Page:The American Boy's Handy Book edition 1.djvu/297

act of throwing such "soakers" should be forever ruled out of the game.

No blows are allowed to be struck by the hand, or by anything but the regulation snowball, and, of course, no kicking is permitted.

The following sketch of a snow battle in which the author took part when a boy, will give an idea of the excitement and interest of the game:

It was a year when the Indian summer had been prolonged into the winter. Christmas had come and gone and a new year begun, but not one flake of snow had fallen on the river bank or neighboring hills.

Such was the condition of things one January morning in a Kentucky town upon the banks of the Ohio River, where myself and some sixty other boys were gathered in a little frame school-house.

We had about made up our minds that old Jack Frost was a humbug, and winter a myth; but when the bell tapped for recess, the first boy out gave a shout which passed from mouth to mouth until it became a universal cheer as we reached the play-grounds, for floating airily down from a dull, leaden, gray sky came hundreds of white snow-flakes!

Winter had come! Jack Frost was no longer a humbug! Before the bell again recalled us to our study the ground was whitened with snow, and the school divided into two opposing armies. That night was a busy one—all hands set to work manufacturing ammunition sleds and shields for the coming battle. It was my fortune to be chosen as one of the garrison of the fort. There was not a boy late next morning—in fact, when the teachers arrived to open the school, they found all the scholars upon the play-grounds, rolling huge snowballs. All