Cricket 1901

114 CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. M ay 9, 1901. organised b y Sir George Newnes, Bart., M .P. Of his earlier cricket Mr. Swinstead said: “ When I first played cricket I was a chorister in the late Queen’s private chapel at Windsor. There were not many opportunities for playing, and whenever the Queen arrived at Windsor we had to leave our match at once to rehearse the music for the follow ing Sunday. After leaving Windsor I became a student at the Royal Academy Schools, and during this time chances of playing in matches had to be snatched when they could. “ What happened when you ceased to be a student ? ” “ I had a studio in the North of London not far from the Hornsey cricket ground. Before I had been there a week Mr. E. W . Nicholls, the president of the Hornsey Cricket Club, called on me and made me join the club, of which I have been a playing member ever since; that must be nearly twenty years ago. Once during that time I received a compliment which I always look back upon with pleasure. One of our members over­ heard two little rustics chattering together as they were lying on their stomachs on the grass, watching a match at Hornsey in which I happened to make a hundred. Presently one of them said to the other, ‘ Well, Bill, this is jist my style—lyin’ down ’ere, and seein’ Swinstead ’it ’em ! ’ ” “ D o you find that cricket interferes much with art ? ” “ No. It does not. A painter, spend­ ing as he does the best part of his life by himself in the studio, absolutely needs a good deal of violent exercise to keep him in a healthy state of mind, and there is nothing like a game of cricket for freshening one up. You may say that matches must be played in the daytime when painting ought to be don e; and it would be perfectly true—with limitations. It is played in the summer, when one can, and often does, work for a couple of hours before and after a match, and besides this I look upon the time given to these occasional matches once a week as being what most men give to a holiday. When I go away at about the end of July I leave m y cricket things behind, and work hard every day, and so right on for the next nine months. Sometimes indeed it happens that when I am busily engaged on a picture in the country my easel and umbrella are forcibly removed and I am taken off to play in a local match, but this does not often happen. Men often say to me, ‘ Y ou artists are lucky beggars ; you have a mighty easy time of it and can get away at any time, while we are hard at work.’ But apart from the fact that these men do get away for matches, they have their holiday when they do nothing but play cricket, and, moreover, their hours of work are not lengthened.” “ What, do you do for exercise in the winter ? ” “ I play golf onC9 a week. This has filled a gap which I used to find it hard to bridge. I used to go wandering about with m y red setter for a walk, and found tbat my health suffered for want of some more energetic exercise. Football I never took up, and it seemed to me that the men who played were always getting their arms hurt. A broken arm or neck would not be con­ ducive to good painting, would it ? Now that I play golf, I can nip off for a round and return quite fresh, and ready for any amount cf work. If it were not for the systematic way in which I regulate my time I should not be able to get through m y work.” “ Y our Academy picture this year must have taken a great deal of time ? ” “ It did. I got up at half-past Bix every morning, had to travel four hours in the day and work six, for I painted the picture in a tennis court on the other side of London, and Borchgrevink or the dogs used to meet me there. The dogs and equipment were all painted from those actually used through the expedition. Mr. Borchgrevink’s dog, Zembla (often mentioned in his book), is now quite docile and is a grand animal. It must be a strange experience to travel about the Antarctic and then settle down to domestic life in England. He, like his master, is a born explorer.” “ Have you ever painted a cricket picture ? ” “ The nearest that I have ever got to doing so was one iu which I introduced a portion of the Winchester College ground as seen from the opposite side of the river. It was as much as I could do to keep my attention on the picture, for 1 was con­ tinually finding myt elf watching the cricket. But I have an idea of doing a cricket subject in bas relief ; in fact, I should like to begin it to-morrow, if it were not that I have so many other things in hand.” “ H ow was the Artists’ Cricket Club originated ? Y ou are hon. secretary, are you not P” “ Yes ! and it is a great pleasure. It was started three years ago. Mr. E. A. Abbey, R .A ., the great painter, invited a number of artists to go down to his place in Gloucestershire to have a week’scricket, and through this visit the idea of a club was evolved. It was founded j ust before midnight in a cloud of tobacco smoke on July 20th, 1898. Abbey himself, who is our president, took a very great interest in it, and is a most enthusiastic cricketer and base-ball player; in fact, if it had not been for him the club would never have been formed. It was at his sug­ gestion that the colours were red, black, and white, red representing colour in art, and black and white the other branches. It was decided from the first that it should be confined to painters, sculptors, and architects, and I don’t think we have ever played a match in which our whole team has not been made up of members of the profession. At about the same time kindred clubs were originated—Authors, etc., for which J. M. Barrie was chiefly responsible. Once when we were playing the Allahakbarrie C.C., Barrie came to me with a brilliant sugges­ tion—we were the captains. He suggested that the tw o worst men on either side should g o in first and that the two worst bowlers should be put on against them. He added that he did not in the least mind being considered one of the two worst men on his side (he is b y no means a bad player). So I agreed. The upshot of it was that he and another author promptly made forty runs off our two worst bowlers, whom, of course, we could not take off until they had done their duty. Barrie made nineteen; our two first bats made two runs between them—but we won the match after all.” “ Matches in which so many well- known professional men are playing ought to be very interesting ? ” “ They are, for everybody is in a good humour. One hears odd things at the luncheon table. I remember Barrie telling us that when he was in America he was introduced to a prominent man, who presently said to him, ‘ Well, Mr. Barrie, when you return home I presume you will write your reminiscences like the famous Charles Dickson did ! ’ It was at luncheon that when someone suggested that the salad cream looked like shaving soap. A well-known writer replied, ‘ That reminds me of a man who, when leaving some rooms which he had taken at a sea­ side town, left a pot of bloater paste behind him on the dressing table. The next visitor just before he went away wrote in the visitors’ book that ‘ every­ thing was satisfactory and comfortable, but he did not care about the pommade! “ Who are the best known artists, besides Mr. Abbey, who are members of the Artists’ Club ? ” “ We have quite a number of members amongst the Koyal Academicians who take an interest in ‘ Artistic ’ cricket. Amongst the more active artists who play cricket occasionally a re: H . H . La Thangue, A .R .A ., our vice-president—he is a fairly good man, and plays with us and at Petw orth; Stanhope Forbes, A .R .A ., Frank Bramley, A .K .A ., Cheval- lier Tayler, Adrian Stokes, all played for Newlyn and for A.C.C. Arnesby Brown, Walter Osborne, and D . O’Brien are good cricketers. H . J. Ford (one of the Fords, which is the same thing as saying he is a fine cricketer), Arthur Studd, of Eton, G. Gascoyne, L. C. Nightingale, L. D. Luard, F. H. Townsend, F. Taubman, A. Proctor, Bernard Partridge, G. P. Jacomb-Hood, F. C. Batson, G. Chowne, etc., etc.” As a hitter of very great power, Mr. G. H. Swinstead naturally is of the opinion that slow play has its disadvantages. “ I have always thought,” he said, “ that the great difference between cricket and golf is that in the one game you have a live ball and in the other a dead one, and it seems to me that a sticker must lose the pleasure of dealing with a live b a ll; he makes it practically a dead one. What I should very much like to see some day, although I suppose it is not possible, is a one-day match, with four stumps, between the most aggressive players of England and the Rest. The play would be lively, and the ‘ gate ’ should, I think, be a good one. I admire Jessop immensely —his play seems to me to show genius in almost every stroke. I do not think the same thing can be said of all of the great amateurs nowadays. A boy goes