How, indeed, can anybody play Anthony-over in a
crowded city?

The old one-story village school-houses stood generally in an open
green. The boys divided into two parties, the one going on one side, and
the other on the opposite side of the school-house. The party that had
the ball would shout "Anthony!" The others responded, "Over!" To this,
answer was made from the first party, "Over she comes!" and the ball was
immediately thrown over the school-house. If any of the second party
caught it, they rushed, pell-mell, around both ends of the school-house
to the other side, and that one of them who held the ball essayed to hit
some one of the opposite party before they could exchange sides. If a
boy was hit by the ball thus thrown he was counted as captured to the
opposite party, and he gave all his efforts to beat his old allies. So
the game went on, until all the players of one side were captured by the
others. I don't know what Anthony means in this game, but no doubt the
game is hundreds of years old, and was played in English villages before
the first colony came to Jamestown.

"I'm not going to play Anthony-over," said Jack. "I'm going to show King
Pewee a new trick."

"You can't get up a game of bull-pen on your own hook, and play the four
corners and the ring all by yourself."

"No, I don't mean that. I'm going to show the boys how to play
hat-ball--a game they used to play on the Wildcat."

"I see your point. You are going to make Pewee ask you to let him in,"
said Bob, and the two boys set out for school together, Jack explaining
the game to Bob. They found one or two boys already there, and when Jack
showed his new ball and proposed a new game, they fell in with it.

The boys stood their hats in a row on the grass. The one with the ball
stood over the row of hats, and swung his hand to and fro above them,
while the boys stood by him, prepared to run as soon as the ball should
drop into a hat. The boy who held the ball, after one or two false
motions,--now toward this hat, and now toward that one,--would drop the
ball into Somebody's hat. Somebody would rush to his hat, seize the
ball, and throw it at one of the other boys, who were fleeing in all
directions. If he hit Somebody-Else, Somebody-Else might throw from
where the ball lay, or from the hats, at the rest, and so on, until some
one missed. The one who missed took up his hat and left the play, and
the boy who picked up the ball proceeded to drop it i