A CRICKET YARN.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 4214, 19 June 1895, Page 5

A CRICKET YARN.

The ' Man of the World ' is responsible for the following cricket yarn :—": — " I was," the Barrister related, " playing in a cricket match at Mote Park, Maidstone, and was fielding out in the position assigned to long leg. Suddenly a man in at the wickets hit a swinging blow to leg. I was unable to stop the ball, which would have gone over the boundary had it not been fielded in a very novel way. A large and ferocious bulldog, darting out from among the crowd, literally swallowed the cricket ball. I myself and two or three others of the men fielding ran up ; we were at a perfect loss to know what to do or how to get the ball. The bulldog seemed almost apopletic ; but he also seemed almost savage, and there was no means of administering him an emetic. We stood gazing hopelessly, and meanwhile the two men in at the wickets were continuing to run steadily, thus increasing the score for our adversaries. It was evident that they knew what had taken place, but considered that it was simply an ordinary case of lost ball. Suddenly I had an idea. Seizing the cap from the head of my fellow cricketer, I thrust it into the bulldog's month. Instantly then I gagged the brute by winding my waist sash tightly round his jaws. He was now helpless. I seized him in my arms and ran with him with all my might to the wickets, which I reached when the two men in, who were still running, were out of block. Indeed, they paid no attention to me, for they only thought that I was drunk or mad to go running about on a cricket field with a bulldog ; they had no idea that the bulldog contained the lost cricket ball. As I approached the wiukets I called out to the umpire : " This dog has swallowed the ball. See, here it is ? " And, to call his attention to the spot, patted the round protuberance in the animal's stomach caused by the leathery sphere within it. Then without a moment's hesitation I knocked off the bails with that part of the bulldog. "How's that, umpire?" asked the bowler. " Out," replied the umpire.