the years that they cover, that Yorkshire has ever been anything but champion county, especially as the names excluded are only a whit less well known than those that are included. [Illustration: _THE CRICKET GROUND AT DARNALL, NEAR SHEFFIELD._] Such in brief is the history, a mere sketch, of our more important counties, their rise and their fall: a full and complete account of them would fill the whole of a goodly volume, which would be replete with interest and anecdote, but which would require the patience and the genius of a Macaulay or a Froude for its adequate and comprehensive compilation. Cricket may indeed be but a mere pastime, but it is a pastime that has come home to the hearts of Englishmen, or at least to the hearts of a goodly number of Englishmen, during a period of some two hundred years. He who would write that history must be a man of infinite patience and vast perseverance. He will not find cricket history writ large in columns of big print, but, for the earlier days at least, often packed away in obscure corners of local journals. Thirty years ago there was no daily sporting paper, while the big “dailies” took but little notice of cricket matches. Add a hundred years on to the thirty, and only local papers record a great match. Consequently, he who would write a full and accurate account of the cricket played by the counties, must rummage even more painfully than the recorder of political facts, and in journals that are far less accessible and that give less prominence to the special facts of which the writer is in quest. The great work may yet be written, but the writing thereof will be largely a labour of love, for the divers into cricket lore are but few, and the writer will naturally wonder whether the game will be worth the candle. [Illustration: _From a Painting by_ _J. Lush._ _THE EARL OF MARCH._] [Illustration] CHAPTER VII AMATEURS AND PROFESSIONALS By the HON. R. H. LYTTELTON It would not appear to be a difficult task to make a clear and accurate definition of the two common words found at the head of this chapter. Forty years ago the making of such a definition would have been easy, and if we could regard things from an ideal point of view, it would be easy now. There are, however, so many difficulties at present in the way, so many changes in the carrying on of the game of cricket, so much acquiesced in which formerly would not have been dreamt of, that the old boundary line has been obliterated—all is confusion, and in too many cases there can hardly be said to be any difference or distinction between the amateur and professional in these days in the world of cricket.