Page:The Cricket Field (1854).djvu/267

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FEMALE CRICKETERS.
243

At a match played at Cambridge, a lost ball was found so firmly fixed on the point of a broken glass bottle in an ivied wall, that a new ball was necessary to continue the game.

Among remarkable games of cricket, are games on the ice—as on Christchurch meadow, Oxford, in 1849, and other places. The one-armed and one-legged pensioners of Greenwich and Chelsea is an oft-repeated match.

Mr. Trumper and his dog challenged and beat two players at single wicket in 1825, on Harefield common, near Rickmansworth.

Female cricketers Southey deemed worthy of notice in his Common-place Book. A match, he says, was played at Bury between the Matrons and the Maids of the parish. The Matrons vindicated their superiority and challenged any eleven petticoats in the county of Suffolk. A similar match, it is noted, was played at West Tarring in 1850. Southey also was amused at five legs being broken in one match—but only wooden legs—of Greenwich pensioners.

Eleven females of Surrey were backed against Eleven of Hampshire, says Pierce Egan, at Newington, Oct. 2, 1811, by two noblemen for 500 guineas a side. Hants won. And a similar match was played in strict order and decorum on Lavant Level, Sussex, before 3000 spectators.

Matches of much interest have been played