Cricket 1889

414 CEICKET : A WEEKLY EECOED OF THE GAME. SEPT. 19,1889. CH IEF F IXTU RE S FOR NEXT W EEK . T h u r s d a y , Sept, 19—Sussex County Ground, Brighton, G. F. Hearne’s XI. v. W . Newham’s XI. (for benefit of N. Burchell.) F b id a y , S e p t . 20-Bristol, Gloucestershire XI. v. Twenty-two Colts. S a t u r d a y , S e p t . 21— Athletic AssociationGround, Richmond, Surrey XI. v. Sixteen of Richmond and District; Streatham, Johnson's XI. v. Streatham Club (F. Johnson’s benefit.) The Richmond match to be concluded on Monday. CRICKETING SAWS AND STORIES * Horace tells us that it is sweet to play the lool in the proper place. It would be, perhaps, of less literal translation if we were to render his words to the effect that a little fooling is not without its advantage, provided it be indulged in at a fitting time. Mr. Horace Hutchinson’s collec­ tion of “ Cricket Saws and Stories/’ just pnblished by Longmans—a good cricket name, by-the-way—Green, and Company, may not be what one can strictly call “ exquisite fooling.” On the other hand, the humour is, at least, of a harmless kind, the anecdotes are not of the fine old crusted kind, and the banter is pleasant, as well as full of playful irony. Mr. Hutchinson has, so far, been known chiefly as a golfer, and in this particular sport he is qualified, by virtue of long and practical experience, to write as an expert. It would be, perhaps, news to the general run of cricketers to know that he had ever taken an active part, however unimpor­ tant, in the greater game which we are wont to regard as the national sport of Englishmen. The author, though, at the outset disarms critical examination of his little book. He “ feels himself,” he admits in his preface, “ peculiarly quali­ fied for addressing the cricketing public, because, being himself a duffer, he is able to enter into the delights and difficulties of the game from the point of view of the great majority, and knowing that his opinion will be universally disregarded as worth nothing, has no hesitation in giving it with perfect freedom, and without the slightest f eelingof responsibility.” Under such circumstances, cricketers will take Mr. Hutchinson’s maxims in the spirit in which they are intended, of innoc nt fun. Now that the active work of the season is over, cricketers will have plenty of leisure on their hands. They might, too, spend an hour or two to less advantage than with Mr. Hutchinson. He illustrates the weaknesses of cricket nature, evidently with the keen enjoyment of a philosopher, and we must confess ourselves to have found instruction as well as amusement in his company. The following extracts will give an example of the way in which he laughs at the foibles of cricketers. On the other hand, it is over zealous, and scarcely courteous to the bow ler, to start off before the ball is bow led, o n the assumption that it is about to be h it to the neighbourhood of the boundary. “ I was fielding cover- po in t to D-----B ------’s bow ling ,” said Mr. R----- • “ D------ used, in those days, to bowl fast, w ith the third ball o f the over slow ; and th is slow ball had been past me for 4 for the last three overs in succession. So the next over, as D-----was ju s t winding h imself up for h is third b all, I started off running. Un- * Cricketing Saws and Stories. London: Long­ mans, Green, & Co. ortunately I )------caught sight o f me. ‘ Where the deuce are you off to ? ” said he. “ Oh, I ’m very sorry ,” I said. “ I d idn ’t think y ou ’d have seen m e ; but I thought if I started now it m igh t only be a three-er.” Mr. B-----never lived down the m em ory of that story. “ I do not understand your crickets,” said a foreigner to me. “ T o me it do appear that it proceed upon wrong principle—that you are what you call penalized when you make the good stroke. F or when you make the good stroke you do have to start away and run like the diable. But it should be the man who p lays badly—he should run and the man who p lays well rest. Instead o f which , death of m y life ! it is the man that gets what you call bow led out who is allowed to sit himself in the pavilion all the afternoon , in the shade, and en joy h im se lf.” A bow ler lays him self dangerously open to the retort courteous when he takes upon h im ­ self to reason w ith h is field on their lack of activ ity in fielding h its off his own bow ling. On one occasion when Mr. F ----- retu ned from a somewhat leisurely pursuit of a h it off Mr. B-----’s bow ling, t he latter said to him , “ W h y did you not run after it faster, F ------? ” to wh ich M r. F ------replied, with pointed brevity , “ A fra id I shouldn ’t last the distance.” W e were lazily discussing the question of the longest h it that ever was known. Each had contributed his humble m ite o f fiction . One had seen a tenner (would they were more common !) o n Cowley Marsh : another remem ­ bered an elevener on Chatham L ines : one had seen a ball picked up by a cow , and the batsmen ran fifteen : another had seen a ball wedged up the spout o f a pump, and they ran 27. Then a warrior, who had been silent, spoke on th is w is e : “ I think I know the largest number ever scored for one h it. It was a scratch eleven o f the Sappers, and we were p laying against an eleven of the Hanwell Lunatic Asylum—they