Page:The American Boy's Handy Book edition 1.djvu/228

ern Ohio. In some parts of this section it used to be a great favorite among the boys, who would throw the arrows up perpendicularly an amazing distance. Arrows can be bought in any city, but most boys prefer to make their own, leaving the "store arrows for the girls to use with their pretty "store bows." The essential quality in an arrow is straightness. A spear-head can be made of an old piece of hoop-iron, a broken blade of a knife, or any similar piece of iron or steel, by grinding it down to the proper form and then binding it on to the shaft with fish line, silk, or a "waxed end," such as shoemakers use, or the arrow may have a blunt end with a sharp-pointed nail in the head. These arrows should only be used in target practice or when after game; they are dangerous on the play-ground. A simple whip-bow may be made by any boy in a few minutes out of an elastic sapling or branch, and an arrow cut out of a pine shingle with a pocket-knife. Image missingUsing the Throw-Stick. This can be improved upon as much as may be desired by substituting a piece of straight-grained, well-seasoned wood for the green branch, and regularly made Indian arrows for the crude pine ones.

The same race that invented the wonderful boomerang also originated the equally ingenious throw-stick illustrated by Fig. 127, page 196. Although any of my readers can, in a few moments, fashion a throw-stick from a piece of wood by the aid of a pocket-knife, I doubt if they could use the instrument to any advantage without considerable practice.