POLNISCH-OSTRAU, A town in the Crownland of Silesia. Austria, on the Gstrawitza, opposite Mithrischtistrau, 00 miles west-southwest of Cracow. Its importance is due to the extensive coal deposits of the neigh borhood, which form the southwestern part of the great Upper Silesia coal-belt. The town produces malt and liquors. Population, in 1890, 13,200; in 1900, 18,800; chiefly Czechs.
POLO (from Tibetan pub/. willow, the ma terial of which the ball is made in Tibet). A game played on horseback. closely resembling hockey (q.v.). While the antiquity of polo in the East is undeniable, in England and America it is of comparatively recent origin. Persian odes, sonic of them thought. to antedate the Christian Era, celebrate the glories of the game; and it is a matter of undoubted record that it has flourished at different courts of Central Asia from the tenth eentury. China and Japan also had a game closely resembling the Persian sport. The game seems to have been first adopted in In dia about 1764, by the English tea-planters in C'achar, from whom it spread to the English merchants of Calcutta. In 1809 some subaltern officers of the Tenth Hussars, stationed at Alder shot, introduced the game into England. The possibilities of the sport were immediately recog nized, and at the present time the game is widely played in Great Britain and her colonies, and is almost as popular in the United States. The Hurlingham Club. London, became the acknowl edged law-making authority, not only for Great Britain, but for her colonies. The executive, how ever, is the County Polo Association, which does not concern itself with rules, but regulates the principal contests, the County Cup Series, dividing England into four divisions, the winners only of which play in the finals at Burlingham, where the Inter-Regimental Cups are also played for. The Champion Cup and the Hunt Cup Cham pionship are played for over the course of the Ranelagh Club. another noted home of the game.
Polo was introduced into the United States in 1876 by James Gordon Bennett, and first prac ticed in Dickler's Riding Academy, New ,York City. The Westchester Polo Club was formed in New York City in the same year and a year later it went into summer quarters at Newport, R. 1., which has been the American headquarters of the game ever since. The game went West as far as the Pacific coast, and a National Polo Associa tion was organized. consisting of the principal
Eastern clubs. Many other clubs exist. besides those affiliated with the association. especially in the Middle West and on the Pacific Slope.
The system of handicapping adopted by the American Polo Association is universally com mended. In order to give younger players a chance. each individual is penalized with so many goals, from two upward, according to his skill. This penalty he takes with him wherever he plays. So that if the penalties on a team of four, each of whom is penalized, amount, say. to 16 goals. and they meet another team of four whose indi vidual penalties aggregate only 10. the first team has to make 6 goals before it can begin to score. Of course this penal handicapping does not apply to ehampionship and open gamin's.
The rules of play adopted by the Westchester Polo Club are those which practically govern all American play. They haNt- been essentially the same all through the game; only minor altera tions. like forbidding hooking mallets and raising the height of the ponies, first in 1879 from thir teen hands to fourteen One. anal subsequently to fourteen two. having been made.
The game is played on a smoothly rolled green, when possible about 750 feet long and 500 wide. A white board ten invites high forms a boundary along the sides of the course. the ends being open, except that in the centre of each end there stand two goal posts 24 feet apart, made of very light material so as to break easily in ease of collision. The ball is of basswood painted white, inches in diameter. and weighs five ounces. The mallets or sticks are generally of Mal:leen cane, or other light wood, covered of the handle with rubber or leather, and from fifty to fifty-six inches long. The mallet head is generally cigar shaped, two inches thick and eight or nine inches long, of strong wood. and fixed on the handle at any angle the player finds most effective to his wrist notion. A loop of thin leather (to break easily) is slipped over the wrist, and the mallets weigh from 15 to 20 ounces. The ponies are not limited to any particular breed, hut those that been broken to the game give a great ad vantage to the players. They must he aetive, spirited, and sympathetic with the game. Each rider changes his pony with every period of play.