by A. W. Pullin
"At Lord's the Players won the toss, and though I could not, and did not, in the match run a yard, I stood short-slip, and could just manage to bowl. The Players made 136 in the first innings, and my share of wickets was 7 for 78 runs. On going in to bat I realised my position, and wondered what the result would be. I had one, or maybe two, balls to play, and to my great satisfaction my partner was bowled clean at the beginning of the next over. So I carried out my bat without having had a chance of making a run, or of showing the crowd that I could not possibly make one. The Players' second innings reached the total of 274, five of their wickets being obtained by me for 87 runs in 59 overs of four balls. The Gentlemen won with 7 wickets to spare.
"On the Wednesday, the day before the Oval match, determining not to run the risk of failure in the next contest, and thinking how I could get out of it, I saw Mr William Burrup, the then secretary of the Surrey Club, in the pavilion, and I went to him and said, 'Mr Burrup, it is impossible for me to play at the Oval to-morrow; I am so lame I can hardly walk along the street, much more play cricket. I must ask you to let me off.'
"His answer was, 'If you can only crawl to the wicket you must play.' I answered, 'If that is the way you put it, I will do my best,' but I looked forward to the match with apprehension.
"The morrow came, bright and fair, and this time my side won the toss, and during the long innings I had plenty of time to reflect and think myself lucky so far, and that nobody knew what an impostor I was. My feelings may be imagined when I, the last man, had to go in. Mr M. Turner—the 'Monty' already referred to—was in, and had played well for 19 runs. As I walked to the wicket I thought, Now I am in for it! what am I to do?
"Again, to my delight and amazement, from the next ball from Southerton, Mr Turner was caught by Carpenter in the slips, and again I carried out my bat. So that in the two matches I was 'not out,' did not run a yard in the field, did not make a run, had not the chance of making one, and if the chance of a run had been offered I could not have made it. The total score amounted to 338 runs. The Players made 168 in their first innings and 182 in the second, leaving the Gentlemen only 13 runs to get to win the match. Four wickets fell to my bowling in the first innings for 48 runs, and two in the second innings for 36 runs. This made 18 wickets in the two matches for a little over 13 runs a wicket. Not so bad for a cripple who could not run a yard, eh 1"
The name of W. G. Grace crops up in every cricket Talk. How could it be otherwise 1 Mention of the champion's name caused Mr Buchanan to search among his scrap-books, and presently he produced the following in triumph. It is an extract from the 'Westminster Gazette,' given under the head of "Grace Stories" by "Dark Blue " :—
The first time he played in Scotland, Davie Buchanan, the gTeat slow bowler, told an admiring circle of youngsters how he was going to get the great man out. "I will just be placing the field as wide as possible, and we will get him caught." That night Davie was in a state of immense glee. Sure enough Grace had been caught in the long-field for a paltry score. The next night he was not so pleased. We asked him what had happened. "Well," he said, "ye see the field was not big enough." VV. G. had hit seven 6's.
"Now," says Mr Buchanan, "is not that a lovely story? It is a real shame to spoil it. But the interests of veracity compel me to say there's not a word of it true! I only played against Grace three times. He stood alone in cricket in those days, and he was one of the very few batsmen who watched the ball to the last moment; consequently I was very keen to get him. The first occasion on which I played against him was in 1870, Gentlemen of the North v. Gentlemen of the South, at Lilley Bridge. It was a hard good wicket, and W. G. played a very good innings of 118. I did not know how he played behind the wicket to slow bowling, and my third man was too deep or he would have had him. Time after time Grace let himself become limp and the ball fell perfectly dead on the ground off his bat, but he never gave a chance that went to hand.
"The next occasion on which we were antagonists was in a match got up by Mr W. Yardley, Universities Past and Present v. Gentlemen of the South, the former not being really a representative team. Mr C. Tillard and I began the bowling, and after I had bowled three or four overs W. G. snicked a ball through the slips to Tillard, who dropped it. Grace then made 12, when he played a ball into his wicket. That was my second experience of bowling at him.
