men of cricket. There have been a hundred, a thousand orators; there never was but one David Harris. Many men can make good speeches, but few men can deliver a good ball. Many men can throw down a strong enemy, but Harris could overthrow the strongest wicket. Cicero once undermined the conspiracy of Catiline; and Harris once laid prostrate even the stumps of Beldham.
It is said that it is utterly impossible to convey with the pen an idea of the grand effect of Harris's bowling. His attitude, when preparing to deliver the ball, was masculine, erect, and appalling. First, he stood like a soldier at drill, upright. Then with a graceful and elegant curve, he raised the fatal ball to his forehead, and drawing back his right foot, started off. Woe be to the unlucky wight who did not know how to stop these cannonades! his fingers would be ground to dust against the bat, his bones pulverized, and his blood scattered over the field. Lord F. Beauclerk has been heard to say, that Harris's bowling was one of the grandest sights in the universe. Like the Pantheon, in Akenside's Hymn, it was ' simply and severely great'. Harris was terribly afflicted with the gout; it was at length difficult for him to stand; a great armchair was therefore always brought into the field, and after the delivery of the ball, the hero sat down in his own calm and simple grandeur, and reposed. A fine tribute this, to his superiority, even amid the tortures of disease!
If, like Sallust and Hume, we may venture our comparison of the relative merits of two illustrious men, we should say, in contrasting Harris with Lumpy that,
Harris always chose a ground when pitching a wicket, where his ball would rise. Lumpy endeavoured to gain the advantage of a declivity where his might shoot.
Harris considered his partner's wicket as carefully as his own. Lumpy attended only to himself.
Lumpy's ball was as well pitched as Harris's, but delivered lower, and never got up so high. Lumpy was also a pace or two slower.
Lumpy gained more wickets than Harris; but then
