Cricket 1884

d e o . 25,1884, CRICKET; A WEEKLY REGORD OP THE GAME. 489 Inns. Runs. Aver. 1876.. , 28 .. 798 .. 28.14 1877 27 .. 788 .. 29.5 1878 23 .. 894 .. 17.3 1879 20 .. 476 .. 23.16 1880 26 .. 691 .. 22.19 1881 25 .. 527 .. 21.2 1882 22 .. 422 .. 19.4 1883 23 .. 750 .. 32.14 1884 24 .. 674 .. 28.2 Total .. 465 11,655 25.30 Played first County Match, August 11,1862. Played last County Match, August 21,1884. Played in all 130 County Matches, won 48, lost 47, drawn 35. Played two tie matches with Surrey. Played 26 matches with Notts, 13 of which were drawn. Highest Middlesex finnings, 537 v . ) „ Gloucester, August 16 and 17,1883 I g 3■! Lowest Middlesex-innings, 82 y. ['-’ <3a Nottingham, June 12,1882 J w ^ Highest individual innings, 145 v. Glou­ cester, August, 1883. 1884, the only year without getting an 0 in First Class Matches. SOME HIGHEST INNINGS. 1868, June 20, Sodthgate v. Quidnuncs ..141 1868, July 2, Gents v. Players.....................165 1869, July 8, Southgate v. Butterflies....... 159 1870, Aug. 19, Gents of South v. North . .179 1876, July 28, Harrow Wanderers v. Leeds Clarence...............................................157 1881, June 23, Middlesex v. Oxford............ 128 1883, June 9, Orleans Club v. Middlesex Club...................................................... 144 1883, Aug. 16, Middlesex v. Gloucester... .145 The next number of C eicket , to be published on Thursday, Jan. 29th, -will con­ tain Portrait and Biography of Mn. W. E. R olled , of Surrey. C H R I S T M A S C R I C K E T . From England , of Deo. 20. B y L ord H arkis . A n article on cricket at Christmas must seem to many most inappropriate. The lovers of the noble game know that that is hardly the case. In raid-winter there is much doing with regard to it both at home and abroad. At home there are all the ar­ rangements to be made for the coming season, and the annuals devoted to the averages and analyses of members of hun­ dreds of clubs appear. But certainly what is done is not of an active character, though cricket does begin, and in the heart of London, too, much earlier than many people imagine. Not far from Liverpool Street Station last winter, of dry afternoons, might be heard the cheerful crack of a driving bat meeting the ball. If the curious passer-by had entered through the high black hoarding, from behind which came the sounds, he would have found, in a space not large enough for a bowling green, with not a blade of grass to be seen, all the necessary paraphernalia for practising; some desperate enthusiast was getting himself ready for the bowling he was not to meet for some months yet. But these same lovers of cricket know, too, that Christmas cricket is no misnomer. Though the favourite bat may have been laid aside in oil, the spiked boots, the gloves, and the pads laid on the shelf for a season; though the grounds that but a few weeks back echoed to the cheers of thousands, are now desolate, the game is being pursued, with as great ardour as they themselves could show, on many a ground in many lands of lower latitudes. Wherever the flag of old England is raised, wherever two-and-twenty Englishmen can be got together, there you may be very sure before long the wickets will be pitched. So let us take a glance at some of these far-off lands, where, with un-English sur­ roundings, under atropical sun, with trees and plants that would die in our more rigorous climate, and with races of people who have but little idea of vigorous exercise for the sake of amusement; English muscle and English endurance insist upon some means of displaying themselves. The spectacle, without doubt, impresses the minds of innately-lethargic races with wonder at first, thenwith admiration for our love of athletics, and at no distant date may create in them the love itself. Let us put ourselves in imagination on board a Peninsular and Oriental steamer, and hurry through the dreaded Bay of Biscay, beneath the far- famed rock of Gibraltar, past the orange- lined hills of Malta, not waiting to see a game played on the uncongenial asphalte, which there has to take the place of our green sward. Let us pass the Canal and by the sands of Suez, where on the yielding Burface the English Telegraph employes can put more twist and break on to the ball than the great Spofforth ever dreamt of in his wildest moments. Down the Red Sea we go with a thought and a prayer for all the good cricketers and gallant Englishmen leagues to the West, steadily pulling their way up the grand old river, almost the only witness of the brave struggle that is being made by the great Englishman beleaguered in Khartoum; and so, rounding into the Indian Ocean, in time we come in sight of the palm-crowned hills of Bombay. And well may we begin our inspection here, for it is on the “ maidans ” of Bombay that the game has really taken root, among a people alien to England, alien almost a3 Englishmen to the soil of British India. On the grounds of the Gymkhana Club you may see our countrymen topee-crowned and girt with scarlet cummerbund, displaying