(_d_) Once more, laughter is a common accompaniment of all varieties of contest or sharp encounter, both physical and mental. When, as in the case of the savage, the schoolboy and the civilised soldier, it breaks out after bodily fight, it {79} has some of the characteristics of nervous laughter. It is a concomitant of a sudden remission of physical and mental strain, of a dissolution of the attitude of apprehensive self-protection. In most cases, since it is “they laugh that win,” the feeling of relief is reinforced by that of contemptuous exultation at the first taste of victory. A prolonged combat, if not too unequal, offers on both sides frequent openings for these reliefs of tension and upspringings of the exultant mood. A good fighter in the ring is, I understand, supposed to be able now and again to relieve the grimness of the situation by a sweet smile. This is certainly true of all mental contests. Nothing is more remarkable in the study of popular laughter than the way in which it seems to penetrate those relations and dealings of social life which involve sharp contest and crossing of wits. These will be illustrated more fully by-and-by. It is enough here, to allude to the enormous influence of contests between the sexes on the development of wit and a lively sense of the ludicrous. (_e_) As a last group of situations favourable to the experience of joyous expansion we have those in which an unusual degree of solemnity is forced upon us. This has already been touched on. Extremes seem to meet here. It might be expected that an impulse born of the play-mood would find its natural dwelling-place in scenes of social gaiety and conviviality. And in the days when society was gay the festive board was doubtless the focus of the activity of the mirthful spirit. In our time it seems almost more natural to associate a laugh with a funeral ceremony than with a dinner-party. Yet the art of extracting fun from solemn things is not of to-day, as may be seen by a glance at the jokes of the church architect and the play writer of the Middle Ages. In such bizarre intrusions of the droll {80} into the domain of the solemn we seem to find the struggling of an irrepressible gladness of spirit against the bonds which threaten to strangle it.