James Lillywhite's Cricketers' Annual 1875

l ' ' .. • • OBAPTER IV. THE ENGLISH TWELVE IN AUSTRALIA. BY ONE OF THEM. ON Thursday the 23rd of October, 1873, at noon, we sailed fi:om Southampton waters. by the P. and O. Steamship Mirzahpore, Capt. Parish, Commander. On Sunday the 17th of May, 1874,·we landed in South�pton dooks _ from the screw steamer Khedive, also th�property of the Pen1nsular and Onental 8'eamship Company. We left og.r country, ns we fondly hwed, for oaz country's good. We came ha.ck, to some extent wiser, if not adder men. How and why we went, must be told in a few brief lines. In the s1.1mmer of 1873 a proposition had been made to Mr. Grace to form one of an English Twelve, but the inducement was not of a sufficiently tempting character� and the idea was abandoned. Not £01· long though, for in the spring of 1873 another offer came direct from the Melbourne Cricket Club to Mr. Grace to bring out a team of . his own selection, and the proposal met with considerable favour. Circumstances, no doubt, tended to cripple the Captain in his task of forming a Twelve, or some of . us possibly-no names if yon please might never have had a chance of narrating their experiences of the trip. Emmett was unable, and Alfred Shaw unwilling, Pooley was in disgrace, Pinder in domestic disarrangements, and Hill, at hand if wanted, but not required. Amateurs, as is their wont, promjsed, and no doubt intended, to fulfil their promise, but failed at the crisiS, or Messrs. Hornby and Bird might have been of the party. There were njne of us from the South and only three from the North, a rather unfair division you may feel induced to assert. I do not propose to go il;lto details of our voyage. I presume that ii was much the same as ordinary voyages, though to some of us it gave sensations far from ordinai·y. On the Sunday after embarkation we were free of the Bay of Biscay, and a good riddance it was to most of us who had shuddered at the idea of that awful coast. On Mon�y the 27th we rounded Cape Si. Vincent, a-nd · on the following morning we were off·' the rock.'' No space was allowed us to vi:ew the irnpFegnable isle that gives Great Britain com-­ mand of the J\1editerranean, but at least we . h-ad an opportunity of satisfying ourselves with a view of old Gib., the coveted of Spain, the curse of British subalterns and the safeguard <1f British rights. On the 30th we had a real storm; none of your stage thun<Wr and lightning, but heaven's artillery itself, and no mista,ke. To aay that we w:er� uuooncerned du.ring that £·earful time, would be a iliul perversion of the truth. For one whole day the storm played tip and rnn with us. It was a splendid sight, awful beyon� all conception to those of us who were novic,es at nautical scenes, and I never wish to participate in a genuine gala again. Dlouds of foam surround­ ing us and threatening to swamp us, to a disturbed fancy chuckling hoarsely at a prospect of the prey at band. Now and again a shivering s011nd that told surely of a sail rent to pieces, and throughout a ceaseless heave of •