Results Details

Much speculation had coursed among the contest fields as to the true identity of the smooth-shaven Thorgeir. Prior to his winning the swimming he had won talmits for climbing the "mast," a tall pole of needle wood, some fifty feet high, smoothed and peeled; for jumping the "crevice," actually a broad jump, on level land, where marks are made with strings, to the point at which the back heel strikes the earth; walking the "oar," actually, a long pole; and throwing the spear, a real spear I am pleased to say, both for distance and accuracy; counting the distance and the accuracy of the spear events as two events, which they are, he had thus, prior to the swimming, won five talmits. He had done less well in the singing contest, though he much prided himself on his singing voice; he thought, in that one, the judges had been against him; he did not score highly either in the composition of poetry contest nor in the rhyming games; "I am not a skald," he explained to me later; he did much better, I might mention, in the riddle guessing; but not well enough to win; he missed the following riddle; "What is black, has eighty legs and eats gold?"; the answer, though it might not seem obvious, was Black Sleen, the ship of Thorgard of Scagnar; the Forkbeard's answer had been Black Shark, the legendary ship of Torvald, reputed discoverer and first Jarl of Torvaldsland; he acknowledged his defeat in this contest, however, gracefully; "I was a fool," he grumbled to me. "I should have known!" Though I attempted to console him, he remained much put out with himself, and for more than an ahn afterward. In spite of his various losses, he had, even in his own modest opinion, done quite well in the contests. He was in excellent humor. Perhaps the most serious incident of the contests had occurred in one of the games of bat and ball; in this contest there are two men on each side, and the object is to keep the ball out of the hands of the other team; no one man may hold the ball for more than the referee's count of twenty; he may, however, throw it into the air, provided it is thrown over his head, and catch it again himself; the ball may be thrown to the partner, or struck to him with the bat; the bat, of course, drives the ball with incredible force; the bats are of heavy wood, rather broad, and the ball, about two inches in diameter, is also of wood, and extremely hard; this is something like a game of "keep away" with two men in the middle. - (Marauders of Gor, Chapter )