T had returned from _w: match at Lord's, had di and_ was enjoyii tobacco in an the w somewhat tong on the occult sciences of th katinas, Tibetans, and the lil falling into that semi-drowsy state, which partly, from the unwonted con-ration of thought which a difficult subject requires, partly from the enjoy ment of the good things of life, 1 to have acquired on a-sudden a of these occult power Cricket was mixed with esoteric Buddhism, cricketers with Mahatmas, and projecting my astral self some 103 years forward into time, I seemed to materialise at Lord's into my physical self, and to be standing in the pavilion talking to the secretary. He seemed, as is the way in dreams, to be no more surprised at my un: authorised presence than at my knowledge of the past, and my ignorance of the present, and he answered my questions heritance of iLG.c. secretaries, The ith the kindly courtesy that is the in-
ground had an aspect of familiar unfamiliarity; th n of 1900, me ud ivy covere ed by a similar struc-of similar size; while a gigantic series surrounded the rest of the area, munodat IT was told, some 000 people with. But are these huge plices often filled?" ' Always, when there is a big match, for people are well-to-do and can easily' earn in three days enough to keep them in comfort for the week, food, clothes, and other necessaries, are now so cheap, oil improvements in machinery, ete. what is that curious tower poles?" "A wireless tele connects us direct with all the grounds, and automatically registers the Scores on those two huge screens: hence evening cricket specials,' such us you used to have, I believe, have no sile here. Nor have cards, for on those big scoring boards are recorded, as you see, the names of the players, the hits and scores of the batsmen, together with the bowling analysis up to the latest moment. I believe cards used to be sold in your time containing this information 2" "That is so, and the boy was always sold out' before he got to me. Are there similar arrangements elsewhere "Oh, dear me, yes; counties would refuse to play on a ground not properly equi "Has anything been done to put batsmen. and bowlers on a level?" "Not a great deal, as far as the alteration of the rules is concerned, for cricketers at (and, I suppose, were) the most jealous and tenacious of conservatives, but the new pitches quite prevent either abnormally high or abnormily low scoring, to say nothing of the new retirement system. I say new,' because they were only introduced about 40 years ago, and so are new to you." About the new pitches, then: what are they?" "They are not made of turf, but of a special composition, the ingredients of which are trade secret, which has all the spring and elasticity of good turf, and yet allows the bowler to get on plenty of break, if he is skilful enough. By plenty of break" I mean that a really clever bowler will make a good-length ball pitch on the off-stump, and hit, or even miss, the leg stump. This composition is unaffected by sun or rain, and is down in slabs, like the slates of a billiard table, and with equal care, The facilities given to the bowler are thus largely increased, but! mentary remarks on the game as then the difficulties are not so great but that played and the exponents thereof. a good batsman may overcome them, while, T was pleased to note that practically no belter still, every' motel played under in improvements had been made in the mat-exactly the sonic conditions, swe the! enols of the gam stumps, bails, pads, 1 or luck of the playa It gloves and balls were only better in that would never do to eliminate the per nal! the workmanship and material were of a equation, and even with these wickets the higher class, but I noted that batsmen and best man is not alw the best man." bowlers wore special soles for the composi-"But suppose it ra Surely the greasy tion pitches, fitting on a sort of skeleton ball handicaps the out ide." "Not tony galosh, properly spiked, for fielding pur-great extent; well, look! They are just poses Full of interested inquisitiveness coming in to avoid that thunderstorm." I did look, and from under the stands shot along cylinder, which unwound as it went, a light waterproof fabric which covered the whole ground. The rain came down in torrents but the water flowed off by proper conduits toa reserve tank, whence it was again drawn when the turf required ater j 2 "Then your ground-man's business" said I, is ta look after the fielding ground rather then the wicket 2" *Exaetly," said the secretary; and I could do no' more than murmur "fempore mutantur."
picked up a bat that had been laid on the table by one of the waiting batsmen, and tried it in the orthodox fashion, testing the spring of the handle, and wagging it to and fro as in hack or forward play id my informant, "that you had cricket in—I mean, where you come from." "Oh, well, I haven't forgotten every You don't seem, however, to have made any change at all in the bats "Look at that one closely," he said smiling; I looked, and bel willow nor of any wood that T recogni answered my look of interroyati Aluminum—steel and strength ow The hat the face, you can feel, is flexible, alas what you will, and ives? under hence it has all the driving powers attribut your wooden bats, of which we have in the writing-room as curiosities, haven't been able to improve on riy more than on the balls, vl lenticel with your own, but for a little improvement in materials and manufacture. As to the bats, you see the demand on English. willow was too great for the supply, and for some ranson o another foreign willow was mover. sutistory." Ab, Iremember,'" T answered, American told me that very thing in 1897, Jubilee Year, and said that all their bats were imported from England." "Well, willow trees—proper, seasoned old willow trees—gave out, so that periments thi well it works.
