FOOTBALL NOTES.

It is worthy of note that Mr Mullineanx's team in Australia are playing the four three-quarter game. The ex-New Zealander, Tom. Pauling, who is recognised as one of the foremost forwards of New South Wales, was unable to play against the Englishmen, while another who would no doubt have been included, had it not been for the fact that he was ordered off the field in a match on the preceding Saturday, is Hardcastle, another Maorilnml front-ranker of repute. The first English Rugby team of ISBB played two matches against New South Wales, winning the first by 18 to 2, and the Becond by 18 to 6. They were unbeaten at Rugby in Australia. In New Zealand they played 19 matches, winning 13, losing 2 (Taranaki and Auckland), and playing 4 draws (Auckland, Otago, Wellington, and Wanganui). Welshmen have but a poor opinion (says Athletic News) of the team selected to visit Austraiia. The picking of individual stars from hero and thero, and dumping them into a team, finds no favor in Wales, where combination is considered tho keysione of success. Gwyn Nicholls is recognised as the finest threequarter of the four countries, butHuzzey, or some other wing player, should have been selected with him so as to bring out tho beauties of combination. Here is a tip for the local Rugby Union. To improve the attendance on Saturday afternoons, let them provide afternoon tea. It has been done in Christchurch. At a meeting last week a member of the Rugby Union Committee very tersely, yet graphically, described the scene at afternoon tea during the football season. "The first rush of people," said he, " go through the refreshments like a plague of locusts through a cornfield." A suggestion to confine the refreshments to a simple cup of tea was not .countenanced, it being agreed to allow the present arrangements to obtain for the remainder of the season. The limitation of tea "to ladies and gentlemen holding stand tickets, and players," has greatly reduced the attendance at the levee, but that • the crush is still severe may be inferred from the Committeeman's observation. Fragments from the disoussion during an inquiry by the Canterbury Rugby Union into alleged rough play at foot- j ball.— Mr Lawrence : I cannot understand the wing play of to-day. The men don't appear to De playing for the ball, but are trying to knock each other out. The sooner such wing play is done away with the better for the game, the players, and the spectators. Mr Asquith : We have been educating our teams to play a " drawing-room " game, and that is why we have been beaten so often by good teams. We should cultivate a good hard game. Mr Adams : I don't like the term " willing." It is now taken to indicate a little more than " hard play." Mr F. T. Evans : I have never before seen so much vile and foul play in football as there is this year, but I think it arises from partisan "barracking." Mr Walton: I hope nothing 1 do will tend to make football a " drawing-room " game, but football is not a dog fight, and should not be made an opportunity for assault and battery. This is what Mr Dooley, the Chicago humorist, says about football : — " Whin I was a young man, an' that was a long time ago — but not so long ago as manny iv me inimies'd like to believe, if I bad army inimies— l played futball, but 'twas not th' futball I see whin th' Brothers' School an' th' Saint Aloysius Tigers played las' week, on th' pee-raries. When i was a la-ad, iv a Sundahafthernoon we'd get out in th' field where th'.oats'd been out away, and we'd choose up sides. Wan cap'n'd pick one man an' th' other another, ' I choose Dooley,' ' I choose O'Connor,' ' I choose Dimpsey,' ' I ohooae Riordan,' and so on till there was twinty-five or thirty on a side. Thin wan cap'n'd kick th' ball, an' all our sided r-run at it an' kick it back, an' thin wan iv th' other sided kick it to us, an' af ther awhile th' gained get so timpischous that all th' la-hds iv both sides'd be in wan pile, kiclcin' away at wan or th' other or at th' ball or at th' impire, who was mostly a la-ad that cudden't play, an' that come out less able to play thin he was whin he wint in. An', if army wan laid hands on th' ball, he was kicked by ivry wan else an* be th' inipire. We played frm noon till dark, an' kicked th' ball all th' way home in the moonlight. That was futball,"an' I was a great wan to play it. I'd think nawthin' iv histin 1 the ball 200 ft in th' air, an 1 wanst I gave it Buoh a boost that I stove in th' ribs iv th' Protestant minister— bad luck to him, he was a kind man — that waslookm'on fr'm a hedge. I was fch'> finest player in th' whole county. I was so,"