Lives in Cricket No 23 - Brief Candles

18 – in which McMaster did not play – to be held. 22 During his brief period as a Test fieldsman, McMaster did not take a catch, and there is no mention of him in the field in the contemporary reports that I have seen. 23 And that was that – his career as a Test cricketer all over in a day and a half. In cricketing terms, the tour was regarded as a success, although early on there was concern when the visiting side lost four of its first six matches, which suggested to some in South Africa that they had been sent a weaker side than they had been hoping for. Wisden for 1890 has a credible explanation for the early lack of success: ‘it is no libel to say that for a time generous hospitality had a bad effect upon the cricket’. It is reported that one banquet went on so long that none of the players had time to get to bed before the next day’s cricket. The tour was certainly a very gruelling one: ‘It was a case of travel, cricket, banquet, with no breathing time’ ( Cricket , 25 April 1889). But the players knuckled down after the first six games, and were unbeaten thereafter, winning 11 of the remaining 13 matches and having the upper hand in both the draws. Cox includes a brief summary of the performances of each of the tourists. For McMaster, the verdict read: ‘Mr Emile McMaster, moderate bat and fair field. Played in only thirteen matches during the tour and was fairly successful.’ Praising with faint damns, perhaps, but to judge from the figures, an accurate enough assessment of his performances. Former Test cricketer What next? Well, for the amateurs on the tour, the delights of South Africa clearly proved to be enduring. Smith and Bowden did not return home with the tour party; both played for Transvaal in the first-ever Currie Cup match in April 1890, and they also dipped their toes, unsuccessfully, into local financial affairs. When the Garth Castle set sail for home at the end of March, all the other amateurs, bar Skinner, had the intention of returning to South Africa at some time. One to whom this certainly applied was McMaster, but first he had more important business to attend to in England. On Friday, 12 July 1889, in a civil ceremony at the Marylebone Register Office, he married Ethel Hancock. His wife, born in Shanghai, was the sister of the widow of one of Emile’s older brothers, Percy Jocelyn McMaster (1852-1887). McMaster and his bride were soon back in South Africa. Although there is 22 This game was not part of the official tour schedule, and so does not appear in most records of the tour. For what it is worth, the tourists batted first and made 248 (Bowden 82, Read 48; Skinner 0), and on the scheduled third day of the ‘Test Match’ South Africa had made 123 for six (A.B.Tancred 51) before the game was called off. The game was not taken very seriously. Major Warton played for the tourists, for whom most of the bowling was done by the batsmen; even Skinner bowled five, wicketless, overs. 23 Unfortunately the Cape Town newspapers for the relevant dates are missing from the newspaper library at Colindale. The Unlikeliest Test Cricketer