"Yes, and not too well; at least no one has over beaten your friend Thorn. ton's record: you were a contemporary of "Yes." " And of Grace then, of course ye heard of him and his feats, and if you ever meet him—er, anywhere—you might tell him that he still holds a geod many records." At this moment the bell rang, the cylinders (driven by liquid air, I was told) rolled back, and play began. I watched with much interest, but saw_no very new features: there was bowling of all kinds, and batting of all styles: short-slip missed a catch, as in the good old days, and mid-off dropped on his Fight knee tostopa hot drive. This seemed familiar, and I cudgelled my bewildered brains to fall into the line of thought, when suddenly all came back to me and I said aloud, but half to myself, "'Stoddy!" "No," said my friend, "Stoddart is the gentleman's name: I believe his grandfather used to play a little." Play a little Shades of Middlesex, Gentlemen s. Players, la v. England! And I turned round to give a short recital of his feats, but fortunately refrained; fortunately, for I remembered the cricket bore of 1900, with his interminable stories about the heroes he had seen in the days when I was trying to kick my toes through my long clothes, hich stories always ended in uncompli.
I began to pump my friend the secretary further. 'You said something about" retirement system': What is it?" 'Oh, it works well and simply: when a man has got thirty he retires and stars a life,' as at billiards; if he gets out before he has got 30 in the second innings, he hi nother life. Then when all four inrun; have been played, the stars' on cither side, if there are any left, go in, with the not-outs of course, and play till one side or another is dead.' Under this system, which it is hard to explain in detail, sup: ported by our special pitches, drawn matches are unknown, for the batsman has to play himself in'' perhaps three or four times in the same match: indeed 150 is a good average score for the side, and two days are quite enough for a match. Travelling again is so easy and quick that three matches a week are no great tax. Without this we could never get a proper county competition, now that neatly all counties are first-class, Ah, Rutlandshire are all out, and only one star,' that looks bad for the championship. Would you like to look at the pitch?" There was nothing in the world that I desired so much, so we strolled out, I wondering at the absence of tall hats and black coats, but leaned that nothing of a "black or sub-fuse hue" was now tolerated on cricket grounds, that the dark background, the fieldsman's T looked at pitch with much interest; it had a distinct "nap" on it, to imitate ti it looked ideal, and it was set in the middle of the ground, one of the new laws being that from the centre of the pitch to the boundary the distance must not be less than 80 or more than 100 yards. 'This gives the sloggers a chance," my friend. I noticed on the pitch that the wickets stood on a strip of a darker tint than the rest of the composition and naturally asked the reason. 'That is to help the umpires in' deciding 1.b.w. The dark strip is 16 inches across, twice the breadth of the wicket; if the ball fitches on it and the batsman. interposes jis leg, he is out l.b.w., if the umpire thinks the ball would have hit the wicket. The umpire finds the difference in colour a great help, and always remembers the adage of your days, when in doubt, not out.' OF course with diminished scoring, the follow-on has quite disappeared, and our modern critics regard it as quite a clumsy contrivance." "Well, it was; and it cost many a deserving side a match, besides giving rise to heinous scandals, or incidents,' as we called ther The secretary looked puzzled: this was ancient history to him with a vengeance. "By the way," stid I, "how does your new system work with regard to averages?" "Averages he answered rather contempt tously, we've done away with them long ago. They did harm enough in your day, if the records in Somerset House can trusted, as I presume they can, We play to win matches, not to make averages'; and we've done away with maiden overs, or at least with the exhibition of them on the score-sheets. Our legislation has been guided by one main consideration—to give the bowler a cha ud the batsman chance, together with a fair value for the batter's hits. You must have noticed that three-foot fence all round the ground. If the ball clears it the stroke counts s'x; butit the ball hits it, the stroke counts two plus all the runs the batsmen can run in addition
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.