Our Baseball Club and How It Won the Championship

Our Baseball Club and How It Won the Championship

By Noah Brooks.

Table of Contents

1. Titlepage
2. Imprint
3. Introduction
4. Our Baseball Club and How It Won the Championship
   1. I: Great Expectations
   2. II: A Scrub Game
   3. III: After the Battle
   4. IV: Reorganization Begins
   5. V: Notes of Preparation
   6. VI: An Interesting Episode
   7. VII: In the Field
   8. VIII: A Turn of the Tide
   9. IX: Hope and Suspense
   10. X: How the Good News Came
   11. XI: In a New Field
   12. XII: After the Victory
   13. XIII: Pride Has a Fall
   14. XIV: A Strange Message from Home
   15. XV: Mike Costigan’s Discovery
   16. XVI: The Conspiracy Laid Open
   17. XVII: A Famous Victory
5. List of Illustrations
6. Colophon
7. Uncopyright

Imprint

This ebook is the product of many hours of hard work by volunteers for Standard Ebooks, and builds on the hard work of other literature lovers made possible by the public domain.

This particular ebook is based on a transcription from Project Gutenberg and on digital scans from the Internet Archive.

The source text and artwork in this ebook are believed to be in the United States public domain; that is, they are believed to be free of copyright restrictions in the United States. They may still be copyrighted in other countries, so users located outside of the United States must check their local laws before using this ebook. The creators of, and contributors to, this ebook dedicate their contributions to the worldwide public domain via the terms in the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication. For full license information, see the Uncopyright at the end of this ebook.

Standard Ebooks is a volunteer-driven project that produces ebook editions of public domain literature using modern typography, technology, and editorial standards, and distributes them free of cost. You can download this and other ebooks carefully produced for true book lovers at standardebooks.org.

Introduction

When we consider how strong a hold the pastime of baseball playing has upon our people, it is a little surprising that more frequent use of the game, as a framework, has not been made by writers of fiction. There are very few Americans, certainly very few of the younger generation, who are not only familiar with the nomenclature and rules of baseball, but are enthusiastic lovers of the sport. Even among the gentler sex, who may be regarded as spectators only of the game, there is to be found much sound information and an intelligent acquaintance with the details of baseball playing; while every hearty and wholesomely taught boy knows everything worth knowing about the game, the famous players, the historic contests, and the notable features of the sport, as practiced in various sections of the republic.

To write an introduction to a story whose slender plot should be threaded on a baseball match seems to be an almost superfluous work. But I am glad that Mr. Brooks has undertaken to illustrate “The National Game” by a story of outdoor life, founded on fact and incidentally introducing personages which are not wholly creatures of his imagination. The tale here told very cleverly gives the reader a glimpse of the ups and downs, the trials and the triumphs of a baseball club. It is written by one who is thoroughly well informed of the things concerning which he gives such vivid pictures, and, while nothing is really needed to popularize the game, I am sure the story will commend itself to every lover of pure and wholesome literature.

A. G. Spalding

Our Baseball Club and How It Won the Championship

I

Great Expectations

Alice Howell was flattening her pretty nose against the window pane as she looked ruefully out into the misty atmosphere that surrounded her father’s house in North Catalpa. It was eight o’clock in the morning, and the great baseball match was set for two o’clock, that afternoon. As soon as she had risen, Alice had run to the window to see what were the signs of the sky, for Alice was an ardent lover of the American game, and her heart was set on the great match that was to come off on the Agricultural Grounds, near Catalpa, that day. The sky was dull and lowering, and there was little chance that the game would be called.

“Your father, the Judge, says you should come to breakfast right away, miss,” said the little handmaid of the house.

Alice turned from the window with an impatient sigh, saying “Oh dear, Jessie, do you suppose the Jonesville Nine will come up to play the Catalpas, this afternoon?”

“ ’Deed I don’t know, miss. I hope so, for Miss Anstress has promised me that I shall go over to see the game if it is played, and goodness only knows when I shall get off again to see a baseball match if I don’t go today.”

“But look at the weather! It’s as dark as a pocket, and it looks as if it might rain at any moment. Oh dear! oh dear! it’s too bad, so it is. And this is to be the last game of the season, and the decisive one, too.” And so, more talking to herself than to the small servant who trotted behind her, with a sympathetic air, the pretty Miss Alice went to the breakfast-table where her father waited for her with an aspect of amused dignity.

“One cannot see across the river for the fog, papa,” said the girl, with a disconsolate tone, as she seated herself. “The fences are dripping with moisture, and the dam roars just as it always does when there is a rainstorm coming up. How very provoking!”

“Well, and has my little girl forgotten that it was the day before yesterday that Farmer Boggs was in here from Sugar Grove and said that unless they had