THE HAMBLEDON CLUB AND THE OLD PLAYERS
Bt the Rev. James Pycroft.
What have become of the old scores and the earliest records of the game of cricket? Bentley's Book of Matches gives the principal games from the year 1786; but where are the earlier records of matches made by Dehaney, Paulet, and Sir Horace Mann? All burnt!
What the destruction of Rome and its records by the Gauls was to Niebuhr—what the fire of London was to the antiquary in his walk from Pudding Lane to Pie Corner—such was the burning of the Pavilion at Lord's and all the old score-books it is a mercy that the old painting of the M.C.C. was saved—to the annalist of cricket. 'When we were built out by Dorset Square,' says Mr. E. H. Budd, 'we played for three years where the Regent's Canal has since been cut, and still called our ground 'Lord's', and our dining-room 'the Pavilion'.
Here many a time have I looked over the old papers of Dehaney and Sir H. Mann; but the room was burnt, and the old scores perished in the flames . . . . .
And now, the oldest chronicler is Old Nyren, who wrote an account of the cricketers of his time. The said Old Nyren borrowed the pen of our kind friend Charles Cowden Clarke, to whom John Keats dedicated an epistle, and who rejoiced in the friendship of Charles Lamb; and none but a spirit akin to Elia could have written like 'Old Nyren'. Nyren was a fine old English yeoman, whose chivalry was cricket; and Mr. Clarke has faithfully recorded his vivid descriptions and animated recollections. And, with this charming little volume in hand, and inkhorn at my button, in 1837 I made a tour among the cottages of William Beldham, and the few
