Cricket 1904

42*2 CRICKET: A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. Sept. 22, 1904 ball. As Le was now the batsman gave the ball a bit of a tap and it went to the ropes. In the old days, whatever the state of the light, they used to play till seven o’clock. Now stumps were drawn at 6 or 6 30, so that the batsman never played in a bad light. With all those improvements taking place the bowler remained ashewai, except inonerespect, which had been to his disadvantage, that he was expcc‘ednow to bowl six days a week throughout the season. In every single respect the batsman had been getting tbe whole advantage and the bowler thewhole disadvantage. Andyet ia all other things they naturally sympa­ thised more with the attackers than with the defenders. In a battle they thought more of those who attacked a place than of tho.e who had fortified themselves, and b o they sympathi-ed more with an opposition which alt eked a Gjvernment than with the Government. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) The time had comewhen there was a nec srity for altering cricket matches which wore cut the bowlers and kept themat the fullest stretch andpitch throughout the setson. He thoughtthey should make a strong and genuine effort to bring it before the Surrey Club, and still more before theM.C.C. so that there might be more chance of playing out three-day matches, which under the im­ proved conditions of first-class cricket were all iu favour of the batsmen. He was afraid there was not sufficient sym­ pathy with the aim, because everyone was afraid that if the stumps were raised they would be the stumps which they might have to defend themselves. (Laughter.) He had once thought that a fourth stumpmight beadded. (Laugh­ ter.) In conclusion, he said he thought that on such occasions they might meet and discuss those things as cricketers, forgetting suchthings aspolitics. (Hear, hear.) He knew a great many in that room thought there was no difference between cricket and politico, believing that the whole object of one side was to bowl the other out. (Laughter.) There­ fore, if they took that view of the pro­ fession he had the more immediate con­ nection with, they saw how cordial his sympathy was for others, seeing that he had been a batsman for sixteen years out of the last eighteen—and therefore all his sympathy was for that miserable and down-trodden cla;s who had been trying to get himout of office. (Laughter and applause.) A N AM E R IC A N V I E W OF CR ICKET . Being the Observations of Si Slocum, a DownEast Yankeewho is Doing Yewrup, h’gosh! Written to a Friend •' Back ter Hum, in Borst’n.” —Fromthe St. James's Gazette. “ Say, Josh did yer ever see a game o’ cricket P Waal, I’ve bin a-goin out to Lord’s some this season jest to seewhat it’s like, and I alius sit side of a nice feller I met there. Guess he’s a dook or somethin’ like that. “ Waal, they stick two littlewickets up with a feller with a big flat bat ’bout four or five inches wide in front of each one, with instructions not to let anyone touch them wickets. Then there’s eleven other fellers and two more ia butcher’s frocks. A chap tosses the ball or slings overhand with a straight arm at the wicket ’bout half as fast as we pitch a baseball. How often do yer think he hits the wicket ? ’Bout once in an hour. The chap with the joist knocks the easy ones clean out o’ the lot and jest blocks the others kinder easy- like. I’ve seen a feller do the blockin’ business for an hour and hit ’bout one bill in a hundred hard ’nough to hurt it. “ It’s excitin’, I tell yer. When he hits it hardthe twochaps changewickets, but there ain’t nohurry ’bout it, coz they don’t take no chances. There ain’t no watchin’ bases and ketchin’ runners off on ’em, like baseball, nor any ketchin’ ’embetween basesand runnin’ ’emdown. Everything’s dead slow. At baseball when a feller hits a grounder he scoots for first base and the ball has to be gathered in and chucked to first before the runner gets there, if it ain’t a fly; and if he gets his base he’s alius in dan* ger o’ bein’ ketched or forced off on it, so it’s excitementall the time. Thebowlers, them what c'mcks the bill, they get a kind of a baby break onto it, but I guess their eyes’d stick out if they could see one of our pitchers sendin’ up the inside shoots and outside curves and the rises ! “ The fust game I saw they sorter slouched onto the field ’bout ’leven o’clock, and