Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1886-06-24
BASEBALL INTRICACIES.
An Incident Which Proves That They Will
Never BE Understood by Ladies'.

An Incident Which Proves That They VIII
Never BE Understood by Ladies.
My first serious mistake lay in taking
Il party of ladies to the ball park. l
asked them if they understood the
game. They replied that they did in a
general way. l never knew before
what dense Ignorance is covered up by
that vague and unsatisfactory expires.
sion. We arrived at the park without
exciting incident, save the temporary
excitement of leaving a bill of large de-
nomination at the gate. 1 purchased
score cards all around, and explained
briefly and cOurteously the intcnts
thereof. The ladies said ''Oh," and
for about ten seconds were deeply in
terested. Then they fell to looking
around to see who were there and what
they had on. Every few seconds a
score card would slide out of LADY,
lap. This kept me busy and served to
relieve the monotony of waiting. The
Dctroits were praciicing in the field
and Hanlon was knocking flies into the
SUBURBS. Presently he hit terrific ball
over the center field fence. Singular.y
enough enc of the ladies saw him per-
form the feat.
'Why doesn't he run?" she cried, ex-
citedly.
"Why doesn't who run?" asked, in
establishment.
"Tha. little fellow with the Club"
she said.
l explained that it was probably be-
cause the club overwcighed him. This
seemed to satisfy her, and she resumed
her inspection of the spectators. i
discovered that the ladies were very
much interested in the uniforms, and 1
observed with alarm tendency to get
utcs to straighten the matter satisfac-
torily. and then the umpire called time.
The umpire is pretty busy man,
but he absolutely reveled in idleness
that day as compared with my laborS.
The second ball pitched was foul,
which whizzed into the grand stand and
came near diminishing my responsible
tiles by one. This necessitated
change of base, andwe moved around
in an agile manner, my perturbation
being increased by vOlley of sugges-
tons from the rear of ''down in front"
Again fairly seated, one of the ladies
discovered that she had forgotten her
parasol, so back travelled, secured it,
returned, picked up score card or two
and sank into my seat in profusc per-
spiration. Then the questioning began.
"Why do they keep taking off and
putting on those masks?'
(Which is the pitchcr?"
''What makes them slide along on
their faces?'
(which side is at the bat?"
What is foul?''
isn't over the fence out?''
These questions l answered with be-
coming fortitudc and patience. but
when the youngest and daintiest lady
said it was perfect shame to dirty
their uniform by rolling along the
ground l gave her up as bad job.
At the end of the first inning / took
the score cards with some apprchen-
sion, which proved to be we'll based.
l found that three of the ladies had
kept the Kansas City score on the
Detroit side, and one of them had cred
tied the home club with four runs and
some sixteen base hits. l straight
cned out the score with some difficulty
and was rewarded by the remark Of
the owner of the most complicated
system of scoring that she wouldn't
have missed seeing the game for any
thing" That was where we differed,
but, then, I make ic point to he al
ways open to reasonable propositions.
Kansas City Times.