ear from the cricket field,
"How's that?" pronounced sharply and clearly; and then the prompt and
equally incisive reply, "Not out." Wonderful to say, the decisions of
the umpires are accepted with tolerable readiness, except when they
are flagrantly contrary to fact, as they sometimes are. A few of the
politically disaffected students have tried to boycott the game as a
foreign importation, but they have not met with much success.

There is a proper season for all the purely Indian games, and to play
any of them out of season is almost as great an enormity as to shoot a
partridge in England before the 1st of September. If you ask an Indian
boy if he has been playing a certain game, and if it happens not to be
in season, he will look at you with an air of pained surprise, and
briefly saying "No," he will change the subject.

Indians of almost any age play marbles, and there are many divers ways
of doing this, the rules of which are clearly established by an
unwritten tradition and are strictly adhered to. If a disputed point
arises when a company of boys are playing, an appeal to a senior
bystander is always conclusive. Games between experts are watched with
interest by quite a number of lookers-on, of every age. The Indian
method of shooting a marble is to use the middle finger of the right
hand as a sort of catapult. The marble is held with the left hand
against this finger, and bending it back, it is suddenly let go. The
effect of this is to volley the marble with great force and accuracy.
The English boy's method is tame by comparison. The prevailing
gambling instinct finds scope in this game, because the marbles are
generally kept by the winners, and experts amass great stores. Some
schoolboys, with a money-lender's disposition, make a fortune by
selling marbles cheap to small and inexperienced boys and then
promptly winning them back again.

Spinning tops is an amusement of which the Indian boy never grows
weary, and he only leaves off regretfully because its season comes to
an end. If he has nothing else to do he will be happy spinning his
top, on and off, from morning until nightfall, and naturally grows
skilful in the art, although, if he has no companion, it does not
admit of much variety. His chief exploit is to scoop up the top while
it is still spinning, on to the palm or back of his hand, or on to his
arm. But there are exciting contests, when one boy endeavours to spin
his top with all his force on to