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A T H L E T I C SPORTS there are nine short innings, in the course of which the Professional sport is limited to leagues of base-ball teams score may be half-a-dozen times reversed. Again, in representing the great cities; and the main cultivation of American football, which developed from the Rugby amateur sport outside the universities is in the great athletic Union game, the contrast is equally striking, the Ameri- clubs which are now to be found in many of the large cities. can game having developed a thoroughly-planned and These clubs differ from such organizations as the London dramatic series of manoeuvres often of much complexity. Athletic Club in that they maintain large club-houses, In track and field athletics the performances of Americans which, in addition to expensively equipped gymnasiums, are as excellent in all contests requiring a single burst of have luxurious lounging rooms, billiard rooms, and marble nervous energy, such as sprinting, hurdling, and jumping, SAvimming baths. The ruling spirit is social rather than as those of English athletes are in the longer runs. It athletic. They have been strongly influenced by university was not until shortly before the Civil War (1861-65) that sportsmen and sports, but the university element has never there seemed to spring up something of athletic interest been dominant. The sports most successfully pursued are in America—boating being almost the only sport which track and field athletics. Those sports which require more until that time possessed any rules and permanent organi- extensive organization and preparation, such as base-ball, zations. But the period of the war interrupted what football, and rowing, are practised Avith indifferent success. might have been a speedy development along English The oldest and most characteristic development of sport lines. After peace was established, athletics appeared to has been, as in England, in the universities, but even the take root once more, and in the succeeding decade (1870- percentage of men engaged has not been large. Whereas 79) there was a rapid increase in general organization and in England almost 80 per cent, of the undergraduates interest. Rowing, which had been less interrupted during engage in some athletic pastime, the percentage of Amerithe war, and had had a longer existence than the other can undergraduate athletes had not until the closing sports, came once more into prominence, and especial decades of the 19th century exceeded 20 j and even in interest was added by the inter-collegiate regattas and by those universities in which athletics are most enthusithe centennial races (1876). Football was still in a astically pursued, the percentage is not yet even 40. This chaotic stage, but the year 1876 saw the inauguration of is in part due to the intensity characteristic of sports, and the Rugby Union rules, and with them the beginning of in part to the lack of that athletic rivalry within the unifootball as it is played to-day in the United States. versity, and the consequent multiplication of contests, Base-ball had for some half-dozen years been decidedly which is afforded in England by the division of the unisuccessful in the colleges, and among both amateurs and versity into colleges. Whereas an English ’varsity crew is professionals outside. Track athletics, which had hitherto content to row together for a month or two, the candidates been only incidental to college boat-racing, had now made for an American crew that is to race in July usually train an independent place for itself. Thus in 1876 the four in a gymnasium through the greater part of the preceding principal American sports had begun to push forward winter. And whereas in England football teams rely on along the lines which were followed during the next practice games and a few informal “ squashes,” an Ameriquarter of a century. can team, in addition to one or two practice games a week, In rowing, since the introduction of eight-oared shell works hard every afternoon in developing complicated racing over a four-mile course, there has been but little “ plays ” and in perfecting team work. variation, this distance and this number of oars proving The methods of training and the spirit of sportsmanthe most satisfactory. Upon several occasions there has ship have shoAvn a very characteristic development. Owing been an agitation in favour of shortening the distance or partly to the extremes of the climate and the severity of of altering the methods in one way or another, but the nervous tension induced by it, and partly to the lack of movement has not met with more than temporary favour. more general participation in sports, the training has In football the growth has been most rapid and most dis- become in all instances more elaborate and more thorough tinctly American—though here the rules adopted originally than in England, and the winning of athletic victories is were those of the Rugby Union—and at first there Avas no considered of more importance. Rivalries have been, and legislation save where the rule failed specifically to cover still are, of great intensity. At the same time the athletic a disputed point, and where there was only tradition to be spirit has run into grave excesses. All college teams have relied upon. But with the growth of the game rule- at one time or another been under strong and well-founded making became necessary, and the inventive genius of the suspicion of inducing athletes to play for them by improper American player developed special “ plays ” and formations means. Excessive partisanship has involved excessive until now the game is almost as distinctly American as training, crafty diplomacy in arranging games, and trickbase-ball. Track athletics had a very small beginning, ery. All of the objectionable features have been intensibut Avas taken up by an increasing number of colleges; fied by the fact that the great games have often been held more events were added, and greater interest was developed, in the cities, where they are apt to take on the character until it grew in the last twenty years of the 19th century of public gladiatorial contests. In the closing decade of into a well-equipped and permanent branch of amateur the 19th century a marked reaction began. The publicity sport. In fact, there is no branch Avhich has as much attending university sports gave occasion for a vigorous strength among athletic clubs outside the colleges protest against all forms of unsportsmanship, and the as track athletics. The new sports since 1875 are members of the university faculties now exercise a strong bicycling, tennis, and golf, together with the minor and, in many cases, a wise supervision. Except in occasports of basket ball, hockey, and polo. Tennis has sional instances, for Avhich individuals only are responsible, both waxed and waned in .the same period, but is now the representatives of the eastern universities are amateurs once more gaining in popularity, and bids fair to secure in the full sense of the word; and in the western univerand maintain a permanent place. Golf has withdrawn sities, where the development of sports Avas very sudden, many from the tennis ranks, and is probably as widely and was attended by flagrant abuse, wise counsels prevail. engaged in to-day as any sport in the country, largely The spirit of moderation has been strongly abetted by the owing to the fact that it can be played by individuals who abandonment of the old league championships in favour of have passed the age for the more violent athletic sports. independent meetings between one college and another ; and In the country at large the percentage of men who this practice in turn tends to limit inter-university games engage in athletic pastimes has been almost inappreciable. to university grounds. The rapid increase, moreover, in
