Ancient Games and Pastimes. 555 
in improved sanitation and honest scientific work on the 
side of medical men, who have done much to counteract 
the evil influences which appear to be necessarily attendant 
upon the progress of civilization, and to mitigate the ills 
inseparable from all human endeavours at advancement. 
What moral is to be gained from all this, cuz dono, this 
diatribe against the times? We reply that although the 
intellect of man improves with the march of civilization 
the doubt arises that his morale does not advance in 
an equal ratio. It is to be feared that the present 
generation of men and women is not actuated by the 
same high code of principles which influenced their 
fathers; that there is more frivolity in the world but less 
‘heart, less soul, and consequently less real happiness. 
People now-a-days live for appearance and outward show, 
and marry far too often for money, family connection, or 
something analogous, which may account for much of the 
misery of the time, and misery not to be adequately met 
by such a product of civilization as the institution of a 
Divorce Court. 
Could the moral keep pace with the intellectual develop- 
ment civilization would indeed be a blessing and a mighty 
instrument for good, and the English race, moving as it 
does in the vanguard of civilization, would not only be a 
greater and a nobler nation, but from the example it would 
present to other countries, in consequence of raising and 
following a higher standard of right, would be practically, 
what it is professedly, a Christian people. 
ANCIENT GAMES AND PASTIMES.—I. 
- BY W. F. HUNTER. 
[* order that the history of any age or people may be 
read aright something more than the knowledge of a 
multiplicity of facts and dates is necessary. A man may 
know the dates of all the important events from the time 
of Adam, and yet have little real appreciation of history. 
There is nothing more useless than to store the memory 
with a series of battles, murders, revolutions and political 
intrigues, unless some meaning is attached to them. 
That historical events may be rightly understood, it is 