long ’bout one they went off kinder sadlikeand had lunch (that’swhat they call dinner over here). Then they kimback agin and fooled round till five, and off they went agin. I asked my friend who’d beat, and he said they’d only gone for their tea. No foolin’, Josh, hope to die, that’s what he said. W ha’ do yer think the crowd at a ball game down to Bost’n wud say if the teams retired inter their boodwaws after the fifth inning’ to take tea? I asked my British friend why they didn’t pass round candy ev’ry time they got a feller out, but he didn’t see my suttle sarcasm. “ Waal, now, Josh, the fellers with the flat bats do hones’ly flip ’em round fine, no mistake, and once in a while the awjence lets out a feeble whoop or two, but do y’ever see ’emstand up over here and yell for five minutes stiddylike what they do when Buck Freeman makes a home-run down’t Boston ? Guess not! “ But there’s two measly things ’bout cricket-the fieldin’, so called, and the leDgth o’ the game anyway. There ain’t no premium on fieldin’ as there is on battin’, and so nobedy cares a tinker’s darn whether he stops or ketches a ball. In the fust place they wear long pants, an’ that liuds their knees. Tuen they don’t practise, leastways not very much. You know how the baseballers have to be on the fieldhalf an hour before ev’ry game aud practise throwin’ and ketchin’ hard right before the awjence. Wny, I see a Yorkshire feller stop a ball with his foot at Lord’s. Wouldn’t that jar yer P “ There ain’t nuthin’ clean an’ snappy ’bout cricket. If theywant to get a ball in quick to ketch the runner they don’t pick it up and snapit over to thewicket­ keeper underhand the way we do, but they lose a lot o’time straightenin’ up and chuckin’ overhand. An’ the way they muff! Jeemimy Jerooshy! I see one chap named Wells have four flies muffed one after t’other in no time. It would make a cow laff. “ An’ say, the score’s a corker. They don’t take no ’count o’errors. You kin make a dozen rottenmuffs if yer want to, the score won’t give y’away, and there aint no fieldin’ averages published here. No foolin’, that’s straight! Yer see battin’s ev’rything and iieldin’s nuthin’. They don’t score no assists neether. A feller kin stop an old sockdologer all smeared over with twist and speed and get it up to thewicket smart and in time for the keeper to tag the wicket, but do yer think it’ll be- in the scoreP Nixy ! No, sirree, there ain’t no encouragement for fieldin’ incricket. Inbaseball afeller knows an error is goin’ to pull down his fieldin’ average, and he does his very darndest; angels could do no more. “ And the length o’ the game! Do you s’pose a feller can run up to the grounds at three and see a lively game all finished in good time to get hum ’fore the old lady gets huffy ? Well, I don’t think ! A game o’ cricket’s likeaChinese play—on the instalment plan. They begin one day, play on the next day, and finish (if they have all the luck) on the third. They jest won’t hurry. It’s what they call bid form. I can’t see why they don’t split up the game into shorter innings, like baseball. Then both sides’d get an even chance at the weather. As ’tis here one side gets a good day and makes a grist o’ runs and next day the other fellers get a wet wicket and a lickin’. Is that a fair test o’ playin’ P Guess not. An it leads to drawgames till you sicken; more’n haff on ’em’s that way. Yorkshire’s played twenty-seven games this yearand sixteen on ’em was drawed ! You’ll be askin’ what they’re doin’ to fix up such a sitiwation. Waal, I’ll jes’ tell yer: they’re talkin' to beat the band! “ But, say, all them fellers in white on the green English field makes a slick pictur, that’s a fact. But it’s too ex­ citin’, Josh, an’ I wouldn’t recommend anyone goin’ to a cricket match without a cold compress round his head to guard against hysteria ! And every time I go I kim back thankin’ my stars we’ve got baseball an’ not cricket up to Hustle- ville, Mass., U.S.A. So no more to-day fromyour friend, Silas Slocum.” The above article was followed a day or two later in the same paper by some “ Retaliatory observations about baseball fromanEnglish point of view.” In the course of his remarks the writer says :— “ The player was apparently doing well, when forth stepped a burly ruffian in a red coat, and with a voice like A circular saw buzzing though the nasal organ of some cyclopean monster, he proceeded to revile the player. I had