THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF SPORT

Author:
SI Staff

BLOOD TELLS AGAIN
Remember Nashua and Swaps? Well, last week their Thoroughbred 'half brothers,' just turned 3, were running on separate roads both signposted Louisville and the Derby. At Hialeah, Bold Ruler (left), like Nashua a son of Nasrullah, outran some of the best 3-year-olds in Florida in the Bahamas Stakes. At Santa Anita, Prince Khaled (below), like Swaps a son of Khaled, proved himself the hope of the West

BOLD RULER, ATKINSON UP, BEATS (FROM RIGHT) GEN. DUKE, FEDERAL HILL AND GALLANT MAN

PRINCE KHALED, WITH EDDIE ARCARO UP, GALLOPS TO 9½-LENGTH VICTORY IN 1 1/16-MILE CALIFORNIA CHAMPION BREEDERS' STAKES

THE EDUCATION OF A PRINCE
The bringing up of Prince Charles, 8-year-old heir to the British throne, took an unprecedented turn last week when he enrolled in a London pre-prep school. After studies the Prince and his classmates, by immemorial tradition, were turned out onto the playing fields, soon were involved in immemorial fisticuffs. Charles acquitted himself royally

FIRST DAY, A BONNY ANGEL

ON SECOND DAY, CHARLES (CENTER, BEHIND BALL) GETS BRIEFED ON RULES BY HEADMASTER TOWNSEND

CHARLES, WHO PLAYED OUTSIDE RIGHT, PURSUES BALL WHICH HAS ELUDED OPPONENT

PRINCE SHOWS OFF DRIBBLING TO TEAMMATE

HEADMASTER LOOKS ON ADMIRINGLY AS PRINCE KEEPS HIS EYE ON THE BALL AND DISPLAYS FINE FOLLOW-THROUGH IN MID-FIELD BOOT

CHARLES (RIGHT) ENTERS A SHOVING MATCH

THE PRINCE PARRIES A RIGHT HOOK WITH HIS ELBOW

AND LUNGES FOR WRESTLING HOLD

SPORT: MIRROR OF A PEOPLE

The Near East, now the center of the world's political concern, is also the setting of ancient and revelatory pastimes, sketched by Artist John Groth on a recent trip

Fast dromedaries, bred for speed and long the backbone of premotorized desert cavalry, get racing test over four-furlong course in Aden, southwest tip of Arabian peninsula. Well-bred dromedaries can outleg Thoroughbreds over short sprints as well as outlast them on patrol.

Dismounting from bushed pony, Egyptian polo player is proffered a soft drink by a Nubian servant at the Gezira Sporting Club outside Cairo. The most ancient of stick-and-ball games, polo originated in Persia and spread eastward throughout the Orient.

Stick-Wielding Yemeni (currently "at war" with Britain) fight at a desert encampment on the border of Saudi Arabia. The sport is a relatively harmless parody of Saracen scimitar duels. The contestants parry the blows with hand shields and wear heavy felt gloves to protect the "sword" arm. A touch on the body is scored as a "wound."

Pitted partridges, tiny natural fighters, battle in a cocking-main before Afghans in a Kunduz bazaar. For lack of gamecocks, Near East tribesmen have been matching quail and partridge in such tests for more than 3,000 years.

Whipping game, a small boys' trial of manliness, was noted often by Groth in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq, but he was never able to figure out how the winner was determined.

Nubian boys race their "water bugs" across the Nile from Elephantine Island to Aswan, near the site of Nasser's projected dam. The boats are made of old boards and flattened oil tins and are propelled by hand or tin-can paddles.

Stooping falcons and worrying dogs pursue gazelle in Kuwait desert. The birds are fed from the eye sockets of a calf's head to train them to strike at the quarry's eyes. In their swift descent they are often impaled on the horns.

Proud Kuwait Sheik bears his lanner falcon on his right hand (Western hawkers carry with the left) to a bustard hunt in the tiny, oil-rich principality on the Persian Gulf. Despite its decline in the West, falconry has been a thriving, continuous pursuit in the Near East since 600 B.C.

Shotguns blasting, Qashgai tribesmen gallop beneath a rain of plummeting partridges in the mountainous Iranian province of Fars. A bellicose, nomadic people, the Qashgai hunt without dogs, raising the coveys by riding upon them until they rise.

TWO PHOTOS

PHOTO

NINE ILLUSTRATIONS

February 11, 1957