half dozen yards apart, so that nobody, of course, can hit to leg or point without the chance of breaking some one else’s head. There is certainly excitement in practice of this sort, but I must confess that it is not much to my taste; and, after all, such play is terribly slow work, for the players loll and smoke until their turn comes for the bat, and if you are so unlucky as to make a slashing hit, you have to bellow out “Ball, thank you!” until you are half hoarse, and even then the chance is you must go for it yourself.
But what is better than good generalship, and more important to good cricket, I consider it essential that there should be good fellowship. As cricket is a sport, and is merely played for exercise and healthful recreation, it never should be played but with good feeling and good humour. No matter who wins, they who lose their temper I can but hold to lose; and I would say to any cricketer, if you cannot play without squabbling, you had best not play at all. I have heard of deadly feuds between two rival country clubs, and how the Swipewell never played a match with the Long Stopperton without the day’s fun ending in a wrangle and a fight. But I hope these bad old bulldog times are past, and, although the fire of rivalry may be as hot as ever, I trust players are too sensible to let their temper become heated by it. No man has a claim to be considered a good cricketer who allows himself to show a sign of anger at defeat. I recollect once playing in a match where our antagonists, against express agreement, brought a paid player to bowl. The ground was hard and rough, and we thought this bowling dangerous; but he pledged his word that he would moderate his pace. Rather than not play, we therefore waived objection, and for the first innings he contrived to keep his word. But when I drew his wicket with, I think, my second ball, he broke his bat upon the ground in a sudden fit of rage (an act which, had I been their captain, would certainly have got him his dismissal on the spot), and when we took our second innings he bowled with all his might, and I especially came in for a full share of his wrath. It is not because my legs were next day black and blue that I treasure the reflection that this was no true cricketer, however good a player he may have been and is.[1]
Some may think that it may be from such remembrances as these, and because I have poor pluck and cannot bear a good bruising, that I have protested against the fast round bowling. But this indeed is not the case. My chief cause of objection is not at all one based on any personal antipathy to having my legs pounded to the colours of the rainbow, or to losing half my beauty by getting a black eye, or having (say) the bridge of my finely-chiselled nose smashed. I object to round-shot bowling mainly on the score that, to my thinking, it lessens the enjoyment of the game. Few people can face a really swift round bowler without feeling somewhat nervous about their eyes and limbs; and although, by constant practice, such feeling may wear off, they can never be completely at their ease when at the stumps. I think much more amusement may be got out of the game when there is less danger in it; and though I have small wish to see young men made mollycoddles, and funky of hard knocks, I think games, to be games, ought to have some fun in them. I admit there’s more variety in round than under bowling, and I have no wish to see the round become extinct. But, judging by what daily one reads about “the slows,” it surely cannot be said success is always with the swift; on the contrary, although there may not be such “devil” in them, I think, with proper practice, the slows may be destructive as the rapids of Niagara. And why I cry out for slow bowling is, that I consider much more real fun and real pleasure is produced by it. When a ball is discharged as from the mouth of a six-pounder, you must look out for your legs, or you’ll have no legs to look to. But with slower bowling you have leisure to enjoy yourself, and instead of standing swathed up at the wicket like a mummy or a mute, you can laugh and chaff with those who are about you, without fearing that your laughter may be turned by a leg-ball to the wrong side of your mouth. As they are played at present, the only fun in matches appears to be in the queer names which are oftentimes assumed; but to call yourselves “Anomalies,” or “Amalgamated Duffers,” appears, at least to my thinking, a rather feeble joke, and one I am by no means disposed to join in laughing at.
No one ever heard of a third innings at cricket, or it would be easy to write another paper on the points I have not noticed. But I think I hear the editor, who is my umpire, crying “Time!” and so I must cut short what more I have to say. Some people seem to fancy that, as men get more luxurious, cricket may die out: or that the love of rifle practice will gradually supplant it. I have little fear, however, of either of these deaths for it; in fact, I quite believe that so long as there are Englishmen, so long there will be cricket. The love of out-door exercise is much too strong a passion with us ever to die out, and cricket is a sport in everybody’s reach; and one, therefore, that the “Million” will be sure to keep on foot, if ever it be neglected by the “Upper Ten Thousand.”
STOCK INCIDENTS OF FICTION.
Novel-writing is an art that is getting more and more difficult every day. Originality being one of the chief merits of a novel, every original thought in a novel strikes off a chance for all succeeding writers. Given that there are a certain number of characters in the world, every time one of these is drawn and held up in a book to public view the task of finding a new one becomes more difficult. It is very like the Salmon fishery. Time was when Salmon were for anybody’s catching. Now it is by no means so easy to get them. Imagine, then, some character fishery, in some intellectual river—somewhere. Thither go your character-catchers and fish, and
- ↑ I think I ought to add that, in a dozen years’ experience, this has been the only case in which I have ever found a hired player misconduct himself. As a rule, professional cricketers are in their behaviour all that one can wish; and one very rarely hears a foul word from their lips, as one does too often from watermen and jockeys, and other paid professors of gentlemanly sports.