the more advanced stages of the game. Look a little farther, across the wide space beyond, go on to the grassy strips that bound one of the bays, and you will see, what ought to make every Englishman and every cricketer rejoice, hundreds of Parsees, most intelligent and enterprising of mer­ chants, and best of citizens, hard at work with bat and ball. Not all the paraphernalia of the game, which have become necessaries in England, will you find, but a game not far different from that which was good enough for Englishmen a century ago. There is the old underhand fast bowling, which practice and experience will presently reduce to a slower pace with more pitch and more break or twist. To meet it stands the batsman, with unnecessary coat-tails flying in the breeze, it is true, but scornful as were our forefathers of pads and gloves, with high-crowned hat, not very unlike their head-eovering. Darker of hue he is than the rosy-cheeked players of our northern clime, but with a litheness in every movement that tells of agility in the field, and, above all, with a real love for the great English game. This Christmas cricket at Bombay is but a primitive form of the game, but there is nothing to prevent its becoming more matured; and, as it advances, with it will come those good effects which we believe Englishmen have obtained from its pursuit. Neither is it in Bombay alone of our Eastern possessions that we may see cricket practised. Calcutta possesses a paradise for cricketers in its ground there; a good one is to be fonnd at Madras ; and at Trichinopoly, beneath the shade, or, rather, within sight of the far- famed Rock, the scene of as desperate fight­ ing as Englishmen did anywhere in the last century, at a time when they were fighting all the world over, votaries follow their favourite pursuit on a wicket formed of cocoanut matting. But go still further south, walk along the roads of Ceylon, and you will see the little Cingalese bowling with anything that comes handy, answering to a ball at an improvised wicket. Stroll on to the cricket ground at Colombo and you will find the descendants of the old Portu­ guese settlers can prove themselves no novices at all points of the game. Now, let us pick up another P. and 0. boat and settle ourselves down for twelve or fourteen days’ voyage through the Straits, touching at Singapore, where the constant breeze just makes a game at cricket possible, until we glide under the terraced heights that crown the Harbour of Hong Kong. Here is a climate more congenial to cricket. Though John Chinaman has not taken pos­ session of the game yet, as have the Parsees, for John—good merchant as he is, like Englishman and Parsee—is even more slow- going than either; still he is to be found with his pigtail curled up in a plait at the back of his head, making himself useful during the practice hour on the most picturesque ground in the world. Away across the blue waters of the harbour, which glint under the lychee and other trees that circle the ground, stand up the bold red heights of Chinese Kowlung; whilst behind, beyond the terraces of flowering trees and shrubs, rises the bold outline of the mountain. John may or may not be im­ pressed by the beauties of the surroundings, but, at all events, he makes no display of his feelings. His business is to make himself useful on the crieket-ground, and with that business-like capacity which may some day give his nation the command of the world’s trade, he sets himself to that business. Look at hislong arms, they look like throwing, and they can. Andhere is one, perhaps the one instance of John being in step with tefae times. Discarding all old-fashioned ideas of under-arm bowling, or round-arm bowling, or below-the-shoulder or straight-arm bowl­ ing, John “ chucks,” and “ chucks” as deliberately as any privileged bowler in Eng­ land ; not however with any great accuracy, for the batsman must be prepared for a body ball quite as often as a head ball, but with great energy and variety. We question whether John will advance as rapidly in the art of batting, for he is woefully afraido£ his shins. But let him be, he doesn’t like being hurried; he progresses in a dignified manner like one of his own junks, at no great pace and with very little show, but still it is progression ; and having set his head in a certain direction he will not bo easily turned from it, as our volatile neighbours may discover. So, having taken up English athletic sports, let us hope John will work at them with all that great perseverance of his, and have his mind enlarged and im­ proved by all the generous and manly attributes they possess. Leaving, then, unvisited tho lawn-like expanse of the Shanghai ground, and those of Japan—^with but little hope that those cheery little people, the veritable Gauls of the far East, will ever take to so earnest a pastime—let us turn south again to the English Antipodes to find cricket in full swing. Let us have our roast beef and our plum pudding, aye, and our fire too, for the -Next issae o f Cricket Jan. 29-