is believed to indicate the most important and component parts of an eastern army, elephants, infantry, horses, &c. But this name was supplanted by the Persian word Shah (king), which the game has retained, more or less corrupted in all languages. The Italians call it scacchi; the Germans, schachspie, and the French, echecs, from some of which we may have taken our word check. The pawn seems to have been evidently so called after the peon, while the rook, though more generally termed a castle, took its name from the Persian rukh, which is the corresponding piece; and it is remarkable that, in all the languages here enumerated, the word mat or mate is preserved, and a term is used corresponding with the schahmat of the Persians.

BACKGAMMON.

Of this game we have no clue to its origin; at any rate, we can give our readers the derivation of the term. The word is of Welsh origin, from back, little, and cammawn, battle, from which comes Backgammon.

ARCHERY.

"And thou, peculiar weapon of our land,
Graceful, yet sturdy bow."

The use of the bow may be traced to the remotest antiquity. The first notice which we find of it is in Genesis (xxi. 20), where it is said that Ishmael became an archer. It was first introduced into England in the reign of Egbert the Saxon, but was not, however, used as a martial weapon until the reign of Edward I. The period at which the long bow had attained its meridian fame, may be fixed in the reign of Henry V., whose archers destroyed the whole French cavalry, clothed in complete steel, with their yard long arrows. At the battle of Flodden-field, likewise, the English archers made sad havoc. As to the amusement, the bow was extremely fashionable in the reign of Henry VIII.; and Holinshed reports, that the prince shot as well as any of his guard. After the siege of Devizes, in the civil wars, 1647, the bow, as a military weapon, was entirely laid aside. During the reigns of Charles II. and James II., the amusement was continued, and the Artillery Company, originally the Finsbury Archers, then so celebrated, has survived to the present time; but with the exception of this Company, till within these last fifty years the bow was scarcely known. It derived its name of archery from the bow being, when drawn, in the shape of an arch.

MORRIS DANCE.

The origin of the dance is uniformly given to the Moors. The fandango of Spain, danced to the present day, is the old Moorish

or Morris Dance. It is supposed to have been first brought to England in the time of Edward III., when John of Gaunt returned from Spain.

FIVES AND FIVES' COURTS.

"Tost and retost, the ball incessant flies."

A game so called, because when first played, in the reign of Elizabeth, there were five competitors in it; and not, as generally supposed, from the hand, which strikes the ball, consisting of four fingers and a thumb, vulgarly called a "bunch of fives."

The place so celebrated in the annals of pugilism, derives its name from the circumstance of its being once equally famed for the game of Fives.

GAME OF RACKETS.

The French palm-play, consisted in receiving the ball, and driving it back again with the palm of the hand, similar to our game of Fives. Anciently they played Rackets with their naked hand, then with a glove, which in some instances was lined; afterwards they bound cords and tendons round their hands, to make the ball rebound more forcibly; and hence, says St. Foix, the Racket derived its origin.

DANCING.

Hail, loveliest art! thou canst all hearts insnare,
And make the fairest still appear more fair,

Hence with her sister arts shall dancing claim

An equal right to universal fame;

And Isaac's rigadoon shall live as long

As Raphael's painting, or as Virgil's song."-Jenyns.

Dancing, applied to harmonize the motions of the body, to teach an easy gesture, and a graceful attitude, is highly useful, and the poet's numbers have thus been attuned to its eulogy.

To trace the origin of dancing would be a difficult task. That it was used by the Jews in their religious rites, there can be no question of; for we are informed that "David danced before the Lord with all his might, until his linen ephod came off." It passed from the religious ceremonies of the Jews to the Egyptians, and afterwards to the Greeks and Romans, with whom it was a principal part of the worship of their gods. It was afterwards adopted in many Pagan nations; and Christians ultimately, in Popish countries, celebrated certain festivals, particularly the Sacrament of the Passion of our Lord, with dancing. Socrates learned to dance at an advanced time of life; it is no wonder, therefore, that such honourable mention is made of dancing by his disciples, Plato and Xenophon. The people of Sparta and Crete went to the attack dancing. On the other hand, Cicero reproaches

Galbinus, a consular man, with having danced. Tiberius expelled the dancers from Rome, and Domitian excluded several members from the senate for having danced; but the acts of these imperial despots may be considered rather as the suggestions of caprice and folly, than as the dictates of wisdom and virtue.

Our ancestors used to keep up the sport till midnight, and it was an indispensable accompaniment of weddings. The monks used to dance in their dormitories. Swords, called Dancing Rapiers, were worn in the dancing-schools; which schools existed in the Universities in Evelyn's time. In the grand rebellion, a clergyman was charged with having taught, in the pulpit, that we ought to learn to dance, and that if we could not dance we were damned.

The London servants in the twelfth century used to dance before their masters' doors. Hawkins notices dancing to a bagpipe, played by a domestic; and that no dance tunes are known so early as 1400; "Sellenger's Round," to be traced nearly to Henry VIII., being the oldest. In the most ancient dances, a man and woman danced together, holding each other by the hand or arm; and a kiss was the established fee of the lady's partner. In the time of Queen Elizabeth, at a solemn dancing, were first the grave measures (as now, minuets), then the corrantoes and golliards; at length to frenchmore, or trenchmore, and the cushion dance, after which all the company danced, lord and groom, lady and kitchen-maid, without distinction! Before the reign of Francis I., they danced in France to fife and drum. Coryat notices, that the brother to the Duke of Guise, and his gentlemen, danced corrantoes and lovaltoes in the court of an inu.

