No doubt much can be said against football, which ranks second in popularity among American athletic games.  For some years the elements of hazard and rough treatment have been unhappily too prominent, so that the suspicion is warranted that players have been sacrificed to the bloodthirsty demands of the vast throng of spectators.  The tension of playing in the presence of thousands of partisan enthusiasts shows itself in a reckless disregard of physical injury.  Furthermore, for boys in early adolescence the tax upon the heart constitutes a common danger which is often rendered more serious by the untrained condition of the players.  It is to be hoped that in the further modification of the rules from year to year, the players and their welfare will be kept more in mind and the sensation-loving public, whose gate-fees have been too big a consideration, will be measurably overlooked.

But with this concession, all of the virtue that attaches to baseball will be found in football, only in accentuated form.  Physical bravery is, of course, more emphasized; while team loyalty, with all that it implies, is more intense.  The relation of the members to one another in a well-organized team amounts to an affection which is never forgotten.  The words of cheer when the team is hard pushed and has to take a “brace”; the fighting spirit that plays the game to a finish, no matter what the odds; the hand extended to help to his feet the man who has just advanced the ball; the pat on the back; the impulsive embrace; the very tears shed in common after a lost game—­all of this is a social and moral experience of no small value.  Basketball also offers a good field for the subordination of personal glory to team success and, in point of intensity, stands midway between baseball and football with the elimination of the dangerous qualities of the latter.

[Illustration:  THE NORMAL BOY IN THE ABNORMAL PLAYGROUND]

Games of this sort are also the most effective means of developing, through expression, the boy’s sense of justice or fair play.  And this sentiment will always be found strong and operative in him unless it has been overcome by the passion to win or by imitation of the bad example of certain debased athletes, popularly known as “muckers.”  Under proper leadership, the boy soon learns that the true spirit of manly sport is the farthest removed from that of the footpad and the blackguard.  Appreciation of successful opponents and consideration for the vanquished can be made effectually to supplant the cheap, blatant spirit which seeks to attribute one’s defeat to trickery and chance and uses one’s victory as an occasion for bemeaning the vanquished.  The presence of a capable director of play is sure to eliminate this evil which has crept in under the sanction of vicious ideals and through gross neglect of boys’ play on the part of adults in general and educators in particular.  The Decalogue itself cannot compete with a properly directed game in enforcing the fair-play principle among boys.  It is worth something to read about fair play, but it is worth much more to practice it in what is, for the time being, a primary and absorbing interest.