A few jottings

This time last year, when I seized the pen, by request, to do something for my old friend Wisden's, the air was full of the sound of cricket revolution because a few of the leading batsmen had gone out of their way and transgressed by palpably using their legs--instead of their bats--to play the ball with. And here let me again remark, as I oft have done, that it was only the great batsmen, and they can do without it, that knew how to put on the scientific legging according to the pitch of the ball, and even they at times legged themselves out by misjudgment. Anyhow, I think cricketers will admit that this temporary blemish has almost died out without any law being called forth to run the perpetrators in, and in the few instances in which it has occurred wherein batsmen forgot themselves, their very looks seemed to say, I wish I had not done it. Therefore, I fancy, and hope, that the unsightly legging, like the dodo and the tinder box, may be booked as extinct, and gone from our gaze. The past season has undoubtedly been a bowler's one, for the grounds on many occasions were so treacherous through rain that most of the leading bowlers could do a nice little bit of conjuring with the batsmen. Cricket, like other events of life, alters according to its surroundings, and the goodness of the wickets during the last twenty years has brought forth not only more forcing batting, but also deep out-fielding, with bowling that partakes more of the art of trying to get the batsman caught than, as of yore, going for the sticks. Times were--even at Lord's, as many can well recollect--when Mynn, Wisden, Jackson, Willsher, Tarrant, Fellowes, and others, did indeed want nerve and pluck to look at, much more play, for with balls bounding frequently from the pitch over the batsman's head into the long-stop's hands, it can well be imagined what a punishing game it then was; the more so when 'tis still further brought to mind that in those days batsmen were not treated with much of the Southerton, or cock-a-doodle, style of slow bowling, but had to put up with the "I'll warm you" fast bowlers. But this dissertation leads me on to recount that it is improvement in the grounds that has to a great extent made the fast bowler more harmless; and batsmen in due course came along, of whom the marvellous little Doctor ( E. M. Grace) was the pioneer, who upset all the stereotyped fast-footed play by going to the ball, when the pitch suited, and cracking it all over the shop. Not that I for a moment put less value on the fast bowler in these days of good wickets; for I well know he is still the most effective; but length and pace, without spin, break-back, or rearing-up qualities, don't count for much on modern wickets. Length is certainly one of the most essential points for a bowler, but 'tis not rigid length that has now placed a Southern player in the foremost rank as the best bowler in England. The great secret of his success is variation of pace, with the tricky flights and the spin he puts on to the ball--à la Spofforth. Our Australian friends certainly woke us up with their displays of bowling and fielding; and from what we have seen in the way of samples since 1878-- Spofforth, Allan, Palmer, Tommy Garratt, one of the best perpetual peggers at the off-stump; Harry Boyle, the reliable; George Giffen, the all-rounder; Evans, a sparkler, whom I should like to have seen in his best day; Trott, the skimmer; Ferris, the every-day trundler; and Turner; the rearer-up and destructive--taking the lot altogether, I think we can fairly designate Australia a land of bowlers. But withal, memory will bring back the doughty deeds of Jackson, Tarrant, Freeman, Tom Emmett, Jem Shaw, Allan Hill, Jem Grundy, George Wootton, Atkinson, Howitt, Willshear, Stephenson, Hinkley, Wisden, and many more, as specimens of first-class pace bowlers, and if I had to decide, with a casting vote, which of these professionals I had looked upon as the very best, I should plump for -- - but there, hold hard, "Over"; and thus I finish, with best wishes to all cricketers and with the hope that succeeding issues of Wisden's Almanack will in the future happily record, from time to time, the doings of yet unborn champions of England and Australia--after the style of a Grace and a Murdoch.