FANDANGO.

This far-famed dance, so peculiar to the South Americans, of which writers have said so much, and which has recently been imported into this country, is intended as a dumb representation of courtship. The music begins at first slow and monotonous, but gradually increases from andante to allegro. The gentleman commences by pursuing the lady quietly and gently, who retreats in the like manner, making short circles, and turning on her heel at each time that her partner approaches, quickening her step and evolutions as the tune of the music increases, until she perceives that he seems inclined to give up the pursuit; repentance follows, and the pursuer is in his turn pursued, making similar retreats, and the same circumvolutions that the lady so recently practised; until at last relenting, he turns to meet her, and they approach each other more closely; and, being apparently reconciled, make three or four peculiar stamps with their feet, bow to each other, and retire to their seats literally exhausted, amidst the acclamations of the bystanders.

SKAITING.

Skaiting was first introduced into this country from Holland, at an early period, and the Dutch introduced it from Lapland.Skate or Skait, in the German, signifies to glide along a smooth surface. The Dutch are allowed to be the first skaiters in Europe; the farmers' daughters frequently skaiting on the canals to the market towns with milk, eggs, butter, &c., in baskets on their heads. Fitzstephens, who wrote in the reign of Henry II., thus notices it:-" When that great moor which washes Moorfields at the north wall of the city is frozen over, great companies of young men go to sport upon the ice, and bind to their shoes, bones, as the legs of beasts, and hold stakes in their hands, headed with sharp iron, which sometimes they strike against the ice, and then these men go with speed, as doth a bird in the air, or darts shot from some warlike engine. Sometimes two men set themselves at a distance, and run one against another, as if it were at tilt, with these stakes, wherewith one or both parties are thrown down, not without some hurt to their bodies, and after their fall, by reason of their violent motion, are carried at a good distance one from another. Thus do the young men exercise themselves in counterfeit battles, that they may bear the brunt more strongly when they come to it in good earnest.'

Some singular specimens of such bones, used as skaits by the citizens of London, are preserved in the curious museum of London Antiquities, collected by Mr. C. Roach Smith.

BULL-BAITING IN ENGLAND.

"In Lincolnshire, where virtuous worth
Does raise the minstrelsy, not birth;
Where bulls do choose the boldest king

And ruler, o'er the men of string."-Hudibras.

The first bull-bait held in this country was held at Stamford in Lincolnshire, about the year 1209, and was introduced from the following circumstances:- "Earl Warrenare, lord of the town, standing upon the walls of the castle, observed two bulls fighting, until the butchers' dogs interposed and pursued one of them through the town, which sight so pleased his lordship, that he gave the meadow where the fray began to the butchers of the town, to be used as a common after the first grass was mown, on condition that they should find a mad bull the day six weeks before Christmas-day, for the continuance of that sport for ever."

BEAR-BAITING.

This cruel and unmanly amusement is of African origin, and was introduced into Europe by the Romans. Long, however, as

it disgraced the continent, the Romans, to their credit, did not introduce it here; judging, it is presumed, that our ancestors were of themselves savage enough. The first we read of bear-baiting in England, was in the reign of king John, at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, where "thys straynge passtime was introduced by some Italyans for his highness's amusement, wherewith he and his court were highly delyghted."

CATS.

"E'en now I see, descending from his throne,
Thy venerable Cat, O Whittington!"

Cats were brought into England from the island of Cyprus, by some foreign merchants, who came hither for tin. In the old Welsh laws, a kitten from its birth till it could see, was valued at a penny; when it began to mouse, twopence; and after it had killed mice, at fourpence, which was the price of a calf! Wild cats were kept by our ancient kings for hunting. The officers who had the charge of these cats, seem to have had appointments of equal consequence with the masters of the king's hounds; they were called catatores.

DOGS.

The bull-dog was originally from Italy; the greyhound and the beagle, as well as the fox-hound, are peculiar to Britain. This country was once famous for the export of dogs; they are thus described in a passage of Appian.

"There is a kind of dogs of mighty fame
For hunting, worthy of a fairer frame,

By painted Britons brave in war they're bred,
Are beagles call'd, and to the chase are led;
Their bodies small, and of so mean a shape,

You'd think them curs that under tables gape."

The blood-hound was once peculiar to this country, but now is seldom met with save in the West India Islands, particularly St. Domingo and the island of St. Lucia.

HAWKING.

Hawking, according to Beckmann, was known to the Greeks and Romans; its origin, in England, cannot be traced till the reign of king Ethelbert, the Saxon monarch, in the year 760, when he wrote to Germany for a brace of falcons. In the reign of James I., Sir James Monson is said to have given a thousand pounds for a cast of hawks. In the reign of Edward III., it was made felony to steal a hawk; to take its eggs, even in a person's own ground, was punishable with imprisonment for a year and a day, together with a fine at the king's pleasure. In former times, the custom of carrying a hawk on the hand was confined to men of high dis