The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-05-14
JAY Gould at Court Tennis.

II has more than once been the privi-
lege of our citizens to astonish in sports
our British cousins in their own lane
and under their own conditions. Yet
nothing more amazing, when observed
through English s~pectacles, has ever
happened in the long chronicle of such
sporting triumphs than the successes
of the seventeen-year-old boy JAY
GOULD at court tennis. Other Ameri-
cans have tried for the championship
title in the past at the Queens Club,
Kensington, but only to retire in their
first or second match. Until the advent
of this youngster there had been no
reason to doubt the value Of the COM
parisononce made by EUsTACE H. MILES,
that the best American players were one
half fifteen below the best English form.
Present company is always excepted in
such estimates, but the honestly won
preeminence of MILES in the British
courts makes fair the supposition that
he regarded his own game as at least
fifteen better than that of any American
amateur. Now that JAY GOULD has
become runner up for the year and as
challenger has won one set in the match
with MILES, it is evident that the Ameri-
can form must DO deemed up to the Brit
ieh stand=rd.
That JAY GOULD is head and shoulders
above his American contemporaries does
not affect the rating, for class in sports
must be gagged from the rank Of the
best individual. The American cham
pionship, established in 1892, has had but
eight holders, including JAY GOULD. The
English amateur championship dates in
fact from the institution Of the Maryle-
bone Club competition in 1857. Only
the club members could take part, which
led to the starting Of the open amateur
championship at the Queens Club in
1889. Only five players have won this
competition, and MILES has held the
title since 1899. This is not the first
time MILES has earned the champion
ship of the two countries, for he won the
American championship in 1901. The
point to be noted is that supremacy in
the game is long retained, and with the
added severity that the interval should
give to his stroke, the victory in the
English championship is to JAY GOULD
only a distinction deferred.
In its English lineage something of the
ceremon and romano of the minuet Is
associated with court tennis. 1t has
been the game of the ~aristocracy in the
past and is the highest recreation of
modern English country life. In COM
petitions the English amateurs have
held supremacy for fifty years. The
French have had great professionals, as
DELAHAYE and BARRE, but the British
have been first in the amateur game, at
least since CHARLES TAYLoR's time or
j. NJ. HEATHCoTE's first Marylebone
Club gold prize. The position attained
by GOULD must seem to the English as
something iconoclastic, a SCATTERING of
the nations pride in its courts, old and
new, and its court tennis players. In a
way it is as sensational in the ancient
game as the advent of MARK TwAIN's
Yankee at King ARTHUR's court.
The victory will reveal to the tennis
players of the world that it is a game at
which youth has the right to be more
prominent. Court tennis has been too
much regarded as the old mans game,
One pictures the Duke of WELLINGTON
playing it at Strathieldsaye with the
tutor Of his sons. rather than any match