There are some games that seem to be as instinctive to mankind as are the processes of eating and sleeping. Kites, tops, and marbles appear at their proper seasons in Korea, India, and Persia, the rules of “Hop-Scotch,” “tag,” “hide and seek,” “crack the whip” seem to be very similar whether played by the Lao children or European immigrant children on an American pavement. Jack-stones and “Fox and Geese” are popular among the small, bound-footed girls in China. The rhythmic movement and exciting choices of “London Bridge” are recognized in the very heart of Africa in a game so prettily described by Miss Jean McKenzie that we long to join in the fun.
African “London Bridge.”
A mother and her children file under the arms of two players. The child caught is drawn aside for the choice between a cake of gourd seed or a peanut porridge, a necklace of beads or a bow and arrow—we all know the phantom bliss of such choices. The children are caught and ranged until there remains none but the mother and one who is now called “the only child.” This remnant of a once numerous family takes to the bush, but the mother sallies forth from time to time and tosses a handful of grass toward the company, who ask her in chorus:
“How big is the only child now?”
“The only child creeps,” says the mother.
“Hay-a-a!” exclaims the astonished chorus after this and all other complacent maternal announcements.
“How old is the only child now?”
“The only child walks.”
“Hay-a-a!”
To this chorus of astonished approval, the only child comes to be a young girl, has a sweetheart, is married, and has a baby!
Having achieved so much success, the only child ceases to figure in this drama, and the grandmother is plied with questions about the child of the only child.
“How old is the child of the only child now?”
“The child of the only child creeps.”
“Hay-a-a!”
He walks, he sets traps, one day he has killed a little antelope, another day he has killed a big antelope, and now he has killed an elephant!
Here surely is a climax. “Hay-a-a!” The chorus disintegrates; one after another comes to beg a piece of elephant meat from the child of the only child, who emerges from hiding. One after another is refused, until that one comes who pleases the child of the only child. He gives her a piece of elephant meat for a sign that she is his sweetheart—and they are obliged, of course, to run away. After them the entire company is, of course, obliged to follow.
Here, you see, is a rehearsal of life as it is to be. Here is the dissension, the gossip, the greed, the romance, and the adventure of life.[33]
“London Bridge” at the Midori Kindergarten, Japan
African children’s play.
“Kidd in his book on ‘Savage Childhood’ describes the Bantu children of Africa as showing great power of imagination in their games. Before the missionary they appear dull and unresponsive, but when no stranger is about they delight in playing missionary, holding a play service, singing hymns, and mimicking the padre’s bad dialect. The insistence of the motor idea is strong in the native; he likes to play games involving motor skill, is fond of acrobatic tricks, of mimicking animals, and delights in dolls and play animals. In fact, the whole picture is that of an intensely human little animal, decidedly attractive, and one feels pity that it should grow up into an unattractive and troublesome Kaffir problem.”[34]
Children of the desert at play.
How invariably true is the child’s instinct for imitation, for making his play largely a “rehearsal of life as it is to be.” The little Bedouin boys, each with a pet locust harnessed to a bit of string, enjoy the exciting races of their “fiery steeds,” and prepare eagerly for the great game in which the bigger boys show their budding manhood. A dweller in the region of the Dead Sea thus describes some of the games of the desert:
“The boys of the desert are glad when the first of the month comes. For that day their fathers allow them to have a horse each and ride away from their black tent homes into the open desert, their athletic field. A few of the men, heroes of the tribe, meet there with the boys and act as judges in the horse-racing. They divide the boys in two rows, and then select a boy from each side, and start off this first pair in their race (on horseback) to the distant goal, a pole with a prize on it such as eggs, money, or clothes. The one who arrives first takes the prize off the pole or knocks it down with his staff. The judge keeps the conqueror on one side, the conquered on the other. A new prize is put up, another pair races, and so on till all the victors are on one side, and the poor defeated ones on the other.