The Athletes and Athletic Sports of Scotland

68 ATHLETIC SPORTS OF SCOTLAND. ever have been called Scottish wrestling, andput on the pro­ gramme ofa Scottish gathering of any standing, showswhat a want oforganisation exists inScottish athletics.At present there are three differentstyles of putting thestone and three different styles ofwrestling practised by Scottish competitors at Scottish sports. Each stylehas aright to be called Scottish. Any style used ina public competitionin Scotland by Scotsmen is a Scot­ tish style ; no style atpresent practised in Scotland has a right to be called the Scottish style. The same state ofmatters exists in England, and various attempts have been made tointroduce a style neither Cumberland, Lancashire, nor Cornish. At present a style which can be described only incircumlocutory fashion as " The-catch as-catch-can-first-down-to-lose" style has met with considerable success. Its mainfeatures willbe understood from its title. It doesnot bind the competitors to take hold inany definite manner, and the man who is first down loses immedi­ ately he isdown. It aims at getting rid of the weakand unsatis­ factory points ofthe threeexisting styles. A REPRESENTATIVE SOCIETY WANTED.— Whatis needed in Scotland is a Societyof Scottish athletes aided by the gentlemen who patronise and support Scottish athletic sports to settle defi­ nitely the rules under which every event in the programme oi Scottish games shallbe contested. Regarding wrestling, there are two main points to be settled—(i) How a hold is to be taken, whether by any fixed method as in the Cumberlandstyle, or by allowing eachto take hold as he best can; (2)when is a man to be considered down ? The position in which a man is most unmistakably down is when he is flat on his back. In that position the mainparts ofthe body touching the groundare the head, shoulders, and buttocks, and the simplest definition of being down would be to consider aman down whenever oneor more of these points of the body touch the ground—the one whose head,shoulder, or buttock firsttouches the groundto be the loser. NOTED SCOTCH WRESTLERS,— Thewant of encouragement of