The Savannah morning news., 1902-07-27
HAD THE PING PONG EYE.
Result of Too Much Playing With
the CeIIuIOid Spheres-Corrective
to Reading Habit.

Result of Too Much Playing with
the CelIuIOid Spheres-Corrective
to Reading Habit.
From the New York Tribune.
I had always known Jones as
frank open faced fellow, and accord
ingly was not a little grieved and per-
haps shocked when l ran across him
the other day in the corridor of a
Broadway hotel and found that he re-
fused to meet my eye. He came up
readily enough. and exchanged grips.
but there was none of "the spirit meet
ing spirit" There was something
hangdog about the man. His eye was
shifty, constantly darting up and down,
back and forth. 1t had a short, I'M
easy motion which was distinctly dis
agreeable.
Jones'" said I, in some disgust,
planning an elopement. Really, do you
know, 1 don't like your look"
Il know all about it," he replied sad
ly. THE fact is, I've got the ping
pong eye"
Il have heard tell of the pink eye
I have read of the Egyptian cigarette
heart. [ may even go SO far as to say
that have seen the bicycle face. But
you have sprung new one on me with
your ping pong eye. Do tell me all
about it,"
1--WE got it," he replied briefly and
rather YEARLY.
you'd better tell an old friend"
suggested 1 sympathetically."
well, I will he returned, after a
moment of thought. "This condition
in which you see me has been going
on now for a fortnight. I began play
ing ping pong
Poor fellow" said I gently.
Il began playing ping pong a little
over a month ago. The habit grew
on me. l played it nightly with my
wife and children. 1 had morning
bouts with my firm. couldn't shake
myself loose from it, You know how
it is. Little by little began to realize
that something was wrong with me-
| Things were always dancing back and
| forth to my sight. My eye refused
to stay put on any object. Every
thing acquired a motion. 1 watched
them. I was increasingly busy with
a to and fro play of the optics. In
short, had the ping-pong eye.''
But what is your theory for all
| this?" asked I.
There is only one explanation" he
returned. You know yourself that
the dimensions of the arena demanded
by the game are limited. A six-foot
table, on which the celluloid sphere
comes and goes, back and forth, to and
fro, here and there, now that side now
this, hither and"-
Yes, yes" said / hastily 81 know"
1.-THE play of the eye. which should
have from the sky line to the pit of
the heavens for its range, is miser-
ably confined to a dining room table,
| on which an abominable little ball is
ceaselessly dancing-that is. if you
| play we'll" he added well grad
Vrs,1I %kA
petty radius, picks up the trick of
an unsubdued restlessness, and there
you are. But hear me out. My
friends are falling away. They say I
don't make a good impression on
strangers. that it has ceased to be a
| pleasure to introduce me to the lately
arrived relative. Acquaintance say
that l suggest something criminal.
Why, I was blackballed for a club the
other day. and it was a ping-pong
club at that"
This is a black business said as
kindly as 1 could. But surely you
have given up the gamer"
Eyes, but they tell me that my eye
still wiggles. 1t does. doesn't it?"
yes" replied. ''It does wriggle
some'
1.-THE only CLEAN of comfort in the
whole affair is the fact that the di-
rection of the wiggle is exactly at right
angles to the motion of reading. That,
you see, is a constant crisis from
side to side, while this is back and
forth, here and
Yes 1 said: ""I know"
Really" he continued, with more
cheerfulness than he had yet shown,
this new motion of mine is a good
antidote for the strain of keeping up
with things in the reading line
You mean that ping-pong is cure
for the historical novel habit?"
| asked.
Exactly that" he exclaimed with
considerable animation. 81 hadn't
thought of it in just that way, but 1
guess you're right. Anyway. you've
cheered me up lot"
Then he hastily disappeared, as he
saw one of his oldtime associates APP
J preaching.
| II A u