Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-11-25

Each man wore a chemiloon like COM
bination vest and trousers over flannel
shirt. The Yale men wore blue shirts and
stockings, and the Princeton boys wore
striped garments of those two kinds, SC that
the colors of both teams showed on their
arms and legs. In front of each shin the
men wore what appeared like half a corset,
their old, patched and dirty canvas breeches
were padded so that halt the men looked as
if their leg bones were broken and pro-
truding And here and there man had
great black leather cup fitted over his nose.
Whether they were muscular men or
mere spindle shanks done up in cotton bat
ting there was nothing in sight to tell That
any of them could ever be washed and
dressed to look like q gentleman seemed
preposterous fancy. Around the edge of
the field sat lot of such men who were not
IN the game, but were ready to take the
places OF such as might be killed or man
gled.
Pictures of the Side Line.
The writer of this thoroughly untech-
nical report, never having seen anything
like them except in South Sea Island
pictures. studied them with interest
Their hair fell over their toreheads like
the thatch on a Devonshire root. They
had five hob nails on the sole of each shoe,
every one larger than the largest that
Alpine climbers use. Some had their
heads bandaged as if their skulls had been
broken and had been glued and tied up as
women mend broken china.
One man had his ear deftly set into a
thick circlet of flannel and cotton, like-it
is not pretty simile but 1t is the best one
"a corn plaster. ANY one OF half dozen
OF these ambassadors from our chief seats of
intellectual activity could have got S25
week in a Bowery museum as Fill can
nibal, without touch of grease, paint or
an alteration OF any sort.
The game of football having been called
it began in earnest at once, like a tussel be-
tween a bull moose. All the queer. mis-
shapen canvas figures stood in group with
their heads together and their broader ends
describing an oval Between their knubbed
and disiointed legs could be seen the ball
which, from that moment, monopolized the
attention of every man as If 1t were an
eternal fortune that the god would give to
whoever could catch it and get off with it.
The Way They Played the Ball.
The man with the ball wabbled and fun
bled it nervously, and the fellows on the
ends of the oval pushed and punched and
showed one another in a way that seemed
purposeless at first, but was really an i'm
portant part of the play. At the right mo-
ment, or at all moments. it distracted the
attention of the man whose side had not got
the ball and impaired his usefulness
Finally the ball wasllet 60, somebody got it
and ran, somebody else caught him by the
neck and flung him down, and, quicker
than Bowery photography, all the % were
atop of one another.
Some had their legs in the air, some had
their legs out straight, some had their legs
bent under them and some seemed to have
no legs at ALL 1t is useless for one who
does not understand the game to attempt to
describe it in detail. A few notes of what
occurred during its progress will serve to
bring out in strong lights the impressions
it produced
1t was only twice or perhaps |
three times that a player who got |
the ball succeeded in running |
20 wards with it. His opponent seemed to |
spring out of the earth, whoever had it and |
wherever he went. When they got up to |
him they flung him in various ways to suit |
each occasion. The commonest way was to |
hook an arm about his neck and fall and /
drag him down with the impetus of two |
men weighing 40 pounds and running at |
full speed.
Some of the Peculiar Methods.
A clever way, much in favor with the /
Yale men, was to run up against the man |
and carom against him with terrible butt ]
of one shoulder Thereupon the man who /
was butted lost his equilibrium, staggered f
and went down like an OK. Phil King, the
Princeton Captain, had a method all his
own.
In the first half Of the game, at a time
when Laurie Bliss was making bold dash
in the open with the ball at his right breast,
King came to him diagonally with the
speed of a greyhound and while 10 feet off
lurched forward, lifted his feet from the
ground and flung him like a bullet, bang
against Bliss ribs Sometimes the two sets
OF young Senecas would rush against one
another with such a crash that hiss accom-
panied the impact, as the breath was
knocked out of dozen at once.
The whole % tore over the field this way /
and that, leaving it all tutted behind them
where their hobnals had torn up the turf |
Now and then-not seldom, but often
when bunch that had been wriggling on |
the ground like eels in a box rose to their |
feet and passed on, they lett what looked |
like dead man on the field.
who's that hurt?" was the cry that ran |
around the amphitheater as the people saw |
the form OF man on his back, pale, with |
his mouth oren, pulling his legs up and |
down as if he had been hurt in the stomach |
or clutching the grass like man who is |
suffering.
Laurie Bliss "Done Up"
Laurie Bliss was one of these victims and |
saw the last part of the game while being |
led around, muthed up like squaw in mid
winter with a friend at each elbow He |
was hurt more than once. Two or three |
others know how it feels from the same |
days experience. When a man was hurt, it
several times happened that player ran |
toward the umpire with his hand up, as if
to reproduce the scene in the Roman Coli
eeum, when the signal with the thumbs of
the people-up or down, settled the fate of
the vanquished To judge from the atti-
tudes OF the PLAYERS, their thumbs might
have gone down as readily as up, for they
invariably drew of to one side and talked |
and laughed.
Never more tnan two, or at the outside
four, stopped over the injured man or clus-
tered around him. Attendants with pals,
sponges ana mysterious valises always ran
from the edge of the field on such occasions
and swabbed the boys face with cold water,
while some one else rubbed the part that he
said hurt him, or patted and spanked his
breast TO encourage his breathing.
At one time, after Bliss was hurt, two
men lugged white canvas stretcher on the
field, but nothing was done with it. Al
ways in less than three minutes the injured
fellow was on his feet, usually with cry OF
''Im all right.
Soon Forget Their Hurts.
At q to 25 years of age their bones are
soft, and the exercise they get makes them
so supple that they are not easily hurt Of |
course there will be bad hurt on the field |
some day. If it is death, it will also be
the death of public football, for the resem-