were temporarily sane lunatics, or believed to be so, but the lunatic at long leg f ielded a hard h it so brilliantly that in h is excitement, instead o f returning the ball, he started off w ith it across country o f course w ith all the field in pu rsu it; anc. before they cou ld catch h im and bring back the ball the batsmen had run 157.” No one else cared to try an over, after that. F o r many years I used to tell that story, and it “ took the cak e ” w ithout question. I t is but quite recently that I have found it chal­ lenged by a tale that bears every mark of or ig in a lity : “ The match was at Bou logne ,” said the narrator, “ but all the players, save one, were Eng lish . Th is one, the only French­ man, was a man named B illy . Now B illy was the most energetic fielder ever seen. He was all over the p la ce ; there was no ho ld ing him . A t length the batsman put his bat up very hard against the ball and sent it over square leg ’s head. I t went on and on till it finally topp led over the cliff, down o n t o the beach. L ong leg f ollowed it to the edge of the cliff, and looked over, but declined to go any further. Not so, however, B illy . He scaled down t he cliff w ith extraordinary activity, and secured the ball. But then he found that he could neither throw it up nor climb up again h im ­ self, s o, after several futile efforts he had to take a cab and go round by the town. I forget exactly how many the batsmen ran, but it was far more than 157.” And one of those ex ­ asper ting men, who are always on hand when one tells a good story, said, in a voice o f gentle in qu iry :— “ Bu t is not ‘ B i lly ’ rather an un­ usual name for a Frenchman ?” Cricketers may be classed in order o f ability much on the lines o f the h istoric classification of he egg. F or as the egg is comm on ly susceptible of fourfold discrim ination in resp ct o f the elative freshness of particular specimens—as 1, “ The new laid egg ” ( which we hope to get for breakfast), 2, “ The fresh egg ” (which may be used w ithout offence in a pudd ing), 3, “ The breakfast egg ” (whose wh ite is comparatively innocuous for glazing pastry), and 4th and lastly, “ The e g g ”— simple, but not always pure— (a usef p litical warfare); so too, o f crick may likewise say that we have 1, “ class cricketer,” 2, “ The good c rick “ The keen cricketer,” and 4, “ The c which las includes those who play not play, cricket—a vast difference et hoc genus omno. N o good umpire should travel out province to give extra-judicial d ic lave all heard o f the u mp ire who, bow ler asked “ H ow ’s th a t ? ” res dm iri gly, “ Beautiful 1” Th is wa compli e tary, if not satisfactory ; of thes extra-judicial umpires’ d i neither the one nor the other. Mr. many years ago captaining a scrat against an eleven of potters in Sout It was an excellent match . The la was i n ; they had two runs to mak The batsman p layed a ball to cove “ Come a l g !” said he, starting “ No, I tell ’ee. Get back, m un !” s other potter at the other end. So t turned in m id-career, and in so do in The ball was well r eturned to Mr. wicket. He promptly knocked off t and, for form ’s sake, appealed to th “ H ow ’s that ? ” (It was the potters’ “ Not ou t.” “ W h a t? ” said M r. astounded. Then, p icking togeth s umps, he got them all upright aga bails on, before the potter succee scrambling back into nis ground. how ’s that, then ? ” he asked, again off the bails, w ith the ball in his ha out 1” came the sturdy answer, th is a postscr ip t; “ and if yer ask again yer bloom i ’ ’e d.” “ Then,” said relating the story, “ I thought it wa me to go on to bow l, and I bow led wh ich wrent ten yards wide o f the w nearly killed point, and away it we furze bushes for four wides, and h been heard of since. So the potter match .” As the author remarks, the rustic mind is pt t be far more impressed by the hitting that is hard, high and frequent, than by the most masterly powers of defence. The captain of a certain county eleven was once driving in his dog-cart past a village cricket match. One of the batsmen attracted his attention. “ That’s a good bat, isn’t he ? ” he asked of a yokel as he pulled up his horse. “ Oh, yaas, ’e be a pretty fair bat,” was the grudging response. “ He makes a good many runs, I should think, doesn’t he ? ” “ Oh, yaas, ’e do make some runs some­ times.” “ H um ! difficult man to get out, I should think, isn’t he ? ” “ Oh, yaas ; we haven’t gotten ’im out for fower years.” T e captain took that batsman away in his dogcart, then and there, to play for the county eleven. And he has played for it ever since. This anecdote bears a strong family resemblance to one of which Fabius Cuncta or , the L ncashire stonewaller, Barlow, was the he;o. The technical phraseology of one game canuot always be properly applied, without some m dification, to the incidents of another. It is related that John Roberts, the champion billiard-player, once, and once only, took part in a game of cricket. He returned to the Pavilion “ stumped.” “ Hullo, how are you out ? ” asked some­ on , wh had no seen the catastrophe. “ I don’t quite know,” said Roberts, “ but some one knocked the top off the wdckets, and the marker said I was out of baulk.” Nothing makes a cricketer so unpopular, Mr. Hutchinson thinks, as disputing the