But Mr. Perkins hit the nail on the head, all the same. For I feel sure that boys need more excitement than they did. Or perhaps I ought to say they want it. That’s it: they just want it. And thinking it over, I believe the cinematograph is to blame: it makes them want more excitement, and then it gives it them; and then it makes them want still more, and then it gives them still more; quite restless, in fact, it makes them, and I shouldn’t be surprised if sooner or later it weren’t responsible for a new kind of boy altogether. And that would mean the end of a number of these old games. Because nowadays the bigger lads, those who used to do most of the inventing—they prefer to go to picture-shows whenever they get a chance, instead of larking about the streets as they used to do. (They get some games out of the cinematograph,by the way, such asCOWBOYS—INDIANS, which has lately been re-christenedGERMANS—ENGLISH). So the playing-age is growing to be younger and younger, and these small boys are not so good at discovering fresh sports; it’s quite true they do make up new ones every day, but I think, on the whole, they forget more than they ought to remember; and this is the reason, if you really want to know, why I’m making up this catalogue: to see whether the next lot of children knows anything about these sports, or even their names.
But Mr. Perkins hit the nail on the head, all the same. For I feel sure that boys need more excitement than they did. Or perhaps I ought to say they want it. That’s it: they just want it. And thinking it over, I believe the cinematograph is to blame: it makes them want more excitement, and then it gives it them; and then it makes them want still more, and then it gives them still more; quite restless, in fact, it makes them, and I shouldn’t be surprised if sooner or later it weren’t responsible for a new kind of boy altogether. And that would mean the end of a number of these old games. Because nowadays the bigger lads, those who used to do most of the inventing—they prefer to go to picture-shows whenever they get a chance, instead of larking about the streets as they used to do. (They get some games out of the cinematograph,by the way, such asCOWBOYS—INDIANS, which has lately been re-christenedGERMANS—ENGLISH). So the playing-age is growing to be younger and younger, and these small boys are not so good at discovering fresh sports; it’s quite true they do make up new ones every day, but I think, on the whole, they forget more than they ought to remember; and this is the reason, if you really want to know, why I’m making up this catalogue: to see whether the next lot of children knows anything about these sports, or even their names.
The “organized games” they make them play in the parks nowadays—they work in the same direction; so does the regular county council schooling; so does the scout movement. The fact is, boys are not left to themselves the way they used tobe; everybody goes fussing about and telling them to do this and that, when they want to be doing something else—something of their own; that’s why many games are being forgotten. I don’t know a single boy who really cares for “organized games” the way a man does; even Aunt Eliza can’t bring herself to believe in the system over-much, though she likes to think it keeps the youngsters out of mischief. And it all comes from thinking that boys think the same as we think—which they don’t; or ought to learn to think the same as we think—which they oughtn’t. Because the right kind of boy thinks differently from the right kind of man about games and everything else. And so he ought.
To prove that they still can invent, you need only watch them at theirpicture-games—played with cigarette-cards and all of them, of course, absolutely new, seeing that these cards were quite unknown up to a few years ago. These picture games have helped to do away with marbles, for two reasons: firstly, the boys are keener on them because they’re more exciting; and secondly, they’re cheaper. You have to pay for marbles. But you don’t pay for fag-pictures: you mump them, see? And here the difference between our games and those of richer people comes in. The more expensive their games are, the more they like to play them; they don’t seem to care about sports that are played with nothing at all—the dearness is what makes everybody want to go in for them; whereas with our boys a game can only be played if it’s cheap, and if it costs nothing at all—why,then it becomes really popular, or fashionable—as the case may be. Now fag-cards are cheap, and no mistake. That’s why you can play so many games with them—EGGS IN THE BUSH, andSNAP, andBANKER(orBANK), andNEAREST THE WALL TAKES, andNEAREST THE WALL SPINS UP, andSEVENS(quite a new kind), andSCALING UP THE RING, andSCALING UP THE LINE, andUNDER THE HAT, andGETTING IN THE RING(that’s a paving-flag, and the game is also calledIN THE SQUARE), andOVERLAPPINGS, andIN THE RING FARTHEST, andPOKE IN THE HOLE, andDROP THEM(orDROPS), andSKATE THEM, andPICTURE OR BLANK, andWALLIE(orUP THE WALL), andPITCHING IN THE BLOCK(orPITCHER), andPITCHING UNDER, andSLAP-DAP, andSCRAPINGS, andTIPPING IN THE HOLE, andBLOWINGS(also calledBLOWSorBLOWUMS: you need an outside window-sill for this), andTOUCH-CARD, andGETTING ON, andINNERS AND OUTERS, andTHUMBS, andSHOWS-UP, andKNOCK ’EM DOWN, andDICINGS, andWATERFALLS(orSNOWFALLS) andSPANS(orSPANNERS)—there’s thirty of them, anyhow.
