CRICKET PRELUDE

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20062, 18 October 1930, Page 13

CRICKET PRELUDE

A PARSON BOWS IN THE SEASON. (specially wiuttek foe the MIEGS.) i [By Cyrano.] Outside of church assemblies proper there are two occasions on which you may see clergy 0 f the Established Church gathered in numbers in one place. One is the meeting of the governing body of Oxford or Cambridge, and the other is the Oxford-Cambridge cricket match at Lord's. The University match has its own crowd and its own atmosphere. The stands are thick with town and country vicars, who recall in low voices the years that the locust has eaten and the mighty deeds of the giants of old. In the lovely glow of the summer afternoon, with the white figures of the run-stealers flickering to and fro on the green sward, the stranger's heart may be moved to poetry, but if he comments too loudly on somo bit of play he may encounter reproving looks from underneath clerical hats. It is not done. On this day something of the atmosphere of immemorial elms and old brick quadrangles and ancient cloisters descends upon Lord's, and to make a racket there would be like brawling in church. imagine, then, a loud speaker suddenly blasting the peace of that afternoon with this recent remark by Edgar Wallace: "Outrageously I say that I hope the sport of horse racing will never descend to the level of cricket." Many a fine boundary hit and many an exchange of reminiscences would be required to drown the memory of that insolence. If any clergyman wore required to exorcise this demon of a blasphemer, the country vicar who has anonymously written "Cricket Memories" would do it very well. This now book on the great game, which appropriately arrives to bow in our Antipodean season, is a very pleasant volume. Tlie author, as an English critic says, belongs to the class to which the University match is the flower and crown of the cricket year, but he has much to Bay of the minor cricket that is more than 90 per cent, of the game—the cricket that is played on bumping country pitches with outfields where the long grass trammels the travelling foot of the fieldsman, or city grounds where you may field a sardine tin instead of the ball, or strange oversea grounds, such as the Great Square at Corfu, where, when he played, the batting crease was on the footpath. In those dayg love of the game, which the British garrison had made popular many year." before, lingered in the lovely lonian Islands, and perhaps it is still played there.

The writer is an agreeable guide, as many clergymen aro in the fields and byways of cricket. The Church and cricket are natural friends. It is true that in the old days bishops forbade their clergy to play, but that was because there was so much betting on the game. Now it is part of the English country vicar's duties to foster cricket in his parish. Many of them must echo the statement that what a certain parish needed was not a theologian, but a bow:er with a good off-break. All the better if the vicar can open tho innings capably or stop a rot or bowl a good length; it helps liim in hia spiritual ministrations. "That hit o' yourn to square-leg for a six a fortnight ago converted me," said a formerly hostile minor to his vicar. There is, of course, such a thing as top much zeal. "Oil Saturday next wo play the return cricket match with T (a neighbouring village)," announced a Hampshire clergyman from tho pulpit. "I shall umpire on that occasion, when I trust that our united endeavours will meet with success. ''

The country vicar who lias written this book was born in 1870 and remember# tlie stir caused by the doings of the rtrst Australian team to visit England. He wp.B up at Cambridge when the famous P. S. Jaclteon was cuptuin, and when Ranjitsinhji was beginning to win fame. He describes many Test matches, county matches, and university games, and his comments are ofton vigorous. Criticism of selectors of England's eleven is no new thing; in 1909, one gathers, they were positively imbecile. Three things emerge in particularly clear outline from his narrative—the decline of vigour in batting, the decrease in the number of amateurs of first-class ability and the smaller number to-day of players of strong and easily identified personality, This writer is as emphatic as Mr Neville Cardus, most accomplished of presently critics, in his condemnation of fashionable caution in batting. In "his day" a half-volley was meant to be hit. Even when master batsmen scored slowly they charmed with their style. Each Btroke was graceful and finished- —"not th? presentation of an immobile bat hung out as though to dry!" The dominance of the professional in big cricket has beeorne mueli more marked of recent years. Last year only two amateurs played regularly in the Yorkshire and Lancasshire elevens, Look at the great amateurs of the 'nineties—tho Old Man himself, Jackson, Maclaren, Ranjjitsinhji Jessop, Fry, Palairet, Stoddart, MacGregor, Kortright. All of these, and many of the professionals as well, were men whoso personalities impressed themselves strongly in the public mind. When they were in action the spectator had no need to look at his scoring card to identify them. Our author has graduated from the country to a church in the city of London, one of those many churches, perhaps, which it was proposed a few years, ago should be demolished, because there was no congregation for them. At any rate, it gives him plenty of time to watch ericket. He and his wlfa love to go to Lord's on the morning of a big match and sit there all day b&slcing in the light of the game that is "music and service and sport and art."

What o delightful moment it is when a ffreut contest, to which one has been looking forward for months, actually starts I One forgets everything but cricket 1 One glows ivlth a warm, comfortable exhilaration! There seems to be nothing in the whole wide world but the green exj»anse of smooth sward, the glistening stumps, the white-coated umpires, and the players.

His enjoyment of cricket's resumption after the war was boyish, and he saw in 1020 his finest county match. Middlesex had to beat Surrey outright to win the championship, and on the morning of the last day the score stood: Surroy 341, Middlesex 268 and 27 for no wicket. Middlesex forced the pace finely, and at twenty to four Warner "declared," leaving Surrey 244 to get in three hours and ten minutes. Surrey accepted the challenge like sportsmen, and went for the runs. The end did not come until ten minutes before time, when the last Surrey wicket fell. "It was cricket at its best, with both sides going all out to win and no striving for a draw." Incidentally it was Warner's last match.

Angela shared our author's excitement. He wishes us to meet his wife, and I am sure we should all like to. Not many women really like cricket, and fewer still understand it. Very few indeed have the grasp of the game that Mr Snaith's heroine shows in "Willow the King." I have just been re-reading that minor classic, which for some unaccountable reason Is out of print, and chuckling over the racy wisdom of that daughter of a country parson.

"Fast bowlers," said she, "are oil bis hearts and brute foroe—»no intellect at a", you know. They're got nbout as many brains as a giddy old eroeodile. What's Charlie boy/ling lika that for? Can't he see that he s-just helping that man to play himself in? why don't he chuck down a 'tic©' or a iull

toss, or something that's downright had—anything to make him have a so before he gets his eye in."

Angela may not know as much about cricket as Grace, who not only batted well but bowled a slow, swerving, Jeg break that baffled the best, but I should say she was moro companionable. And, after all, we do need companionable companions in cricket, whether we are playing or watching. This book is a good companion, and with tho smell of new-cut grass and oiled bats it is assured of a warm welcome.