The game of “ the baton,” as it is called, tor the aimless dangers encountered in playing it, is worthy of the peasants of Brittany It is amusing enough to a certain class of spectators. Two stakes, of unequal length, are fixed upright in the ground, at ailistance from one another of about twenty paces, and < n the taller one is placed a hat in such a maimer as to he easily lifted off by a
Stick thrust inside it. The performer then holds his $039 with one ban I, and placing the > o | ther* , on the top of the short stake, 1 earls -on it with his foroh-a 1, and in tjhs* omhaltassed position walks round it three times, }till keeping his nose pinched, and stooping his forehead to the stake. After the third round he raises his head, pulls up the stake, and endeavours to walk to the hat, and thrust the stake inside it. But before taking two steps, he usually swerves aside, reels for an instant, and then rolls ■over insensible. Out of fifteen men who trie 1 it myself included, only one had ■strength to keep his hea I and totter to the hat without a tumble. Nothing can be more silly than such a performance ; the act of lowering the head to the knees of itself creates a tendency to dizziness, and when to that is added the stoppage of the nose and the giddy motion of going round, the effect is that the blond cannot recover its freedom. without convulsing the senses. —“ The Tourist,”
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Bibliographic details
Dunstan Times, Issue 449, 25 November 1870, Page 2
Word Count
260Untitled Dunstan Times, Issue 449, 25 November 1870, Page 2
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