There’s this to be said for picture-games: they make the boys uncommonly nimble with their hands and fingers, and this must help them later on, if they go in for certain trades like watch-making. In fact, they require real skill; as I found out the other day when they asked me to playBANKER(just for a lark, they said) and got five coppers out of me in about half as many minutes. No, I’ve nothing against picture-games except that their names are not as good as those of the dutysports and that they don’t give the youngsters any chance of running about and using their legs. And also this: they’re really horrible inducements to gambling—especiallyBANKER. Now I don’t like even talking about gambling, because it’s forbidden by law, and everybody knows it. And yet, only yesterday I noticed a lot of them at it; evidently at it. I could see they were up to mischief, by the way they cleared. Dam funny it was—how they just melted into nothing, before I could get a proper sight of them. Not our boys, I’m glad to say.
They’re so keen on these picture-games that you can see them playing at half-past six in the morning and after nine at night; and in the rain, too; and when they have no fag-pictures they try to play the same games with bus tickets andthen, if you’re not very careful, you can hear some shocking bad swear-words which they pick up I can’t think where, because the bus tickets bend too easily and won’t fly as they should.
And that reminds me of some other games of the smaller children—those played with five stones (boys) or gobs and bonsers (girls). Gobs (cobs) are shaped like dice, or ought to be; and a bonser or bonk or buck or bonster is a large marble that bounces from the ground (bouncer), about the size of a forty-eighter. You can buy four gobs and a bonk for a half-penny; you can also make them yourself—the gobs or stones, I mean—out of bits of porcellain and pebbles and winkle-shells; but the bought ones are the best, because, for one reason, you have to pay for them.
With these things you playBUCK AND FOURof different kinds, such asTELLINGSandSISTERSandSTAND UP JACK. ForBASKETSyou need a diagram on the pavement, which I can’t draw. Other games of this sort areALLEY GOBSandCHANGESandPICKSESandSTANDSES—
“In standses aim the marble up then as the marble is coming down stand one of the stones up till you stand all the four up then you drop them again—”
“In standses aim the marble up then as the marble is coming down stand one of the stones up till you stand all the four up then you drop them again—”
andSHUFFLESandFULL-STOP AND COMMAandFLY DOBSandBABES IN THE WELLandONE STAND UP ONES’ES—
“if one gob stands up when thrown out, the process of ones’es must be taken. After this you must get two to stand up [on their sides, ofcourse], then three and so in the right order”—
“if one gob stands up when thrown out, the process of ones’es must be taken. After this you must get two to stand up [on their sides, ofcourse], then three and so in the right order”—
andOVER THE WALL ONE TWO THREEandSPANSandLONDON BRIDGE—
“the bonk is thrown up and while it is descending the two in the middle are caught up, but the bonk must be caught with both stones in the middle then the two stones outside are caught up making a total of three in the hand” (not very clear, is it?)—
“the bonk is thrown up and while it is descending the two in the middle are caught up, but the bonk must be caught with both stones in the middle then the two stones outside are caught up making a total of three in the hand” (not very clear, is it?)—
andBABES IN BEDandPIGEON-HOLEandCROW’S NESTandLAMP-POST—
“build up four stones, throw up the bonk so that it knocks down one of them; and so on till only one stone is left. Then throw up the bonk and catch it in your handtogether with the four stones that are on the ground; if you miss one, you’re out”—
“build up four stones, throw up the bonk so that it knocks down one of them; and so on till only one stone is left. Then throw up the bonk and catch it in your handtogether with the four stones that are on the ground; if you miss one, you’re out”—
andTWOS AND THREESandFOURSandFIVERSandFIVES SIX TIMESandSAVING BABY’S LIFE—
“The way to play Saving Babies life is like this. First of all you pick out a stone which will be the bonk, then lay the remaining four on the left hand, and then by hitting the hand which holds the stones one of them flies into the air, then when it comes down the player must catch it or else he is out. When all the stones have been caught in this way they are laid on the hand in two’s, then in three’s, and when that is done all the four are caught, but this time the bonk must be picked up while the others are coming down.”
