The Traditional Children's Games of England Scotland
& Ireland In Dictionary Form - Volume 2

With Tunes(sheet music), Singing-rhymes(lyrics), Methods Of Playing with diagrams and illustrations.

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	256	THREE HOLES
	to be most attached to, or chosen him whom she is believed to regard with aversion; either of which events is sure to throw the company into a state of outrageous merriment.—Chambers' Popular Rhymesy p. 127. Mr. W. Ballantyne has given me a description of this game as played at Biggar when he was a boy, which is practically the same as this. Three Holes Three holes were made in the ground by the players driving the heels of their boots into the earth, and then pirouetting. The game was played with the large marbles (about the size of racket balls) known as u bouncers," sometimes as " bucks." The first boy stood at u taw," and bowled his marble along the ground into I. (It was bad form to make the holes too large ; they were then u wash-hand basins," and made the game too easy.) Taking the marble in his hand} and placing his foot against I, he bowled the marble into 2. He was now u going up for his firsts." Starting at 2, he bowled the marble into 3, and had now " taken off his firsts," and was " coming down for his seconds." He then bowled the marble back again into 2, and afterwards into 1. He then "went up for his thirds," bowling the marble into 2, and afterwards into 3, and had then won the game. When he won in this fashion, he was said to have " taken off the game." But he didn't often do this. In going up for his firsts, perhaps his marble, instead of going into 2, stopped at A ; then the second boy started from taw, and, having sent his marble into I, bowled at A; if he hit the marble, he started for 2, from where his marble stopped; if he missed, or didn't gain the hole he was making for, or knocked his anta­gonist's marble into a hole, the first boy played again, hitting the other marble, if it brought him nearer to the hole he was making for, or else going on. In such a case as I have supposed, it would be the player's aim to knock A on to B, or some place between 2 and 3, so as to enter 2, and then strike again so as to near 3, enter 3, and strike on his way down for his seconds,