BASE-BALL. 



field can be enjoyed by every spectator, its 

 beauties being as plainly apparent as is the 

 characteristic blundering in the field of a mere 

 novice in the art. In batting, however, while 

 the great majority fully enjoy the dashing hit 

 of the ball that yields a "home-run," it is 

 only the minority who have sufficient knowl- 

 edge of the batting " points " in the game to 

 appreciate the scientific work of " facing for 

 position," "timing the swing of the bat," ob- 

 serving " good form " in hitting, and other 

 like points in team-work at the bat. But in 

 fielding every one in the crowd of spectators 

 knows when a fine a pick-up " of a " hot ground- 

 er" is made; or when a hard-hit "liner" is 

 handsomely caught "on the fly"; or a short 

 high ball is held after a long run in for it from 

 the out-field ; or when an apparently safe hit 

 to right field is changed into an out at first 

 base by the active fielding and swift, accurate 

 throwing-in of the ball to the first-base man. 

 Then, too, the brilliant catching of the swift 

 curved-line balls from the pitcher by the catch- 

 er, and the straight, swift throwing of the lat- 

 ter to the bases, are all features of sharp field- 

 ing which everybody can appreciate. Hence 

 it is that fielding is the most brilliant and at- 

 tractive feature of the game. Next to that comes 

 base-running, which is one of the most import- 

 ant essentials of success in winning games, a 

 greater degree of intelligence being required in 

 the player who would excel in base-running 

 than is needed either in fielding or in batting. 

 Of the four departments of the game of base- 

 ball pitching, batting, base-running, and field- 

 ing the delivery of the ball to the bat ranks 

 as the most important. Indeed, the " battery " 

 of a club team viz., the pitcher and catcher 

 is the main feature of the attacking force in a 

 contest, and it is chiefly on the excellence of 

 the " battery " work that success in a match 

 depends. In the early period of the game's 

 history the " square pitch " of the ball to the 

 bat was the invariable rule; but since the 

 professional rules came into vogue, overhand 

 throwing has been the rule. At first it was 

 disguised, but afterward it was openly allowed 

 under all the codes of playing-rules, and now 

 it is the regular rule of the game throughout 

 the country. There is one peculiar feature of 

 the method of the delivery of the ball to the 

 bat which merits special notice, and that is 

 the power to give a bias to the ball in throwing 

 it to the bat by means of which the ball is made 

 to go through the air in a curved horizontal 

 line, and the ball is made to curve outward or 

 inward toward the batsman, at the option of 

 the pitcher. The theory of this curved deliv- 

 ery is based on the fact that a retarding ef- 

 fect is produced on one side of the ball in its 

 passage through the air, caused by its rotating 

 on its own axis, by which means it deflects 

 from a direct line on the side of the ball that 

 passes through the air the quickest. The ap- 

 pended diagram illustrates the lines of the 

 curved delivery. 



This theory is practically illustrated in every 

 match-game played in which a pitcher who is 

 well up in the curve-line delivery occupies the 



pitcher's position. It was thoroughly tested 

 in public several years ago in Cincinnati before 

 several college principals. The first practical 

 exemplar of the art of curving the ball in pitch- 

 ing was Arthur Cummings, the pitcher of the 

 Excelsiors of Brooklyn in 1867. But it had 

 been exhibited in actual play by Richard B. 

 Willis, of the Lone Star Club of Rochester, 

 seven or eight years before that time. 



The Season of 1885. The base-ball season of 

 1885 saw the national game in the enjoyment 

 of a greater degree of popularity throughout 

 the United States and Canada than ever before. 

 "While amateur clubs could be counted by the 

 thousand in the most populous States of the 

 Union, the prof essional organizations were more 

 numerous than ever. The game never flourished 

 in Canada to such an extent as in 1885, while 

 North, East, South, and West in the United 

 States it has become the field-sport of the peo- 

 ple. In the South, during the past year, base- 

 ball has been received with more public favor 

 than ever before, the Southern Professional 

 Association having become a permanent organ- 

 ization. The contests for the championship 

 pennants of the National League and the Amer- 

 ican Association during the season of 1885 at- 

 tracted hundreds of thousands of spectators to 

 witness the championship games. Especially 

 was the struggle for the League pennant a note- 

 worthy one, the closeness of the contest being 

 exceptional in the history of the League. The 

 four games played between the Chicago and 

 New York Club teams in Chicago the last of 

 September, 1885, attracted an aggregate of 

 over forty thousand people to the Chicago Club 

 grounds, and the receipts were nearly twenty- 

 five thousand dollars. At horse-races, pedestri- 

 an contests, rowing-matches, and every other 

 public sport in vogue, if the pool-selling and 

 book-making of the gambling fraternity are 



