Chapter 16

SPORTS AND PASTIMES

I had not been in Washington a month before I received invitations to a "country club golf" tournament, to a "rowing club," to a "pink tea," to a "polo game," to a private "boxing" bout between two light-weight professionals, given in Senator ----'s stable, to a private "cock-fight" by the brother of ----'s wife, to a gun club "shoot," not to speak of invitations to several "poker games." From this you may infer that Americans are fond of sport. The official sport--that is, the game I heard of most among Government officials, senators, and others--was "poker," and the sums played for at times I am assured are beyond belief. There are rules and etiquette for poker, and one of the most distinguished of American diplomatists of a past generation, General Schenck, emulated the Marquis of Queensberry in boxing by writing a book on the national game, that has all the charm claimed for it. It is seductive, and doubtless has had its influence on the people who employ the "bluff" in diplomacy, war, business, or poker, with equal tact and cleverness.

Middle-class Americans are fond of sport in every way, but the aristocrats lack sporting spontaneity; they like it, or pretend to like it, because it is the fashion, and they take up one sport after another as it becomes the fad. That this is true can be shown by comparing the Englishman and the American of the fashionable class. The Englishman is fond of sport because it is in his blood; he does not like golf to-day and swimming to-morrow, but he likes them all, and always has done so. He would never give up cricket, golf, or any of his games because they go out of fashion; he does not allow them to go out of fashion; but with the American it is different.

Hence I assume that the average American of the better class is not imbued with the sporting spirit. He wears it like an ill-fitting coat. I find a singular feature among the Americans in connection with their sports. Thus if something is known and recognized as sport, people take to it with avidity, but if the same thing is called labor or exercise, it is considered hard work, shirked and avoided. This is very cleverly illustrated by Mark Twain in one of his books, where a boy makes his companions believe that white-washing a fence is sport, and so relieves himself from an arduous duty by pretending to share the great privilege with them.

No one would think of walking steadily for six days, yet once this became sport; dozens of men undertook it, and long walks became a fad. If a man committed a crime and should be sentenced to play the modern American game of football every day for thirty days as a punishment, there are some who might prefer a death sentence and so avoid a lingering end; but under the title of "sport" all young men play it, and a number are maimed and killed yearly.