marbles

   I regard golf as an expensive way of playing marbles.

—Chesterton, G(ilbert) K(eith)

Marbles of the dancing floor Break bitter furies of complexity, Those images that yet Fresh images beget, That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea.

—Yeats,W(illiam) B(utler)

They find pearlsby theseashore, diamondsand rubiesin certain cliffs, but never go out of set purpose to look for them.If they happento find some, they polishthem, and give them to the children who, when they are small, feel proud and pleased with such gaudy decorations. But after, when they grow a bit older, and notice that only babies like such toys, they lay them aside. Their parents don't have to sayanything, they simply put these trifles away out of a shamefaced sense that they're no longer suitable, just as our children when they grow up put away their rattles, marbles and dolls.

—More, SirThomas

Mr Raymond Martin, beyond question, was born in the gutter, and bred in a Board-School, where they played marbles. He was further (I give the barest handful from great store) a Flopshus Cad, an Outrageous Stinker, a Jelly-bellied Flag-flapper (this was Stalky's contribution), and several other things which it is not seemly to put down.

—Kipling, (Joseph) Rudyard