Toboggans and sleds are not always used on snow and ice, neither is coasting confined to winter weather.
At most of the summer resorts you may coast down an artificial hill, upon real toboggans, over a slide of hard-wood rollers, and end with a whoop and a splash in the water of the bathing-pool.
Slipperies.
All through the southwestern part of this country the summer drought causes the rivers to subside, leaving more or less high mud or clay banks, which are utilized by the youngsters as mud-slides, and called by them “slipperies.” The boys use neither sled nor toboggan, but make a slide by pouring water over the dry mud until they have a long, slippery track, down which they coast, ending with a splash in the river.
A War-Time Slippery.
A good many years ago a battalion of Union soldiers were camped on the river-bank, near where some Kentucky boys were having fun on a long slippery, and one day, before the lads knew what had happened, two thousand naked men suddenly made their appearance, jostling each other, for a slide down the mud-track. It was a great sight to see these men-children coasting down the mud-bank, and the show the soldiers made for them repaid the boys for their labor in building the slide.
Fig. 138.—The Toboggan-Slide.
Tropical Toboggan-Slide.
Under the torrid zone, away out on the Islands of the Pacific Ocean, the natives coast down-hill, in the hottest weather, on the dry grass, and where that does not exist they build themselves toboggan-slides, with slabs of smooth lava. Hundreds of these tracks line the mountain-sides near the native villages. The sled these daring coasters use is from seven to twenty feet long, and as narrow in proportion as a shell-boat, there being only a few inches of space between the very hard, polished wooden runners. It takes both skill and pluck to ride one of these cranky tropical sleds, or toboggans, but the natives possess both of these qualities, and without a thought of failure pick up their primitive machine, take a short, swift run, and throw the sled and themselves together, headlong down the lava-slide. There follows a wildly exciting and breathless ride down the incline, and a scoot over the level country, until gradually the queer sled slows up and comes to a stop; and then there is a long climb back, for another daring coast to the quiet valley below.