has most ably filled up to the present time. It would take up too much space to recount the various large scores made for the county, which have proved him to be one of the biggest hitters and quickest run-getters of the day. The score he made last August, 113, against Lancashire, is the largest score made by him for the county in a first-class county match.
The club is managed by a president, Sir A. R. Palmer, Bart, (a most enthusiastic cricketer, ably filling that position now), four vice-presidents, honorary secretary, honorary treasurer, and twelve members of committee, four of whom retire annually together with the whole of the officers, but are eligible for re-election. There are 700 members; and whereas the gate-money taken twenty years ago only amounted to a few pounds a match, last season it reached respectable proportions, showing the great interest taken in the game by the general public at the present time.
MIDDLESEX.
Middlesex, like Lancashire, first boasted a county club in 1864, but as far back as 1787 the county team participated in the first match recorded on the original Lord's ground at Dorset Square. Mr E. H. Budd, who played an innings of 76 for the County v. M.C.C. in 1808, was one of the hardest hitters of the early days. He invariably played with a bat 3 lb. in weight. A powerful club called the Islington Albion was founded in the early part of the century by Mr Gibson, while Mr Ford of Lynmouth, Devon, has in his possession a pamphlet intituled "Rules and Regulations of the Islington Union Cricket Club, agreed to at a meeting of the club held at the Canonbury Tavern, 19th April 1826." From the year 1830 (when "no-balls" were first recorded in the match Middlesex v. M.C.C.) to 1850, Middlesex County cricket was dormant, with the exception of a single match played against Surrey in 1844. A revival was effected in 1850 by the renewal of the matches with Surrey, and subsequently the formation of a bonâ fide county club was debated. With this object in view a ground nine acres in extent, at the rear of the Eton Tavern, Primrose Hill, was enclosed in 1854, but no county matches were played there. In 1859 Mr John Walker of Southgate invited the Kent Eleven to play Middlesex on his pretty ground, situated in close proximity to the charming Gothic Southgate Church. The home side contained five of the celebrated Walker family. Several county families in
