The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV | Page 5

Also to save their
heads, in case the players should slug them. Then they gave him a spear
wherewith to enforce his decisions, And to stick in the ground to mark
the place to line up to. He advanced to the thirty-yard line and began an
oration:
"Listen, Trojans and Greeks! For thirty-five seasons, I played foot-ball
in Greece with Peleus for half-back and captain. Those were the days of
old when men played the game as they'd orter. Once, I remember,
Æacus, the god-like son of Poseidon, Kicked the ball from a drop,
clean over the city of Argos. That was the game when Peleus, our
captain, lost all his front teeth; Little we cared for teeth or eyes when

once we were warmed up. Why, I remember that Æacus ran so that no
one could see him, There was just a long hole in the air and a man at
the end on't. Hercules umpired that game, and I noticed there wasn't
much back-talk."
Him interrupting, sternly addressed the King Agamemnon: "Cease, old
man; come off your antediluvian boasting; Doubtless our grandpas
could all play the game as well as they knew how. They are all dead,
and have long lined up in the fields of elysium; If they were here we
would wipe up the ground with the rusty old duffers. You call the game,
and keep your eye fixed on the helmeted Hector. He'll play off-side all
the while, if he thinks the umpire don't see him!" Then the old man
threw the lots, but sore was his heart in his bosom. "Troy has the
kick-off," he said, "the ball is yours, noble Hector." Then he gave him
the ball, a prolate spheroid of leather, Much like the world in its shape,
if the world were lengthened, not flattened, Covered with well-sewed
leather, the well-seasoned hide of a bison, Killed by Lakon, the hunter,
ere bisons were exterminated. On it was painted a battle, a market, a
piece of the ocean, Horses and cows and nymphs and things too many
to mention.
Then the heroes peeled off their sweaters and put on their nose-guards,
Also the fiendish expressions the great occasion demanded. Ajax stood
on the right; in the center the great Agamemnon; Diomed crouched on
the left, the god-like rusher and tackler, Crouched as a panther crouches,
if sculptors do justice to panthers. Crafty Ulysses played back, for none
of the Trojans could pass him, All the best Greeks were in line, but
Podas Okus Achilleus, Who though an excellent kicker stayed all day
in his section.
Hector dribbled the ball, then seized it and putting his head down, And,
as a lion carries a lamb and jumps over fences-- Dodging this way and
that the shepherds who wish to remonstrate-- So did the son of Priam
carry the ball through the rush line, Till he was tackled fair by the
full-back, the crafty Ulysses. Even then he carried the ball and the son
of Laertes Full five yards till they fell to the ground with a deep
indentation Where one might hide three men so that no man could see

them-- Men of the present day, degenerate sons of the heroes--
Now, when Pallas Athene discovered the Greeks would be beaten, She
slid down from the steep of Olympus upon a toboggan. Sudden she
came before crafty Ulysses in guise like a maiden; Not that she thought
to fool him, but since Olympian fashion Made the form of a woman
good form for a goddess' assumption. She then spoke to him quickly,
and said, "O son of Laertes, Seize thou the ball; I will pass it to thee
and trip up the Trojan." Her replying, slowly re-worded the son of
Laertes-- "That will I do, O goddess divine, for he can outrun me."
Then when the ball was in play, she cast thick darkness around it. Also
around Ulysses she poured invisible darkness. Under this cover, taking
the ball he passed down the middle, Silent and swift, unseen, unnoticed,
unblocked, and untackled. Meanwhile she piled the Greeks and the
Trojans in conglomeration, Much like a tangle of pine-trees where
lightning has frequently fallen, Or like a basket of lobsters and crabs
which the provident housewife Dumps on the kitchen floor and vainly
endeavors to count them, So seemed the legs and the arms and the
heads of the twenty-one players. Sudden a shout arose, for under the
crossbar, Ulysses, Visible, sat on the ball, quietly making a touch-down;
On the tip of his nose were his thumb and fingers extended, Curved and
vibrating slow in the sign of the blameless Egyptians. Violent language
came to the lips of the helmeted Hector, Under his breath he murmured
a few familiar quotations, Scraps of Phrygian folk-lore about the