They take their billiards seriously in Canada. They make almost a crusade of the business. Missionaries of the game are militant and go armed to the teeth with arguments to meet the ranks of Tuscany. But the thread of their verbosity is sometimes drawn finer than the staple of their argument, and Tuscany stands a good chance of being occasionally bored.
Yet there is a lot of unconscious humour in the activities of those enthusiasts. They have picked up the alms-basket of words about billiards. The broken meat of the game is again put to use; and "facts" about its origin, which every historian who knows his subject has abandoned years ago, are ladled out for public consumption with a lavish hand by the native writers. For instance, in a book, "The Game of Billiards," published in Toronto, that delightful and familiar wheeze about our old friend Cathire (or Cathaoir) More, the Irish king who lived and died in the first half of the second century, and of whom it is alleged that he bequeathed fifty billiard balls of brass, and pools and cues of the same material, is given special prominence as "conclusive evidence" that the game of billiards was known prior to 148 A.D.!
But the richest humour lies in other sections of this publication. It appears that billiards has become universally esteemed for its "wonderful sanitary advantages." There are other reasons, of course, but "above all, for its wonderful sanitary advantages." The sanitation committees of our municipal and other local authorities should have their special attention drawn to this argument. Billiard table manufacturers please note.
It is an old argument in favour of billiards that the exercise necessarily associated with the game contributes to health, but never, surely, has this argument been stated with such charming frankness and artless sincerity. "Hypochondriacs and persons suffering with bilious and even pulmonary disorders have gradually recovered from their maladies by indulging in the game, where private tables afforded them the opportunity." "Billiards for Biliousness" might be a very attractive heading for the advertisements of a go-ahead firm. "Billiard Balls for Bilious People" might result in as substantial profits as have been earned through a similar advertisement which recommends a certain well known pill. Why not?
Another illustration is given showing how billiards may cure yellow jaundice. For proof of the cure of liver complaints by billiards the reader is referred to more than one specific case. And instances are related on every other page of the cure of consumption by the same treatment. Why should England wait? What we want is not a Consumption Crusade, but a Billiard Crusade. Another B.C.C. as a matter of fact—Billiards Consumption Crusade—to act as auxiliary to the National Health Committee. References may be had from Canada (if not available at home) where, according to the publication under review, diseases of all kinds which have become almost chronic have been driven from the human system by billiards.
The gentleman who is responsible for the production of this book is rather behind the times in one important matter, by the way. In clinching an argument he takes occasion to say "The billiard room, as with the nursery, is an indispensable portion of an Englishman's home, when he can afford it." A study of our vital statistics would have warned him of the danger of using an Englishman's "indispensable nursery" as a clincher.
But we get nearer to him when he advocates the game on moral grounds. There is no doubt about his attitude here:—
"The great feature which most likely will eventually lead to the general adoption of billiards as the game for home—the game to be introduced into private houses and shared with the families of all who are wealthy enough to afford the luxury—is this: That it will admit of being enjoyed in common by both the male and female members of the family circle. Neither sex can enjoy an amusement so rationally or innocently when alone, for in company they exert a happy influence on each other, and more than one-half of the vices and follies which affect society result from the separation of the sexes in the pursuit of their different amusements. These giant plague spots of society, as at present constituted, gambling and intemperance, seldom dare to show their features in the drawing-room, while they often obtrude their unwelcome presence into places from which ladies are excluded."Nobody can mistake his meaning anyway. And he goes on to draw pretty pictures of the future—
"..of happy and healthy wives and children, more affectionate and fond of home, with fathers sleeping more soundly at night, and all the world cleaner and sweeter for the adoption of billiards as the pastime of man. The billiard cue is to be the salvation of the race. Happiness hangs on a fifty up—but it must be played on a private table. You cannot buy peace, comfort, love, friendship, and all the other desirable things by playing on a public table; you must first buy your own table, and trade your canons and your hazards for happiness on it. The unsophisticated Canadian! He smiled, as he wrote private table—"with a smile that was childlike, and bland."