Athletics and Football (extract)

ATHLETIC SPORTS IN ENGLAND 29 The annals of the eighteenth century are full of accounts of wagers for the performance of athletic feats, both sublime as well as ridiculous. The majority of the genuine athletic performances are those of professional pedestrians, amateurs only figuring occasionally in these wagers, and often in prepos- Race between elderlfyat manand manwith jockey onback. terous ones. Luttrell's ' Diary ' tells us of a wager made by a German of sixty-four years old to walk 300 miles in ' Hide Park ' in six days, which he did 1 within the time, and a mile over.' In 1780 the 'Gentleman's Magazine' tells us that a man of seventy-fiveyears old ran four milesand a half round