Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

candidates have small pecuniary rewards, but the other three get nothing for their trouble.

Of late years the proprietor of Vauxhall Gardens, and Astley the rider, give each of them in the course of the summer a new wherry, to be rowed for by a certain number of watermen, two of which are allowed to row in one boat; and these contests are extended to two or three heats or trials before the successful candidates are determined.

XX. SAILING.

Another popular amusement upon the water is sailing, and many persons have pleasure boats for this purpose; I do not mean the open boats which are usually let out for hire by the boat-builders for the purpose of sailing, but vessels of much greater magnitude, that are covered with a deck, and able with skilful management to weather a rough storm; many large bets are frequently dependant upon the swiftness of these boats, and the contest is sometimes determined at sea.

A society, generally known by the appellation of the Cumberland Society, consisting of gentlemen partial to this pastime, give yearly a silver cup to be sailed for in the vicinity of London. The boats usually start from the bridge at Blackfriars, go up the Thames to Putney, and return to Vauxhall, where a vessel is moored at a distance from the stairs, and the sailing boat tha first passes this mark upon her return obtains the victory.

CHAPTER III.

1. Hand-ball an ancient Game.-The Ball, where said to have been invented.-II. Used by the Saxons-III. And by the Schoolboys of London.-IV. Ball Play in France.-V. Tennis Courts erected.-VI. Tennis fashionable in England.VII. A famous Woman Player.-VIII. Hand-ball played for Tansy Cakes.IX. Fives.-X. Balloon-ball.-XI. Stool-ball.-XII. Hurling.-XIII. Foot-ball; -Camp-ball.-XIV. Goff;-Cambuc;-Bandy-ball.-XV. Stow-ball.-XVI. Pall-mall.-XVII. Ring-ball.-XVIII. Club-ball.-XIX. Cricket.-XX. Trapball.-XXI. Northen-spell.-XXII. Tip-cat.

I.-HAND BALL.

THE ball has given origin to many popular pastimes, and I have appropriated this chapter to such of them as are or have been usually practised in the fields and other open places. The most ancient amusement of this kind, is distinguished with us by the name of hand-ball, and is, if Homer may be accredited, coeval at least with the destruction of Troy. Herodotus attributes the invention of the ball to the Lydians; succeeding writers have affirmed, that a female of distinction named Anagalla, a native of Corcyra, was the first who made a ball for the purpose of pastime, which she presented to Nausica, the daughter of Alcinous, king of Phoacia, and at the same time taught her how to use it; this piece of history is partly derived from Homer, who introduces the princess of Corcyra with her maidens, amusing themselves at hand-ball:

O'er the green mead the sporting virgins play,

Their shining veils unbound, along the skies,
Tost and retost, the ball incessant flies."

Homer has restricted this pastime to the young maidens of Corcyra, at least he has not mentioned its being practised by the men; in times posterior to the poet, the game of hand-ball was indiscriminately played by both sexes.

II.-ANGLO-SAXON BALL PLAY.

It is altogether uncertain at what period the ball was brought into England: the author of a manuscript in Trinity College, Oxford, written in the fourteenth century, and containing the 'Lib. i. 2 Ælian, lib. ii. Volaterranus, lib. xxix. Odyssey, by Pope, b. v

life of Saint Cuthbert,' says of him, that when he was young, "he pleyde atte balle with the children that his fellowes were." On what authority this information is established I cannot tell. The venerable Bede, who also wrote the life of that saint, makes no mention of ball play, but tells us he excelled in jumping, running, wrestling, and such exercises as required great muscular exertion, and among them, indeed, it is highly probable that of the ball might be included.

III.-LONDON BALL PLAY.

Fitzstephen, who wrote in the thirteenth century, speaking of the. London school-boys, says, "Annually upon Shrove Tuesday, they go into the fields immediately after dinner, and play at the celebrated game of ball; every party of boys carrying their own ball;" for it does not appear that those belonging to one school contended with those of another, but that the youth of each school diverted themselves apart. Some difficulty has been stated by those who have translated this passage, respecting the nature of the game at ball here mentioned. Stowe, considering it as a kind of goff or brandy-ball, has, without the least sanction from the Latin, added the word bastion, meaning a bat or cudgel; others again have taken it for foot-ball, which pastime, though probably known at the time, does not seem to be a very proper one for children and indeed, as there is not any just authority to support an argument on either side, I see no reason why it should not be rendered hand-ball.6

IV.-BALL PLAY IN FRANCE.

The game of hand-ball is called by the French palm play," because, says St. Foix, a modern author, originally "this exercise consisted in receiving the ball and driving it back again. with the palm of the hand. In former times they played with the naked hand, then with a glove, which in some instances was lined; afterwards they bound cords and tendons round their hands to make the ball rebound more forcibly, and hence the

1 No. lvii.

bereti, cap. i.

