Sporting and Athletic Records

2 ARCHERY In England five public Archery meetings are held every year, namely, the Grand National, the Leamington and Midland Counties, the Crystal Palace, the Grand Western, and the Grand Northern meeting. Besides these, the different clubs hold meetings throughout the season at which various competitions and handicaps are contested. Two kinds of Archery are still practised, (i) Long distance shooting or shooting at the clout and (2) Target-shooting. Shooting at the clout is carried on at 9, 10, 11 or even 12 score yards [i.e. 180—240 yards]. Its chief votaries to-day are the Woodmen of Arden and the Royal Com­ pany of Archers Scotland. The clout consists of a black-centred white target two feet six inches in diameter placed at an angle of about sixty degrees, with its lower edge raised some inches above the ground. The clout was originally only a piece of canvas stretched over a wooden frame without any backing, hence the name (clout = cloth).Formerly the scoring was as follows:—a clout (i.e., a hit) scores 2 and all arrows within four bows' length or 24 feet of the target count—the nearest being the shot and scoring 1. Nowadays, circles are drawn round the clout at distances of eighteen inches three, six, nine and twelve feet, an arrow within the outermost circle scoring 1, and in the next succeeding circles 2, 3, 4 and 5 respectively: a hit in the clout scoring 6. But by far the most popular form of the sport at the present time is target-shooting. The targets are placed at any distance from 50 to 120 yards. Reckoning from the centre the usual colours are gold (= 9), red (= 7), blue (= 5), black (= 3), and white (= 1). The method of scoring is in favour of the archer, that is to say, if the arrow touches any two colours in the target, the hit is reckoned as being in that colour which counts more, no matter though the greater part of the arrow be in the lower colour. The competition generally consists in making the best score out of a given number of arrows at given distances. The most general competitions are as follows:—