"handyn and handoute" was probably only another name. Fosbroke, in his Dictionary of Antiquities, said, "club-ball was the ancestor of cricket:" he might have said, "club-ball was the old name for cricket, the games being the same."
The points of difference are not greater than every cricketer can show between the game as now played and that of the last century.
But, lastly, as to the name of Cricket. The bat, which is now straight, is represented in old pictures as crooked, and "cricce" is the simple Saxon word for a crooked stick. The derivation of Billiards from the Norman billart, a cue, or from ball-yard, according to Johnson, also Nine pins and Trapball, are obvious instances of games which derived their names from the implements with which they are played. Now it appears highly probable that the crooked stick used in the game of Bandy might have been gradually adopted, especially when a wicket to be bowled down by a rolling ball superseded the blockhole to be pitched into. In that case the club having given way to the bandy or crooked bat of the last century, the game, which first was named from the club "club-ball," might afterwards have been named from the bandy or crooked stick "cricket."
Add to which, the game might have been played in two ways,—sometimes more in the form of Club-ball, sometimes more like Cricket;
