GAMES OF CHILDHOOD

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 151, 23 December 1921, Page 14

GAMES OF CHILDHOOD

THEIR ANCIENT ORIGIN

A writer in a Londpn paper wonders how many rather contemptuous passers-' by, glaricipg ' at. a little ' child ..playing hop-scotch oh the.chalk-marked pavement, realise that": they are in the presence of a piece of folklore that itr'aoes direct dcs; cent f°.'r SS'veral thousand years!"/ . ':■'_' '.. Hop-scotch was ah'ancient pastime, its begipnings Jqst'in Egyptian history,' be: for' c the first j pricket 'match" was played; before the far older game' of football had ever called, forth the 'jerepiis)ds of rnediaovVl town councillors.' - -"'••■ "Egyptian ch'ildr.en.'pla.y it in thp street tq-day;' much ' as. tliqy", playpd it )vhen Christ was a*'boy. They are unable, .like English'children, to' tell ap.V'thing of its' pabalistiq origins-;,bi^fc they' know' its settled rules. Tlibir cpdo, like that of little English hop-scotch players,', is as. definite as that' of the M.C.C., though a deal 163S' complicated. "■ '

Older still is that game, which appears to be the "common ancestor of "hop'scplclj and bagatelle, played in little squares' pi phalli."' '■'"" •""• ""''■' " ' "'■' '•'■' '" Grbwp-up^ as well as children, will spend.-hour? 'rapt in 'this ' fascinating ganie^ Shunters have been seen playing it peappfully pri the. fpptbp/ard"of :a'railway carriage at ParrjQSaus, V'h'ile 'traffic clefks hpwle.d apd .rayed over 'tiaifu}''qe-. laypj). ■,-■•■■-• ■■- Marbles, next tp PPl|tics, is the Egyptian "schoolboys' fayouritp game; and such ajley-tftws are to bp seen in the shops as wpiild have Plugged the Epglish schoplbby of a 'gpperation ago into ecstacy.'Egyptian schoplboys play, all the marble gamps we playpd at school in the 'eighties, hut thpir favourite is a sprt pf bagatelle. And the facsimile* pf the board they scoop in the- grqupd to-day nniy bo seen in Jerusalem, in tho swept, quiet convent of Eccp Homo, at' tho beginning of'the Via Dolorosa. Hero tho nuns -show—one 'of the few convincing sights pf the Holy City—the actual pavement of the Braeforium, scarred with tho squares and holes "whore Pilate's bodyguard 'sprawled 6n the flagstones," p!a..yiug marbles, 2QOO years ago, and' looking up' idly, whop tho lalost Prisoner .was crowned with' a Croivn pf Thorns. ' ■' .'"'" '' -: