New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1902-11-23
4 U4TCRLESS GAME.

We may we'll ask whether it is not time to
revise our application of the phrase our
national game" For years baseball has been
thus called and with good reason. In origin
or at least in almost its entire development. II
is American. and it has from the outset been
played almost exclusively in this country.
Properly played. and especially properly man
aged, it is a superb game, well worthy or the
distinction which popular phraseology has given
to it. In recent years, however, 1t has nde-
niably fallen into uDfayOrable if not evil ways.
Never since the unfortunate "Brotherhood
split has it been what it was before. 1t Is sun
played more widely. perhaps than any other
game; but the vast popular enthusiasm and
the mutitudinous patronage which 1t once en-
iOyed are now things Of the past.
They are now given instead to football. and
they are given to it in a measure unknown to
baseball even in It's most halcyOn and vocifer-
Gus days Where attendance at the great hol-
day games of baseball used to be counted by
thousands. that at the great football games is
counted by tens of thousands. Moreover, While
football appeals to the general populace with
much force. it also commands the attention or
the social world Of wealth and fashion to de-
gree never Appropriated to by baseball. The
only other sport comparable with it in such
respects is the turf, and are not sure that
any racetrack in the country ever saw n spec
tacle quite rivalling that seen again and again
at New Haven at Cambridge and at Prince
ton. Nor are the games of the big universities
the only ones worth considering. Hundreds OF
lesser universities colleges and schools all over
the land have their football teams, and their
games are witnessed by hundreds and by thou
sands. If one were to set down the total num-
Der of spectators at yesterdays games or at
of no So bafo or ar those nf
next Thursday, be would have to use at least
six figures,
Football is indeed at the present time n
matchless game in the esteem of lovers OF
manly sports. The reasons therefor are not
hard 10 discover. II is one thing TO watch a
number of men playing game for wages, just
others lay bricks and hoe potatoes. 1t IS n
very different thing to watch n company OF
young men, in mind and character the very
flower Of the new generation, contending in
strenuous game just for the sake of the game
and the triumph and nothing more. OF course
the comparative shortness Of the football sea
son is a contributory factor for it congresses
all the interest into so small n space of time
and thus makes it the more intense. There is
also, the fact that as a spectacle football Is
simply unapproached by any other game, not
even by the thrilling sport of polo. Its action
II 81 swift anu COulHuouS, ana so strenuous
in the direct personal contact of the contending
players, that no heholder can escape tinglng
IF the nerves and a Quickening Of the pulse
Moreover, while some of its methods are so In
ricate in strategy that one might almost think
Emerson had a quarterback in mind when he
wrote OF Brahma.
They know not we'll the subtle ways
l keep. and pass, and turn again.
yet the whole plan of campaign is so perfectly
obvious that every spectator readily under
stands 1t and appreciates every successful
move It is a game for the scientific and
equally for the unscientifc mind, FOR the lover
of strength and the lover Of skill and the lover
Of speed; and if the fascinating element of
chance enters into 1t less than into some other
games, ask any of the myriads who thronged
Yale Field yesterday If there was not enough
Of quivering uncertainty in 1t TO satisfy the
maddest devotee of chance
Truly, it is a matchess game worthy of the
pride of every lover OF true sport and worthy
of most vigilant safeguarding from any OF the
evil influences which have made some other
sports a byword and reproach Long may its
remnants wave,