And there! I nearly forgot some of the best of all these sports: the touch games. There’s OFF-GROUND TOUCH and FRENCH TOUCH and TOUCH THE ROAD YOU MUST GO OVER and CROSS TOUCH and HE (called EE; all touch-games are “he” games, and this is the grandfather of the whole family), and ELBOW TOUCH and HELP TOUCH and B--TOUCH and TOUCHING BOOTLEATHER and HOP TOUCH and DOUBLE TOUCH and TOUCH LAST (or HAD YOU LAST) and TOUCHING IRON and TOUCH WOOD AND WHISTLE and NON-STOP TOUCH and STICK-TOUCH, or STICK-HE (touching with sticks) and WATER-HE (played in the baths) and STRING-HE (touch and hold hands: like WIDDY) and TREE-HE (up trees) and SHADOW-HE, which must be played in the sunshine, like this: “The one who is he has to try and tread on one of the person’s shadders, then he is he.” FRENCH TOUCH is as good as any of those I can remember just now; it is played like this: “Fr tutch run after another boy and tutch him any were and the boy you tutched has to keep his hand on the place were you tutched and go ea (“he”) and run after another boy and tutch him any were and he has to keep his hand on the place where he tutched and go ea and run after another boy and tutch him any were and he has to keep his hand on the place were he tutched and go ea and run after another boy and tutch him any were etc.”-- and OFF-GROUND TOUCH like this: “You are not supposed to let your feet touch the ground, if you do, the one who is out can have you”-- but somebody really ought to make a full list of games of this kind. Aunt Eliza might do it (always fussing about with school-children, she is, and seeing that their clothes are properly patched behind) if she weren’t so fond of explaining things--so fond that I daresay she’ld mix up B--TOUCH with HOOPS and HONEY-POTS, for the sake of fitting it in with some explanation or other. That’s the worst of Aunt Eliza; she’s sometimes right, but you never know when.... And now, come to think of it, I believe I can tell you just one or two more of the games they play down our way. There’s WILL YOU ’LIST (a recruiting game, very popular just now), and HAMMERS ON, and KICKS, and RED ROVER (“Three steps and I’ll be over”), and CARLOW, and FRIED EGGS AND A RASHER, and POSTMAN’S KNOCK, and TEN O’CLOCK POLICE, and SCHOOL-BOYS, and ICKAMY-ICKAMY-CO (“where’s the poor man to go?”), and SHUNTING ENGINES and FOLLOW THE LEADER-- It’s the only really dangerous game we have, FOLLOW THE LEADER. Because of course the bravest boy is chosen as leader, one who crosses the road just in front of some heavy van and then goes and raps at all the doors of the neighbours who rush out in a rage to see what’s the matter; so that by the time the third man has done the same there’s sometimes a smash-up and always a row. A grand old game is DOING EACH OTHERS’ DAGS, as they call it; but its bound to end in trouble of some kind, for dead certain; though the “leader” generally comes off without a scratch, as they do in the army--