amusement and happiness,’ as she stated in her letter. She _was_ a good Christian, as her house stood deep long-leg, and many a time has a ‘four’ been scored for a hit through her window--and this is fact. With the enormous number of large schools in England where cricket is played, it will seldom happen that any cricket neighbourhood has not some young fellows from school, or possibly a few from either University, close by; and if they happen to be of the right sort they are a great boon. At the same time it should be a golden rule never to put out of the eleven a good one, who has worked for and earned his place, for a ‘swell.’ The rule must be kept hard and fast, that the eleven is open only to those who have proved themselves good enough, and if that rule is observed, in the event of a real first-rate amateur turning up, you will generally find that more than one volunteer will offer to stand out for him. Captaining a village team is not all a bed of roses; but if you are really a cricketer at heart, you will soon acquire the absolute confidence of people of all classes, especially of the humbler order. It is not an unpleasant thing, as you walk across the green on your way to the train, to hear a pack of little boys on their way to school, who look on you as a kind of big dog that won’t bite, all chattering about the match the day before. ‘Ah! Sir, I heerd my father say that he won a pot over the match,’ says one. ‘That boy, Sir, got the stick for playing truant yesterday morning,’ says another. ‘Well! if I _did_,’ replies the culprit, ‘I _see_ the beginning of the match, and _you_ did not--there!’ That boy may be another Fuller Pilch some day.