2 "Sive enim saltu, sive cursu, sive luctatu,' &c. Vita Sancti Cud3 "Lusum pilæ celebrem." Stephanides de ludis. "The scholars of each school have their ball or bastion in their hands.' Survey of London.

Lord Lyttelton, History of Henry the Second, vol. iii. p.275; and [Dr. Pegge] the translator of Fitzstephen, in 1772.

• By the word celebrem Fitzstephen might advert to the antiquity of the pastime. 7 Jeu de paume, and in Latin pila palmaria.

1

racket derived its origin." During the reign of Charles V. palm play, which may properly enough be denominated handtennis, was exceedingly fashionable in France, being played by the nobility for large sums of money; and when they had lost all that they had about them, they would sometimes pledge a part of their wearing apparel rather than give up the pursuit of the game. The duke of Burgundy, according to an old historian,2 having lost sixty franks at palm play with the duke of Bourbon, Messire William de Lyon, and Messire Guy de la Trimouille, and not having money enough to pay them, gave his girdle as a pledge for the remainder; and shortly afterwards he left the same girdle with the comte D'Eu for eighty franks, which he also lost at tennis.

V.-TENNIS-COURTS.

At the time when tennis play was taken up seriously by the nobility, new regulations were made in the game, and covered courts erected, wherein it might be practised without any interruption from the weather. In the sixteenth century tennis-courts were common in England, and the establishment of such places countenanced by the example of the monarchs. In the Vocabulary of Commenius,3 we see a rude representation of a tenniscourt divided by a line stretched in the middle, and the players standing on either side with their rackets ready to receive and return the ball, which the rules of the game required to be stricken over the line. Hence the propriety of Heywoode's proverb, "Thou hast stricken the ball under the line; " meaning he had failed in his purpose.4

VI. TENNIS FASHIONABLE IN ENGLAND.

We have undoubted authority to prove that Henry VII. was a tennis player. In a MS. register of his expenditures made in the thirteenth year of his reign, and preserved in the Remembrancer's Office, this entry occurs: "Item, for the king's loss at tennis, twelvepence; for the loss of balls, threepence." Hence one may infer, that the game was played abroad, for the loss of the balls would hardly have happened in a tennis-court. His son Henry, who succeeded him, in the early part of his reign was much attached to this diversion; which propensity, as Hall assures

Essais historiques sur Paris, vol. i. p. 160. 2 Laboureur. Sub an. 1368.
Published by Hoole, 1658. John Heywoode's works, London, 1566.

us,' being perceived by certayne craftie persons about him, they brought in Frenchmen and Lombards to make wagers with hym, and so he lost muche money; but when he perceyved theyr crafte, he eschued the company and let them go." He did not however give up the amusement, for we find him, according to the same historian, in the thirteenth year of his reign, playing at tennis with the emperor Maximilian for his partner, against the prince of Orange and the marquis of Brandenborow: "the earl of Devonshire stopped on the prince's side, and the lord Edmond on the other side; and they departed even handes on both sides, after eleven games fully played."2 Among the additions that king Henry VIII. made to Whitehall, if Stowe be correct, were "divers fair tennis-courts, bowling-allies, and a cockpit." 3

James I., if not himself a tennis player, speaks of the pastime with commendation, and recommends it to his son as a species of exercise becoming a prince. Charles II. frequently diverted himself with playing at tennis, and had particular kind of dresses made for that purpose. So had Henry VIII. In the wardrobe rolls we meet with tenes-cotes for the king, also tennis-drawers and tennis-slippers.5

VII.-A FAMOUS WOMAN PLAYER.

A French writer speaks of a damsel named Margot, who resided at Paris in 1424, and played at hand-tennis with the palm, and also with the back of her hand, better than any man; and what is most surprising, adds my author, at that time the game was played with the naked hand, or at best with a double glove.

VIII.-HAND-BALL PLAY FOR TANSY CAKES.

Hand-ball was formerly a favourite pastime among the young persons of both sexes, and in many parts of the kingdom it was customary for them to play at this game during the Easter holidays for tansy cakes; but why, says Bourne, they should prefer hand-ball at this time to any other pastime, or play it particularly for a tansy cake, I have not been able to find out." The learned Selden conceives the institution of this reward to have originated from the Jewish custom of eating bitter herbs at the time of the passover.8

In the life of Henry VIII. the second year of his reign, fol. 11. 2 Ibid. fol. 98. 3 Survey of London, p. 496. 4 Basilicon Doron, b. iii.

• MSS. Harl. 2248 and 6271. 6 St. Foix Essais Historiques sur Paris, vol. i. p. 160. Antiquities of the Common People, chap. xxiv. Table Talk, art. Christmas.

« ZurückWeiter »