THE TKOUT 



Australia versus England are in progress, or indeed, 

 look anywhere where good cricket is being played. 

 Then as to football, what an extraordinary concourse 

 of people flock to see the final tie of the Association 

 Football Cup ! I saw some 65,000 gathered together 

 at the Crystal Palace for this purpose in the April of 

 1897. Notice, moreover, that every Saturday during 

 the winter, when the Association Football teams are 

 competing, there are generally many more than 

 100,000 people looking on at that competition alone, 

 to say nothing of the crowds attending the ordinary 

 matches. Or turn to Golf; it is but a very few years 

 ago that the game was played in England only at 

 Blackheath, Wimbledon, Westward Ho ! and one or 

 two other places ; but now all over the country golf 

 links are to be found. No watering-place, no health 

 resort, no town of any importance or progressive 

 aspirations is without this adjunct to the happiness 

 of its inhabitants and visitors. In fact, it is not too 

 much to say that a town labours under a consider- 

 able disadvantage, if it be dependent on the advent 

 of visitors, should no golf links be available in its 

 immediate vicinity. 



So with all other kinds of athletics, public in- 

 te-rt'st in them has grown enormously during the past 

 d'.'cade ; in fact of very recent years, sport in r\vry 



