“If you mean to say that cricket’s a ——” the old squire speaking (Squire Uplift of Fallowfield) remembered the saving presences, and coughed—“good thing, I’m one with ye, Sir George. Encouraged, egad! They don’t want much of that here. Give some of your lean London straws a strip o’ clean grass and a bit o’ liberty, and you’ll do ’em a service.” “What a beautiful hit!” exclaimed one of the ladies, languidly watching the ascent of the ball. “Beautiful, d’ ye call it?” muttered the squire. The ball, indeed, was dropping straight into the hands of the long-hit-off. Instantly a thunder rolled. But it was Beckley that took the joyful treble—Fallowfield the deeply-cursing bass. The long-hit-off, he who never was known to miss a catch—butter-fingered beast!—he has let the ball slip through his fingers. Are there Gods in the air? Fred Linnington, the unfortunate of Fallowfield, with a whole year of unhappy recollection haunting him in prospect, ere he can retrieve his character—Fred, if he does not accuse the powers of the sky, protests that he cannot understand it, which means the same. Fallowfield’s defeat—should such be the result of the contest—he knows now will be laid at his door. Five men who have bowled at the indomitable Beckleyans think the same. Albeit they are Britons, it abashes them. They are not the men they were. Their bowling is as the bowling of babies; and see! Nick, who gave the catch, and pretends he did it out of commiseration for Fallowfield, the ball has flown from his bat sheer over the booth. If they don’t add six to the score, it will be the fault of their legs. But no: they rest content with a fiver and cherish their wind. Yet more they mean to do, Success does not turn the heads of these Britons, as it would of your frivolous foreigners. And now small boys (who represent the Press here) spread out from the marking-booth, announcing foremost, and in larger type, as it were, quite in Press style, their opinion—which is, that Fallowfield will get a jolly good hiding; and vociferating that Beckley is seventy-nine ahead, and that Nick Frim, the favourite of the field, has scored fifty-one to his own cheek. The boys are boys of both villages: but they are British boys—they adore prowess. The Fallowfield boys wish that Nick Frim would come and live on their side; the boys of Beckley rejoice in possessing him. Nick is the wicketkeeper of the Beckley eleven; long-limbed, wiry, keen of eye. His fault as a batsman is, that he will be a slashing hitter. He is too sensible of the joys of a grand spanking hit. A short life and a merry one, has hitherto been his motto.