SPORT: ITS RELATION TO THE STATE 341 



First Republic. Neither the hatred on the part of 

 the oppressed nor the contempt on the part of the 

 oppressors would have assumed such violent pro- 

 portions. It is true that we have had our own 

 civil wars, but they have never been caused through 

 class hatred. The squires of Shropshire and Cheshire 

 hunted with William of Orange, while they were 

 plotting for the restoration of the Stuart dynasty. 

 Briefly, our internal disputes have generally been 

 conducted in a spirit of fair play without treachery 

 or cruelty; and I feel justified in assigning sport 

 as one of the principal causes for this. The effect of 

 sport upon our external disputes has been repeatedly 

 acknowledged. If, as the Duke of Wellington is 

 reported to have said, Waterloo was won on the 

 playing fields of Eton, it is equally true that many 

 of our soldiers received their first lessons in warfare 

 on the village green. It would seem that a love 

 of sport and of a military life are generally to 

 be found together. Both require discipline, obedience, 

 and physical training. Similar qualities are necessary 

 to make a good sportsman and a good soldier. From 

 the earliest times sport has been regarded as a train- 

 ing school for the army, as is witnessed by the games 

 of ancient Greece and Rome and the tournaments 

 of the Middle Ages. In modern times every en- 

 couragement to sport is given by the officers to 

 the men. To the best of my belief there is not 

 a regiment in England which does not boast of 

 a cricket club or a football club : generally it boasts 



