Badminton

“ BADMINTON, or Great Badminton, a village in the southern parliamentary division of Gloucestershire, England, 100 m. W. of London by the Great Western railway (direct line to south Wales) . Here is Badminton House, the seat of the dukes of Beaufort, standing in a park some 10 m. in circumference. ”

“ The small space required is a great advantage that Badminton enjoys. A large part of the population of this great country lives in city houses, whose back yards are perhaps fifty feet long and only half as wide. Not much in the way of games can be done in a city back yard; yet one can play Badminton there. ”

“ For, as was well said by a learned judge, men and women are almost on an equality as regards the upper part of their dress, and can use their hands and heads with nearly equal effect. But when a lawn-tennis ball makes a bound into the skirts of a lady’s dress she has not the same facility of escaping from it as her male adversary. Therefore, as the shuttlecock of Badminton was always flying high, and from head to head, so to speak, Badminton for a long time in India held its own against the introduction of lawn-tennis ”

“ Lord Moncrief (then Wellwood) writing in the Badminton Book on Golf, had said that ladies were relegated and restricted to a species of "Jew's quarter" where they were graciously permitted to play with a single club, the putter, those little strokes which we all of us are fond of saying are the most important in the game of golf, but which we all feel to be the least interesting. ”

“ The difference in the width of the court has been stated. In Four-handed Tennis the players deliver the service in turns: thus supposing A and B are partners opposed to C and D; A serves in the first game, C in the second, B serves in the third, and D in the fourth, and so on. In Three-handed Tennis the single player serves in each alternate game. No player may return a service that has been delivered to his partner.
2768. Badminton
Badminton is a game similar to Lawn Tennis, but it is played with shuttlecocks instead of balls, and over a higher net. ”

“ We must decide to ignore all future championships... We must decline to be aggravated if a Japanese Badminton champion appears. We must cease to be interested if Britain's Hope beats the Horrible Peruvian at Tiddly-winks. ”

“ It is, according to the same Badminton authority, a game during the progress of which neither player smokes nor interrupts the other, and spectators are generally courteous, silent, and impartial. [Pg 159] In a private house where ladies are apt to be present and to be players, shirt sleeves are certainly not tolerated. The dinner coat is useful on these occasions. Smoking is permissible if the hostess consents.
The etiquette of cards calls for but a word. Whist means silence. No gentleman quarrels with a billiard marker or a golf caddie; still less should he dispute a point at cards. ”

“ The general grip is a trifle looser, although the right hand requires to be firm. Mr. Horace Hutchinson, in the Badminton Book on Golf, says as follows: "The principal secret of good putting, as of good driving, is that the club should travel as long as possible on the line—or a production of it—on which the ball is to travel.
"Putting is a stroke made almost exclusively with the wrists. The wrists do not hit the club on to the ball and then check it, but the club is swung by a movement of the wrists... any checking of the club as it meets the ball being fatal to consistent good putting.... ”

“ Planters are always hospitable. In India it is a sort of maxim still that the guest confers the favour, for, of course, the guest is really very welcome when your nearest neighbour lives five miles from you. And so each planter gathers round him from time to time a little party of visitors and neighbours, and when the men are sufficiently numerous they get up a game of polo. Perhaps the best social game that was ever invented for India was Badminton, which has now been almost superseded by lawn-tennis. Badminton has never been much appreciated in England ”

“ The Badminton Library of Sports and Pastimes were a series of books which aimed to cover all major sports and pastimes. The books were published in London by Longmans, Green & Co. and in Boston by Little, Brown & Co. between 1885 and 1902. The Supervising Editor was the Duke of Beaufort assisted by Alfred E. T. Watson. ”

“ Landowners, farmers, and business men alike in the Badminton country are keen supporters of fox-hunting, and their attitude towards the sport is due in no small degree to the unremitting attention and care for their interests displayed by the honorary secretary both in winter and summer. ”

“ And yet, scalloping more [155] nearly approaches the original meaning of sport than most of the games which are commonly classed under this heading, for not only does the scallop divert and provoke the mirth of his pursuer, but the pursuer in turn evokes a similar feeling and impression upon those who chance to see him in action. Those who have never tasted the joys and excitement of a scallop hunt have not completed their education as real sportsmen. It is true that Badminton does not devote a volume to this particular pastime ”

“ He was the "father" of paper-chasing, the name given to cross-country running when he introduced the sport, and it is interesting to recall the scorn with which he regarded paper-chasing into racing over closed circuits with the accompaniment of betting. "Some day," he wrote in the Badminton Library, "when the loathsomeness of the roping and betting has disgusted the better class of runners, a championship in which gentleman can take part without loss of self-respect will probably be again instituted on the old lines." ”

“ There is nowhere for them to spring back from." This is correct and absolutely sound; the wrists must, unquestionably, be in their right place at the top of the swing, the right place being, as I have already indicated, and as indeed practically every respectable book on golf, with the exception of the Badminton volume, shows, underneath the shaft of the club at the top of the swing, but it is quite wrong to speak of any such thing as there being no place "for them to spring back from." ”

“ But if you can once overcome your pride, and condescend to use such playthings, you will find that the game is not nearly so babyish as you may think it. The battledores should be good ones, strong and heavy, and strung either with catgut, like a tennis racket, or with string. The shuttlecock is greatly improved by being made heavy. Those sold in stores especially for Badminton are already made heavy enough, but the ordinary toy shuttlecocks require a little, a very little, melted lead poured into a hole in the cork. ”

“ I have not heard Indian club life described, but this club, though small, is, I think, fairly typical. Half the station turns up at it every evening before dinner; I should think there are generally about twenty ladies and men. You bike down, or drive, and play tennis on hard clay courts, a very fast game; then play badminton inside when it gets dark, and the lamps are lit.—I'd never played it before. What a good game it is; but how difficult it is to see the shuttle-cock in the half light as it crosses the lamp's rays—A.1. practice for grouse driving, and a good middle-aged man's game ”

