The players that made the first trip abroad in the interest of the

National Game may well be styled the Argonauts of Base-ball, and though
they brought back with them but little of the golden fleece, the trip
being financially a failure, their memory is one that should always be
kept green in the hearts of the game"s lovers, if for no other reason
than because they were the first to show our British cousins what the
American athlete could do when it came both to inventing and playing a
game of his own
The players that made the first trip abroad in the interest of the
National Game may well be styled the Argonauts of Base-ball, and though
they brought back with them but little of the golden fleece, the trip
being financially a failure, their memory is one that should always be
kept green in the hearts of the game"s lovers, if for no other reason
than because they were the first to show our British cousins what the
American athlete could do when it came both to inventing and playing a
game of his own.

But there was no machinery for such a thing

But there was no machinery for such a thing. There was no method by
which the great heart of one country could speak with that of another.
Our obsolete diplomatic envoys, the errand-boys of international
politics, were mere artifices, tending to cement rather than to dispel
the mutual distrust of nations. What, then, stood in the way of
world-understanding? What was the cause of the blindness which permitted
men to be led like dumb cattle to the slaughter?

"But, you ask, what of the real American, descended from the men who

fought in the War of Independence and the Civil War
"But, you ask, what of the real American, descended from the men who
fought in the War of Independence and the Civil War. Yes--what of him?
From earliest boyhood he has been taught that Britain is our traditional
enemy. To secure existence we had to fight her. To maintain existence
we fought her again in 1812. When we were locked in a death-struggle
with the rebellious South, she tried to hurt our cause--although history
will show that the real heart of Britain was solidly with the North. In
our short life as a people we find that, always, the enemy is Britain.
In one day could we change the teaching of a lifetime? The soul of
America was not dead, but it was buried beneath the conflicting elements
in which lay her ultimate strength, but her present weakness.

They went in and urged their father to go with them down to the brook to

see the freshet, but he said they must wait till after tea
They went in and urged their father to go with them down to the brook to
see the freshet, but he said they must wait till after tea. 'It is too
wet to go now,' said he.