Page:Seventy One Not Out.pdf/37

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
20
I COMMENCE MY PUBLIC CAREER.

cheered and hooted all the more; but the laugh was turned against them when the batsman quietly returned to the wicket and resumed his innings.

My first match as a member of the All-England Eleven was at Cranbrook, on July 18, 19, and 20, 1850, against Kent, on which occasion I scored 9 and 12. This match was unfinished owing to rain. The following week saw me at Lord's first representing the Players v. the Gentlemen, whom we defeated at an innings. George Parr made the top score of the match, playing a very fine innings of 65. The Gentlemen scored 42 and 58, there being only one double-figure score in each of their innings—viz., Mr Felix 22, and in their second venture Mr A. Mynn 12. Clarke and Wisden were responsible for all the wickets, and bowled unchanged throughout the match. Two famous bowlers played for the Gentlemen—Sir F. Bathurst and Mr Harvey Fellows. Sir Frederick was a big powerfully built man of 6 feet or more, and had for years been noted for his fast bowling, being for some years a tower of strength to the Gentlemen in this department of the game. He bowled very straight as a rule, and had a remarkably low delivery. As a bat he belonged to the slogging order. Mr Fellows was without doubt the fastest bowler the Gentlemen ever possessed, in my opinion. He was a fairly tall man, weighing over 15 stone, and carried himself erect as a dart. He too had a very low delivery,