of ball is by measuring the stick. To do this, the leader of one side first heaves the stick in the air, skilfully catching it, as it falls, at a point as near a hand’s-breadth to the end as possible, as his opponent must then measure the stick with him, alternately hand-over-hand, from the point where it is caught. The one securing enough of the last of the stick for a hold, has the first choice. This is determination by lot.
Still another form of invocation, formerly much used to clinch a bargain between boys, when “swapping” jack-knives or marbles, runs to this effect:—
“Chip, chop, chay,
Give a thing, give a thing,
Never take it back again.”
The process of counting a person out in the familiar phrase as being “it,” is fairly traced back to the ancient custom of designating a criminal from among his fellows by lot. The form that we know the best in New England, a sort of barbaric doggerel, according to Mr. Burton, is still current in Cornwall, England, and goes in this wise:—
“Ena, mena, bora, mi:
Kisca, lara, mova, di:
Eggs, butter, cheese, bread,
Stick, stock, stone dead.”
The resemblance between the foregoing, and what is current among playfellows on this side of the water easily suggests that the boys of the “good Old Colony times,” so often referred to with a sigh of regret, brought their games and pastimes along with them. As now remembered, the doggerel charm runs as follows:—
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