"The third was a match with odds, Birmingham and District v. United South, played on a wet wicket. Grace came in as usual, and after an over or two I tossed a ball a little higher. He thought he was going to hit it, but he missed it altogether. He had covered his stumps with his leg, and the ball went six inches up his leg. 'How's that?' I promptly asked, but Jim Lillywhite said, 'Not out.' I was disgusted. The next over I asked the reason of his decision, and Lillywhite said he gave Grace not out because the ball would not have hit the wicket! I did not say much, but I thought a great deal. W. G. made 27, and was caught in skying a ball to mid-wicket."
Tom Emmett was an adept at setting traps for unwary batsmen, but he was occasionally victimised himself, as the following reminiscence shows :—
"In the Gentlemen v. Players' match at Lord's in 1874, when we had been having a long spell after luncheon, we adjourned to the pavilion for a drink at the fall of a wicket. In the pavilion I saw Mr Hamar Bass, who said, 'Old Tom Emmett is coming in; you give him a yorker first ball.' I thought it was a good idea, so I carried it out. I gave Tom a yorker, right up, and he touched it and was beautifully caught by Bush close to the ground, and very near his off-stump. I told Mr Bass afterwards it was a very good piece of advice. But it is not often these things come off at the first attempt.
"Mr C. I. Thornton has been properly styled the 'hitter of the century.' For continuous, gigantic hitting in good matches no one has equalled him. He gloried in a long-hop, and could hit it harder than any man of his day. Though he took great liberties, I never had the luck to get him stumped. When he went out to hit and missed the ball, the mighty swing with which he made the stroke brought his bat round and landed it just inside the crease, before the ball could reach the wicket-keeper's hands.
"I see Mr Thornton mentions that Mr Fellowes once hit a ball 175 yards, but that the measurement was not authenticated. I knew Mr Fellowes—'Slack Fellowes,' as he was familiarly called—very well, and my recollection of his statement as to this hit is that it was made while practising on one of the College grounds at Oxford; that he was having balls pitched purposely to be hit by him as hard and as far as possible—the wind favouring—in order to try a bat; and that the distance was not quite so far as stated.
"One incident recalls another. This concerns the 'hitter of the century.'
"In the Players' match at Lord's iu 1874, Richard Daft, though he played a very good innings, allowed some twenty offballs in succession from me to go past him without attempting to play them. On the day after the match I played for the Free Foresters v. Southgate. Mr C. I. Thornton was playing against me, and came in first on a perfect wicket, under beautiful summer surroundings. Before going in he said to Mr John Walker, alluding to the match of the previous three days, 'I am going to imitate four of the Players'—naming them—'each ball of the first over. The first shall be Dfft, and so on.' I bowled the first ball, and Mr Thornton lifted his bat a la Daft and allowed it to go past. But it bowled his off-stump! He looked at me and pretended it was a trial ball. 'Am I really to go out ?' he asked. 'Ask the umpire,' I calmly replied. So Mr Thornton went back discomfited, to the hearty laughter of all present. I never heard of a further attempt on his part to assume the role of Dick Daft."
Turning his thoughts back to earlier times, Mr Buchanan proceeds:—
"I recollect the first match in which George Tarrant came to Lord's as a colt. There used to be a little garden behind where the dining pavilion now is at Lord's, and I saw George Parr hit Tarrant twice into Dark's little greenhouse. Old Dark, one might almost say, used to farm the M.C.C. He used to take all the money and find all the cricket; at anyrate, he was q
uite a moving power at Lord's in those days.
"I always looked upon Robert Carpenter as one of the finest bats that ever lived. I never saw Fuller Pilch. Hayward was a most brilliant bat, but he was not the lasting cricketer that Carpenter was. Modern bowlers say that George Parr would not make his famous leg-hits now. That is all gammon. Had they known Parr in his best days they would have a different opinion. But, of course, like all men, he was vulnerable. I remember that in 1865 I played for the Foresters against Notts, with Parr, Chris. Tinley, Jackson, Oscroft, Grundy, and others in the latter team, and I finished up the match by sending down 37 balls for 5 wickets and 1 run. Such things will happen!
