Cricket 1910

CRICKET: a w e e k l y r e c o r d o f t h e g a m e . JUNE 2 , 1910 . “ Together joined in Cricket’s manly toil.”— Byron. No. 84 0 . v o l . x x i x . T H U R S D A Y , J U N E 2 , 1 9 1 0 . o n e p e n n y . their sons to the armies which were so well representing their country. In a yerse of the song of “ The Man of Kent ” it is told how “ Their oxen stall and cricket ball they left for martial glory: Ye Kentish lads shall win the odds your fathers won before ye. ” The lines were written many year 3 before 1810, but apply also to that and the few suc­ ceeding years, when the counties mentioned had little time for cricket. man was obdurate,” says Mr. Alfred D. Taylor in his Annals of Lord’s : “ Lord was stub­ born.......... The result was inevitable, for the climax had arrived, and Lord determined to relinquish the ground. Building operations were speedily entered upon, and very soon all trace of the sward, once so dear and familiar to cricketers, was obliterated, and the resort, with its old associations, became a thing of the past.” The last match played on the A HUNDRED YEARS AGO. Very few great or, as we should now say, first-class matches were played in 1810 ; Scores and Biographies , in fact, contains par­ ticulars of only eight such games, all of which took place at Lord’s. The paucity of important matches in that and the few fol­ lowing seasons can only be attributed to the From an old print. LORD’S FIRST GROUND, IN DORSET FIELDS, 1787-1810. (The artist, in error, depicted a tvicket of two stumps instead of three.) wars of the period, in which the chief patrons of the game, who were members of the lead­ ing county families, naturally played their part. In those days Surrey, Kent, Sussex and Hampshire were the principal cricketing counties, and, as they happened to be those situated nearest the Continent, it was but natural that they should follow events very closely and be well prepared against invasion, in addition,'of course, to supplying many of In 1810 Lord’s was, as it is in 1910, the recognized headquarters of the game. The ground had been formed in 1787 by Thomas Lord, a native of Thirsk, in Yorkshire, who, after seeing it through two removes and one fire, died in January, 1832, in his seventy- seventh year. Of the three enclosures which bore his name, the first existed until 1810, when the landlord, realizing the value of the site, attempted to increase the rent. “ Port- ground was between the Young and the Old, which was commenced on July 24th, con­ tinued on the following day, and completed On August 17th. The cricketers of early days did not experience the wear and tear in­ separable from the game of to-day, and in consequence continued to play until quite middle-aged. In the match mentioned no one was allowed to appear for the Old unless at least thirty-eight years of age. Nowadays