2G4 THE RACES. 



quite of late years given up going to see cocks fight, or 

 lieretics burnt : but that is mainly because the heretics just 

 now make the laws in favour of themselves and the cocks. 

 But are our amusements to be comj)ared with those of the 

 old Greeks, with the one exception of liking to hear really 

 good music? Yet that fruit of civilization is barely twenty 

 years old; and we owe its introduction, be it always remem- 

 bered, to the Germans. French civilization signifies practi- 

 cally, certainly in the New World, little save ballet-girls, 

 billiard-tables, and thin boots : English civilization, little save 

 horse-racing and cricket. The latter sport is certainly blame- 

 less ; nay, in the West Indies, laudable and even heroic, when 

 played, as on the Savanna here, under a noon- day sun which 

 feels hot enough to cook a mutton-chop. But with all respect 

 for cricket, one cannot help looking back at the old games of 

 Greece, and questioning whether man has advanced much in 

 the art of amusing himself rationally and wliLlssomely. 



I had reason to ask the same question that evening, as we 

 sat in the cool verandah, watching the fire- flies flicker about 

 the tree-tops, and listening to the weaxy din of the tom- 

 toms which came from all sides of the Savanna save our 

 own, drowning the screeching and snoring of the toads, and 

 even, at times, the screams of an European band, which was 

 playing a " combination tune," near the Grand Stand, half a 

 mile off. 