"A funny thing occurred when I was at the University. I was staying near Solihull with a friend, and played in a match in which a local gardener took part. He fielded very close in at short-slip to my bowling, which of course was then fast. After the first over I remarked that he was in a very dangerous position, and had better get farther back. 'Oh, I know what I am about,' was the reply. 'Very well,' I said, and went on bowling. A few balls after one off the bat struck the gardener on the nose and glanced on to long-slip, where it was caught. The gardener promptly displayed a more retiring disposition.
"It is not often you hear of a match being both lost and won by one side in one day. I was playing for Forest of Arden -—- the Arden mentioned in * Kenilworth' — against Leamington, who headed us by a few runs on the first innings. Their innings closed about a quarter-past five o'clock, and they had really won the match, and as I wished to catch a train a little after six, I said it was no use going on again. The other side protested that was not cricket, and made themselves a little obnoxious. So I agreed to play on, and be content to get home at midnight. As we went into the field a second time I told our fellows to 'field up.' Two of the batting side went to get their hair cut, saying they would be back in twenty minutes. When they returned they found that their nine colleagues—8 wickets—had been got out for 6 runs, and we had won the match! I took several of the wickets without a run being scored off me. Not only did we win the match, but I actually caught my train. That side would not accuse us of not playing cricket after that!"
A few opinions of modern bowling from a man of Mr Buchanan's long experience will be valuable.
"I don't think," he says, "the bowling is so good at the present time as it used to be. There is, for instance, no bowler like Old Clarke. They tell you wickets are better, but that is all gammon. Country grounds were certainly not as good as they are now, but we always had good wickets at Fenner's, the Oval, and other places where first-class cricket was regularly played. The fault I find with many bowlers of the present day is that the ball comes from their hands too often like a bit of lead. It ought to come as if it had a fiend inside it, which works the mischief immediately it touches the ground. My wrist sometimes used to crack when imparting spin to the ball. I may add here that I was never no-balled in my life, &nd only bowled four wides in forty-five matches v. Oxford and Cambridge and the Players in seventeen years.
D
"Among fast bowlers George Freeman was the best. Allan Hill was very fast and straight, but had not the 'devil' in his deliveries that Freeman had. Poor Mr Donny Walker used to tell me, 'Freeman is the best bowler there is'; and he was quite right.
"Mention of Allan Hill reminds me that once I had from him the most wonderful ball I ever saw in my life. It was in a Gentlemen v. Players' match, and I went in last. He bowled a ball at the leg-stump which came like a flash, a full-pitch only the height of the stump. I had no time for thought, but instinct seemed to tell me that if the ball hit me I should be done. I put my bat out, and as luck would have it the ball struck it and went for one run on the leg-side. Allan came up immediately and said, 'I am sorry I bowled you that ball; I had no intention of bowling a ball like that.' I replied, 'Well, Allan, if it had hit me it would have killed me.' I never saw another such ball in my life."
The new enterprise of the M.C.C., the increasing of the number of balls in an over to six, must surely have Mr Buchanan's approval, after the following unqualified commendation of the previous alteration from four to five :—
"I think bowlers have a great pull nowadays in the fifth ball of the over. An over of four balls does not give a bowler scope enough in his plan of attack, for after working a batsman up to a certain pitch, he often feels that with another ball or two in hand he might be able to give him his coup de grdce, whereas with his next over he has, as it were, to begin the plan of attack de novo. So the extra ball increases the effectiveness of variety in the over. I have often said to myself, 'Oh, if I could only have another ball!' In the fourballs-an-over days I once got Lord Alfred Paget's wicket with a fifth ball, the umpire having forgotten to call 'Over.' Wasn't his lordship angry!"
It will interest many of both the old and modern school of cricketers to know that Mr Buchanan does not find fault with the way in which batsmen allow off-balls to go by.
"I used to wish that batsmen would hit them; that was my feeling," says he. "A good-length ball is very nice, but it is not effective, and you must try off-balls in reason. Speaking as a bowler, I should say the batsman is doing right in allowing seductive-looking off-balls to go past him. It is the bowler's duty to try his patience. Contrary to many opinions, there was, I think, a better cutter than Eph. Lockwood in the Hon. C. J. Lyttelton, now Lord Lyttelton, whose father used to bring a classic author to read at Lord's ground during cricket-matches, and to place on one side while his son was batting! When his son was out, off he went."
