SECOND EDITION Wairarapa Daily Times. [Established 1874.] TUESDAY, SEPT, 25, 1894. "ON THE BALL."

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XV, Issue 4834, 25 September 1894, Page 2

SECOND EDITION Wairarapa Daily Times. [Established 1874.] TUESDAY, SEPT, 25, 1894. "ON THE BALL."

Football is an old English game but how ancient wo kuow not, We can remember playing it ourselves in a King Edward's School playground some forty years ago,but the game then was very different to what it is now, The nail itself was a clumsier affair, an ox-bladder, that tried the lungs of the stoutest lad when it was distended, covered with leather by a village cobbler. There were few or 110 rules in those days excepting to run fast and kick hard, and scrums, umpires aud referees were rarely thought of. There were then no competitions between one school and another, one town and another, or one country and another, the game was played for warmth aud exercise rather than for fame and glory, Since the day when we played football,thc game as anational pastime, fell somewhat into disuse, but of late years a revival has sat in and brought it to the front as the favourite amusement of the English race all the world over. 111 old times we can recall broken shins in connection with the game, but the modem development of it has boon attended with all sorts of dangers to life and. limb, and these porhaps to an unnecessary extent. Even now when tho game is played scientifically thero is little or 110 risk of injury to the players, but in New Zealand we are in a somewhat transition stage. Brute strength rather than science is relied upon, and hence the frequent accidents which attend matches. As a rule, our footballers do not submit to the exercise aud training essential to scientific play, and till they do this they must necessarily indulge in a somewhat rough game," Still taking all risks into consideration, the game is..worth the caudle. A father knows that when his son follows up the game, lie takes a chance of a broken bono or a bad sprain, but this is not a high price to pay for the excellent physical training a lad gets in the football ground. In past centuries the pluck of Englishmen ■ conquered half the civilised world, lighting, however undesirable from one point of view it may be, has placed the nation in the foreground, Physical courage and physical endurance inherited from former generations is conserved and developed 011 the football field, Of course " there is a nobler thing than even .physical courage, for moral bravery is superior to it, but it not uiifrequcntly happens that physicaland moral courage are associated, and that one helps the other/ There' is, too, the social side of football, arid this is an immense gain; To football we owe a'visit from a number,'of New South Wales neighbours tidily, and to football some of our own men are indebted to pleasant reminiscences of trips to other towns, other provinces,! and other colonies. Footballers arqalways.moving about in trains andan steamers, making new friends ami viewing new scenes. A brotliorhowl indeed between tho various cpnies of Australasia is

established thvpugh'the,instramenta v ; lity of this distonded(bladder and h leather covering, which Jiaa : beco mo h tho symbol of very, muoli- of the courage, skill aud endurance of the 4 young men who aro to be the future rulers of this and of neighbouring li colonies, ' •' <)