“ Badminton Fencing, page 91.↑ The froissement, or Jroisst. is executed by rubbing or scraping one's foil along the opponent's↑ Liement (binding the blade) is executed by passing the point over the opponent's sword without losing touch of his blade, straightening the arm and lunging in one movement, with strong opposition. Flanconnade is the liement d'octave. Croise. or twist, da bringing the adversary's blade from an upper to a lower line, when the other's point is too low. Badminton Fencing, page 53.↑ Coule is gliding the blade along the adversary's without pressure or scraping. ”

“ It can be played either in or out of doors, on a marked-out space 40 feet long by 20 feet wide, divided into 4 courts, 2 at each end, with a centre space, across which a net is fixed, 5 or 51⁄2 feet in height. ”

“ Great sport can be attained by adding several articles; for instance, basket ball, base ball, tennis ball, Indian club, dumb bell, etc., if the class is large. This combination keeps one in a state of excitement, and perhaps in some instances too much, but still is a very practical game for the gymnasium. A penalty may be attached to the person dropping or failing to pass accurately. It may be to withdraw from the circle after making two or more such errors. ”

“ That the head is the proper thing with which to play ball appears to be in his blood. My head is round, he argues, and hard, just like the ball itself; what part of the human frame more fit and proper with which to meet and stop a ball.
Golf has not yet caught on, but tennis is firmly established from St. Petersburg to Bordeaux. The German, with the thoroughness characteristic of him, is working hard. University professors, stout majors, rising early in the morning, hire boys and practise back-handers and half-volleys. ”

“ It is the Big Bertha of tennis. It is the long range terror that should always score. The rules of footwork, position, and direction that govern the volley will suffice for the overhead. The swing alone is different. The swing should be closely allied to the slice service, the racquet and arm swinging freely from the shoulder, the wrist flexible and the racquet imparting a slight twist to the ball to hold it in court. The overhead is mainly a point winner through speed, since its bounce is so high that a slow placement often allows time for a recovery. ”

“ Now contests are held annually—and since 1908 under official control—with outside teams in baseball, football, fencing, basketball and hockey. The present system of indoor gymnastics dates from 1882 and track work, tennis, golf, polo and wrestling are indulged in. Most of the contests are held at West Point—many of them being played on the beautiful green infantry parade ground—and seats arranged in tiers like the bleechers at professional ball games are put up in sections on the plain to accommodate the thousands of spectators that now witness these contests. ”

“ Yet unless this rule is implicitly obeyed you cannot expect much success at lawn tennis. Taking your eye off the ball is the secret of every mis-hit and mis-timed stroke. You must not be content merely to look at the ball, but follow it right on to your racket; watch it up to the actual moment of striking. The court and the position of your opponent must be mentally engraved at the same time. How frequently attentive observation will reveal a player lifting his or her eye from the ball a fraction too soon! ”

“ The hockey do dent the floor somewhat, pins are sometimes split, windows not properly barred are broken, and unless the audience is in a safe place, ladies' hats are often disarranged.
Scoring.—Every pin knocked down scores one point for the offense, even though a man knock down his own pin.
Gas Ball
A tennis ball bounded in the centre of the floor by the referee starts the game. Each side endeavors to bat the ball into their opponents' goal or basket, as in Basket Ball. The ball may be batted, bounded or scooped with one hand only. ”

“ It would indeed seem exceedingly strange to see a batsman furnished now with a curved bat, but that, in effect, is what we have in golf. It is certain that to obtain the best result from one's strength, it is necessary that the forearm, the ball, and the shaft of the striking implement shall be, at the moment of impact, in one and the same straight line or plane. This is a fundamental rule in athletics which is too much ignored by many players, both at lawn-tennis and in golf. ”

“ Athletic sports were in vogue. Many of the young nobles were expert swimmers; others, among whom was the Duke of Monmouth, were fast runners, so that foot-races were a favourite amusement. Two of them once ran down a buck. Tennis was a favourite game, as was also pall-mall; skating, when there was ice, was extensively practised; bowl-racing and horse-racing were common. Bowls continued as a game which never goes wholly out of fashion. Baiting of the bull and the bear were resumed after the Restoration, but the lust for this brutal sport seems to have gone out. ”

“ Ten years ago, tennis occupied every moment of our young people’s time; now golf has transplanted tennis in public favor, which does not prove, however, that the latter is the better game, but simply that compelled by the accumulated force of other people’s opinions, youths and maidens, old duffers and mature spinsters are willing to pass many hours daily in all kinds of weather, solemnly following an indian-rubber ball across ten-acre lots. ”

“ When once the club or racket had been invented for horseback, it was easy to use it on foot, and thus in the middle ages there began the whole set of games in which balls are hit with bats, such as pall-mall and croquet, tennis, hockey and golf, rounders and cricket. ”

“ One forenoon in the month of July, a year later, the lawn-tennis courts of the Westfield Hunt Club were all occupied. The reason was clear; tennis had become the fashionable sport. Some of the younger spirits, who found golf too gentle a form of exercise, had rebelled successfully against the predominance of that pastime. Consequently all the people of every age who try to do what the rest of the world is doing had consigned their golf clubs to the recesses of their hall closets and bought rackets. ”

“ To learn the game of tennis, first obtain a proper grip of the racket. It should always be held firmly and as near the end as possible, the leather butt being inside the hand. A loose grip will absolutely prevent a player from becoming expert, as the accuracy and quickness that are a part of tennis can never be obtained unless we have the racket under perfect control. ”