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86 CRICKET .. (CHAP. V
descending ball and so get rid of Wylde ; but it was necessary
to gaze so long and earnestly up into the sky that he
became oblivious of the state of things on earth. The
wind, of course, blew the ball out of the vertical, so that it
promised to fall not on to the stumps but two or three
yards nearer the middle of the pitch. The speetators
one by one saw what must happen. At the last moment the
conscientious X., with gloved hands exlended, strode
forward to get under the ball, stumbled noisily over the
stumps, fell with a crash, and lay sprawling while the ball
descended with a thump close to his pink, ingenuous face
as he measured his length, wondering what he had done
to deserve such an overthrow. We laughed, I remember,
especially W. G. Mitchell, well known later to Rugbeians,
till some of us felt a pain in the back of the neck I
There was something dramatic about the last innings I
ever played, or ever shall play. While being engaged in
giving addresses ' to Sunday-school teachers in a remote
Suffolk vh!age I was persuaded, though sixty-four years of
age, to join in a curious match of two mixed elevens of
boys and girls, pupils and teachers, in a meadow. I went
in first and had to meet the deliveries of a tiny boy scout,
aged twelve, who had never played cricket before. He
bowled scout-wise, with his whole soul and body, but
hardly managed to get the big, heavy ball to roll the
whole twenty-two yards. His first ball pitched half-way,
and I made as if to drive it on the long-hop forwards.
But it was a" hen-shooter,".and its second bound was just
under the bat. Twice before I had been bowled by the .
same ball, once by G. F. Grace at Cambridge in ·1876.
It is always a short-pitched, liad ball, but very likely to
be fatal. I retired for a "blob," and settled that it was
time to " hang up the shovel and the hoe."
But the scout, I am told, went home much elated.