way in which to spend a vacation, if you know the way.
Chapter XX Bicycles and Lassoes
Can you ride a bike? Information on wheels. How to throw a lariat.
Chapter XXI Golf, Hockey and Shinny
The old Scotch game of golf, hockey and shinny.
Winter
Chapter XXII Skating — Skiing — Snow Shoeing
On the ice and snow. The royal sport of skating. Some hints on skiing and snow shoes.
Chapter XXIII Coasting — Tobogganing — Sleds
Coasting. How to make sleds. The bob sled. The toboggan. Snow games.
Chapter XXIV General Athletics
Walking, Running, Jumping.
Introduction
Among the many good and wise things said by the great Lincoln was this: “Give me the boy with promise of the man in him, and give me the man with the memory of the boy in him, and both can sit at my table, and if they sit together, we’ll have all the better time!”
This book of out-door games for boys will make better boys, and they’ll get a lot more joy out of life and be the better men in time, for having read it and carried out its rules as to wholesome, honest sport.
The boy who plays an honest game will do an honest business, and he’ll win over “the sneak.”
If you are “a grown-up,” read this book, and in doing so live over again the joyous, gladsome days of your boyhood, and you will sigh, as we do while writing this: “Would I were a boy again!”
We want the mother, as well as the father, to read this book, for it will recall the brothers of far-off days, and bring her into closer sympathy—we must not say “love,” for that is already strong enough —with the exuberance of her boys.
And the girls? Why, bless you! They, too, should read every scrap of this book, for they will find in it many of their own games, and not one that they could not play and enjoy, if circumstances permitted.
And the grand-parents? God bless them! Why, they’ll enjoy it quite as much as the young folks.