The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-11-26
Foot Ball.

The mutations of our civilization have
brought it about that. while we still cele-
brate Thanksgiving day, we do it chiefly
with game of foot ball, And after the
game we give thanks that so few, or none,
as the case may be, were killed or Grip
pied. Thanksgiving day may be said to
have passed through three stages of an
alliterative evolution. First fast. then
feast, and now a fight. And may the
best eleven win!
While Thanksgiving and foot ball in
evitably suggest each other, the day is
merely a marker of the hight of the sea-
son for the game, which fiourishes from
the time the first chrysanthemum bursts
its bud until exhaustion or casualties or
returning warm weather compels halt.
When the weather is cold enough to freeze
the unprotected ears off brass monkey,
foot ball players put on ear muffs and go
out and play. 1t is really astounding
what hold the game has taken upon the
great American public. 1t would seem,
almost, that there was not healthy ma
tive of the country, who had arrived at
an age to distinguish between colors of
uniforms, who would not brave the dan
ger of pneumonia and stand for hours,
even in a cold drizzle, for the sake of see
ing twenty-five shock-headed young men
batter each other for the possession of an
elliptical sphere of pigskin. Not only are
people willing to undergo dlscomforts for
the sake of seeing this thing, but they
are eager to give up money for the privi-
lege of undergoing any discomforts that
may be incidental to seeing it. The gross
receipts at the two games of foot ball
between Yale and Princeton last Satur-
day are estimated at $65OO0, a sum larger
than is required for the support for a
year of each of many small but excellent
colleges; a sum large enough to pay the
| annual salaries of an eleven of United
States senators.
Interesting manifestations of the foot
ball craze are presented by the sex which
does not play foot ball; that is, not to any
considerable extent. Young women who
are adopts in Delsarte, who practice say
ing ''prunes' and "prisms'' for the lips.
and who would faint at the sight of blood
/ on the STUDDED Toe OF IL small DrOlner,
swing their arms like wind-mills, stretch
their mouths and strain their larynxes
when the flying wedge of one foot ball
team strikes the center of the opposition,
brushes its way through and kicks a goal.
Like the noble danes of ancient Rome,
who turned their thumbs down and there
by sealed the fate of fallen gladiators,
the modern foot ball girl desires her
champions TO do" the other fellows, re-
| CARELESS of consequences, and she Justify
cheers when her favorite team makes a
good point Notwithstanding few bones
may have been broken and few noses
smashed in the effort Yet. apart from
the game. the foot ball girl is as tender
and as timid as could be imagined. She
is a queer bundle of humanity. AS the
eloquent, pork-fed poet Of the Chicago
Times-Herald puts it:
The girl who laughs at foot ball gore,
| AT noses smashed and broken bones,
\ Who claps her hands and cries for more,
And likes 10 hear the crippes' groans,
7 WIN faint IL she but see beside her
The shadow of a harmless spider.