just _because_ it's been vacation. They
say they have been so long at home and there has been no chance to
play." Classes were stopped, and all the school played, from the
greatest unto the least, until the newly aroused instinct was satisfied.
Basket ball had an interesting history in one school. At first the
players were very weak sisters, indeed. The center who was knocked down
wept as at a personal affront, and the defeated team also wept to prove
their penitence for their defeat. But gradually the team learned to play
fair, to take hard knocks, and to cheer the winners. They grew into such
"good sports" that when one day an invading cow, aggrieved at being hit
in the flank by a flying ball, turned and knocked the goal thrower flat
on the ground, the interruption lasted only a few minutes. The prostrate
goal-thrower recovered her breath, got over her fright, and, while
admiring friends chased the cow to a safe distance, the game went on to
the finish.
Dramatics.
The dramatic instinct is strong and the school girl actress shines,
whether in the role of Ophelia or Ramayanti. In India among Hindus or
Christians, in school or church or village, musical dramas are
frequently composed and played and hold unwearied audiences far into the
night. Among Christians there is a great fondness for dramatizing Bible
narratives. Joseph, Daniel, and the Prodigal Son appear in wonderful
Indian settings, "adapted" sometimes almost beyond recognition. They
show interesting likeness to the miracle and mystery plays of the Middle
Ages. There is the same naive presentation; the same introduction of the
buffoon to offset tragedy with comedy; the same tendency to
overemphasize the comic parts until all sense of reverence is lost. In
some respects India and Mediaeval Europe are not so far apart.
A high school class one night presented part of the old Tamil drama of
Harischandra. The heroine, an exiled queen, watches her child die before
her in the forest. Having no money to pay for cremation on the burning
ghat, she herself gathers firewood, builds a little pyre, and with such
tears and lamentations as befit an Oriental woman lays her child's body
on the funeral pile. Just as the fire is lighted and the corpse begins
to burn, the keeper of the burning ghat appears and, with anger at this
trespass, kicks over the pyre, puts the fire out, and throws the body
aside. Just at this moment Chandramathy sees in him the exiled king, her
hus
|