"There are three wicks, you know, to the lamp of a man's life: brain, blood, and breath. Press the brain a little, its light goes out, followed by both the others. Stop the heart a minute, and out go all three of the wicks. Choke the air out of the lungs, and presently the fluid ceases to supply the other centres of flame, and all is soon stagnation, cold, and darkness." —O. W. Holmes.
[Illustration: Bending the Bow—Camp Kineo]
CHAPTER XVII—ATHLETICS, CAMPUS GAMES, AQUATICS AND WATER SPORTS
PURPOSE OF GAMES BASEBALL LEAGUE GROUP CLASSIFICATION WHAT TO AVOID ATHLETIC EVENTS AWARDS MAKING ATHLETIC APPARATUS CAMPUS GAMES CIRCLE JUMPING WOLF ROVER ALL COME OVER INDIAN AND WHITE MAN GERMAN BOWLING TETHER BALL VOLLEY BALL AQUATIC SPORTS WATER GAMES WATER BASKET BALL WATER BASEBALL OLD CLOTHES RACE TILTING CANOE TAG WHALE HUNT MAKING A "SHOOT-THE-CHUTE" ARCHERY THE TARGET THE BOW MAKING A BOW MAKING ARROWS ESSENTIAL POINTS IN ARCHERY BIBLIOGRAPHY
If I can teach these boys to study and play together, freely and with fairness to one another, I shall make them fit to live and work together in society.—Henry van Dyke.
Purpose of Games
The spirit of camping is too frequently destroyed by over-emphasis upon competitive games. Play is necessary for the growing boy and play that engages many participants has the most value. America today is suffering from highly specialized, semi-professional athletics and games. "When athletics degenerate into a mere spectacle, then is the stability of the nation weakened. Greece led the world, while the youth of that great country deemed it an honor to struggle for the laurel leaf, and gymnasiums were everywhere and universally used and the people saw little good in an education that neglected the body. It is a significant fact that the degeneracy of Greece was synchronous with the degrading of athletics into mere professional contests. What had been the athletics of the people became a spectacle for the people." [1]
[Footnote 1: Emmett D. Angell in "Play," p. 19.]
Baseball League
Do not allow the athletics and games of the camp to become a mere spectacle for the campers. Something should be planned for every boy and every boy encouraged to participate in the program. Nothing has yet taken the place of the good old American game of baseball. Divide the camp boys into teams. Have a league playing a series of games. The teams may be named after the different colleges or prominent cities or as one camp named the league, the "Food League" after popular camp dishes, such as: "Prunes," "Beans," "Soup," "Hash," "Mush," "Chipped Beef." It is needless to state that the boys in the league not only had a lot of fun, but the camp paper contained very amusing accounts of the games played.