“The way to play Saving Babies life is like this. First of all you pick out a stone which will be the bonk, then lay the remaining four on the left hand, and then by hitting the hand which holds the stones one of them flies into the air, then when it comes down the player must catch it or else he is out. When all the stones have been caught in this way they are laid on the hand in two’s, then in three’s, and when that is done all the four are caught, but this time the bonk must be picked up while the others are coming down.”
It takes some doing, this game; and it isn’t worth doing when you can do it.
Now proper boys won’t touch a marble that bounces from the ground—I can’t tell you why, but there it is; so they generally use a fifth stone instead of a bonk, as in this last game, which is the boys’ way of “Saving Baby’s Life”. But most of them don’t care about these things anyhow, and I don’t either; rotten games, I call them, fit for silly little girls and only interesting because they’re a sort of half-way (the oldFIVE-STONES, for instance, is played both with common stones and with gobs) between marbles which you can’t manufacture at any price and real stones which you just pick up anywhere.
Talking of real stones, there’s nodoubt whatever that games played with them are the oldest in the world, together with the mud-larks—excepting perhaps those that are not played withthingsat all, like hide-and-seek and some of the old “he” games. And it’s just wonderful what you can do with stones. But they are dying out, all the same; because the worst of it is, there are not half enough stones about, nowadays; not half enough. You can playDUMPING(orDUMPLING) with stones, andBUNG(also calledGO-GULLEY) andNIP(also calledTAPorLEG-ALONG—where you hit each others’ stones, each hit counting ten) andDUCK; and you can tell from these names how old the games are. Stones forLEG-ALONG—stones of the right kind, of proper shape and weight, flat on both sides and fitting nicelyinto the hand, are hard to come by and carefully kept.Duck(orDUCK ON) goes like this:
“About eight or nine can play; you make a hole in the ground and Duck puts his stone before it, then the Others come up close and have to knock his one into the hole with theirs; if they miss they must pick up there stones and run back to the Curb before he can catch his One; if he catch him, that man is Duck instead.”
“About eight or nine can play; you make a hole in the ground and Duck puts his stone before it, then the Others come up close and have to knock his one into the hole with theirs; if they miss they must pick up there stones and run back to the Curb before he can catch his One; if he catch him, that man is Duck instead.”
Other stone-games areFRENCH PACKETandSHUFFING THE MONEYandFIVE-TENandHESLINGandTWO AND THREE HOLESandKNOCKING THREE’SandPENNY-TUPPENCEandCOCK-SHIESandSTONE CHASEandTHROWINGS OUTandRINGING THE STONEandPUDDING.
Have you ever playedDUCKING MUMMY? Probably not. But it’s a good old stone-game for small boys. Two of them take a stone each, and with these stones they aim at a third stone. The third stone—that’s Mummy. If one of them hits Mummy, he keeps on throwing till he misses; then the other has a turn at it; and so on. In the end they are supposed to count up who has made most hits—the loser paying a peppermint. Of course they try to cheat each other, and so it always ends in a free fight: that’s the best part of the whole game. Nobody ever gets the peppermint.
But they sometimes gets a black eye....
And that’s about all the games I can think of, just now.