650 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ized, and the mythology which embarrassed earnest Christians has vanished as an 

 evil mist, the lifting of which has only more fully revealed the lineaments of infal- 

 lible truth. No longer in contact with fact of any kind, faith stands bow and 

 forever proudly inaccessible to the attacks of the infidel. 



So far the apologist of the future. Why not ? Cantabit 

 vacuus. — Nineteenth Century. 



■♦•» 



A LITTLE BOYS' GAME WITH A BALL. - 



By HENEY J. PHILPOTT. 



A YEAR or two ago there went the rounds of the daily papers 

 a few verses intended to express the feelings of an elderly 

 lady from the country when her city folks had taken her to see 

 the national game. It was all very interesting and funny, but 

 may be summed up in her of tenest-repeated couplet : 



" Jist a passel o' big men a-playin' 

 A little boys' game with a ball " — 



which was a true bill. But how came these men to be playing 

 this little boys' game ? Here steps in the student of sociology, 

 and offers explanations in abundance. The truly great philoso- 

 pher of this and all generations is the man who for the first time 

 considers unconsidered trifles. Herein lies the greatness of Her- 

 bert Spencer. 



In this matter we all have a duty which most of us are likely 

 to forget. We should record for the benefit of the coming phi- 

 losopher, who by the process of evolution is sure to have a finer 

 and more effective brain than ours, certain facts which seem triv- 

 ial to us, but which may be of transcendent importance to him. 

 What if our predecessors had scrupulously done likewise ? How 

 much more satisfactory would have been our nineteenth-century 

 philosophy ! 



Hit or miss, I propose to describe a few of the ball-plays I 

 learned as pupil and teacher in country schools within twenty 

 miles of the Mississippi River, and about half-way between St. 

 Louis and St. Paul. I shall not be deterred by the reflection that 

 others may be able, if they would, to describe a greater variety of 

 ball-games. 



Did you ever stop to think how much of human life there is 

 consumed in games of ball ? A marble is a ball. So is a billiard- 

 ball, a croquet-ball. So — did you ever think of it ? — are shot and 

 shell, though their elongation in modern military engineering has 

 made war less truly than it used to be 



"Jist a passel o' big men a-playin' 

 A little boys' game with a ball." 





