LexRides

[brokebike]

An excerpt from Patrick Leigh Fermour’s ‘Between the Woods and the Water’...

[The year is 1933 and the author, Leigh Fermor is an eighteen year old, walking across Europe. He is staying with some Hungarian nobility in a big house near the border with Slovakia]

“Great wings formed a courtyard and, from a terrace leading to a ceremonial door, branching and balustraded steps descended in a sweep. As I was crossing this place d’armes, several people were coming down the steps, and one of them was Count Józsi. Forewarned by Lászlo, he spotted me at once. He waved a greeting and cried, “You are just what we need! Come along!” I followed him and the others across the yard to a shed. “Have you ever played bike-polo?” he asked, catching me by the elbow. I had played a version of it at school with walking sticks and a tennis-ball on the hard tennis-courts; it was thought rather disreputable. But here they had real polo-sticks cut down to the right size and a proper polo ball and the shed was full of battered but sturdy machines. Józsi was my captain, and a famous player of the real game called Bethlen had the rival team; two other guests and footmen and a groom were the rest of the players. The game was quick, reckless and full of collisions, but there was nothing to match the joy of hitting the ball properly: it made a loud smack and gave one a tempting glimmer of what the real thing might be like. I couldn’t make out why all the shins weren’t barked to the bone; nor why, as one of the goals backed on the house, none of the windows were broken. The other side won but we scored four goals, and when the iron Maltese Cats were back in their stands, we limped back to the steps, where Countess Denise and her sister Cecile and some others had been leaning on the balustrade like ladies gazing down into the lists.”
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[dixietiff]

"I couldn’t make out why all the shins weren’t barked to the bone; nor why, as one of the goals backed on the house, none of the windows were broken."

I am always barked to the bone... apparently they weren't playing hard enough.

This is awesome though.
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T$

[the great zombo]

this proves that hard court was being playing in 1933. messman and Seattle can blow one. you didn't make up shit. you just never thought that anyone would read this. hahahaha
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the/great\zombo

[ihearthuckabees]

I love that it was, and of course still is, thought of as "rather disreputable". See you kids at the courts.

[shadowalker]

Nice read. It might've looked something like this "sweet polo edit" I found from 1940...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7TYijfh3FA&feature=player_embedded


originally posted @ polo-velo-bloomington.blogspot.com/

[brokebike]

that guy's shot is amazing... I'd love to be able to shoot a ball like that. I bet he can't handle the ball for shit, though.
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