Mr Buchanan was one of the founders of the Warwickshire County Club, a captain of the county team for some years, and treasurer for seven years, and one of his last county matches was in 1885 for Warwickshire v. Leicestershire, when he obtained 7 wickets for 23 runs.
"I was very glad," he says, "to get out of the treasurership. The way I got out of it was this: they thought that thirty miles was too far away from Birmingham to have their treasurer, though personally I thought that did not matter, for everything was kept right and straight. Our funds were very low, and I had always to be at them about spending money. Fortunately the club is in a very different position now. You can imagine how trying it was to a treasurer in my time when he had to give ^600 to the Australians to take away with them. That was what I once had to do.
"I may be permitted to add that there was only one engagement in my forty years' cricketing career that I did not keep. I was asked to go to Australia with Lord Harris's team. I promised, but had, regretfully, to withdraw. When you have to be away six months and have a family and responsibilities, such a journey cannot be lightly undertaken. Had I gone, no professional would have been included in the team. George Ulyett was chosen in my place, and the only professionals were Emmett and he."
At the jubilee of the Rugby Cricket Club in 1894 Mr Buchanan issued a book descriptive of the club's rise and progress. It also contains a chapter entitled "Hints on Slow Bowling," which is the most practical exposition of the three P's—Pitch, Pace, and Precision—one could have the pleasure of reading.
Finally, it should be said that Mr Buchanan always played the game for the love he had for it. "All that I got, besides pleasure, for playing cricket I could put in my eye. It is true I got a few new hats; but I also earned some I never received 1"
CRICKET—THE PRIDE OF THE VILLAGE.
"GOOD MATCH OLD FELLOW?"
"OH YES; AWFULLY JOLLY!"
"WHAT DID YOU DO?"
"I 'AD A HOVER OF JACKSON; THE FIRST BALL 'IT ME ON THE 'AND,
THE SECOND 'AD ME ON THE KNEE; THE THIRD WAS IN MY EYE; AND THE FOURTH BOWLED ME OUT!" [Jolly game.
—From. 'Punch,' August 29, 1863.
I COMMENCE the Talk with John Jackson by giving two sides of a picture. The first is a copy of a sketch from 'Punch,' dated August 29, 1863, which I reproduce with the kind permission of the proprietors of the famous Charivari. It illustrates the reputation of the great Notts bowler of the 'Sixties.
En passant, I may remark that it is with no small amount of satisfaction that I trace the delightful anecdote given in the sketch to its source. It has been fathered on many humorists within the past generation. "Mr Punch " now gets his own.
Now let me give the reverse side of the picture. A bent and grisly man of sixty-seven, with the remnants of a fine presence, subsisting on a pittance of 5s. 6d. a-week, willing to work but elbowed out by younger and more vigorous competitors in the battle of life, having no permanent address, and always hovering on the threshold of the workhouse. This is the John Jackson of to-day. Jolly game, cricket! "Mr Punch's " hero was the "demon bowler " of Notts and All-England, of whom it was written—
"Jackson's pace is very fearful,"
more than a generation ago. The bowler still has acquaintance with a demon: he has to fight to keep the demon of destitution outside the door.
When the writer saw John Jackson at Liverpool, the old Notts bowler was on the rocks. Some assistance was forthcoming from a few friends, as the result of attention being drawn to his position in life, but it was necessarily of a temporary character. For some years Jackson's main, if not his sole, support has been an allowance of 6s. per week from the Cricketers' Friendly Society, and from that sum a subscription of one guinea a-year has to be deducted. This society does a very useful work in its way. But its operations are restricted; it can.only half solve the problem of how to keep cricketing heroes out of the workhouse in their declining years.
The position of men like Jackson is a strong testimony to the need of a reform in cricket benefits. Reform was suggested by Alfred Shaw in a letter to the M.C.C. a year and a half ago, the contentions and conclusions in which were considered startling in high quarters. Since then Lord Hawke, one of the truest friends the professional cricketer possesses, has brought the whole question of cricket benefits before the authorities of the game, and the result will probably be that in future there will be some guarantee that a cricketers' benefit fund is securely invested.